How to customize android action bar in android 4.2?

Question

After searching a lot and testing solutions could not customize action bar. This post is really good but didn't help me. I'm wondering why doing this simple work is really hard in android.

I created a sample project with Basic Activity in Android Studio, API 17, and Android 4.2 and want to customize the action bar with a white background and dark text color, without changing "colorPrimary" in style.xml.

Below is my codes but didn't work, of course, I have tested other ways but didn't work, this is my latest test codes. Is it possible because of the API version?

This is in the color.xml:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<resources>
    <color name="colorPrimary">#028a58</color>
    <color name="colorPrimaryDark">#005c3a</color>
    <color name="colorAccent">#03DAC5</color>
     //I added these lines
    <color name="colorWhite">#FFFFFF</color>
    <color name="colorDark">#4E4E4E</color>
</resources>

In the style.xml:

<resources>
  <!-- Base application theme. -->
  <style name="AppTheme" parent="Theme.AppCompat.Light.DarkActionBar">
      <!-- Customize your theme here. -->
      <item name="colorPrimary">@color/colorPrimary</item>
       <item name="colorPrimaryDark">@color/colorPrimaryDark</item>
      <item name="colorAccent">@color/colorAccent</item>
      <item name="actionBarStyle">@style/MyActionBar</item>
 </style>
   <style name="AppTheme.NoActionBar">
      <item name="windowActionBar">false</item>
      <item name="windowNoTitle">true</item>
  </style>
  <style name="AppTheme.AppBarOverlay" parent="ThemeOverlay.AppCompat.Dark.ActionBar" />
  <style name="AppTheme.PopupOverlay" parent="ThemeOverlay.AppCompat.Light" />

  <style name="MyActionBar" parent="@style/Widget.AppCompat.Light.ActionBar.Solid.Inverse">
     <item name="android:background"  >@color/colorWhite</item>
     <item name="background">@color/colorWhite</item>
     <item name="android:textColor">@color/colorDark</item>
   </style>
</resources>

Updated:

activity_main.xml:

<androidx.coordinatorlayout.widget.CoordinatorLayout
 xmlns:android="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res/android"
 xmlns:app="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res-auto"
 xmlns:tools="http://schemas.android.com/tools"
 android:layout_width="match_parent"
 android:layout_height="match_parent"
 tools:context=".MainActivity">

 <com.google.android.material.appbar.AppBarLayout
     android:layout_height="wrap_content"
     android:layout_width="match_parent"
     android:theme="@style/AppTheme.AppBarOverlay">  

    <androidx.appcompat.widget.Toolbar
        android:id="@+id/toolbar"
        android:layout_width="match_parent"
        android:layout_height="?attr/actionBarSize"
        android:background="?attr/colorPrimary"
        app:popupTheme="@style/AppTheme.PopupOverlay" />

</com.google.android.material.appbar.AppBarLayout>

<include layout="@layout/content_main"/>

<com.google.android.material.floatingactionbutton.FloatingActionButton
    android:id="@+id/fab"
    android:layout_width="wrap_content"
    android:layout_height="wrap_content"
    android:layout_gravity="bottom|end"
    android:layout_margin="@dimen/fab_margin"
    app:srcCompat="@android:drawable/ic_dialog_email" />

</androidx.coordinatorlayout.widget.CoordinatorLayout>

Answer 1

Using an ActionBar you can use the actionBarStyle attribute in your app theme:

 <style name="AppTheme" parent="Theme.AppCompat.Light.DarkActionBar">
      <item name="actionBarStyle">@style/MyActionBar</item>
 </style>

  <style name="MyActionBar" parent="@style/Widget.AppCompat.Light.ActionBar.Solid.Inverse">
       <item name="background">@color/...</item>
  </style>

or the actionBarTheme attribute:

  <style name="AppTheme" parent="Theme.AppCompat.Light.DarkActionBar">
     <item name="actionBarTheme">@style/ThemeOverlay.ActionBar</item>
  </style>


  <style name="ThemeOverlay.ActionBar" parent="">
        <item name="colorPrimary">@color/....</item>
  </style>

Using a Toolbar you can use:

• the android:background attribute in the layout:

    <androidx.appcompat.widget.Toolbar
        android:background="@color/...."
        ... />

• override the default color using the android:theme attribute:

    <androidx.appcompat.widget.Toolbar
        android:theme="@style/ThemeOverlay.ActionBar"
        ... />