How to create an alarm using AlarmManager

What’s the AlarmManager used for?

The AlarmManager is used to schedule events or services at either a set time or a set interval. It’s Android’s “version” of the cron. In this case, we’re going to set an alarm for five seconds after the app is launched.

What we’re going to build

In order to use it, we’re going to create an alarm which will be called after a time interval and we will perform a task using it.

Let’s have a look at the steps to create an alarm

1. Create an IntentService which will execute some task and will be triggered by a BroadcastReceiver. The example below provides you the idea of it.
   
   public class MyLocationUpdateService extends IntentService { public MyLocationUpdateService() { super("MyLocationUpdateService"); } @Override protected void onHandleIntent(Intent intent) { // Perform your task here } }

   1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11

   public class MyLocationUpdateService extends IntentService {       public MyLocationUpdateService() {         super("MyLocationUpdateService");     }       @Override     protected void onHandleIntent(Intent intent) {         // Perform your task here     } }

2. Create a BroadcastReceiver which will monitor the alarm triggering and execute the IntentService for you according to it. Look at the below given example
   
   public class MyAlarmReceiver extends BroadcastReceiver { public static final int REQUEST_CODE = 12345; // Triggered by the Alarm periodically (starts the service to run task) @Override public void onReceive(Context context, Intent intent) { Intent i = new Intent(context, MyLocationUpdateService.class); context.startService(i); } }

   1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10

   public class MyAlarmReceiver extends BroadcastReceiver {     public static final int REQUEST_CODE = 12345;       // Triggered by the Alarm periodically (starts the service to run task)     @Override     public void onReceive(Context context, Intent intent) {         Intent i = new Intent(context, MyLocationUpdateService.class);         context.startService(i);     } }

3. Now we will schedule the alarm. The minimum time interval for the alarm is 60 seconds because below this time interval the alarm will consume a lot of battery.
   
   Intent intent = new Intent(context.getApplicationContext(), MyAlarmReceiver.class); final PendingIntent pIntent = PendingIntent.getBroadcast(context, MyAlarmReceiver.REQUEST_CODE, intent, PendingIntent.FLAG_UPDATE_CURRENT); long firstMillis = System.currentTimeMillis(); // alarm is set right away AlarmManager alarm = (AlarmManager) context.getSystemService(Context.ALARM_SERVICE); if (alarm != null) { alarm.setInexactRepeating(AlarmManager.ELAPSED_REALTIME, firstMillis, 60000, pIntent); }

   1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8

   Intent intent = new Intent(context.getApplicationContext(), MyAlarmReceiver.class);     final PendingIntent pIntent = PendingIntent.getBroadcast(context, MyAlarmReceiver.REQUEST_CODE,             intent, PendingIntent.FLAG_UPDATE_CURRENT);     long firstMillis = System.currentTimeMillis(); // alarm is set right away     AlarmManager alarm = (AlarmManager) context.getSystemService(Context.ALARM_SERVICE);     if (alarm != null) {         alarm.setInexactRepeating(AlarmManager.ELAPSED_REALTIME, firstMillis, 60000, pIntent); }

4. And to cancel the alarm.
   
   Intent intent = new Intent(context.getApplicationContext(), MyAlarmReceiver.class); final PendingIntent pIntent = PendingIntent.getBroadcast(context, MyAlarmReceiver.REQUEST_CODE, intent, PendingIntent.FLAG_UPDATE_CURRENT); AlarmManager alarm = (AlarmManager) context.getSystemService(Context.ALARM_SERVICE); if (alarm != null) { alarm.cancel(pIntent); }

   1 2 3 4 5 6 7

   Intent intent = new Intent(context.getApplicationContext(), MyAlarmReceiver.class);    final PendingIntent pIntent = PendingIntent.getBroadcast(context, MyAlarmReceiver.REQUEST_CODE,            intent, PendingIntent.FLAG_UPDATE_CURRENT);    AlarmManager alarm = (AlarmManager) context.getSystemService(Context.ALARM_SERVICE);    if (alarm != null) {        alarm.cancel(pIntent); }

   
    

This is all you need to do to create an alarm and perform your task. It will be triggered after the time period specified automatically.

Thank you very much. This is Vedesh Kumar signing off.