Understanding AccessoryViews in UITextView

Introduction to UITextView and its Accessories

When developing iOS applications, it’s essential to understand the various components that make up a view hierarchy. The UITextView is a fundamental element for displaying text within an app. One of its most interesting features is the ability to display custom accessories, such as keyboards or toolbars. In this article, we’ll delve into the world of AccessoryViews in UITextView.

The Problem: AccessoryView without Keyboard?

The original question posed by the developer asks how to display an AccessoryView with a TextView without causing the keyboard to appear. The developer is trying to achieve two things:

1. Hide the standard Apple virtual keyboard.
2. Display a custom accessory view when editing the text.

Let’s break down the problem step by step and explore the solution.

Solution: Using inputAccessoryView Instead of textViewShouldBeginEditing

The key insight here is that inputAccessoryView is used to display a custom accessory, such as a keyboard or toolbar. When you set an AccessoryView, it will be displayed above the standard Apple virtual keyboard if one is present. On the other hand, textViewShouldBeginEditing returns a boolean value indicating whether the user can begin editing the text.

If you want to hide the standard Apple virtual keyboard and display only your custom accessory view, you should use inputAccessoryView. Here’s how:

- (void)viewWillAppear:(BOOL)animated {
    // Make the keyboard appear when the application launches.
    [super viewWillAppear:animated];
    // Hide the standard Apple virtual keyboard.
    [[UIApplication sharedApplication] endInputAccessibilityException];
}

- (void)viewDidLoad {
    [super viewDidLoad];
    textView.inputAccessoryView = accessoryView;
}

In this code snippet, we hide the standard Apple virtual keyboard by calling endInputAccessibilityException on the app’s shared instance. We then set the custom AccessoryView in the viewDidLoad method.

The Difference Between inputAccessoryView and textViewShouldBeginEditing

Now that we’ve covered how to use inputAccessoryView, let’s explore the difference between this property and textViewShouldBeginEditing.

• inputAccessoryView: This property is used to display a custom accessory view above the standard Apple virtual keyboard.
• textViewShouldBeginEditing: This method returns a boolean value indicating whether the user can begin editing the text.

Here’s an example that demonstrates the difference between these two properties:

- (BOOL)textViewShouldBeginEditing:(UITextView *)aTextView {
    NSLog(@"textViewShouldBeginEditing");
    
    // Allow text editing.
    return YES;
}

// No need to implement this method if you're using inputAccessoryView.

- (void)viewDidLoad {
    [super viewDidLoad];
    textView.inputAccessoryView = accessoryView;
}

In the above code snippet, we allow text editing by returning YES in textViewShouldBeginEditing. This means that when the user taps on the TextView, it will be editable. However, if you want to display only your custom accessory view and not allow text editing, you should use inputAccessoryView.

Conclusion

Displaying an AccessoryView with a TextView without causing the standard Apple virtual keyboard to appear can be achieved using the inputAccessoryView property. By setting this property in your app’s view hierarchy, you can display custom accessories above the standard Apple virtual keyboard.

In conclusion, we’ve explored how to use inputAccessoryView instead of implementing textViewShouldBeginEditing. This approach allows you to control the visibility of your custom accessory views and provide a better user experience for your app.

Last modified on 2023-10-15