How to get text color for current theme in android?

Question

I am trying to retrieve text color in my Java code

    TypedValue typedValue = new TypedValue();
    context.getTheme().resolveAttribute(android.R.attr.textColor, typedValue, true);
    int color = typedValue.data;

Taking reference of this and this questions.

But all the time I get 1637 but when I set it on textview Shader textView.getPaint().setShader(Gradient...) this color appears transparent.

How to solve this?

score 1 · Answer 1 · answered Mar 11 '20 at 23:26

We are used to seeing colors represented in hex form, like #RRGGBB or #AARRGGBB. However, these hex codes are just numbers, and you're seeing the decimal representation of your color value.

If you use Color.valueOf() on the output, you should be able to get more information about the color in a manner you expect. For me, I wanted to look at the value of ?colorAccent, so I wrote this:

val typedValue = TypedValue()
theme.resolveAttribute(R.attr.colorAccent, typedValue, true)
val color = Color.valueOf(typedValue.data)
println(color)

And this is the output:

Color(0.84705883, 0.105882354, 0.3764706, 1.0, sRGB IEC61966-2.1)

That's telling me that my color is 84.7% red, 10.6% green, 37.6% blue with 100% opacity. I can also use a quick extension method to get the hex value:

private fun Color.toHexString(): String =
    String.format("#%08X", toArgb())

This gives me the hex string #FFD81B60, which matches what I see in my colors file (though I specified it without an alpha channel).

If I run my code with your output (1637), I get this:

Color(0.0, 0.023529412, 0.39607844, 0.0, sRGB IEC61966-2.1)

(#00000665)

This is telling me that your color is 0% red, 2.4% green, and 39.6% blue... but also that it is 0% opaque. This matches the fact that you see this color as transparent when you use it in a shader.

You don't need to actually use `Color.valueOf()` in your production app. It was meant to help illustrate the issue. — Ben P., Mar 12 '20 at 03:58
His answer solves the issue and even explains it, why don't you give it the check mark? — einUsername, Mar 12 '20 at 09:29
No it doesn't solve the issue. The problem and answer is explained in my answer. Also my answer is not complete. It only says that need to use String color, but does not explain how to get color when reference is used insted of hex color, e.g. @android:color/white — Mayank Kumar Chaudhari, Mar 13 '20 at 08:31
Can you help with this - https://stackoverflow.com/q/60667113/9640177 — Mayank Kumar Chaudhari, Mar 13 '20 at 08:31

einUsername · Answer 2 · 2020-03-11T23:35:24.273

If i run your code i get a different value back each time i change the color in my styles file. Examples:

-15658735 for hexcolor #111111

-16777216 for hexcolor #000000

-1 for hexcolor #ffffff

So it is working but i don't know how that color is being 'formatted'. Maybe it is just some kind of reference to the styles value which contains the actual color code. If i run your code like this it does change the text color the way it should.

TypedValue typedValue = new TypedValue();
getTheme().resolveAttribute(android.R.attr.colorAccent, typedValue, true);
int color = typedValue.data;
TextView textView = findViewById(R.id.textView);
textView.setTextColor(color);

How to get text color for current theme in android?

2 Answers2