I am coming from iOS and working to port an iOS app on android. In iOS there is the storyboard where you can connect different view (activities) and embed them into tab bars and navigation bars. I am having an issue to understand what is the best way to implement bottom navigation in android...
Let say I have 3 bottom navigation items with the following
tab1
tab2
tab3
As an example in tab1 I have page1.1. Then let say I have a button in page1.1 which bring me in page1.2. If I go back from page1.2 I want to go back to page1.1. Same story for page2.1, I can go to page 2.2 and from page2.2 I can go to page2.3. I also want to go from page3.2 to page 1.2
I have read fragments are the best way to do it (each page.x is to become a different fragment with a different layout) but it does not seem very easy. I have also read I can use activities but many suggest not to use it
What do you recommend that I focus on? Are there any other solution to consider on top of fragment and activities? Thanks
You should use Fragments with a Single Activity. If you don't, you will have to copy/include one bottom bar in multiple Activities. It might be useful in some cases however when Activity is switched, your bar will redraw which might turn out to be a bad user experience.
I have read fragments are the best way to do it (each page.x is to become a different fragment with a different layout) but it does not seem very easy
Using Fragments might actually make it easier than if you use Activities. If you use Fragments, you can have one Activity be in control of every fragment that is being displayed, meaning that you can control navigation based on which fragment is being shown. This way, you can handle some special scenarios that do not fall into usual navigation behavior. Doing the same in Activities would be a little more difficult since you'd have to continuously pass around data in Intents and it would be difficult to control the behavior since your logic will be spread across Activities.
What do you recommend that I focus on? Are there any other solution to consider on top of fragment and activities?
These two are only recommended solutions. If some of your UI elements are same in all pages while some part of it is changed constantly, then its best to use Fragments with single Activity. For screens that are completely different or that are not part of your navigation flow, you add more Activities for them instead of Fragments.
For example, You can use Fragments in One Activity with Bottom Navigation Bar, but for settings screen or profile screen, you should make separate Activites.