Android - CheckBox Control

A CheckBox is an on/off switch that can be toggled by the user. You should use check-boxes when
presenting users with a group of selectable options that are not mutually exclusive.

CheckBox

CheckBox Attributes

Following are the important attributes related to CheckBox control. You can check Android official documentation
for complete list of attributes and related methods which you can use to change these attributes are run time.
Inherited from android.widget.TextView Class −

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Sr.No Attribute & Description

android:autoText
1 If set, specifies that this TextView has a textual input method and automatically corrects some common
spelling errors.

android:drawableBottom
2
This is the drawable to be drawn below the text.

android:drawableRight
3
This is the drawable to be drawn to the right of the text.

android:editable
4
If set, specifies that this TextView has an input method.

android:text
5
This is the Text to display.

Inherited from android.view.View Class −

Sr.No Attribute & Description

android:background
1
This is a drawable to use as the background.

android:contentDescription
2
This defines text that briefly describes content of the view.

android:id
3
This supplies an identifier name for this view.

android:onClick
4
This is the name of the method in this View's context to invoke when the view is clicked.

android:visibility
5
This controls the initial visibility of the view.

Example

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This example will take you through simple steps to show how to create your own Android application using Linear
Layout and CheckBox.

Step Description

1 You will use Android Studio IDE to create an Android application and name it as myapplication under a package
com.example.myapplication as explained in the Hello World Example chapter.

2 Modify src/MainActivity.java file to add a click event.

3 Modify the default content of res/layout/activity_main.xml file to include Android UI control.

4 No need to declare default string constants. Android studio takes care of default constants at string.xml

5 Run the application to launch Android emulator and verify the result of the changes done in the application.

Following is the content of the modified main activity file src/MainActivity.java. This file can include each of the
fundamental lifecycle methods.

package com.example.myapplication;

import android.os.Bundle;
import android.app.Activity;
import android.widget.Button;

import android.view.View;
import android.view.View.OnClickListener;

import android.widget.CheckBox;
import android.widget.Toast;

public class MainActivity extends Activity {

@Override
protected void onCreate(Bundle savedInstanceState) {
super.onCreate(savedInstanceState);
setContentView(R.layout.activity_main);

ch1=(CheckBox)findViewById(R.id.checkBox1);
ch2=(CheckBox)findViewById(R.id.checkBox2);

b1=(Button)findViewById(R.id.button);
b2=(Button)findViewById(R.id.button2);
b2.setOnClickListener(new View.OnClickListener() {

@Override
public void onClick(View v) {
finish();
}
});
b1.setOnClickListener(new View.OnClickListener() {

@Override
public void onClick(View v) {
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 StringBuffer result = new StringBuffer();
result.append("Thanks : ").append(ch1.isChecked());
result.append("\nThanks: ").append(ch2.isChecked());
Toast.makeText(MainActivity.this, result.toString(),
Toast.LENGTH_LONG).show();
}
});
}
}

Following will be the content of res/layout/activity_main.xml file −

<RelativeLayout
xmlns:android="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res/android"
xmlns:tools="http://schemas.android.com/tools"
android:layout_width="match_parent"
android:layout_height="match_parent"

android:paddingBottom="@dimen/activity_vertical_margin"
android:paddingLeft="@dimen/activity_horizontal_margin"
android:paddingRight="@dimen/activity_horizontal_margin"
android:paddingTop="@dimen/activity_vertical_margin"
tools:context=".MainActivity">

<TextView
android:id="@+id/textView1"
android:layout_width="wrap_content"
android:layout_height="wrap_content"
android:text="Example of checkbox"
android:layout_alignParentTop="true"
android:layout_centerHorizontal="true"
android:textSize="30dp" />

<CheckBox
android:id="@+id/checkBox1"
android:layout_width="wrap_content"
android:layout_height="wrap_content"
android:text="Do you like Tutorials Point"
android:layout_above="@+id/button"
android:layout_centerHorizontal="true" />

<CheckBox
android:id="@+id/checkBox2"
android:layout_width="wrap_content"
android:layout_height="wrap_content"
android:text="Do you like android "
android:checked="false"
android:layout_above="@+id/checkBox1"
android:layout_alignLeft="@+id/checkBox1"
android:layout_alignStart="@+id/checkBox1" />

<TextView
android:id="@+id/textView2"
android:layout_width="wrap_content"
android:layout_height="wrap_content"
android:layout_alignLeft="@+id/checkBox1"
/
 android:layout_below="@+id/textView1"
android:layout_marginTop="39dp"
android:text="Tutorials point"
android:textColor="#ff87ff09"
android:textSize="30dp"
android:layout_alignRight="@+id/textView1"
android:layout_alignEnd="@+id/textView1" />

<Button
android:layout_width="wrap_content"
android:layout_height="wrap_content"
android:text="Ok"
android:id="@+id/button"
android:layout_alignParentBottom="true"
android:layout_alignLeft="@+id/checkBox1"
android:layout_alignStart="@+id/checkBox1" />

<Button
android:layout_width="wrap_content"
android:layout_height="wrap_content"
android:text="Cancel"
android:id="@+id/button2"
android:layout_alignParentBottom="true"
android:layout_alignRight="@+id/textView2"
android:layout_alignEnd="@+id/textView2" />

<ImageButton
android:layout_width="wrap_content"
android:layout_height="wrap_content"
android:id="@+id/imageButton"
android:src="@drawable/abc"
android:layout_centerVertical="true"
android:layout_centerHorizontal="true" />

</RelativeLayout>

Following will be the content of res/values/strings.xml to define these new constants −

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>

Following is the default content of AndroidManifest.xml −

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>

<application
android:allowBackup="true"
android:icon="@drawable/ic_launcher"
android:label="@string/app_name"
android:theme="@style/AppTheme" >

<activity
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 android:name="com.example.myapplication.MainActivity"
android:label="@string/app_name" >

<intent-filter>
<action android:name="android.intent.action.MAIN" />
<category android:name="android.intent.category.LAUNCHER" />
</intent-filter>

</activity>

</application>
</manifest>

Let's try to run your MyApplication application. I assume you had created your AVD while doing environment

setup. To run the app from Android studio, open one of your project's activity files and click Run icon from the
toolbar. Android studio installs the app on your AVD and starts it and if everything is fine with your setup and
application, it will display following Emulator window −

User needs you check on either do you like android check box or do you like tutorials point check box. and press
ok button, if does all process correctly, it gonna be shown toast message as Thanks. Or else do press on cancel
button, if user presses cancel button it going to close the application

Exercise

I will recommend to try above example with different attributes of CheckBox in Layout XML file as well at
programming time to have different look and feel of the CheckBox. Try to make it editable, change to font color,
font family, width, textSize etc and see the result. You can also try above example with multiple CheckBox controls
in one activity.