RecyclerView onCreateViewHolder called excessively when scrolling fast with DPAD

Question

I'm developing on Amazon Fire TV.

Because it's a TV app(No touch), I need focusables inside row's layout to be able to navigate around.

I have a really simple Recyclerview with image, text, and a focusable. When I press up or down, it all scrolls and stuff correctly, but I noticed that when I navigate faster than scroll can keep up, it creates new viewholders (Off screen) and lags up the UI.

I have created an activity with Creation numbers on it. When I scroll slowly, the highest creation # is 10. But when I scroll fast, I get cards with creation number 60 in a second. This causes an enormous lag and the application drops a lot of frames. Is my approach totally wrong?

Use the code below to test this out.

/**
 * Created by sylversphere on 15-04-15.
 */
public class LandfillActivity extends Activity{

private Context context;

private static int ticketNumber;
private static int getTicket(){
    ticketNumber ++;
    return ticketNumber;
}

@Override
protected void onCreate(Bundle savedInstanceState) {
    super.onCreate(savedInstanceState);
    context = this;
    setContentView(R.layout.landfill_activity);
    RecyclerView recyclerView = (RecyclerView) findViewById(R.id.recyclerView);
    GridLayoutManager glm = new GridLayoutManager(context, 2);
    recyclerView.setLayoutManager(glm);
    SickAdapter sickAdapter = new SickAdapter();
    recyclerView.setAdapter(sickAdapter);
}

public class SickViewHolder extends RecyclerView.ViewHolder{
    TextView ticketDisplayer;
    public ImageView imageView;
    public SickViewHolder(View itemView) {
        super(itemView);
        ticketDisplayer = (TextView) itemView.findViewById(R.id.ticketDisplayer);
        imageView = (ImageView) itemView.findViewById(R.id.imageView);

        itemView.findViewById(R.id.focus_glass).setOnClickListener(new View.OnClickListener() {
            @Override
            public void onClick(View view) {
                context.startActivity(new Intent(context, LouisVuittonActivity.class));
            }
        });
    }
    public void setTicket(int value){
        ticketDisplayer.setText(""+value);
    }
}

public class SickAdapter extends RecyclerView.Adapter<SickViewHolder>{

    @Override
    public SickViewHolder onCreateViewHolder(ViewGroup parent, int viewType) {
        SickViewHolder svh = new SickViewHolder(getLayoutInflater().inflate(R.layout.one_row_element, null));
        svh.setTicket(getTicket());
        return svh;
    }

    @Override
    public void onBindViewHolder(SickViewHolder holder, int position) {
        String[] image_url_array = getResources().getStringArray(R.array.test_image_urls);
        Picasso.with(context).load(image_url_array[position % image_url_array.length] ).fit().centerCrop().into(holder.imageView);
    }

    @Override
    public int getItemCount() {
        return 100000;
    }
}
}

one_row_element.xml

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<FrameLayout xmlns:android="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res/android"
    android:layout_width="match_parent"
    android:layout_height="wrap_content"
    android:orientation="horizontal">
    <FrameLayout
        android:layout_width="match_parent"
        android:layout_height="200dp"
        android:orientation="horizontal">
        <ImageView
            android:id="@+id/imageView"
            android:layout_width="match_parent"
            android:layout_height="match_parent"
            android:adjustViewBounds="true"
            android:scaleType="centerCrop"
            android:src="@mipmap/sick_view_row_bg" />
        <LinearLayout
            android:layout_width="wrap_content"
            android:layout_height="wrap_content"
            android:layout_gravity="left|center_vertical"
            android:layout_marginLeft="15dp"
            android:orientation="horizontal">
            <TextView
                android:id="@+id/virusTextView"
                android:layout_width="wrap_content"
                android:layout_height="wrap_content"
                android:text="Creation #"
                android:textColor="#fff"
                android:textSize="40sp" />
            <TextView
                android:id="@+id/ticketDisplayer"
                android:layout_width="wrap_content"
                android:layout_height="wrap_content"
                android:text="1"
                android:textColor="#fff"
                android:textSize="40sp" />
        </LinearLayout>
        <FrameLayout
            android:layout_width="match_parent"
            android:layout_height="match_parent"
            android:id="@+id/focus_glass"
            android:background="@drawable/subtle_focus_glass"
            android:focusable="true"
            android:focusableInTouchMode="true"/>
    </FrameLayout>
</FrameLayout>

test_image_urls.xml (Urls not owned by me)

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<resources>
<string-array name="test_image_urls"
    formatted="false">
    <item>http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3175/2737866473_7958dc8760.jpg</item>
    <item>http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3276/2875184020_9944005d0d.jpg</item>
    <item>http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2531/4094333885_e8462a8338.jpg</item>
    <item>http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3289/2809605169_8efe2b8f27.jpg</item>
    <item>http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_SrRTF97Kbfo/SUqT9y-qTVI/AAAAAAAABmg/saRXhruwS6M/s400/bARADEI.jpg</item>
    <item>http://fortunaweb.com.ar/wp-content/uploads/2009/10/Caroline-Atkinson-FMI.jpg</item>
    <item>http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3488/4051378654_238ca94313.jpg</item>
    <item>http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3368/3198142470_6eb0be5f32.jpg</item>
    <item>http://www.powercai.net/Photo/UploadPhotos/200503/20050307172201492.jpg</item>
    <item>http://www.web07.cn/uploads/Photo/c101122/12Z3Y54RZ-22027.jpg</item>
    <item>http://www.mitravel.com.tw/html/asia/2011/Palau-4/index_clip_image002_0000.jpg</item>
    <item>http://news.xinhuanet.com/mil/2007-05/19/xinsrc_36205041914150623191153.jpg</item>
    <item>http://ib.berkeley.edu/labs/koehl/images/hannah.jpg</item>
    <item>http://down.tutu001.com/d/file/20110307/ef7937c2b70bfc2da539eea9df_560.jpg</item>
    <item>http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2278/2300491905_5272f77e56.jpg</item>
    <item>http://www.pic35.com/uploads/allimg/100526/1-100526224U1.jpg</item>
    <item>http://img.99118.com/Big2/1024768/20101211/1700013.jpg</item>
    <item>http://farm1.static.flickr.com/45/139488995_bd06578562.jpg</item>
</string-array>
</resources>

subtle_focus

    <?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<selector xmlns:android="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res/android">
    <item android:state_focused="true" android:drawable="@color/glass_focus"/>
    <item android:drawable="@color/glass_normal"/>
</selector>

glass_normal is #9000

glass_focus is #0000

Answer 1

Try increasing the maximum number of recycled views in the pool:

recyclerView.getRecycledViewPool().setMaxRecycledViews(50);

50 is an arbitrary number, you can try higher or lower and see what happens.

RecyclerView tries to avoid re-using views that have transient state, so if views are invalidated quickly or are animating, they may not be re-used right away.

Similarly if you have many smaller views, you may end up with more on screen than the default pool size can handle (more common with grid like layouts).

Answer 2

Picasso is holding you up but the suggested solution to build your own mechanism is not the way to go.

Picasso has fallen behind in the last year or so and today there are far better alternatives in the form of Google Glide and Facebook Fresco which specifically released updates to work better with RecyclerView and have proved faster and more efficient in loading, caching and storing in many tests which are available online such as:

• http://inthecheesefactory.com/blog/get-to-know-glide-recommended-by-google/en
• https://code.facebook.com/posts/366199913563917/introducing-fresco-a-new-image-library-for-android/

I hope that helped. Good luck.

Answer 3

As the commenters pointed out pending responses from Picasso might be holding you up. If that is the case, you can solve it by extending ImageView and overriding the following method. I think it is worth trying.

@Override
protected void onDetachedFromWindow() {
    Picasso.with(context).cancelRequest(this);
    super.onDetachedFromWindow();
}

Update:

Turns out this is not the correct way, anyone wanting to cancel requests should do so in the onViewRecycled() callback as pointed out in the comments below.

Answer 4

By digging deeper in Sam Judd's answer I forced recycler to recycle the views by implementing the followings in its adapter.

@Override
public boolean onFailedToRecycleView(@NonNull VH holder) 
      return true;
}

As you can see here:

Called by the RecyclerView if a ViewHolder created by this Adapter cannot be recycled due to its transient state. Upon receiving this callback, Adapter can clear the animation(s) that effect the View's transient state and return true so that the View can be recycled. Keep in mind that the View in question is already removed from the RecyclerView.

In some cases, it is acceptable to recycle a View although it has transient state. Most of the time, this is a case where the transient state will be cleared in onBindViewHolder(ViewHolder, int) call when View is rebound to a new position. For this reason, RecyclerView leaves the decision to the Adapter and uses the return value of this method to decide whether the View should be recycled or not.

Note that when all animations are created by RecyclerView.ItemAnimator, you should never receive this callback because RecyclerView keeps those Views as children until their animations are complete. This callback is useful when children of the item views create animations which may not be easy to implement using an RecyclerView.ItemAnimator.

You should never fix this issue by calling holder.itemView.setHasTransientState(false); unless you've previously called holder.itemView.setHasTransientState(true);. Each View.setHasTransientState(true) call must be matched by a View.setHasTransientState(false) call, otherwise, the state of the View may become inconsistent. You should always prefer to end or cancel animations that are triggering the transient state instead of handling it manually.

Answer 5

For anyone else looking for a quick hack, Do this. This will delay selection until it's been inflated and selected. I don't know how but it works. Just return null on onFocusSearchFailed.

 /**
 * Created by sylversphere on 15-04-22.
 */
public class SomeGridLayoutManager extends GridLayoutManager{

    private final Context context;

    public SomeGridLayoutManager(Context context, int spanCount) {
        super(context, spanCount);
        this.context = context;
    }

    public SomeGridLayoutManager(Context context, int spanCount, int orientation, boolean reverseLayout) {
        super(context, spanCount, orientation, reverseLayout);
        this.context = context;
    }

    @Override
    public View onFocusSearchFailed(View focused, int focusDirection, RecyclerView.Recycler recycler, RecyclerView.State state) {
        return null;
    }
}