Creating Applications with Content Sharing

If you want to create applications that offer content sharing features to the user, Tizen provides various options for you.

You can share various types of content (text, binaries, and files) between applications on the same device using the application control features, which allow you to use features in other applications, or advertise your own features and allow others to use them. In addition, you can exchange simple NDEF messages (such as business cards) wirelessly with closely coupled devices using a Near Field Communication (NFC) P2P connection.

When creating a content sharing application, you can implement the following features:

  • Sending content to other applications
    • You can send text to other applications. For example, a browser application can share the URL of a recently visited site with a messenger or email application.
    • You can share single or multiple binary items with other applications.
    • You can share files with other applications. For example, you can send an image file to a viewer application to allow the user to see it.
  • Receiving content from other applications
    • To allow other applications to find and use your application features (such as share various data with you), you must advertise your available features by exporting them as application controls.
    • When another application sends content to you, your application is automatically launched, and you must handle the incoming data using the application control callback.
    • If the incoming request contains extra data, you must read it and react to it appropriately.
  • Sharing through NFC
    • To share data with other devices, you must first ensure that the device supports NFC and then initialize the NFC feature.
    • You can send and receive simple NDEF messages through the NFC P2P connection.

To share content through application controls, you must use the App Control API (in mobile and wearable applications). Application controls are a way of sharing an application’s functionality in Tizen. The App Control API provides functions for launching other applications with a specific operation, URI, MIME type, and extra data, and for settings and getting the details:

  • The mandatory operation information defines the action to be performed.
  • The URI and MIME type contain information about the content to be handled.
  • The extra data consists of key-value pairs, which provide additional information for the operation.

By specifying a proper operation with the content information, your application can share the content with other applications. On the other hand, to allow other applications to find and launch your application, you can advertise your application features by declaring your application control information in the tizen-manifest.xml file.

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