Broadcast receiver lifecycle in android application

Broadcast receiver lifecycle in android application
A broadcast receiver has single callback method:

void onReceive(Context curContext, Intent broadcastMsg)

When a broadcast message arrives for the receiver, Android calls its onReceive() method and passes it the Intent object containing the message. The broadcast receiver is considered to be active only while it is executing this method. When onReceive() returns, it is inactive.

A process with an active broadcast receiver is protected from being killed. But a process with only inactive components can be killed by the system at any time, when the memory it consumes is needed by other processes.

This presents a problem when the response to a broadcast message is time consuming and, therefore, something that should be done in a separate thread, away from the main thread where other components of the user interface run. If onReceive() spawns the thread and then returns, the entire process, including the new thread, is judged to be inactive (unless other application components are active in the process), putting it in jeopardy of being killed. The solution to this problem is for onReceive() to start a service and let the service do the job, so the system knows that there is still active work being done in the process.