getView returning null when fragment has been created from an activity

Question

I have a working tablet application which I am now trying to make work on phones too. On a table there is two fragments on the screen a list fragment and a details fragment. When on a phone the list fragment appears and creates a new activity when a list item is pressed. This activity simply creates the fragment in the onCreate() method and commits it to the screen as follows.

// Place an DeallDetailsFragment as our content pane
DealDetailsFragment f = new DealDetailsFragment();
getFragmentManager().beginTransaction().add(android.R.id.content, f).commit();
getFragmentManager().executePendingTransactions();

This is working as expected however from within this activity I need to tell the fragment what details to load and display. In my DealDetailsFragment class I have a updateDeal() method which updates the content as follows.

if (deal==null) { // could be null if user presses the loading deals list item before it loads
    return;
}
this.deal=deal;
if (dealTitle==null) { // get the view objects only once
    holder = new ViewHolder();  
    holder.dealHeat=(TextView) getView().findViewById(R.id.dealDetails_heat_textView);
    holder.dealPrice=(TextView) getView().findViewById(R.id.dealDetails_price_textView);
    holder.dealRetailer=(TextView) getView().findViewById(R.id.dealDetails_retailer_textView);
    holder.dealTitle=(TextView) getView().findViewById(R.id.dealDetails_title_textView);
    holder.dealDesc=(TextView) getView().findViewById(R.id.dealDetails_desc_textView);
    holder.goToButton= (LinearLayout) getView().findViewById(R.id.dealDetails_goToDeal);
    holder.dealImage=(ImageView) getView().findViewById(R.id.dealDetails_imageView);
    holder.postedBy=(TextView) getView().findViewById(R.id.dealDetails_poster_textView);
    holder.datePosted=(TextView) getView().findViewById(R.id.dealDetails_date_textView);

getView() is returning null when the application is ran on a phone where there is only a single fragment shown.

Any ideas? Unfortunately, there is not many fragment examples available online.

Answer 1

Move your method call to be executed during onCreateView, and use the view you are inflating for reference instead of getView(). See the fragment lifecycle for more information: https://developer.android.com/guide/components/fragments.html#Creating

and the documentation of getView() that explains why it returns null before onCreateView(LayoutInflater, ViewGroup, Bundle) returns:

getView() Get the root view for the fragment's layout (the one returned by onCreateView(LayoutInflater, ViewGroup, Bundle)), if provided.

https://developer.android.com/reference/android/app/Fragment.html#getView()