Avoiding NullReferenceException with RecyclerView

Question

When using RecyclerView, the recycling feature is constantly causing methods such as FindViewHolderForAdapterPosition to return null, causing a NullReferenceException. This occurs in almost every scenario that involves more items than fit on screen (which is almost always, and it is the reason for having the recycling feature), and I cannot find a simple solution to avoid it. I need users to be able to scroll the RecyclerView, and sometimes I need to scroll it programmatically. Many of my scenarios involve editing and/or navigating data that is saved in collections & arrays and accessed by index, so I am often scrolling to items that are most likely already recycled. How can I easily access not currently visible items by index and/or know how & when to wait for them?

Answer 1

Hello,

Welcome to our Microsoft Q&A platform!

Many of my scenarios involve editing and/or navigating data that is saved in collections & arrays and accessed by index
How can I easily access not currently visible items by index and/or know how & when to wait for them?

We can only edit or navigate the item on the UI when the item is visible. Of cource, we can also edit the data in code-behind and call the following code in your RecyclerView.Adapter to update the UI once the item is visible.

          NotifyDataSetChanged();  

For example, we can edit the datalist filled into the RecyclerView in our activity like this:

    private void updateData() {  
        Photo item = datalist[0]; // loadBranch is my datalist Photo  is my model of data list  
        item.mCaption = "updated value";  // mCaption  is a field of my item  
        mAdapter.UpDateData(datalist );//mAdapter is my RecyclerView's adapter     
    }  

method UpDateData is a method of my RecyclerView.Adapter

    public class PhotoAlbumAdapter: RecyclerView.Adapter  
    {  
        public  List<Photo> mPhotoAlbum = new List<Photo>();  
  
        public  RecyclerView.Adapter adapter;  
  
        public PhotoAlbumAdapter(List<Photo> branchesList)  
        {  
            adapter = this;  
            mPhotoAlbum = branchesList;  
        }  
  
        public override void OnViewRecycled(Java.Lang.Object holder)  
        {  
            base.OnViewRecycled(holder);  
  
            PhotoViewHolder holder1 = holder as PhotoViewHolder;  
  
        }  
  
        public void UpDateData(List<Photo> temp)  
        {  
            mPhotoAlbum = temp;  
            NotifyDataSetChanged();  
        }  
  
   // other code  
   }  

Best Regards,

Jessie Zhang

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