Action Bar Sherlock doesn't keep transparency when orientation is changed from portrait to landscape
<p>I'm using Android Sherlock in one project where I show a VideoView. When the screen orientation is portrait, the video and some text is shown. When is landscape, only the video in fullscreen is shown.</p>

<p>Well, my doubt is: why the alpha color (of the Sherlock Action Bar) is shown when the orientation is portrait, but changes it's alpha property (becames opaque) when the orientation is landscape?</p>

<p>My onCreate() is showed below:</p>

<pre><code>public void onCreate(Bundle savedInstanceState) {
    // Makes action bar become translucent, and sets layout of this activity.
    requestWindowFeature(Window.FEATURE_ACTION_BAR_OVERLAY);
    super.onCreate(savedInstanceState);
    setContentView(R.layout.activity_video);
}
</code></pre>

<p>Well, I'm using <strong>requestWindowFeature(Window.FEATURE_ACTION_BAR_OVERLAY)</strong>, which allows the alpha color in the action bar. </p>

<p>When the orientation changes, I call onConfigurationChanged(), which calls setScreenLayout(). This method sets the video size and change the action bar background color.</p>

<pre><code>/**
 * Sets the screen layout, according with the current orientation.
 * 
 * @param isInLandscapeMode
 */
public void setScreenLayout(Boolean isInLandscapeMode) {
    // If orientation is landscape.
    if (isInLandscapeMode) {
        // Hides text of the layout.
        mTextScrollView.setVisibility(View.GONE);
        // Set the size of the video.
        setVideoDimensions((int)Math.floor(mWindowWidth * (1 / WIDESCREEN_RATIO)), mWindowWidth);
        // Sets window to full screen.
        setWindowToFullScreen();
        // Sets action bar background color.
        getSupportActionBar().setBackgroundDrawable(getResources().getDrawable(R.color.bg_translucent_black));
    }
    // If orientation is portrait.
    else {
        // Shows text of the layout.
        mTextScrollView.setVisibility(View.VISIBLE);
        // Set the size of the video.
        setVideoDimensions(mWindowWidth, (int)Math.floor(mWindowWidth * WIDESCREEN_RATIO));
        // Sets window to normal screen.
        setWindowToNormalScreen();
        // Sets action bar background color.
        getSupportActionBar().setBackgroundDrawable(getResources().getDrawable(R.color.bg_translucent_black));
    }
}
</code></pre>

<p>This color is set in res/colors.xml:</p>

<pre><code>&lt;?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?&gt;
&lt;resources&gt;
    &lt;color name="bg_translucent_black"&gt;#11EEEEEE&lt;/color&gt;
&lt;/resources&gt;
</code></pre>

<p>In my AndroidManifest.xml, I set the VideoActivity with the <strong>android:configChanges="orientation"</strong> property, which allows the video to continue playing if the orientation is changed.</p>

<pre><code>&lt;!-- Video Activity --&gt;
&lt;activity 
    android:name=".VideoActivity" 
    android:label="@string/app_name"
    android:screenOrientation="portrait"
    android:configChanges="orientation"
/&gt;
</code></pre>

<p>Therefore, when the orientation is changed, the onCreate() isn't call.</p>

<p>I think what is happening is that the <strong>requestWindowFeature(Window.FEATURE_ACTION_BAR_OVERLAY)</strong> allows the alpha only in the first orientation when the activity is created (in this case, in portrait). This way, the landscape orientation doesn't became alpha color. But I'm not sure.</p>

<p>What I'm sure is that I need the alpha color of the action bar in both orientations.</p>

<p>Anybody knows if is possible for my video to have alpha color in both orientations?</p>
