Using cordova plugin with a native Android interface

Question

I wrote a Cordova plugin for Android to build a phonegap app with an HTML5 GUI.

I now want to have a native interface too and was wondering what is the neatest option to reuse my plugin for the native UI. Basically I would like to have two apps, one with a phonegap (HTML5) interface and one with a native Android interface, both of them using the Cordova plugin.

The plugin extends the CordovaPlugin class, so for this reason I don't know how to use it without calling the following method from the javascript in the WebView, as described here http://docs.phonegap.com/en/2.3.0/guide_plugin-development_android_index.md.html

exec(<successFunction>, <failFunction>, <service>, <action>, [<args>]);

I just want to call the native side of the plugin without going through a WebView:

@Override
public boolean execute(String action, JSONArray args,
        CallbackContext callbackContext) throws JSONException { ... }

Provided that I could just adapt the code from the plugin fairly easily, I would like to find a method by which the plugin remains exactly the same for better decoupling of frontend/backend (I could change the code in one app without the need to replicate it in the other app).

Is this possible at all? I understand this is not the point of having a Cordova plugin, but I would like to find a way around it.

Thanks.

Could you please better specify your problem? What does it mean to "reuse my plugin for the native UI"? Do you want to call some business logic from native and HTML5 app? — gingo, Mar 07 '13 at 20:23
I edited the question and hopefully made it a bit more clear. — gozzilli, Mar 07 '13 at 21:33

gingo · Answer 1 · 2013-10-29T09:57:24.230

In my opinion you need to apply Facade pattern:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Facade_pattern

Simply extract your business logic from Cordova plugin to dedicated class called MyFacade and hide all your business logic behind.

The other way is to do something like this:

MyCordovaPlugin myPlugin = new MyCordovaPlugin();
myPlugin.execute("foo", new JSONArray(), new MyCallbackContext() {
    @override
    public void handlePluginResult(PluginResult pluginResult) {
        //your code for handling plugin result for Android UI
    }
}

Where MyCallbackContext implementation is:

public abstract class MyCallbackContext extends CallbackContext {

    public MyCallbackContext() {
        super(null, null);
    }

    public void sendPluginResult(PluginResult pluginResult) {
        synchronized (this) {
            if (finished) {
                Log.w(LOG_TAG, "Attempted to send a second callback for ID: " + callbackId + "\nResult was: " + pluginResult.getMessage());
                return;
            } else {
                finished = !pluginResult.getKeepCallback();
            }
        }

        handlePluginResult(pluginResult);
    }

    public abstract void handlePluginResult(PluginResult pluginResult);

}

This second way works only with current version of Cordova and is based on this source codes:

https://github.com/apache/cordova-android/blob/master/framework/src/org/apache/cordova/api/CordovaPlugin.java

https://github.com/apache/cordova-android/blob/master/framework/src/org/apache/cordova/api/CallbackContext.java

Did you mean to `MyCallbackContext` class to `CallbackContext`? Or this you explicitly extended it to `itself` ??????? — Anas Azeem, Oct 25 '13 at 06:15
You are right, it should be MyCallbackContext extends CallbackContext! — gingo, Oct 29 '13 at 09:57
That said, I have similar questions unanswered. Please take a kind over them. [Question 1, plz make to sure to look at this comment](http://stackoverflow.com/questions/19177991/asynchronous-communication-between-javascript-and-phonegap-plugin#comment28451880_19198844),[Question 2](http://stackoverflow.com/questions/19558535/). — Anas Azeem, Oct 29 '13 at 10:02

Using cordova plugin with a native Android interface

1 Answers1