Re: TextInput bug with soft keyboard (mobile)

[Erik Thomas]

Hey Frederic:

Thanks for your response. I have worked around this problem in the one instance 
it occurs in my app. It's a kludge but works for now, I just set text to a 
blank space ' ' and then remove it when it gets focus and the input cursor 
shows up after the contents are scrolled into view to make way for the soft 
keyboard.

I have tried both the mobile textinput skin and the spark, and a custom skin 
making a copy of both the spark and mobile skins. Trouble is I uncovered other 
bugs including when using the mobile skin, clicking (tapping) into the input 
field, the cursor appears almost in the middle of the field and the prompt text 
never disappears when typing. I didn't have time to troubleshoot all that and 
fix it. My workaround is OK for now. With either custom skins (just copies of 
the ones TextInput uses in the spark and mobile libraries even with no changes 
at all), I got a viewPort error deep in the framework every time running the 
app. 

I upgraded to Flex SDK 4.16 from 4.15, using AIR 25 now, and that didn't make 
any difference. There is something else going on.

I'm using my own view management mechanism with an Application (single page) 
and as the user navigates, I hide one view and show another, having 5 views 
active with 4 hidden all the time and this seems to be affecting the Stage 
TextInput field. Now on several of my views the TextInput fields won't accept 
focus at all. The soft keyboard pops up and immediately disappears. This 
affects three of the 5 views. I am doing something fundamentally against the 
way Flex was designed, or just uncovered a bug.

Thanks.

Erik

> On May 11, 2017, at 9:42 AM, Fréderic Cox  wrote:
> 
> Which skin are you using for the TextInput? The default spark textinput skin? 
> The mobile textinput skin? Or ScrollingStageTextInput ?
> 
> On Thu, May 11, 2017 at 5:20 PM, Erik J. Thomas  > wrote:
> I spent the better part of a day trying to solve for an annoying user 
> experience with TextInput on mobile devices (Apple). 
> 
> If a TextInput or TextArea input field is located in the top 50% of the 
> display area, and a setFocus() call on the input field is made, the soft 
> keyboard displays and the input cursor is visible (all is well). But if the 
> input field is where it would be obscured by the soft keyboard (lower half of 
> the display), Flex moves the content up so the input field is visible (nice 
> feature), but the input cursor disappears.
> 
> I have tried many workarounds, all failing:
> 
> Using callLater to call a function that sets the input focus a second time.
> Listening for soft keyboard events and then setting input focus again.
> Setting kludge timer to wait after the soft keyboard is activated and set 
> focus to the control again after waiting a variety of different durations.
> 
> My latest idea is to try scrolling the content up myself so I know the input 
> field is visible BEFORE setting focus so the input cursor will always be 
> visible, but operations on the scroller don't give me the ability to place 
> the input field exactly above the soft keyboard. Before I go down the road of 
> firing an event from the ItemRenderer that the parent view with the scroller 
> can react to I wondered if there is a known solution that's less work.
> 
> Anyone found a good workaround for this obvious bug in Flex (or perhaps AIR)? 
> BTW, I ran into this bug the first time about 5 years ago and worked around 
> it by placing input fields in the top 50% of the display area, but in this 
> case, my content is scrolling so I cannot do that. I was surprised to see 
> this bug has never been fixed.
> 
> For more detail read on...
> 
> My design is a Facebook-ish social app (for one view) with scrolling content:
> 
> 
> 
> 
> When the user taps Comment and the input field is in the lower half of the 
> device's display area, Flex moves the content up enough for the input field 
> to be visible above the soft keyboard, but the input cursor never displays:
> 
> 
> 
> Thanks so much for your suggestions!
> 
> Erik
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 

Re: TextInput bug with soft keyboard (mobile)

[Fréderic Cox]

Which skin are you using for the TextInput? The default spark textinput
skin? The mobile textinput skin? Or ScrollingStageTextInput ?

On Thu, May 11, 2017 at 5:20 PM, Erik J. Thomas  wrote:

> I spent the better part of a day trying to solve for an annoying user
> experience with TextInput on mobile devices (Apple).
>
> If a TextInput or TextArea input field is located in the top 50% of the
> display area, and a setFocus() call on the input field is made, the soft
> keyboard displays and the input cursor is visible (all is well). But *if
> the input field is where it would be obscured by the soft keyboard (lower
> half of the display), Flex moves the content up so the input field is
> visible (nice feature), but the input cursor disappears.*
>
> I have tried many workarounds, all failing:
>
>
>- Using callLater to call a function that sets the input focus a
>second time.
>- Listening for soft keyboard events and then setting input focus
>again.
>- Setting kludge timer to wait after the soft keyboard is activated
>and set focus to the control again after waiting a variety of different
>durations.
>
>
> My latest idea is to try scrolling the content up myself so I know the
> input field is visible BEFORE setting focus so the input cursor will always
> be visible, but operations on the scroller don't give me the ability to
> place the input field exactly above the soft keyboard. *Before I go down
> the road of firing an event from the ItemRenderer that the parent view with
> the scroller can react to I wondered if there is a known solution that's
> less work.*
>
> Anyone found a good workaround for this obvious bug in Flex (or perhaps
> AIR)? BTW, I ran into this bug the first time about 5 years ago and worked
> around it by placing input fields in the top 50% of the display area, but
> in this case, my content is scrolling so I cannot do that. I was surprised
> to see this bug has never been fixed.
>
> For more detail read on...
>
> My design is a Facebook-ish social app (for one view) with scrolling
> content:
>
>
>
>
> When the user taps Comment and the input field is in the lower half of the
> device's display area, Flex moves the content up enough for the input field
> to be visible above the soft keyboard, but the input cursor never displays:
>
>
> Thanks so much for your suggestions!
>
> Erik
>
>
>
>
>