Dismiss keyboard by touching background of UITable

Question

I have a UITableView with UITextFields as cells. I would like to dismiss the keyboard when the background of the UITableView is touched. I'm trying to do this by creating a UIButton the size of the UITableView and placing it behind the UITableView. The only problem is the UIButton is catching all the touches even when the touch is on the UITableView. What am I doing wrong?

Thanks!

Answer 1

tableView.keyboardDismissMode = .onDrag

Answer 2

Here's how I finally made works. I combined suggestions and codes from different answers. Features: dismissing keyboard, moving text fields above keyboard while editing and setting "Next" and "Done" keyboard return type.REPLACE "..." with more fields

static const CGFloat ANIMATION_DURATION = 0.4;
static const CGFloat LITTLE_SPACE = 5;
CGFloat animatedDistance;
CGSize keyboardSize;

@interface ViewController () <UITextFieldDelegate>
 @property (weak, nonatomic) IBOutlet UITextField *firstNameTXT;
  .....// some other text fields
 @property (weak, nonatomic) IBOutlet UITextField *emailTXT;
@end

@implementation ViewController
- (void)viewDidLoad{
.....
// add tap gesture to help in dismissing keyboard
UITapGestureRecognizer * tapGesture = [[UITapGestureRecognizer alloc]
                                       initWithTarget:self
                                       action:@selector(tapScreen:)];// outside textfields

[self.view addGestureRecognizer:tapGesture];

// set text fields return key type to Next, last text field to Done
[self.firstNameTXT setReturnKeyType:UIReturnKeyNext];
.....
[self.emailTXT setReturnKeyType:UIReturnKeyDone];

// set text fields tags
[self.firstNameTXT setTag:0];
....// more text fields
[self.emailTXT setTag:5];

// add keyboard notification
[[NSNotificationCenter defaultCenter] addObserver:self     selector:@selector(keyboardDidShow:) name:UIKeyboardDidShowNotification object:nil];
}
[[NSNotificationCenter defaultCenter] addObserver:self      selector:@selector(keyboardDidHide:) name:UIKeyboardDidHideNotification object:nil];
}

// dismiss keyboard when tap outside text fields
- (IBAction)tapScreen:(UITapGestureRecognizer *)sender {
  if([self.firstNameTXT isFirstResponder])[self.firstNameTXT resignFirstResponder];
  ...
  if([self.emailTXT isFirstResponder])[self.emailTXT  resignFirstResponder];

  }
- (BOOL)textFieldShouldReturn:(UITextField *)textField{
   if(textField.returnKeyType==UIReturnKeyNext) {
     // find the text field with next tag
     UIView *next = [[textField superview] viewWithTag:textField.tag+1];
     [next becomeFirstResponder];
   } else if (textField.returnKeyType==UIReturnKeyDone || textField.returnKeyType==UIReturnKeyDefault) {
    [textField resignFirstResponder];
 }
return YES;
}

// Moving current text field above keyboard
-(BOOL) textFieldShouldBeginEditing:(UITextField*)textField{
   CGRect viewFrame = self.view.frame;
   CGRect textFieldRect = [self.view.window convertRect:textField.bounds fromView:textField];
   CGRect viewRect = [self.view.window convertRect:self.view.bounds fromView:self.view];
   CGFloat textFieldBottomLine = textFieldRect.origin.y + textFieldRect.size.height + LITTLE_SPACE;//

   CGFloat keyboardHeight = keyboardSize.height;

   BOOL isTextFieldHidden = textFieldBottomLine > (viewRect.size.height - keyboardHeight)? TRUE :FALSE;
  if (isTextFieldHidden) {
    animatedDistance = textFieldBottomLine - (viewRect.size.height - keyboardHeight) ;
    viewFrame.origin.y -= animatedDistance;
    [UIView beginAnimations:nil context:NULL];
    [UIView setAnimationBeginsFromCurrentState:YES];
    [UIView setAnimationDuration:ANIMATION_DURATION];
    [self.view setFrame:viewFrame];
    [UIView commitAnimations];
  }
  return YES;
}

-(void) restoreViewFrameOrigionYToZero{
  CGRect viewFrame = self.view.frame;
  if (viewFrame.origin.y != 0) {
    viewFrame.origin.y = 0;
    [UIView beginAnimations:nil context:NULL];
    [UIView setAnimationBeginsFromCurrentState:YES];
    [UIView setAnimationDuration:ANIMATION_DURATION];
    [self.view setFrame:viewFrame];
    [UIView commitAnimations];
  }
}

-(void)keyboardDidShow:(NSNotification*)aNotification{
   NSDictionary* info = [aNotification userInfo];
   keyboardSize = [[info objectForKey:UIKeyboardFrameBeginUserInfoKey] CGRectValue].size;
 }

-(void)keyboardDidHide:(NSNotification*)aNotification{
   [self restoreViewFrameOrigionYToZero];// keyboard is dismissed, restore frame view to its  zero origin
}
@end

Answer 3

I had a UITableViewController and implementing touchesBegan:withEvent: didn't work for me.

Here's what worked:

Swift:

override func tableView(tableView: UITableView, didSelectRowAtIndexPath indexPath: NSIndexPath) {
    view.endEditing(true)
}

Objective-C:

- (void)tableView:(UITableView *)tableView didSelectRowAtIndexPath:(NSIndexPath *)indexPath {
    [self.view endEditing:YES];
}

Answer 4

I wanted my cell to open the keyboard when any part of the cell was selected and close it if you clicked anywhere off the cell. To open the keyboard:

- (void)setSelected:(BOOL)selected animated:(BOOL)animated
{
    [super setSelected:selected animated:animated];
    if (selected)
    {
        [self.textField becomeFirstResponder];
    }
}

(NOTE: I've subclassed the cell but you can easily achieve this in the tableView:didSelectRowAtIndexPath: delegate method of UITableView)

Doing this meant that with the top solutions if you clicking on the cell twice the keyboard would shake as, first the gesture recogniser tried to close the keyboard, and second the cell was reselected and tried open the keyboard.

Solution is to check whether the click occurred inside the currently selected cell:

- (void)viewDidLoad
{
    [super viewDidLoad];
    //gesture recognizer to close the keyboard when user taps away
    UITapGestureRecognizer *tap = [[UITapGestureRecognizer alloc] initWithTarget:self
                                                                          action:@selector(dismissKeyboard:)];
    tap.cancelsTouchesInView = NO;
    [self.tableView addGestureRecognizer:tap];
}

-(void)dismissKeyboard:(UIGestureRecognizer*)tapGestureRecognizer
{
    if (!CGRectContainsPoint([self.tableView cellForRowAtIndexPath:[self.tableView indexPathForSelectedRow]].frame, [tapGestureRecognizer locationInView:self.tableView]))
    {
        [self.view endEditing:YES];
    }
}

Answer 5

Here's the swift version for your coding pleasure:

It adds a tap gesture recognizer then dismisses the keyboard. No outlet for the TextField is required!

override func viewDidLoad() {
    super.viewDidLoad()
    view.addGestureRecognizer(UITapGestureRecognizer(target: self, action: "handleTap:"))
}

func handleTap(sender: UITapGestureRecognizer) {
    if sender.state == .Ended {
        view.endEditing(true)
    }
    sender.cancelsTouchesInView = false
}

Answer 6

I've found a solution that works great.

Is needed to use the UIGestureRecognizerDelegate and the method – gestureRecognizer:shouldReceiveTouch:.

Add the gesture recognizer to the TableView as follows:

UITapGestureRecognizer *tapGestureRecognizer = [[UITapGestureRecognizer alloc] initWithTarget:self action:@selector(hideKeyboard)];
tapGestureRecognizer.cancelsTouchesInView = NO;
tapGestureRecognizer.delegate = self;
[self.suggestedTableView addGestureRecognizer:tapGestureRecognizer];
[tapGestureRecognizer release];

Then, implement the shouldReceiveTouch delegate method to reject touches that are performed in UITableViewCell class. The hideKeyboard method only will be called when the touch has been performed outside UITableViewCell class.

- (BOOL)gestureRecognizer:(UIGestureRecognizer *)gestureRecognizer shouldReceiveTouch:(UITouch *)touch {
    if([touch.view isKindOfClass:[UITableViewCell class]]) {
        return NO;
    }
    // UITableViewCellContentView => UITableViewCell
    if([touch.view.superview isKindOfClass:[UITableViewCell class]]) {
        return NO;
    }
    // UITableViewCellContentView => UITableViewCellScrollView => UITableViewCell
    if([touch.view.superview.superview isKindOfClass:[UITableViewCell class]]) {
        return NO;
    }
    return YES; // handle the touch
}

- (void) hideKeyboard{
    [textField resignFirstResponder];
}