I'm writing an app based around a calculator-like UI. On an iPad, I'd like the number UIButtons on my calculator UI to respond to the numbers on the external keyboard. I have no text input anywhere in the app, and I'd never want an on-screen keyboard to appear. How do I get my UIButtons to respond to specific key presses as if they'd been touched?
I'd say create a hidden UITextField with the delegate set, make it become the first responder upon viewDidLoad. The keyboard won't appear when a bluetooth keyboard is connected as far as I know, then just check what characters are typed in the shouldChangecharactersInRange and activate the right buttons accordingly.
EDIT: a quick example I just made, https://github.com/benjaminq42/buttonTest , if you wish to have a highlight animation of some sorts you need to create a custom UIButton class. You can use 'setHighlighted' but that 'sticks'.
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I am looking to create a Custom Keyboard for iPhone,iPad. I have successfully integrated Phrases and Emoticons into the Keyboard, But couldn't get any idea how to add stickers in the keyboard.
Anyone knows how to add ?
Thanks.
I recently created a custom keyboard for sending stickers on iPhone. I noticed this question is tagged as Objective-C but I will be responding in Swift since that’s how I did it.
If I am understanding your question correctly, “add stickers in the keyboard” may refer to stickers similar to those on Facebook Messenger or Peach. My personal inspiration came from wanting to create something similar to Kim Kardashian’s KIMOJI app. This custom keyboard extension works by allowing the user to tap on a sticker, copy it, and then paste it into an input field to send.
To begin with, I found this great custom keyboard tutorial on AppCoda: Creating a Custom Keyboard Using iOS 8 App Extension (written in Swift). The tutorial walks you through how to create a new keyboard extension within an app, add a view which holds buttons (or keys), and apply appropriate constraints. However, I found all the details of creating keys less necessary for a sticker keyboard.
Following the tutorial, once you create a basic keyboard with a KeyboardViewController and KeyboardView xib, I added UIButtons. In my case, I added six buttons to correspond to six stickers. The first UIView row and second UIView row both held three buttons each. I applied constraints so that each button was equal height and width (approximately 100 x 100). In Storyboard, I clicked on each button and in the attributes inspector I set the button “image” property to the corresponding sticker image I had in my assets. Also, to determine an appropriate height for my keyboard, I found this helpful resource: iPhone Development 101 - iPhone & iPad Keyboard Sizes.
Note: In order to create stickers you need images of some sort. I drew / designed my own. You could also design them using Adobe Illustrator or an equivalent program.
Once you set the images for each button and run the app, the images may not appear. To fix this, I had to visit my sticker keyboard Target > Build Phases > Copy Bundle Resources to ensure Assets.xcassets was included. Running the app again, the images appeared.
Next, assuming you have created a KeyboardViewController that corresponds to your KeyboardView.xib, you can create a corresponding #IBAction for each button/sticker in the view controller. We want the user to copy the sticker selected to Pasteboard so they can send the stickers. To enable your custom keyboard to access Pasteboard, go into the keyboard extension’s Info.plist file. Under Information Property List > NSExtension > NSExtensionAttributes, change the RequestsOpenAccess property to YES.
Now, the IBAction method you created can assign the appropriate sticker image path to the Pasteboard! This is very generally how my code looked:
#IBAction func stickerPressed(sender: UIButton) {
let image = UIImage(named: "sticker")
UIPasteboard.generalPasteboard().image = image
}
When you run and test your app on a device and install it, click the globe icon on the keyboard to switch to your custom keyboard. Tap on a button/sticker, then tap in an input field to paste. In Facebook Messenger, options may appear to “Send Photo” “Edit” or “Cancel.” In Peach or Messages, it will send inline. It just depends on the app.
This process worked for me and I hope it can help someone else out there!
You can create UIImageView inside UICollectionView or UITableView, and show sticker images inside these UIImageViews. And when user taps on them, just get the UIImage present in that view.
I am trying to figure out how to keep the textfield about the keyboard in IOS. I tried the different code on stackoverflow but none works perfectly. Like if the textfield is above the keyboard and I click on the field, it does not move up. How can I show the textfield above the keyboard at all times? thanks!
lakesh's link is an excellent resource to look at.
There are essentially two ways to handle the situation.
Method 1:
You can encapsulate your view inside a UIScrollView and when the keyboard pops up, you should scroll your entire view up an equal distance to account for the space taken up by the keyboard.
Method 2:
Take the ultimate parent UIView inside your current UIViewController and change its frame (ideally with an animation) so that it moves off the top of the screen and makes way for the keyboard.
As a general guide, Method 1 is the preferred method. This is because you can still access the UI 'higher up' in the UIScrollView by scrolling up to it (consider say, a form with multiple fields). In Method 2 the user cannot return to the other elements in the view without the keyboard first being dismissed. Of course, it may be that you don't need to see the rest of the view while accepting keyboard input, but that decision is up to you.
I am trying to write an app that uses a custom keyboard. How can I write code that prevents the iPhone keyboard from popping up. I have seen a custom keyboard that enters text in other iPhone applications, so I know that it is possible.
You're looking for the inputView property that's present on every view (inherited from UIResponder).
I've seen a couple of apps that show a transparent view on top of the current ui while the keyboard is present and if clicked it hides the keyboard. I looked around the web and couldnt find a solution for this problem.
Simply add a UIButton, custom type, the size of your screen and add it to your view when your text field (or other entry) takes focus. Make sure your edit view is brought to the front of its superview at the point you add the button (to ensure the edit view still responds to touch).
Add a target to the button which dismisses the keyboard ([myTextfield resignFirstResponder]) and removes the button.
Also make sure to remove the button when the textField dismisses normally.
In an application that I'm writing I have a UIWebview up top and some UITextFields at the bottom that I want the user to be able to type in depending on what's in the webview. But when they touch the Text Field and the keyboard pops up, the user loses the ability to manipulate the web page to see different parts.
Is there a way to keep the keyboard up and still be able to manipulate the UIWebView?
No I believe the Keyboard is modal so you can't access the form underneath it.
You can respond to the
- (void)keyboardWillShow:(NSNotification*)aNotification;
- (void)keyboardWillHidde:(NSNotification*)aNotification;
notifications and scroll the View up or down when the keyboard is shown...
Example here