android: how to use getApplication and getApplicationContext from non activity / service class

The getApplication() method is located in the Activity class, that's why you can't access it from your helper class.

If you really need to access your application context from your helper, you should hold a reference to the activity's context and pass it on invocation to the helper.

The getApplication() method is located in the Activity class, so whenever you want getApplication() in a non activity class you have to pass an Activity instance to the constructor of that non activity class.

assume that test is my non activity class:

Test test = new Test(this);

In that class i have created one constructor:

 public Class Test
 {
    public Activity activity;
    public Test (Activity act)
    {
         this.activity = act;
         // Now here you can get getApplication()
    }
 }

Casting a Context object to an Activity object compiles fine.

Try this:

((Activity) mContext).getApplication(...)