Android Service restarts randomly.

Question

I'm trying to write a Service which sits and waits for SMS messages (using a BroadcastReceiver which the server registers) and will take some action depending on the details of the SMS message. I use an Activity to startService() and stopService() for the Service. After I close the Activity, the Service continues to sit there with its state kept and its BroadcastReceiver waiting, as it should... However, I find that over time, randomly, the Service will restart itself. That is, onCreate() and onStartCommand() will be called even when the Service has already been started. This happens sometimes when my phone sits idle overnight...

Can anyone provide insight on why this is (phone requests resources and kills a service?), what I can do to prevent it, or what I can do to prevent the state of the service from being lost?

Thanks in advance.

Answer 1

I don't think you need to start service from activity at all. Have a broadcast receiver that listens to your SMS messages and starts the service. After work is done, service should call stopSelf();

Answer 2

I'll try Service.startForeground()