The statement below was copied from an android tutorial on google's android page.

Typically you would implement this using a ContentProvider, and in fact the full Notepad application included with the SDK (in the samples/ directory) does implement such a ContentProvider. However, there is no reason you can't just use your own SQLite database directly as we do here

My question is, what is the differences between using the built in contentprovider and using a sqllite database? If I use a content provider, can I move my data from phone to phone, like I could if i had a sqllite db?

thanks for shedding some light on the subject!

Hello Scionwest,

A content provider is only required if you need to share data between multiple applications. For example, the contacts data is used by multiple applications and must be stored in a content provider. If you don't need to share data amongst multiple applications you can use a database directly via SQLiteDatabase.

Moving data from phone to phone is probably a bit easier if you use a SQLiteDatabase.

Regards,
plusminus

Thanks! Something else I was curious about, is the contacts info something already setup by Android in it's content provider? or will I need to create the information myself in a fresh installation of Android?

Hello scionwest,

Contactlist is empty on emulator-default.

Regards,
plusminus

plusminus wrote:Moving data from phone to phone is probably a bit easier if you use a SQLiteDatabase.

I disagree.. Lets say you make an app to send 'notes' (like in the notepad tut) around. Someday you then plan to update the sqldatabase, like you add another field in your table. Two different phones using two different tables will be hard to synchronise. However having a contentprovider, its rather easy: ignore fields that you don't know and fill in missing fields. Do-able with projections. Hard with sql queries. Besides, writing a simple contentprovider isn't that hard.. Copy&paste the notepad contentprovider and change every String you find.

Ishtar

Hello Ishtar,

I was thinking of the 'manual' copying of the database-file to another phone.

Regards,
plusminus

Ah, i see. But that doesn't really make a difference , with a content provider you can still copy the database file around. But sure, its save you time not writing a content provider

Ishtar

Hey there

I am trying to access the database in my free version of the app from the paid for version. So that when/if a user upgrades, they won't lose their data.

Is a ContentProvider the best way to do this (it will only need to be done once, so I don't really need to 'share' the data)? Or is there a better more efficient way of copy a database?

Any help on this is most appreciated!

Thanks,
Neil

There is a way around that which applies to your case.
Read http://developer.android.com/guide/topics/security/security.html .. i just ran over it but i think by signing the non paid and the paid app with the same signature and with appropriate use of the "sharedUserId" tag in the manifest you can achieve exactly what you are looking for.

I have managed to get a connection to the 'lite' database.

http://www.anddev.org/viewtopic.php?p=27932#27932

But am now stuck on migrating the data over? Any ideas?