Programmatically update widget from activity/service/receiver

So to update an widget from an activity, you can do it like this:

Intent intent = new Intent(this, DppWidget.class);
intent.setAction("android.appwidget.action.APPWIDGET_UPDATE");
int ids[] = AppWidgetManager.getInstance(getApplication()).getAppWidgetIds(new ComponentName(getApplication(), DppWidget.class));
intent.putExtra(AppWidgetManager.EXTRA_APPWIDGET_IDS,ids);
sendBroadcast(intent);

Works for me :)

If you are using an AppWidgetProvider, you can update it this way:

Intent intent = new Intent(this, MyAppWidgetProvider.class);
intent.setAction(AppWidgetManager.ACTION_APPWIDGET_UPDATE);
// Use an array and EXTRA_APPWIDGET_IDS instead of AppWidgetManager.EXTRA_APPWIDGET_ID,
// since it seems the onUpdate() is only fired on that:
 int[] ids = AppWidgetManager.getInstance(getApplication())
    .getAppWidgetI‌​ds(new ComponentName(getApplication(), MyAppWidgetProvider.class));
intent.putExtra(AppWidgetManager.EXTRA_APPWIDGET_IDS, ids);
sendBroadcast(intent);

This helped when I searched on how to update a widget from a service/or action (but may be possible from every Context):

Context context = this;
AppWidgetManager appWidgetManager = AppWidgetManager.getInstance(context);
RemoteViews remoteViews = new RemoteViews(context.getPackageName(), R.layout.widget_2x1);
ComponentName thisWidget = new ComponentName(context, MyWidget.class);
remoteViews.setTextViewText(R.id.my_text_view, "myText" + System.currentTimeMillis());
appWidgetManager.updateAppWidget(thisWidget, remoteViews);