Wrong position value in Android ViewPager

Question

I'm trying to implement 3 slides composed of 3 fragments (or 3 layouts) with ViewPager and I want to know which slide I currently show in order to display the appropriate content. In simpler words, I want content 1 on slide 1, content 2 on slide 2 and so on.

Here is my actual code from my Activity (from android official doc) :

public class SliderActivity extends FragmentActivity {
    private static final int NUM_PAGES = 3;
    private ViewPager mPager;
    private PagerAdapter mPagerAdapter;

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

        // Instantiate a ViewPager and a PagerAdapter.
        mPager = (ViewPager) findViewById(R.id.pager);
        mPagerAdapter = new ScreenSlidePagerAdapter(getSupportFragmentManager());
        mPager.setAdapter(mPagerAdapter);
    }

    @Override
    public void onBackPressed() {
        if (mPager.getCurrentItem() == 0) {
            // If the user is currently looking at the first step, allow the system to handle the
            // Back button. This calls finish() on this activity and pops the back stack.
            super.onBackPressed();
        } else {
            // Otherwise, select the previous step.
            mPager.setCurrentItem(mPager.getCurrentItem() - 1);
        }
    }

    // A simple pager adapter that represents 3 ScreenSlidePageFragment objects, in sequence.
    private class ScreenSlidePagerAdapter extends FragmentStatePagerAdapter {
        public ScreenSlidePagerAdapter(FragmentManager fm) {
            super(fm);
        }

        @Override
        public Fragment getItem(int position) {
            System.out.println("POSITION = " + position); // Or mPager.getCurrentItem()
            return new SlidesFragment();
        }

        @Override
        public int getCount() {
            return NUM_PAGES;
        }
    }
}

No matter how hard I try, getCurrentItem() or position still prints wrong values. Only the second slide sends a number to the console. It's 2 when I swipe right and 0 when swipe to left.

What am I doing wrong ?

Answer 1

You definitely want to use the position value in getItem, do not call getCurrentItem because the pager will create items that are not the current item and not on-screen. The pager has an offscreen page limit of 2 by default. So, when it is first created, getItem will be called with a position of 0 and then again immediately with position of 1. The fragment at position 1 is not the current item, but it is being created offscreen so the user can start sliding over and see it. Then when you complete the swipe, getItem is called with a position of 2 to pre-load the next and final slide.

To accomplish "I want content 1 on slide 1, content 2 on slide 2", your SlidesFragment needs to take an argument (store in the arguments bundle) the position that tells it which content to display. Or, more likely, you have 3 different fragment types you would create based on the position.