Placing/Overlapping(z-index) a view above another view in android

Question

I have a linear layout which consists of imageview and textview , one below another in a linear layout.

<LinearLayout android:orientation="horizontal" ... >
 <ImageView 
     android:id="@+id/thumbnail"
     android:layout_weight="0.8" 
     android:layout_width="0dip"
     android:layout_height="fill_parent">
 </ImageView>
 <TextView 
    android:id="@+id/description"
    android:layout_weight="0.2"
    android:layout_width="0dip"
    android:layout_height="wrap_content">
 </TextView>

Some rules might be missing , this is to give an idea , how layout looks. I want another small text view of say 50dip in length and width , placed over the imageview, by "over" I meant z-index more than imageview , I want to place this , in the center and above(overlapping) the imageview.

I want to know how can we place one view above the other, with varying z-index (preferably in linear layout) ?

Answer 1

You can't use a LinearLayout for this, but you can use a FrameLayout. In a FrameLayout, the z-index is defined by the order in which the items are added, for example:

<FrameLayout
    xmlns:android="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res/android"
    android:layout_width="match_parent"
    android:layout_height="wrap_content"
    >
    <ImageView
        android:layout_width="wrap_content"
        android:layout_height="wrap_content"
        android:src="@drawable/my_drawable"
        android:scaleType="fitCenter"
        />
    <TextView
        android:layout_width="wrap_content"
        android:layout_height="wrap_content"
        android:layout_gravity="bottom|center"
        android:padding="5dp"
        android:text="My Label"
        />
</FrameLayout>

In this instance, the TextView would be drawn on top of the ImageView, along the bottom center of the image.