Android Service 要点总结

一、android:process属性

最近在研究Android后台长期运行Service，当服务被杀死后能立即Restart，于是乎又去查阅了一下developer文档，查阅过程中发现了android:process 这一属性，之前在使用百度定位SDK的时候发现它的定位服务指定了android:process=“:remote”，但也没深究，今天在这里总结一下。详细介绍请移步：http://developer.android.com/guide/topics/manifest/service-element.html

android:process
The name of the process where the service is to run. Normally, all components of an application run in the default process created for the application. It has the same name as the application package. The <application> element's process attribute can set a different default for all components. But component can override the default with its own process attribute, allowing you to spread your application across multiple processes.
If the name assigned to this attribute begins with a colon (':'), a new process, private to the application, is created when it's needed and the service runs in that process. If the process name begins with a lowercase character, the service will run in a global process of that name, provided that it has permission to do so. This allows components in different applications to share a process, reducing resource usage.

通过android:process 我们可以指定Service运行进程的名称。这样做有什么好处呢？

在编写Android应用程序时，我们一般将一些计算型的逻辑放在一个独立的进程来处理，它拥有自己独立的内存空间，这样主进程仍然可以流畅地响应界面事件，提高用户体验。Android系统为我们提供了一个Service类，我们可以实现一个以Service为基类的服务子类，在里面实现自己的计算型逻辑，然后在主进程通过startService函数来启动这个服务。

二、onStartCommand 方法

如果使用startService()启动service，系统将通过传入的Intent在底层搜索相关符合Intent里面信息的service。如果服务没有启动则先运行onCreate，然后运行onStartCommand （可在里面处理启动时传过来的Intent和其他参数），直到明显调用stopService或者stopSelf才将停止Service。无论运行startService多少次，只要调用一次stopService或者stopSelf，Service都会停止。使用stopSelf(int)方法可以保证在处理好intent后再停止。

onStartCommand 的原型为 public int onStartCommand(Intent intent, int flags, int startId) ，在2.0后被引入用于service的启动函数，2.0之前为public void onStart(Intent intent, int startId) 。
这里onStartCommand 函数返回一个整形值：
1、START_STICKY
2、START_NOT_STICKY
3、START_REDELIVER_INTENT

对于START_STICKY的解释：
Constant to return from onStartCommand(Intent, int, int): if this service's process is killed while it is started (after returning from onStartCommand(Intent, int, int)), then leave it in the started state but don't retain this delivered intent. Later the system will try to re-create the service. Because it is in the started state, it will guarantee to call onStartCommand(Intent, int, int) after creating the new service instance; if there are not any pending start commands to be delivered to the service, it will be called with a null intent object, so you must take care to check for this.

在运行onStartCommand后service进程被kill后，那将保留在开始状态，但是不保留那些传入的intent。不久后service就会再次尝试重新创建，因为保留在开始状态，在创建     service后将保证调用onstartCommand。如果没有传递任何开始命令给service，那将获取到null的intent。

对于START_NOT_STICKY的解释：
Constant to return from onStartCommand(Intent, int, int): if this service's process is killed while it is started (after returning from onStartCommand(Intent, int, int)), and there are no new start intents to deliver to it, then take the service out of the started state and don't recreate until a future explicit call to Context.startService(Intent). The service will not receive a onStartCommand(Intent, int, int) call with a null Intent because it will not be re-started if there are no pending Intents to deliver.

在运行onStartCommand后service进程被kill后，并且没有新的intent传递给它。Service将移出开始状态，并且直到新的明显的方法（startService）调用才重新创建。因为如果没有传递任何未决定的intent那么service是不会启动，也就是期间onstartCommand不会接收到任何null的intent。


对于START_REDELIVER_INTENT的解释：
Constant to return from onStartCommand(Intent, int, int): if this service's process is killed while it is started (after returning from onStartCommand(Intent, int, int)), then it will be scheduled for a restart and the last delivered Intent re-delivered to it again via onStartCommand(Intent, int, int). This Intent will remain scheduled for redelivery until the service calls stopSelf(int) with the start ID provided to onStartCommand(Intent, int, int). The service will not receive a onStartCommand(Intent, int, int) call with a null Intent because it will will only be re-started if it is not finished processing all Intents sent to it (and any such pending events will be delivered at the point of restart).
在运行onStartCommand后service进程被kill后，系统将会再次启动service，并传入最后一个intent给onstartCommand。直到调用stopSelf(int)才停止传递intent。如果在被kill后还有未处理好的intent，那被kill后服务还是会自动启动。因此onstartCommand不会接收到任何null的intent。

要想让Service 被Kill后能立即Restart，只需要在 onStartCommand方法中返回START_STICKY即可。

三、AIDL

在Android中, 每个应用程序都有自己的进程，当需要在不同的进程之间传递对象时，该如何实现呢? 显然, Java中是不支持跨进程内存共享的。因此要传递对象, 需要把对象解析成操作系统能够理解的数据格式, 以达到跨界对象访问的目的。在JavaEE中，采用RMI通过序列化传递对象。在Android中, 则采用AIDL(Android Interface Definition Language：接口定义语言)方式实现。

AIDL是一种接口定义语言，用于约束两个进程间的通讯规则，供编译器生成代码，实现Android设备上的两个进程间通信(IPC)。AIDL的IPC机制和EJB所采用的CORBA很类似，进程之间的通信信息，首先会被转换成AIDL协议消息，然后发送给对方，对方收到AIDL协议消息后再转换成相应的对象。由于进程之间的通信信息需要双向转换，所以android采用代理类在背后实现了信息的双向转换，代理类由android编译器生成，对开发人员来说是透明的。AIDL的IPC的机制和COM或CORBA类似, 是基于接口的，但它是轻量级的。

关于AIDL的使用可以参考http://developer.android.com/guide/components/aidl.html