 <blockquote> <p>so my question is, can I directly edit the string resources from the xml file?</p> </blockquote> <p>No, you can't change <code>resources</code> at runtime. But your code seems kind of goofy. This is all going to run when the <code>Activity</code> starts up. So, you can check the message then just set it in your <code>TextView</code> of the layout.</p> <pre><code>protected void onCreate(Bundle savedInstanceState) { super.onCreate(savedInstanceState); setContentView(R.layout.activity_display_message); TextView textView (textView) findViewById(R.id.textView); Intent intent = getIntent(); String message = intent.getStringExtra(MyActivity.EXTRA_MESSAGE); textView.setText(message); } </code></pre> <p>simply create a <code>TextView</code> inside of <code>activity_display_message.xml</code> (here called <code>textView</code>) then set the text with the <code>message</code> variable.</p> <p>Also, it is often a good idea to do some error checking such as </p> <pre><code>if (intent !== null &amp;&amp; intent.getStringExtra(MyActivity.EXTRA_MESSAGE != null) { // do your stuff here } </code></pre> <p>or however you want to go about that.</p> <h2> Storing...</h2> <p>You could store that value in a persistent value such as <code>SharedPreferences</code>, a file, db, etc... if you are wanting to use it later.</p> <p>You can read more about that <a href="http://developer.android.com/guide/topics/data/data-storage.html" rel="nofollow">here in the docs</a></p>