Inflating AppBarLayout with Toolbar + TabLayout

Question

I currently have a DrawerLayout in my main.xml. There's a Toolbar wrapped in an AppBarLayout, and then a simple LinearLayout to swap out fragments.

One of the fragments I navigate to, I want it to contain a TabLayout for a ViewPager of fragments. Currently, I have both of these in the fragment's layout file, but this causes a drop shadow to appear between the Toolbar and the TabLayout, which is something I don't want. I also don't want to use setElevation() because it won't work for pre-Lollipop devices.

A possible solution would be to inflate the AppBarLayout from my fragment, so that it holds both the Toolbar+Tabs. However, I'm not really sure how to do this, so any help would be appreciated.

Here is my main.xml file:

<android.support.v4.widget.DrawerLayout xmlns:android="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res/android"
    xmlns:app="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res-auto"
    xmlns:tools="http://schemas.android.com/tools"
    android:id="@+id/drawerLayout"
    android:layout_width="match_parent"
    android:layout_height="match_parent"
    tools:context="com.lumivote.lumivote.ui.MainActivity">

    <android.support.design.widget.CoordinatorLayout
        android:id="@+id/rootLayout"
        android:layout_width="match_parent"
        android:layout_height="match_parent">

        <android.support.design.widget.AppBarLayout
            android:id="@+id/appbarlayout"
            android:layout_width="match_parent"
            android:layout_height="wrap_content">

            <android.support.v7.widget.Toolbar
                android:id="@+id/toolbar"
                android:layout_width="match_parent"
                android:layout_height="?attr/actionBarSize"
                android:background="?attr/colorPrimary"
                app:popupTheme="@style/ThemeOverlay.AppCompat.Light"
                app:theme="@style/ThemeOverlay.AppCompat.Dark.ActionBar" />

        </android.support.design.widget.AppBarLayout>

        <LinearLayout
            android:id="@+id/flContent"
            android:layout_width="match_parent"
            android:layout_height="match_parent"
            android:orientation="vertical"
            app:layout_behavior="@string/appbar_scrolling_view_behavior"/>

    </android.support.design.widget.CoordinatorLayout>

    <android.support.design.widget.NavigationView
        android:id="@+id/navigation"
        android:layout_width="wrap_content"
        android:layout_height="match_parent"
        android:layout_gravity="start"
        app:headerLayout="@layout/nav_header"
        app:itemIconTint="#333"
        app:itemTextColor="#333"
        app:menu="@menu/navigation_drawer_items" />

</android.support.v4.widget.DrawerLayout>

And here is my fragment's xml file:

<LinearLayout xmlns:android="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res/android"
    xmlns:tools="http://schemas.android.com/tools"
    xmlns:app="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res-auto"
    android:layout_width="match_parent"
    android:layout_height="match_parent"
    android:orientation="vertical"
    tools:context="com.alexdao.democracy.ui.candidate_tab.CandidateListFragment">

    <android.support.design.widget.TabLayout
        android:id="@+id/tabLayout"
        android:layout_width="match_parent"
        android:layout_height="wrap_content"
        android:background="@color/myPrimaryColor"
        app:tabMode="fixed"
        app:tabGravity="fill"
        app:theme="@style/ThemeOverlay.AppCompat.Dark.ActionBar"/>

    <android.support.v4.view.ViewPager
        android:id="@+id/viewpager"
        android:layout_width="match_parent"
        android:layout_height="wrap_content"
        android:background="@android:color/white" />
</LinearLayout>

Answer 1

You are able to have separate toolbar for each fragment. Its possible to set fragments toolbar as activity actionbar. Example code:

Toolbar toolbar = (Toolbar) v.findViewById(R.id.toolbar);
 ((AppCompatActivity) getActivity()).setSupportActionBar(toolbar);

It should be possible to have titles, icons and other stuff as well. With it you can mimic shadow on pre lollipop devices, no matter what you have on them.