Android: Using JNI from NativeActivity

We are developing an OpenGL game on android using the NativeActivity class. So far everything went OK, but now we need to access some functionality that only seems to be available from Java.

There are more, but the first one we thought would be useful was accessing the display DPI. As described here the Java code looks like this:

DisplayMetrics metrics = new DisplayMetrics();
getWindowManager().getDefaultDisplay().getMetrics(metrics);

And here is the unfortunate corresponding C++ code:

// My checking routine.
#define JNI_ASSERT(jni, cond) { \
  if (!(cond)) {\
    std::stringstream ss; \
    ss << __FILE__ << ":" << __LINE__; \
    throw std::runtime_error(ss.str()); \
  } \
  if (jni->ExceptionCheck()) { \
    std::stringstream ss; \
    ss << __FILE__ << ":" << __LINE__; \
    throw std::runtime_error("Exception: " + ss.str()); \
  } \
}

void print_dpi(android_app* app) {
  JNIEnv* jni;
  app->activity->vm->AttachCurrentThread(&jni, NULL);

  jclass activityClass = jni->FindClass("android/app/NativeActivity");
  JNI_ASSERT(jni, activityClass);

  jmethodID getWindowManager = jni->GetMethodID
                                    ( activityClass
                                    , "getWindowManager"
                                    , "()Landroid/view/WindowManager;"); 
  JNI_ASSERT(jni, getWindowManager);

  jobject wm = jni->CallObjectMethod(app->activity->clazz, getWindowManager);
  JNI_ASSERT(jni, wm);

  jclass windowManagerClass = jni->FindClass("android/view/WindowManager");
  JNI_ASSERT(jni, windowManagerClass);

  jmethodID getDefaultDisplay = jni->GetMethodID( windowManagerClass
                                                , "getDefaultDisplay"
                                                , "()Landroid/view/Display;");
  JNI_ASSERT(jni, getDefaultDisplay);

  jobject display = jni->CallObjectMethod(wm, getDefaultDisplay);
  JNI_ASSERT(jni, display);

  jclass displayClass = jni->FindClass("android/view/Display");
  JNI_ASSERT(jni, displayClass);

  // Check if everything is OK so far, it is, the values it prints
  // are sensible.
  { 
    jmethodID getWidth = jni->GetMethodID(displayClass, "getWidth", "()I");
    JNI_ASSERT(jni, getWidth);

    jmethodID getHeight = jni->GetMethodID(displayClass, "getHeight", "()I");
    JNI_ASSERT(jni, getHeight);

    int width = jni->CallIntMethod(display, getWidth);
    JNI_ASSERT(jni, true);
    log("Width: ", width); // Width: 320

    int height = jni->CallIntMethod(display, getHeight);
    JNI_ASSERT(jni, true);
    log("Height: ", height); // Height: 480
  }

  jclass displayMetricsClass = jni->FindClass("android/util/DisplayMetrics");
  JNI_ASSERT(jni, displayMetricsClass);

  jmethodID displayMetricsConstructor = jni->GetMethodID( displayMetricsClass
                                                        , "<init>", "()V");
  JNI_ASSERT(jni, displayMetricsConstructor);

  jobject displayMetrics = jni->NewObject( displayMetricsClass
                                         , displayMetricsConstructor);
  JNI_ASSERT(jni, displayMetrics);

  jmethodID getMetrics = jni->GetMethodID( displayClass
                                         , "getMetrics"
                                         , "(Landroid/util/DisplayMetrics;)V");
  JNI_ASSERT(jni, getMetrics);

  jni->CallVoidMethod(display, getMetrics, displayMetrics);
  JNI_ASSERT(jni, true);

  {
    jfieldID xdpi_id = jni->GetFieldID(displayMetricsClass, "xdpi", "F");
    JNI_ASSERT(jni, xdpi_id);

    float xdpi = jni->GetFloatField(displayMetricsClass, xdpi_id);
    JNI_ASSERT(jni, true);

    log("XDPI: ", xdpi); // XDPI: 0
  }

  {
    jfieldID height_id = jni->GetFieldID( displayMetricsClass
                                        , "heightPixels", "I");
    JNI_ASSERT(jni, height_id);

    int height = jni->GetIntField(displayMetricsClass, height_id);
    JNI_ASSERT(jni, true);

    log("Height: ", height); // Height: 0
  }
  // TODO: Delete objects here.
  app->activity->vm->DetachCurrentThread();
}

The code outputs:

Width: 320
Height: 480
XDPI: 0
Height: 0

It's as if the displayMetrics object did not get set in the call

jni->CallVoidMethod(display, getMetrics, displayMetrics);

Is it the case that JNI wouldn't allow me to use an argument as a return value? If so, how can we go around it given that we're using the NativeActivity glue.