Is it possible to set an animated gif file as live wallpaper in android?

Question

I'm new to Android platform. I wish to develop a live wallpaper application. When i was searched regarding this in search Engine's, many of them created a live wallpaper as their code (using SurfaceView and Canvas), I'm not much aware in this. Here my doubt is, any possible to set a .gif images as a live wallpaper.

Answer 1

This is the basic wallpaper service (as supplied in the Live Wallpaper Tutorial) hacked to display an animated gif.

First - create a project & set up your manifest as a Live wallpaper.
Then - download a gif, like this one
   

Save that gif in res/raw/nyan.gif in your project.
Create a live wallpaper service, like shown in this example.

public class NyanNyanService extends WallpaperService {
    static final String TAG = "NYAN";
    static final Handler mNyanHandler = new Handler();

    /**
     * @see android.service.wallpaper.WallpaperService#onCreate()
     */
    @Override
    public void onCreate() {
        super.onCreate();
    }

    /**
     * @see android.service.wallpaper.WallpaperService#onCreateEngine()
     */
    @Override
    public Engine onCreateEngine() {
        try {
            return new NyanEngine();
        } catch (IOException e) {
            Log.w(TAG, "Error creating NyanEngine", e);
            stopSelf();
            return null;
        }
    }

    class NyanEngine extends Engine {
        private final Movie mNyan;
        private final int mNyanDuration;
        private final Runnable mNyanNyan;
        float mScaleX;
        float mScaleY;
        int mWhen;
        long mStart;

        NyanEngine() throws IOException {
            InputStream is = getResources().openRawResource(R.raw.nyan);
            if (is != null) {
                try {
                    mNyan = Movie.decodeStream(is);
                    mNyanDuration = mNyan.duration();
                } finally {
                    is.close();
                }
            } else {
                throw new IOException("Unable to open R.raw.nyan");
            }

            mWhen = -1;
            mNyanNyan = new Runnable() {
                public void run() {
                    nyan();
                }
            };
        }

        @Override
        public void onDestroy() {
            super.onDestroy();
            mNyanHandler.removeCallbacks(mNyanNyan);
        }

        @Override
        public void onVisibilityChanged(boolean visible) {
            super.onVisibilityChanged(visible);
            if (visible) {
                nyan();
            } else {
                mNyanHandler.removeCallbacks(mNyanNyan);
            }
        }

        @Override
        public void onSurfaceChanged(SurfaceHolder holder, int format, int width, int height) {
            super.onSurfaceChanged(holder, format, width, height);
            mScaleX = width / (1f * mNyan.width());
            mScaleY = height / (1f * mNyan.height());
            nyan();
        }

        @Override
        public void onOffsetsChanged(float xOffset, float yOffset, float xOffsetStep,
                float yOffsetStep, int xPixelOffset, int yPixelOffset) {
            super.onOffsetsChanged(xOffset, yOffset, xOffsetStep, yOffsetStep, xPixelOffset, yPixelOffset);
            nyan();
        }

        void nyan() {
            tick();
            SurfaceHolder surfaceHolder = getSurfaceHolder();
            Canvas canvas = null;
            try {
                canvas = surfaceHolder.lockCanvas();
                if (canvas != null) {
                    nyanNyan(canvas);
                }
            } finally {
                if (canvas != null) {
                    surfaceHolder.unlockCanvasAndPost(canvas);
                }
            }
            mNyanHandler.removeCallbacks(mNyanNyan);
            if (isVisible()) {
                mNyanHandler.postDelayed(mNyanNyan, 1000L/25L);
            }
        }

        void tick() {
            if (mWhen == -1L) {
                mWhen = 0;
                mStart = SystemClock.uptimeMillis();
            } else {
                long mDiff = SystemClock.uptimeMillis() - mStart;
                mWhen = (int) (mDiff % mNyanDuration);
            }
        }

        void nyanNyan(Canvas canvas) {
            canvas.save();
            canvas.scale(mScaleX, mScaleY);
            mNyan.setTime(mWhen);
            mNyan.draw(canvas, 0, 0);
            canvas.restore();
        }
    }
}

This will basically scale the nyan-nyan cat to fit the screen and animate it perpetually.

A Live wallpaper manifest looks sort-of-like this (this example does not contain a configuration activity):

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<manifest xmlns:android="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res/android"
    package="your.nyan.nyan.package"
    android:versionCode="1"
    android:versionName="1.0" >
    <uses-sdk android:minSdkVersion="10" />
    <application
        android:icon="@drawable/ic_launcher"
        android:label="@string/application_nyan" > 
        <service 
            android:label="@string/wallpaper_nyan"
            android:name=".NyanNyanService"
            android:permission="android.permission.BIND_WALLPAPER">
            <intent-filter>
                <action android:name="android.service.wallpaper.WallpaperService" />
            </intent-filter>
            <meta-data android:name="android.service.wallpaper" android:resource="@xml/nyan" />
        </service>
    </application>
</manifest>

The AndroidManifest.xml has a reference to a file in res/xml, in this case named "nyan.xml":

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<wallpaper xmlns:android="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res/android" />

Answer 2

See this article: How to set gif as android live wallpaper - techprpr - Medium

Jens answer use "Movie" class, but Movie class is deprecated in android api 28

so when api >= 28, I use AnimatedImageDrawable instead

Setup live wallpaper like Jens answer, and I change wallpaper service code:

wallpaper service: AnimWallpaper

public class AnimWallpaper extends WallpaperService {
    @Override
    public Engine onCreateEngine() {
        return new CustomEngine();
    }

    class CustomEngine extends Engine {
        UseAnim useAnim;

        public CustomEngine() {
            if (Build.VERSION.SDK_INT >= Build.VERSION_CODES.P) {
                useAnim = new UseAnim(getApplicationContext(), getSurfaceHolder(), R.raw.gif2);
            }
        }

        @Override
        public void onVisibilityChanged(boolean visible) {
            super.onVisibilityChanged(visible);
            if (visible) {
                useAnim.restart();
            } else {
                useAnim.stop();
            }
        }

        @Override
        public void onSurfaceChanged(SurfaceHolder holder, int format, int width, int height) {
            super.onSurfaceChanged(holder, format, width, height);
            useAnim.updateScaleAndPadding2(width, height);
            useAnim.restart();
        }


        @Override
        public void onOffsetsChanged(float xOffset, float yOffset, float xOffsetStep, float yOffsetStep, int xPixelOffset, int yPixelOffset) {
            super.onOffsetsChanged(xOffset, yOffset, xOffsetStep, yOffsetStep, xPixelOffset, yPixelOffset);
            useAnim.restart();
        }

        @Override
        public void onDestroy() {
            super.onDestroy();
            useAnim.stop();
        }
    }

}

UseAnim

class UseAnim {
    SurfaceHolder holder;
    Runnable startRunnable;
    AnimatedImageDrawable gif;
    float fps = 60;
    Handler handler = new Handler();

    @RequiresApi(api = Build.VERSION_CODES.P)
    public UseAnim(Context ctx, SurfaceHolder holder, int gifResId) {
        this.holder = holder;
        final ImageDecoder.Source src = ImageDecoder.createSource(ctx.getResources(), gifResId);
        startRunnable = new Runnable() {
            @Override
            public void run() {
                start();
            }
        };

        new Handler().post(new Runnable() {
            @Override
            public void run() {
                try {
                    UseAnim.this.gif = (AnimatedImageDrawable) ImageDecoder.decodeDrawable(src);
                } catch (IOException e) {
                    throw new RuntimeException(e);
                }

                UseAnim.this.gif.start();
            }
        });
    }

    public void restart() {
        stop();
        start();
    }

    float scale = -1;

    public void start() {
        // since get gif with AnimatedImageDrawable must be in handler.post, so gif maybe null
        if (gif != null) {
            Canvas canvas = null;
            try {
                if (scale == -1) {
                    updateScaleAndPadding();
                }

                canvas = holder.lockCanvas();

                if (canvas != null) {
                    canvas.translate(horiPadding, vertiPadding);
                    canvas.scale(scale, scale);
                    gif.draw(canvas);
                }
            } finally {
                if (canvas != null) {
                    holder.unlockCanvasAndPost(canvas);
                }
            }
        }

        handler.removeCallbacks(startRunnable);
        handler.postDelayed(startRunnable, (long) (1000L / fps));
    }

    public void stop() {
        handler.removeCallbacks(startRunnable);
    }

    int horiPadding;
    int vertiPadding;

    private void updateScaleAndPadding() {
        Canvas canvas = null;
        try {
            canvas = holder.lockCanvas();
            int cw = canvas.getWidth();
            int ch = canvas.getHeight();

            updateScaleAndPadding2(cw, ch);
        } finally {
            if (canvas != null) {
                holder.unlockCanvasAndPost(canvas);
            }
        }
    }

    public void updateScaleAndPadding2(int cw, int ch) {
        if (gif != null) {
            int gifW = gif.getIntrinsicWidth();
            int gifH = gif.getIntrinsicHeight();
            if (gifW * 1f / gifH > cw * 1f / ch) {
                scale = ch * 1f / gifH;
            } else {
                scale = cw * 1f / gifW;
            }

            horiPadding = (int) ((cw - gifW * scale) / 2);
            vertiPadding = (int) ((ch - gifH * scale) / 2);
        }
    }
}