Buggy ListView makes me sad

Question

Hi,

I have a ListView where I've defined the layout of each item in a separate XML file. In this file I've included a RatingBar and an EditText.

I've programmatically created 7-8 items in this ListView. When I scroll through them, it seems to be quite buggy. Here are some examples:

1) If I set focus to the EditText in the first row and then scroll down the ListView, random EditTexts from other rows will have focus. It seems to be that the next EditText after the focused one disappears receives focus. Perhaps this is intentional, but, as a user, it seems very weird.

2) If I set focus to an EditText, receive a virtual keyboard, type something, and click the "Done" button on my virtual keyboard, the EditText will empty as soon as the virtual keyboard disappears.

3) Sometimes, when I click an EditText, receive a virtual keyboard and start typing letters, the letters will disappear as soon as I type them.

4) When I click on an EditText, the virtual keyboard shows itself, but the EditText loses focus and I have to click the EditText again.

5) Even though I've set the RatingBar to focusable="false", if I move my scrollwheel, it still grabs focus.

One of my problems is all the visible list items get redrawn when I type a character in the virtual keyboard (and since the text of the EditText is set to some data, which is empty, it gets cleared. I don't understand why Android would decide to redraw the list every time I type a character.

Here is the XML I'm using to draw them. They are white bubbles, with a gray boarder, and some text, a RatingBar and an EditText inside:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<LinearLayout xmlns:android="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res/android"
    android:orientation="vertical"
    android:layout_width="fill_parent"
    android:layout_height="wrap_content"
    android:paddingTop="10dip"
    android:paddingBottom="10dip"
    android:paddingLeft="15dip"
    android:paddingRight="15dip"
    >
    <LinearLayout
        android:layout_width="fill_parent"
        android:layout_height="wrap_content"
        android:padding="2dip"
        android:background="@drawable/shape_outer">
        <LinearLayout
            android:orientation="vertical"
            android:layout_width="fill_parent"
            android:layout_height="wrap_content"
            android:padding="2dip"
            android:background="@drawable/shape_inner">
                    <TextView
                            android:id="@+id/rating_category"
                            android:layout_width="wrap_content"
                            android:layout_height="wrap_content"
                            android:textColor="@color/dark_gray"
                            android:textStyle="bold"
                            android:layout_marginBottom="10dip" />
                        <RatingBar 
                            android:id="@+id/rating_rating"
                            android:layout_width="wrap_content"
                            android:layout_height="wrap_content"
                            android:numStars="5"
                            android:rating="0"
                            android:stepSize="1"
                            android:focusable="false"
                            android:clickable="false"
                            />
                        <EditText 
                            android:id="@+id/rating_text"
                            android:layout_width="fill_parent"
                            android:layout_height="wrap_content"
                            android:layout_column="1"
                            android:padding="6dip"
                            android:textColor="#000000"
                            android:gravity="left|top"
                            android:lines="3"
                            android:hint="Comment"
                            android:imeOptions="actionDone" />
        </LinearLayout>
    </LinearLayout>
</LinearLayout>

Answer 1

It sounds like ListViews aren't able to handle EditTexts well. I've done some research and the consensus seems to be "don't do that." So what I've resorted to is creating a simple layout file which is a ScrollView with a LinearLayout inside. In my onCreate method, I inflate the View I was using for my list item and add it to the LinearLayout. I'm also adding the View to an ArrayList so I can save the data in each View later on.

Does this sound reasonable?