How can I disable/enable UISearchBar keyboard's Search button? - iphone

I am using UISearchBar in my code. I have imported its delegate in header file and implemented some delegate methods in implementation file also.
When we tap on the UISearchBar, a keyboard will appear to enter text. The return key of the keyboard is "Search" button. It will disabled by default. When we enter a character, It will get enabled. (Am I right?)
Here the problem comes.. I want to enable the UISearchBar keyboard's return key when the user types atleast two letters.
Is it possible? If yes, how can we do it?
Thanks

You can't disable the search button. What you can do is use the UISearchBarDelegate methods to figure out if you should take action on the search button being clicked, like so:
- (void)searchBarSearchButtonClicked:(UISearchBar *)searchBar {
if (searchBar.text.length < 2) {
return;
}
else {
// Do search stuff here
}
}
The Apple Documentation for this is very useful as well, and is a great starting point for customizing the searchBar's behavior.

Short answer is no...
Longer, hackier and more exotic one is here:
How to disable/enable the return key in a UITextField?

You can do it by accessing UISearchBar property.
let textFieldInsideSearchBar = searchBar.value(forKey: "searchField") as? UITextField
textFieldInsideSearchBar?.enablesReturnKeyAutomatically = false
By playing with enablesReturnKeyAutomatically property you can achieve your requirements.
Thanks.

This is how i do it:
if([searchbar.text length] == 0) {
[searchBar performSelector: #selector(resignFirstResponder)
withObject: nil
afterDelay: 0.1];
}

You can try this,
- (void)filterContentForSearchText:(NSString*)searchText scope:(NSString*)scope{
if (searchText.length>=2) {
[Main_SearchBar resignFirstResponder];
// Do your code here
}
}

Here is the setting you're looking for:
searchBar.enablesReturnKeyAutomatically = true

You can try this
if([self.searchBar.text length] > 2)
{
[self.searchBar resignFirstResponder];
}

Related

Hide IOS keyboard with multiple textFields

I have 2 textFields side by side, countryCodeTextField and cellphoneTextField
On countryCodeTextField. I have an action selectCountry that happens on Edit Did Begin on the countryCodeTextField
- (IBAction)selectCountry:(id)sender {
countryCodeTextField.delegate = self;
[countryCodeTextField resignFirstResponder];
Note that self implements the <UITextFieldDelegate>.
Problem is when user click's cellphone the keyboard is displayed if he clicks on countryCodeTextField the keyboard is never dismissed.
If the person clicks the countryCode first then the keyboard never appears(which is what I want).
Why isn't the keyboard hidden when the user clicks cellphoneTextField first and then countryCodeTextField?
If you don't want the user to be able to edit a particular UITextField, set it to not be enabled.
UITextField *textField = ... // Allocated somehow
textfield.enabled = NO
Or just check the enabled checkbox in Interface Builder. Then the textfield will still be there and you'll be able to update it by configuring the text. But as sort of mentioned in comments, users expect UITextFields to be editable.
Also, why are you setting the delegate in the IBAction callback? I would think you'd be better off doing this in Interface Builder or when you create the UITextField in code.
EDIT:
Ok - so you want users to be able to select the box, but then bring up a custom subview(s) from which they select something which will fill the box.
So set the UITextField delegate when you create it (as mentioned above) and implement the following from the UITextFieldDelegate protocol:
- (BOOL)textFieldShouldBeginEditing:(UITextField *)textField {
return NO;
}
to return NO. Note that if you are using the same delegate for both of your UITextFields, you will need to make this method return YES for the other field. For example, something like:
- (BOOL)textFieldShouldBeginEditing:(UITextField *)textField {
if (textField == countryTextField)
return NO;
return YES;
}
Hopefully this should stop the keyboard being displayed - and now you have to work out how to fire your own subviews, which I'd suggest doing via an IBAction (touch up or something perhaps). You'll have to test various things out here, but remember you're kinda corrupting the point of UITextField and maybe it'll work and maybe it won't, and maybe it'll break in the next iOS upgrade.
Okay, so first, I think you shouldn't be using a UITextField. I think you should be using a UIButton and have the current value showing as the button's title. However, if you have your heart set on it, I would use our good friend inputView, a property on UITextField, and set that to your custom input view (which I assume is a UIPickerView or similar.)
This has the added bonus of not breaking your app horribly for blind and visually impaired users, something you should probably be aware of before you go messing about with standard behaviour.
In your method :
- (IBAction)textFieldDidBeginEditing: (UITextField *)textField
call this :
[textField becomeFirstResponder];
and apply checks for the two fields i.e., when textField is the countryCodeTextField write :
[textField resignFirstResponder];
and call your method :
[self selectCountry];
In this method display the list of country codes.
So Your code will be :
- (BOOL)textFieldShouldBeginEditing:(UITextField *)textField {
return YES;
}
- (IBAction)textFieldDidBeginEditing: (UITextField *)textField{
[textField becomeFirstResponder];
if (textField == countryCodeTextField){
[textField resignFirstResponder];
[self selectCountry];
}
}
-(IBAction)selectCountry{
//display the list no need to do anything with the textfield.Only set text of TextField as the selected countrycode.
}

Add 'Done' and 'New line' buttons on keyboard in iPhone application

I have created a window based application with a UITabbarController as the RootViewController.
In one of the tabs, i have provided UITextField and UITextView.
I want to provide two buttons on the keyboard itself:
Done - which will hide the keyboard.
Enter - for new line.
Please post your answer if anybody has some idea how to do it.
For the UITextField you can change the return key to a done key by setting the following:
targetTextField.returnKeyType = UIReturnKeyDone;
However, you won't be able to have a Enter and Done key at the same time without custom addition of views to the keyboard.
Also, to control the done behavior of the keyboard you have to implement a UITextFieldDelegate method:
targetTextField.delegate = self;
- (BOOL)textFieldShouldReturn:(UITextField *)textField{
return YES; //dismisses the keyboard
}
I know you can set the returnKeyType for a UITextView but I'm not sure if you can manipulate the return key behavior.
You have a tutorial on how add subviews to the iPhone keyboard here :
http://www.iphonedevsdk.com/forum/iphone-sdk-tutorials/7350-adding-subviews-custimize-keyboard.html
Hope this helps,
Vincent
For some reason return YES; didn't work on its own. that worked for me :
- (BOOL)textFieldShouldReturn:(UITextField *)textField {
if (textField.returnKeyType == UIReturnKeyNext) {
NSInteger nextTag = textField.tag + 1;
// Try to find next responder
UIResponder* nextResponder = [textField.superview viewWithTag:nextTag];
if (nextResponder) {
// Found next responder, so set it.
[nextResponder becomeFirstResponder];
}
}
if (textField.returnKeyType == UIReturnKeyDone) {
[textField resignFirstResponder];
}
return YES; //dismisses the keyboard
}

Simulate Tab Key Press in iOS SDK

When a hardware keyboard is used with iOS, pressing tab or shift-tab automatically navigates to the next or previous logical responder, respectively. Is there a way to do the same programmatically (i.e. simulating the tab key rather than keeping track of the logical order manually)?
As William Niu is right but you can also use this code explained below.
I have used this and got success.Now consider the example of UITextField...
You can use UITextView's delegate method -(BOOL)textFieldShouldReturn:(UITextField*)textField as explained below.
But before doing this you should have to give tag to each UITextField in an Increment order...(Increment order is not required necessary ,but as for my code it is required, you can also use decrement order but some code changes for doing this)
- (BOOL)textFieldShouldReturn:(UITextField *)textField {
NSInteger nextTag = textField.tag + 1;
UIResponder* nextResponder = [self.view viewWithTag:nextTag];
if (nextResponder) {
[nextResponder becomeFirstResponder];
} else {
[textField resignFirstResponder];
}
return YES;
}
Hope this will work for you...
Happy coding....
You may define the "tab-order" using the tag property. The following post describes how to find the next tag index to go to for UITextFields,
How to navigate through textfields (Next / Done Buttons).
Here is a modified version of the code from that post. Instead of removing keyboard at the last tag index, this following code would try to loop back to the first tag index.
-(BOOL)textFieldShouldReturn:(UITextField*)textField;
{
NSInteger nextTag = textField.tag + 1;
// Try to find next responder
UIResponder* nextResponder = [textField.superview viewWithTag:nextTag];
if (nextResponder) {
// Found next responder, so set it.
[nextResponder becomeFirstResponder];
return NO;
}
// Try to find the first responder instead...
// Assuming the first tag index is 1
UIResponder* firstResponder = [textField.superview viewWithTag:1];
if (firstResponder) {
// loop back to the first responder
[firstResponder becomeFirstResponder];
} else {
// Not found, so remove keyboard.
[textField resignFirstResponder];
}
return NO; // We do not want UITextField to insert line-breaks.
}
If you want an UI element other than UITextField, you should still be able to use the same logic, with a few more checks.
Not sure if this helps, but in the context of a UITextFields, if you implement UITextFieldDelegate, - (BOOL)textFieldShouldReturn:(UITextField *)textField will get called when the return key of the soft keyboard is pressed.
I've tried to hit directly on my laptop keyboard and it seemed to jump between all the textfields in the order in which you've added them to the view, but didn't go to any other types of fields (Buttons etc.).
key on the keyboard is simulating the key on the soft keyboard of the simulator, which works as expected.

iPhone - possible to not show keyboard but still show the cursor in a UITextField?

I have a custom keyboard I want to show when the user taps a UITextField. But at the same time I want to show the cursor in the textfield. If if return a NO for canBecomeFirstResponder, it doesn't show the default keyboard but doesn't show the cursor either.
Can someone please help me out?
Thanks.
The answer to your problem is to create a view for your custom keyboard and then edit the inputView property of your UITextField and pass it the view for your custom keyboard.
I hope that helps.
override following two methods in UITextFieldDelegate. Note that this approach is valid for both UITextField and UITextView (in which case you override corresponding methods in UITextViewDelegate)
- (BOOL)textFieldShouldBeginEditing:(UITextField *)textField {
if (!textField.inputView) {
//hides the keyboard, but still shows the cursor to allow user to view entire text, even if it exceeds the bounds of the textfield
textField.inputView = [[UIView alloc] initWithFrame:CGRectZero];
}
return YES;
}
- (BOOL)textField:(UITextField *)textField shouldChangeCharactersInRange:(NSRange)range replacementString:(NSString *)string {
return NO;
}
Seems like what you want is a UITextField with a custom keyboard. Create the class CustomKeyboard : UIView and add buttons/layout the view. Then for your textfield just set the inputView property to an instance of the class CustomKeyboard textField.inputView = customKeyboard;. You'll need to set the inputView property to be readwrite as well #property (readwrite, retain) UIView *inputView; By setting the inputView property, the standard iPhone keyboards will not appear when the textfield becomes first responder.
Register as keyboard notification observer (e.g. in the view controller where you want to hide the keyboard):-
[[NSNotificationCenter defaultCenter] addObserver:self selector:#selector(hideKeyboard:) name:UIKeyboardWillShowNotification object:nil];
Put in the hideKeyboard: function:-
-(void)hideKeyboard:(NSNotification *)notification {
for (UIWindow *keyboardWindow in [[UIApplication sharedApplication] windows]) {
for (UIView *keyboard in [keyboardWindow subviews]) {
if([[keyboard description] hasPrefix:#"<UIKeyboard"] == YES) {
keyboard.alpha = 0;
}
}
}
}
(Thanks to luvieere in this post for showing me how to get the keyboard)
I'm not sure of the point, but why not just use a UILabel with the same contents of the text field and decorated to look like your text field with a cursor in it. Swap it out for a UITextField when you want input.
There are 2 solutions to your problem.
1) Setting the alpha of the keyboard to 0 will make the keyboard invisible... which may be all you want. The cursor will appear.
2) UITextField implements the UITextInputTraits Protocol. It will always call the keyboard when it becomes the first responder. You will need to inherit from either it or anther class to change that default behavior.
Good luck.
If you tell us what your trying to accomplish we might be about to suggest a more elegant way of accomplishing it.
Have fun.
I see two solutions - either create custom animation (and stop or start it depending on the first responder status of the text field), or play with inputView property.
Here is a solution for inputView approach:
Set inputView property of the UITextField to empty view and ask it to become first responder. This will effectively hide default inputView (i.e. keyboard), but will continue showing blinking cursor.
Add Tap gesture recognizer, and when user taps UITextField, set the inputView property to your custom keyboard, dismiss the keyboard and ask the UITextField to become first responder again.
class BlinkingTextFieldVC: UIViewController {
var blinkingTextField: UITextField!
override func onViewDidLoad() {
setupView()
}
func setupView() {
blinkingTextField = UITextField()
blinkingTextField.inputView = UIView() // empty view will be shown as input method
blinkingTextField.becomeFirstResponder()
let tapGuesture = UITapGestureRecognizer(target: self, action: #selector(blinkingTextFieldTapped(_:)))
blinkingTextField.addGestureRecognizer(tapGuesture)
}
func blinkingTextFieldTapped(_ gesture: UITapGestureRecognizer) {
if gesture.state == .ended {
view.endEditing(true)
blinkingTextField.inputView = nil // set your custom input view or nil for default keyboard
blinkingTextField.becomeFirstResponder()
}
}
}
Why do you even need the cursor ?
I think all you need to do, is when ever a user press a key on your own keyboard, you can update the text value of the input.

Can I hook into UISearchBar's Clear Button?

I've got a UISearchBar in my interface and I want to customise the behaviour of the the small clear button that appears in the search bar after some text has been entered (it's a small grey circle with a cross in it, appears on the right side of the search field).
Basically, I want it to not only clear the text of the search bar (which is the default implementation) but to also clear some other stuff from my interface, but calling one of my own methods.
I can't find anything in the docs for the UISearchBar class or the UISearchBarDelegate protocol - it doesn't look like you can directly get access to this behaviour.
The one thing I did note was that the docs explained that the delegate method:
- (void)searchBar:(UISearchBar *)searchBar textDidChange:(NSString *)searchText;
is called after the clear button is tapped.
I initially wrote some code in that method that checked the search bar's text property, and if it was empty, then it had been cleared and to do all my other stuff.
Two problems which this though:
Firstly, for some reason I cannot fathom, even though I tell the search bar to resignFirstResponder at the end of my method, something, somewhere is setting it back to becomeFirstResponder. Really annoying...
Secondly, if the user doesn't use the clear button, and simply deletes the text in the bar using the delete button on the keyboard, this method is fired off and their search results go away. Not good.
Any advice or pointers in the right direction would be great!
Thanks!
Found the better solution for this problem :)
- (void)searchBar:(UISearchBar *)searchBar textDidChange:(NSString *)searchText{
if ([searchText length] == 0) {
[self performSelector:#selector(hideKeyboardWithSearchBar:) withObject:searchBar afterDelay:0];
}
}
- (void)hideKeyboardWithSearchBar:(UISearchBar *)searchBar{
[searchBar resignFirstResponder];
}
The answer which was accepted is incorrect. This can be done, I just figured it out and posted it in another question:
UISearchbar clearButton forces the keyboard to appear
Best
I've got this code in my app. Difference is that I don't support 'live search', but instead start searching when the user touches the search button on the keyboard:
- (void)searchBarTextDidBeginEditing:(UISearchBar *)searchBar {
if ([searchBar.text isEqualToString:#""]) {
//Clear stuff here
}
}
Swift version handling close keyboard on clear button click :
func searchBar(searchBar: UISearchBar, textDidChange searchText: String) {
if searchText.characters.count == 0 {
performSelector("hideKeyboardWithSearchBar:", withObject:searchBar, afterDelay:0)
}
}
func hideKeyboardWithSearchBar(bar:UISearchBar) {
bar.resignFirstResponder()
}
You could try this:
- (void)viewDidLoad
{
[super viewDidLoad];
for (UIView *view in searchBar.subviews){
for (UITextField *tf in view.subviews) {
if ([tf isKindOfClass: [UITextField class]]) {
tf.delegate = self;
break;
}
}
}
}
- (BOOL)textFieldShouldClear:(UITextField *)textField {
// your code
return YES;
}
I would suggest using the rightView and rightViewMode methods of UITextField to create your own clear button that uses the same image. I'm assuming of course that UISearchBar will let you access the UITextField within it. I think it will.
Be aware of this from the iPhone OS Reference Library:
If an overlay view overlaps the clear button, however, the clear button always takes precedence in receiving events. By default, the right overlay view does overlap the clear button.
So you'll probably also need to disable the original clear button.
Since this comes up first, and far as I can see the question wasn't really adequately addressed, I thought I'd post my solution.
1) You need to get a reference to the textField inside the searchBar
2) You need to catch that textField's clear when it fires.
This is pretty simple. Here's one way.
a) Make sure you make your class a , since you will be using the delegate method of the textField inside the searchBar.
b) Also, connect your searchBar to an Outlet in your class. I just called mine searchBar.
c) from viewDidLoad you want to get ahold of the textField inside the searchBar. I did it like this.
UITextField *textField = [self.searchBar valueForKey:#"_searchField"];
if (textField) {
textField.delegate = self;
textField.tag = 1000;
}
Notice, I assigned a tag to that textField so that I can grab it again, and I made it a textField delegate. You could have created a property and assigned this textField to that property to grab it later, but I used a tag.
From here you just need to call the delegate method:
-(BOOL)textFieldShouldClear:(UITextField *)textField {
if (textField.tag == 1000) {
// do something
return YES;
}
return NO;
}
That's it. Since you are referring to a private valueForKey I can't guarantee that it will not get you into trouble.
Best solution from my experience is just to put a UIButton (with clear background and no text) above the system clear button and than connect an IBAction
- (IBAction)searchCancelButtonPressed:(id)sender {
[self.searchBar resignFirstResponder];
self.searchBar.text = #"";
// some of my stuff
self.model.fastSearchText = nil;
[self.model fetchData];
[self reloadTableViewAnimated:NO];
}
Wasn't able to find a solution here that didn't use a private API or wasn't upgrade proof incase Apple changes the view structure of the UISearchBar. Here is what I wrote that works:
- (void)viewDidLoad {
[super viewDidLoad];
UITextField* textfield = [self findTextFieldInside:self.searchBar];
[textfield setDelegate:self];
}
- (UITextField*)findTextFieldInside:(id)mainView {
for (id view in [mainView subviews]) {
if ([view isKindOfClass:[UITextField class]]) {
return view;
}
id subview = [self findTextFieldInside:view];
if (subview != nil) {
return subview;
}
}
return nil;
}
Then implement the UITextFieldDelegate protocol into your class and overwrite the textFieldShouldClear: method.
- (BOOL)textFieldShouldClear:(UITextField*)textField {
// Put your code in here.
return YES;
}
Edit: Setting the delegate on the textfield of a search bar in iOS8 will produce a crash. However it looks like the searchBar:textDidChange: method will get called on iOS8 on clear.