Drawable-hdpi, Drawable-mdpi, Drawable-ldpi Android

Question

Hello, I was working on Android 1.5, but now moved to the latest version. So there is only "drawable" folder in Android 1.5,

but now There are 3 different folder for storing images in android project.

And as i have found some articles for these 3 folders that

1. hdpi means High-dpi
2. mdpi means medium-dpi
3. ldpi means low-dpi

But still in confusion that what is the exact purpose of these 3 folders and when to use particular folder to store images in that?

pls give me some suggestions.

Thanx - paresh

Answer 1

Here's a nice article about that http://developer.android.com/guide/practices/screens_support.html
You'll find more details on 1.5 support in "Strategies for Legacy Apps" section.

Answer 2

I created a tutorial not to long ago about multiple screen support. The developer page is really helpful but sometimes a little confusing cause there is so much info. Hope it helps!

http://wonton-games.blogspot.com/2010/07/tutorial-multiple-screen-support.html

Answer 3

Hi Cameron,

Say if i have 3 devices with different resolutions (320x480, 480x800, 480x854) with medium density and having the same screen size diagonal. If i have given PNG images in the -mdpi folder and set the manifest files correctly (anyDensity=true) and if i look into all the 3 devices, the physical look and feel wont be relative because the size of the image (in width and height pixels) are going to be the same and it does not follow the Einstein Theory of Relativity :).

Also, if i put images into -mdpi -ldpi and -hdpi like what you mentioned will work well if the density increases with resolution. If not, again its a confusion.

Am I making clear? Could you please help me in explaining this?

Thank you, Ram