Android: why is there no maxHeight for a View?

There is no way to set maxHeight. But you can set the Height.

To do that you will need to discovery the height of each item of you scrollView. After that just set your scrollView height to numberOfItens * heightOfItem.

To discovery the height of an item do that:

View item = adapter.getView(0, null, scrollView);
item.measure(0, 0);
int heightOfItem = item.getMeasuredHeight();

To set the height do that:

// if the scrollView already has a layoutParams:
scrollView.getLayoutParams().height = heightOfItem * numberOfItens;
// or
// if the layoutParams is null, then create a new one.
scrollView.setLayoutParams(new LayoutParams(LayoutParams.FILL_PARENT, heightOfItem * numberOfItens));

As we know devices running android can have different screen sizes. As we further know views should adjust dynamically and become the space which is appropriate.

If you set a max height you maybe force the view not to get enough space or take to less space. I know that sometimes it seems to be practically to set a max height. But if the resolution will ever change dramatically, and it will!, then the view, which has a max height, will look not appropriate.

i think there is no proper way to exactly do the layout you want. i would recommend you to think over your layout using layout managers and relative mechanisms. i don't know what you're trying to achieve but it sounds a little strange for me that a list should only show three items and then the user has to scroll.

btw. minHeight is not guaranteed (and maybe shouldn't exist either). it can have some benefit to force items to be visible while other relative items get smaller.