Is there a way to add a badge to an application icon in Android?

Q：

On the iPhone, you can add a numbered badge to the application icon. I want to do this for Android as well. I don't want to use the notification bar, as it's not something that needs to be notified instantly. Instead, I just want the user to be able to see how many new messages are in the application just by looking at the application icon.

A：

Unfortunately, Android does not allow changing of the application icon because it's sealed in the APK once the program is compiled. There is no way to programmatically change it to a 'drawable'.

You may achieve your goal by using a widget instead of an icon. Widgets are highly customisable and can do what you want.

There's a short discussion about the difference between iPhone icon notification and using widgets here:

http://www.cnet.com/8301-19736_1-10278814-251.html

As you'll notice, there is virtually no difference between using a widget or an icon, since they can be the same size and look the same.