Top android libraries every android developer should use

Android market is growing day by day. Android has a vibrant and strong ecosystem of open source android libraries that developers can freely use in their own apps. It may sound like a lot of work to use an open source library in a project, but with Android Studio, it’s easier than ever. Often it only takes one line of code in your app’s build.gradle file to include a library automatically. Gradle is the new build automation tool in Android Studio, and it will automatically download and include libraries if they are set up for it. It is so easy and popular that many libraries have this built in and include instructions on how to do it. Here we explain the top android libraries that will make your app more attractive.

Top android libraries every Android Developer should use

1. Networking 

• Retrofit : Retrofit is the class through which your API interfaces are turned into callable objects. By default, Retrofit will give you sane defaults for your platform but it allows for customization.
• OkHttp : OkHttp perseveres when the network is troublesome: it will silently recover from common connection problems. If your service has multiple IP addresses OkHttp will attempt alternate addresses if the first connect fails.
• Async Http Client : The Async Http Client library’s purpose is to allow Java applications to easily execute HTTP requests and asynchronously process the HTTP responses. The library also supports the WebSocket Protocol. The Async HTTP Client library is simple to use.

2. Image Loader  

• Picasso : Images add much-needed context and visual flair to Android applications. Picasso allows for hassle-free image loading in your application—often in one line of code!
• Fresco :Fresco is a powerful system for displaying images in Android applications. Fresco takes care of image loading and display, so you don’t have to. It will load images from the network, local storage, or local resources, and display a placeholder until the image has arrived. It has two levels of cache; one in memory and another in internal storage.

3. JSON

• Gson : Gson is a Java library that can be used to convert Java Objects into their JSON representation. It can also be used to convert a JSON string to an equivalent Java object. Gson can work with arbitrary Java objects including pre-existing objects that you do not have source-code of.
• Jackson : Jackson is a suite of data-processing tools for Java (and the JVM platform), including the flagship streaming JSON parser / generator library, matching data-binding library (POJOs to and from JSON) and additional data format modules to process data encoded in Avro, BSON,CBOR, CSV, Smile, Protobuf, XML or YAML; and even the large set of data format modules to support data types of widely used data types such as Joda, Guava and many, many more.

4. Layout

• WaveView : A wave view of android,can be used as progress bar.
• AndroidSwipeLayout : Android Swipe Layout Can be easily integrated in anywhere, ListView, GridView, ViewGroup etc. It Can notifiy the hidden children how much they have shown. It Can be nested each other.
• ExpandableLayout : ExpandableLayout provides an easy way to create a view called header with an expandable view. Both view are external layout to allow a maximum of customization.
• Dragger : The library was created in order to provide new animations for activities on Android. Using the ViewDragHelper class, it is possible to create smooth animations that allow full control of the view by the user.  Dragger now uses Rebound(tiny, 41.7kb) from Facebook to provide more realistic animations and improve performance for old devices.

5. List/Grid

• Expandable ListView : Expandable ListView is a type of view very much similar to a  List view.This view shows items in a vertically scrolling two-level list.This has two levels – group and children, which differs it from the List view.Group individually be expanded to show its children.
• FlabbyListView : Android library to display a ListView which cells are not rigid but flabby and react to ListView scroll and touch events.
• ParallaxListView : Parallax is a displacement or difference in the apparent position of an object viewed along two different lines of sight, and is measured by the angle or semi-angle of inclination between those two lines.
• StickyListHeaders : StickyListHeaders is an Android library that makes it easy to integrate section headers in your ListView. These section headers stick to the top like in the new People app of Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich. This behavior is also found in lists with sections on iOS devices. This library can also be used without the sticky functionality if you just want section headers.
• AndroidTreeView : Android Tree view is N – level expandable/collapsable tree. It uses Custom values, views, styles for nodes. It Save state after rotation.

6. View Pager

• CircleIndicator : A lightweight viewpager indicator like in nexus 5 launcher. It gives the circles in the list that tells the exact location or number of the list.
• Android ViewPagerIndicator : Paging indicator widgets that are compatible with the ViewPager from the Android Support Library to improve discoverability of content. These widgets can also be used in conjunction with ActionBarSherlock!
• MaterialViewPager : Material Design ViewPager easy to use library. Use to get a beautiful screen and enable preview. You can use MaterialViewPager as an usual Android View.

7. Action Bar

• FadingActionBar : FadingActionBar is a library which implements the cool fading action bar effect that can be seen in the new Play Music app. This library uses the techniques outlined by Cyril Mottier in a popular blog post. The three most commonly used action bar implementations are supported: stock (API 11+), ActionBarCompat and ActionBarSherlock.
• GlassActionBar : GlassActionBar is an Android library which implements a glass-like effect for the action bar. The three most commonly used action bar implementations are supported: stock (API >13), ActionBarCompat and ActionBarSherlock.

8. Dialog

• MaterialDialog : It’s very easy to use. Just new it & call show() method, then the beautiful AlertDialog will show automatically. It is artistic, conforms to Google Material Design.
• BlurDialogFragment : This project allows to display DialogFragment with a burring effect behind. The blurring part is achieved through FastBlur algorithm.
• DialogPlus :  DialogPlus provides 3 position:  Top : Dialog will appear at top with animation, Center : Dialog will appear in the center with animation, Bottom : Dialog will appear at the bottom of the screen with animation

9. Progress Bar

• SmoothProgressBar : Small library allowing you to make a smooth indeterminate progress bar. You can either user your progress bars and set this drawable or use directly the SmoothProgressBarView.
• NumberProgressBar : There are several attributes you can set: The reached area and unreached area: color, height and The text area: color, text size, visibility and distance between reached area and unreached area The bar: max progress, current progress.
• CircleProgress : There are several attributes you can set: DonutProgress, CircleProgress, ArcProgress.
• FABProgressCircle : Android library to provide a material progress circle around your FloatingActionButton. This component is compatible with any existent FAB. The animation will start playing everytime the user clicks on the button. Developers should control the potential spam click in their fab buttons, to not allow the users to click on it if the asynchronous task and the progress animation are already running / playing at that very moment.
• Loading : Loading is a project with kinds of Android loading view.

10. Material

• MaterialDesignLibrary : If you want use this library, you only have to download MaterialDesign project, import it into your workspace and add the project as a library in your android project settings.
• DrawerArrowDrawable : A simple drawable backport of the new drawer-indicator/back-arrow rotating drawable from the upcoming Android L.
• MaterialTabs : Custom Tabs with Material Design animations for pre-Lollipop devices. It gives the swipe gesture to your tabs.
• PagerSlidingTabStrip : Interactive paging indicator widget, compatible with the ViewPager from the Android Support Library.

These are list of android libraries that every developer should use in their app to make the app attractive. All these android libraries are very helpful to make the android developer’s life easy.

Conclusion

Technology has afforded many individuals the opportunity of owning a mobile phone. These android libraries helps you to make the best UI for your app. These android libraries make your app attractive, smooth, reliable.
There are various native e-commerce mobile apps available in the market for example SocialAPI, MagentoShop – Shopping App, WooShopee – Woocommerce App, Clovia etc that use these android libraries and looking good.

SocialAPI
Looking for a native Social Engine app builder (iOS/Android) for your Social Community? Try the 30-day free trial of our SocialaPI mobile app, go mobile commerce in a few hours and increase your connection. No Setup Fee, Pay as you go pack at just $60/month.

MagentoShop
Looking for a native Magento mobile app builder (iOS/Android) for your Magento based online marketplace? Try the 30-day free trial of our Magento mobile app, go mobile commerce in a few hours and increase your sales exponentially. No Setup Fee, Pay as you go pack at just $69/month.

WooShopee – Woocommerce App
Looking for a native Woocomerce mobile app builder (iOS/Android) for your Woocommerce based online marketplace? Try the 30-day free trial of our Magento mobile app, go mobile commerce in a few hours and increase your sales exponentially. No Setup Fee, Pay as you go pack at just $69/month.