More than one EditText - not getting focus, no soft keyboard? (Android)

Question

The home screen of my Android application has three EditText views, meant to be used as three different search functions, each with a "Search" button.

The app works perfectly on the device (G1) when using the trackball: I can move between the EditTexts with the trackball, all the events fire as expected, I can enter text using the physical keyboard in the selected EditText, Enter correctly submits the proper search, etc. etc.

However, I can't switch between the EditText views using touches - only by using the trackball. Touches seem to be completely ignored by the EditText. Touches do fire for the buttons, but very hard - takes a lot of tries to make a touch register.

In the simulator, clicking on any EditText does nothing - the first one always remains selected, and I never get a soft keyboard.

This is all inside a TabHost - I've read there are some problems with that configuration, but it sounds like a slightly different issue (the EditText doesn't seem to lose focus - everything works perfectly with the trackball).

Any suggestions for what I can check?

Answer 1

It sounds like your touch targets are too small. I would suggest adding some padding to each of your EditTexts, or using a TouchDelegate to increase the size of the touch target.

Answer 2

Ah, I figured it out.

I had a ListView left in my layout from when I first set up the TabHost. Since it didn't show anything on the screen, and it was at the bottom of my layout file after everything else, I didn't notice it... Just noticed it didn't belong there and erased it, and all the controls started behaving properly.

D'oh.