How do I put a border around an Android textview?

Question

Is it possible to draw a border around a textview?

Answer 1

The simple way is to add a view for your TextView. Example for the bottom border line:

<LinearLayout android:orientation="vertical"
              android:layout_width="fill_parent"
              android:layout_height="fill_parent">
    <TextView
        android:layout_width="fill_parent"
        android:layout_height="wrap_content"
        android:layout_marginTop="10dp"
        android:layout_marginLeft="10dp"
        android:text="@string/title"
        android:id="@+id/title_label"
        android:gravity="center_vertical"/>
    <View
        android:layout_width="fill_parent"
        android:layout_height="0.2dp"
        android:id="@+id/separator"
        android:visibility="visible"
        android:background="@android:color/darker_gray"/>

</LinearLayout>

For the other direction borders, please adjust the location of the separator view.

Answer 2

Here is my 'simple' helper class which returns an ImageView with the border. Just drop this in your utils folder, and call it like this:

ImageView selectionBorder = BorderDrawer.generateBorderImageView(context, borderWidth, borderHeight, thickness, Color.Blue);

Here is the code.

/**
 * Because creating a border is Rocket Science in Android.
 */
public class BorderDrawer
{
    public static ImageView generateBorderImageView(Context context, int borderWidth, int borderHeight, int borderThickness, int color)
    {
        ImageView mask = new ImageView(context);

        // Create the square to serve as the mask
        Bitmap squareMask = Bitmap.createBitmap(borderWidth - (borderThickness*2), borderHeight - (borderThickness*2), Bitmap.Config.ARGB_8888);
        Canvas canvas = new Canvas(squareMask);

        Paint paint = new Paint();
        paint.setStyle(Paint.Style.FILL);
        paint.setColor(color);
        canvas.drawRect(0.0f, 0.0f, (float)borderWidth, (float)borderHeight, paint);

        // Create the darkness bitmap
        Bitmap solidColor = Bitmap.createBitmap(borderWidth, borderHeight, Bitmap.Config.ARGB_8888);
        canvas = new Canvas(solidColor);

        paint.setStyle(Paint.Style.FILL);
        paint.setColor(color);
        canvas.drawRect(0.0f, 0.0f, borderWidth, borderHeight, paint);

        // Create the masked version of the darknessView
        Bitmap borderBitmap = Bitmap.createBitmap(borderWidth, borderHeight, Bitmap.Config.ARGB_8888);
        canvas = new Canvas(borderBitmap);

        Paint clearPaint = new Paint();
        clearPaint.setXfermode(new PorterDuffXfermode(PorterDuff.Mode.CLEAR));

        canvas.drawBitmap(solidColor, 0, 0, null);
        canvas.drawBitmap(squareMask, borderThickness, borderThickness, clearPaint);

        clearPaint.setXfermode(null);

        ImageView borderView = new ImageView(context);
        borderView.setImageBitmap(borderBitmap);

        return borderView;
    }
}

Answer 3

This may help you.

<RelativeLayout
    android:id="@+id/textbox"
    android:layout_width="wrap_content"
    android:layout_height="wrap_content"
    android:layout_centerHorizontal="true"
    android:layout_centerVertical="true"
    android:background="@android:color/darker_gray" >

    <TextView
        android:id="@+id/text"
        android:layout_width="wrap_content"
        android:layout_height="wrap_content"
        android:layout_centerHorizontal="true"
        android:layout_centerVertical="true"
        android:layout_margin="3dp"
        android:background="@android:color/white"
        android:gravity="center"
        android:text="@string/app_name"
        android:textSize="20dp" />

</RelativeLayout

Answer 4

Create a border view with the background color as the color of the border and size of your text view. set border view padding as the width of the border. Set text view background color as the color you want for the text view. Now add your text view inside the border view.

Answer 5

You can set a shape drawable (a rectangle) as background for the view.

<TextView android:text="Some text" android:background="@drawable/back"/>

And rectangle drawable back.xml (put into res/drawable folder):

<shape xmlns:android="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res/android" android:shape="rectangle" >
   <solid android:color="@android:color/white" />
   <stroke android:width="1dip" android:color="#4fa5d5"/>
</shape>

You can use @android:color/transparent for the solid color to have a transparent background. You can also use padding to separate the text from the border. for more information see: http://developer.android.com/guide/topics/resources/drawable-resource.html

Answer 6

You can set the border by two methods. One is by drawable and the second is programmatic.

Using Drawable

<shape>
    <solid android:color="@color/txt_white"/>
    <stroke android:width="1dip" android:color="@color/border_gray"/>
    <corners android:bottomLeftRadius="10dp"
             android:bottomRightRadius="0dp"
             android:topLeftRadius="10dp"
             android:topRightRadius="0dp"/>
    <padding android:bottom="0dip"
             android:left="0dip"
             android:right="0dip"
             android:top="0dip"/>
</shape>

---

Programmatic

---

public static GradientDrawable backgroundWithoutBorder(int color) {

    GradientDrawable gdDefault = new GradientDrawable();
    gdDefault.setColor(color);
    gdDefault.setCornerRadii(new float[] { radius, radius, 0, 0, 0, 0,
                                           radius, radius });
    return gdDefault;
}