Android : Icons not showing in actionbar

Question

I am trying to show two icons in the actionbar, one of which is a menu with a few children. However, I am not able to. I have tested a few answers from other similar questions in SO but to no avail. Not even one icon is showing up. Here is the code. Thanks for your help.

<menu xmlns:android="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res/android"
xmlns:tools="http://schemas.android.com/tools"
xmlns:app="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res-auto"
tools:context="com.semantic.semanticOrganizer.sem.activities.HomeActivity" >

<item android:id="@+id/viewTags"
    android:icon="@drawable/ic_action_labels"
    app:showAsAction="always"
    android:title="Tags"
    />

<item
    android:id="@+id/a_More"
    android:icon="@drawable/ic_more_vert_white_36dp"
    app:showAsAction="always"
    android:title="More">
    <menu>
<item android:id="@+id/action_view_notes"
    android:title="Notes"
    android:orderInCategory="100"
    app:showAsAction="never" />

<item android:id="@+id/action_view_habits"
    android:title="Habits"
    android:orderInCategory="100"
    app:showAsAction="never" />
<item android:id="@+id/action_view_checklists"
    android:title="Checklists"
    android:orderInCategory="100"
    app:showAsAction="never" />
<item android:id="@+id/action_view_tags"
    android:title="Tags"
    android:orderInCategory="100"
    app:showAsAction="never" />
<item android:id="@+id/action_settings"
    android:title="@string/action_settings"
    android:orderInCategory="100"
    app:showAsAction="never" />
    </menu>

  </item>
</menu>

Java Code

public class HomeActivity extends Activity {

@Override
protected void onCreate(Bundle savedInstanceState) {
    super.onCreate(savedInstanceState);
    setContentView(R.layout.activity_home);

    stuffWhichDoesNotInvolveGettingActionBar();

}

@Override
public boolean onCreateOptionsMenu(Menu menu) {
    // Inflate the menu items for use in the action bar
    MenuInflater inflater = getMenuInflater();
    inflater.inflate(R.menu.home, menu);
    return super.onCreateOptionsMenu(menu);
}


@Override
public boolean onOptionsItemSelected(MenuItem item) {
    // Handle action bar item clicks here. The action bar will
    // automatically handle clicks on the Home/Up button, so long
    // as you specify a parent activity in AndroidManifest.xml.
    int id = item.getItemId();
    if (id == R.id.action_settings) {
        return true;
    }
    if (id == R.id.action_view_tags) {
        return true;

    }
    if (id == R.id.action_view_notes) {
        return true;
    }
    if (id == R.id.action_view_checklists) {
        return true;
    }
    if (id == R.id.action_view_habits) {
        return true;
    }

    return super.onOptionsItemSelected(item);
}


private void stuffWhichDoesNotInvolveGettingActionBar(){
   //Code
}

Edit: As Neutrino suggested, I tried to shift to appCompat Theme. But then this error showed up on Win64 machine. Resource not found error to the attribute "actionModeShareDrawable". I changed the compileSdkVersion to 21 and it dint work. So, I might have to do it without AppCompat for now. I am currently using Holo. So please suggest a fix for Holo theme.

Edit I found a work around for the error I mentioned by using v20 of the support library instead of v21 since I found out that Gradle 2.3 build system is not around in Android yet and the bug was only fixed in that version (A Bug Fixed Jar of Groovy 2.3.5 was released). Then I was able to use ActionBarActivity and now the action bar icons are visible. Thanks everyone and especially Quark.

You have to show java code, not only xml file, or we can't find out the point. — user3168958, Oct 24 '14 at 05:39
any error in logcat , which android API level are you targeting and what is API level of you device ? — turtle, Oct 24 '14 at 05:40
@turtle : No. There are no errors in logcat. The min API version is 15 and the target version is 20. Thanks! — Bhargav Ponnapalli, Oct 24 '14 at 05:43
Looks like the fault is in the xml file only. Also I want to make sure that the file's name is `home`... — Confuse, Oct 24 '14 at 06:05
Yeah. The file name is home. The icons do not appear, but when the physical menu button is pressed, the appear at the bottom of they screen. Its just the icons do not appear at the top. — Bhargav Ponnapalli, Oct 24 '14 at 06:08

score 0 · Accepted Answer · edited Jun 20 '20 at 09:12

0

Extend ActionBarActivity instead of Activity, ie make

public class HomeActivity extends Activity

as

public class HomeActivity extends ActionBarActivity

EDIT

ActionBarActivity is now deprecated to support toolbar. To use toolbar, use -

public class HomeActivity extends AppCompatActivity

Be sure to include the latest version of support library in build.gradle (Module: app) -

dependencies {
    compile 'com.android.support:appcompat-v7:22.1.1'
}

Read more about toolbar and AppCompatActivity here, here and here.

edited Jun 20 '20 at 09:12

Community

1
1

answered Oct 24 '14 at 06:13

Confuse

5,646
7
36
58

I tried. But it says I need to change my theme to appCompat. I am currently using Holo. – Bhargav Ponnapalli Oct 24 '14 at 06:24
Then change it to compat. There isn't much difference between them. – Confuse Oct 24 '14 at 06:29
Thanks! For some reason, its now working with ActionBarActivity. – Bhargav Ponnapalli Nov 18 '14 at 13:43
`ActionBarActivity` is now deprecated, use `AppCompatActivity` instead – tread Jun 01 '15 at 07:12
@StevieG, Thanks for your comment. I will add that in the answer. – Confuse Jun 01 '15 at 07:20

score 0 · Answer 2 · answered Oct 24 '14 at 09:38

0

I tried compiling your code and the following worked for me. Replace app:showAsAction with android:showAsAction for all the menu items for which you want an icon to appear.

answered Oct 24 '14 at 09:38

vkm

548
7
23

Android : Icons not showing in actionbar

2 Answers2

EDIT