Notifications

An application can use notifications to keep the user informed of important information.

The main features of the Tizen.Applications.Notifications namespace include the following:

Creating a notification

You can create a notification.
Configuring the notification
- You can set notification attributes, such as the notification title, content, timestamp, and various property options.
- You can set accessory options for a notification to control how the device’s sound, vibration, and LED feedback respond to the notification.
- You can set styles for a notification, change its display type, and add features, such as icons and background images.
Posting a notification

You can post a notification using the Post() method of the Tizen.Applications.Notifications.NotificationManager class.

The posted notification has a default notification icon and the application name as the title.
Updating notification content

You can update the content of an ongoing notification using the Update() method of the Tizen.Applications.Notifications.NotificationManager class.
Deleting a notification

You can delete notifications when no longer needed.
Using advanced notification features
- You can display and update the progress bar for an ongoing notification.
- You can create a template that can be reused in multiple notifications.

Notification display types

Tizen provides notifications by using a combination of any of the following notification display types:

Quick panel
Active notification
Indicator
Lock screen
Status message

The notification display type determines where and how the notification message is displayed.

Quick panel notifications

The display area for quick panel notifications can be one of the following:

Notification area

The notification area is the reserved space for displaying all notifications, except the on-going notifications.
On-going area

The on-going area is the application screen area and is only used to display notifications for the currently running application.

Figure: Notification and on-going areas

Notification and on-going areas

Active notifications

An active notification is displayed on the upper side of the screen. You can add buttons for user interaction, and a text input field which the user can use to reply to the notification directly.

Figure: Active notification

Active notification

Indicator notifications

The indicator type notification is displayed for a few seconds in the indicator area. Only a simple string and icon can be displayed.

Figure: Notification on the ticker and the indicator

Notification on the ticker and the indicator

Lock screen notifications

You can display a notification on the lock screen. The notification content can be displayed or hidden.

Figure: Notification on the lock screen

Notification on the lock screen

Status message notifications

A status message type notification can be used like a pop-up. It is displayed for a few seconds and then disappears.

Figure: Status message

Status message

Prerequisites

To enable your application to use the notification functionality, follow the steps below:

To use notifications, the application has to request permission by adding the following privilege to the tizen-manifest.xml file:


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<privileges>
   <privilege>http://tizen.org/privilege/notification</privilege>
</privileges>

To use the methods and properties of the Tizen.Applications.Notifications namespace, include it in your application:


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using Tizen.Applications.Notifications;

To follow this guide, place an image file in, for example, your application’s shared resource directory. The following variables are used in the code:


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DirectoryInfo info = Application.Current.DirectoryInfo;
String imagePath;
String sharedPath = info.SharedData;

imagePath = sharedPath + "imageName.png";

Create a notification

To create a notification, create a new instance of the Tizen.Applications.Notifications.Notification class:


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Notification noti = new Notification();

Set notification attributes

To set notification attributes, such as title, content, icon, and timestamp, set the corresponding properties of the Tizen.Applications.Notifications.Notification class instance:


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Notification noti = new Notification
{
    Title = "Title",
    Content = "Content",
    Icon = imagePath,
    Count = 2,
    Tag = "tag",
    TimeStamp = time,
    Property = DisableAppLaunch
};

Set accessory options

You can set accessory options for a notification to control how the device’s sound, vibration, and LED react to the notification being activated. Any options you do not set use the default values instead.

To set accessory options, follow the steps below:

Create an accessory set for the notification as a new instance of the Tizen.Applications.Notifications.Notification.AccessorySet class:


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Notification.AccessorySet accessory = new Notification.AccessorySet();

Set the properties of the Tizen.Applications.Notifications.Notification.AccessorySet instance.

The available SoundOption and LedOption property values are defined in the Tizen.Applications.Notifications.AccessoryOption enumeration:


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accessory.SoundOption = Notifications.AccessoryOption.Custom;
accessory.SoundPath = soundPath;
accessory.CanVibrate = true;
accessory.LedOption = Notifications.AccessoryOption.On;
accessory.LedOnMillisecond = 100;
accessory.LedOffMillisecond = 100;

To have your notification use the modified values, set the Tizen.Applications.Notifications.Notification.AccessorySet instance as the Accessory property of the Tizen.Applications.Notifications.Notification class instance:


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noti.Accessory = accessory;

Set notification styles

You can set a style for your notification to change how the notification is displayed, including changing the display type or icon. A single notification can only have 1 style set for it.

To add styles to your notification, follow the steps below:

To create an active notification:

Create a new instance of the Tizen.Applications.Notifications.Notification.ActiveStyle class and set its properties:


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Notification.ActiveStyle style = new Notification.ActiveStyle();
style.IsAutoRemove = false;
style.BackgroundImage = backgroundImage;

Optionally, you can add buttons or a reply field to an active notification.

To add buttons:

To add a button, create a new instance of the Tizen.Applications.Notifications.Notification.ButtonAction class. You can add up to 3 buttons into a single active notification:


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Notification.ButtonAction button = new Notification.ButtonAction();
button.Index = Notifications.ButtonIndex.First;
button.Text = "Reply";
button.ImagePath = imagePath;

To create an application control to handle the results of clicking a button, create an instance of the Tizen.Applications.AppControl class and link it to the button by setting it as the Action property of the Tizen.Applications.Notifications.Notification.ButtonAction class instance:


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AppControl appcontrol = new AppControl();
appcontrol.ApplicationId = "org.tizen.test.tpk";

button.Action = appcontrol;

To add the button to the Tizen.Applications.Notifications.Notification.ActiveStyle instance, use the AddButtonAction() method:


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style.AddButtonAction(button);

To add a reply field and button:

To add a reply field for the user to reply to a notification, create a new instance of the Tizen.Applications.Notifications.Notification.ReplyAction class and set its properties:


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Notification.ReplyAction action = new Notification.ReplyAction();
action.ParentIndex = Notifications.ButtonIndex.First;
action.ReplyMax = 160;
action.PlaceHolderText = "Send";

The reply field requires a button for the user to send the completed reply with, and the button in turn requires an application control to handle the results of clicking the button. Create the application control as an instance of the Tizen.Applications.AppControl class, and the button as an instance of the Tizen.Applications.Notifications.Notification.ButtonAction class:


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AppControl appcontrol = new AppControl();
appcontrol.ApplicationId = "org.tizen.test.tpk";

Notification.ButtonAction button = new Notification.ButtonAction();
button.Index = Notifications.ButtonIndex.First;
button.Text = "Reply";
button.ImagePath = imagePath;
button.Action = appcontrol;

To link the button with the reply field, add it as the Button property of the Tizen.Applications.Notifications.Notification.ReplyAction class instance:


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action.Button = button;

To add the reply field to the style instance, add it as the ReplyAction property of the Tizen.Applications.Notifications.Notification.ActiveStyle class instance:


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style.ReplyAction = action;

Apply the new style to your notification by using the AddStyle() method of the Tizen.Applications.Notifications.Notification class:


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noti.AddStyle(style);

To create an indicator type notification:

Create a new instance of the Tizen.Applications.Notifications.Notification.IndicatorStyle class and set its properties:


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Notification.IndicatorStyle style = new Notification.IndicatorStyle();
style.IconPath = iconPath;
style.SubText = "SubText";

Apply the new style to your notification by using the AddStyle() method of the Tizen.Applications.Notifications.Notification class:


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noti.AddStyle(style);

To create a lock screen notification:

Create a new instance of the Tizen.Applications.Notifications.Notification.LockStyle class and set its properties:


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Notification.LockStyle style = new Notification.LockStyle();
style.IconPath = iconPath;
style.ThumbnailPath = thumbnailPath;

Apply the new style to your notification by using the AddStyle() method of the Tizen.Applications.Notifications.Notification class:


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noti.AddStyle(style);

Post a notification

To post a notification to the database, use the Post() method of the Tizen.Applications.Notifications.NotificationManager class:


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NotificationManager.Post(noti);

Update notification content

To update the content of a notification, use the Update() method of the Tizen.Applications.Notifications.NotificationManager class. The method works for ongoing notifications only:


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NotificationManager.Update(noti);

Delete a notification

To delete a notification from the database, use the Delete() method of the Tizen.Applications.Notifications.NotificationManager class:


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NotificationManager.Delete(noti);

Display the progress bar

To display the progress bar and update the progress data, follow the steps below:

To create a notification with a progress bar, create a new instance of the Tizen.Applications.Notifications.Notification.ProgressType class. To be able to retrieve the notification handle and update the progress data later, set a notification tag with the Tag property of the Tizen.Applications.Notifications.Notification class:


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Notification.ProgressType progress = new Notification.ProgressType(Notifications.ProgressCategory.Percent, 0.0, 100.0);
noti.Progress = progress;
noti.Tag = "tag";

To update the progress bar, retrieve the notification with its tag by using the Load() method of the Tizen.Applications.Notifications.NotificationManager class, and update the notification:


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Notification noti = NotificationManager.Load("tag");
noti.Progress.ProgressCurrent = 10.0;

Use a notification template

To create a template from an existing notification, and reuse that template later to quickly create other notifications with the same pattern:

To create a template, follow the steps below:

Create a notification as usual.

The following example creates an active notification with 2 buttons (Accept and Cancel), a background image, and sound, LED, and vibration feedback:


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Notification noti = new Notification
{
    Title = "Notification",
    Content = "Content",
    Icon = imagePath
};

Notification.AccessorySet accessory = new Notification.AccessorySet
{
    SoundOption = Notifications.AccessoryOption.Custom,
    SoundPath = soundPath,
    CanVibrate = true,
    LedOption = Notifications.AccessoryOption.On,
    LedOnMillisecond = 100,
    LedOffMillisecond = 100
};
noti.Accessory = accessory;

Notification.ActiveStyle style = new Notification.ActiveStyle
{
    IsAutoRemove = true,
    BackgroundImage = backgroundImagePath
};

AppControl firstAppControl = new AppControl
{
    ApplicationId = "org.tizen.test.tpk"
};

Notification.ButtonAction button1 = new Notification.ButtonAction
{
    Index = Notifications.ButtonIndex.First,
    Text = "Accept",
    ImagePath = imagePath,
    Action = firstAppControl
};

AppControl secondAppControl = new AppControl
{
    ApplicationId = "org.tizen.test.tpk"
};

Notification.ButtonAction button2 = new Notification.ButtonAction
{
    Index = Notifications.ButtonIndex.Second,
    Text = "Cancel",
    ImagePath = imagePath,
    Action = secondAppControl
};

style.AddButtonAction(button1);
style.AddButtonAction(button2);

noti.AddStyle(style);

Save the notification instance as a template and define a name for the template, using the SaveTemplate() method of the Tizen.Applications.Notifications.NotificationManager class:


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NotificationManager.SaveTemplate(noti, "CALL_ACCEPT");

To use the template when creating a new notification, call the LoadTemplate() method:


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Notification loadNotification = NotificationManager.LoadTemplate("CALL_ACCEPT");

Dependencies
- Tizen 4.0 and Higher