Android: How can you align a button at the bottom and listview above?

Question

I want to have a button at the bottom of the listview.

If I use relativeLayout/FrameLayout, it aligns but listView goes down to very botton.

(Behind the button at the bottom)

FrameLayout:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<FrameLayout
    xmlns:android="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res/android"
    android:orientation="vertical"
    android:layout_width="fill_parent"
    android:layout_height="fill_parent">
    <ListView
        android:id="@+id/listview"
        android:layout_width="match_parent"
        android:layout_height="wrap_content"
        />
    <FrameLayout
        android:layout_width="wrap_content"
        android:layout_height="match_parent"
        android:layout_alignParentBottom="true">
        <Button
            android:id="@+id/btnButton"
            android:text="Hello"
            android:layout_width="match_parent"
            android:layout_height="wrap_content"
            android:layout_gravity="bottom" />
    </FrameLayout>
</FrameLayout>

RelativeLayout:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<RelativeLayout
    xmlns:android="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res/android"
    android:orientation="vertical"
    android:layout_width="fill_parent"
    android:layout_height="fill_parent">
    <ListView
        android:id="@+id/listview"
        android:layout_width="match_parent"
        android:layout_height="match_parent"
        />
    <RelativeLayout
        android:layout_width="wrap_content"
        android:layout_height="wrap_content"
        android:layout_alignParentBottom="true">
        <Button
            android:id="@+id/btnButton"
            android:text="Hello"
            android:layout_width="match_parent"
            android:layout_height="wrap_content"
            android:layout_gravity="bottom" />
    </RelativeLayout>
</RelativeLayout>

Above two codes only work like the first image. What I want is second image.

Can anybody help?

Thank you.

Answer 1

A FrameLayouts purpose is to overlay things on top of each other. This is not what you want.

In your RelativeLayout example you set the ListViews height and width to MATCH_PARENT this is going to make it take up the same amount of space as its parent, and thus take up all of the space on the page (and covers the button).

Try something like:

<LinearLayout 
   android:layout_width="match_parent" 
   android:layout_height="match_parent" 
   android:orientation="vertical">
  <ListView 
     android:layout_width="match_parent" 
     android:layout_height="0dip" 
     android:layout_weight="1"/>
  <Button 
     android:layout_width="match_parent" 
     android:layout_height="wrap_content" 
     android:layout_weight="0"/>
</LinearLayout>

The layout_weight dictates how the extra space is to be used. The Button does not want to stretch beyond the space it requires, so it has a weight of 0. The ListView wants to take up all of the extra space, so it has a weight of 1.

You could accomplish something similar using a RelativeLayout, but if it is just these two items then I think a LinearLayout is simpler.