Problems with Text Mesh Pro InputField selection

Hi!

I have a text mesh pro inputfield in a Canvas that is in world space, and I have some troubles with the caret selection. Everytime I click it select's all of the characters instead of focusing once and then moving the caret's position , unlike the Unity inputfield component that works like this and has the beheavior I want but I want Text Mesh Pro's features. I tried to check/uncheck all the features (such as OnFocus - Select All) but it changes nothing.

Another problem I have is when I click and the selection appears, sometimes the selection is offset from the text by around 1 character, but is fixed if you drag while clicking, which is a bit annoying visually,

If anyone did have a similar problem and found a workaround it would be very helpful if you can share it, otherwise if the dev can point out if i'm missing something it would be great too,

Thanks!

 

Make sure you did not alter the structure / hierarchy of the TMP Input Field. If you do not want Select All on Focus, make sure you unselect OnFocus - Select All.

Are you able to reproduce the behavior in a new scene? If so can you provide the step to reproduce this?

Also, check if you get the same behavior in the latest release of TMP for Unity 2018.3 which is version 1.4.0-preview.2a.

 

Hi!

Thank you for your quick answer, yes it happens in a new scene, and I always made sure I unchecked Select all, and I tested with the latest version of Text Mesh Pro 1.4.0-preview.2a. I have the same results.

So I have here three pictures, the first one is when I focus sometimes the focus is offset for some reason (it seems to happen when I focus/defocus but it's not consistent), the second one is a new text mesh pro input field with OnFocus - Select All unchecked, and unless I click really slow it always selects all no matter what I do,

And the last one is the "normal" Unity inputfield with the beheavior I want, which is just to select all one time and then move the caret,

If you want I could produce small gifs so maybe it would be more clear visually,

Thank you!

 

Can you provide me with the steps to reproduce this or a simple Repro scene / project?

 

There you go: https://www.mediafire.com/file/37n74gg4xbyl416/UI_Problem.zip/file

It has all my three problems, and for the focus problem you need to write characters, de-focus and re-focus on the panel so trigger it (it may take a couple of time),

Thank you!

 

Thank you for providing the Repro project.

Regarding issue #1, it is the result of how you have the RectTransform of the child objects (Placeholder and Text) setup where their pivots do not align. To resolve this offset issue, make sure the size of the child text and placeholder are the same. Make sure their Left, Top, Right and Bottom are all zero. Make sure the Anchors min are 0, 0 and max 1, 1. This should result in these child objects being properly aligned (pivot and all) with the parent Text Area.





The Placeholder and Text child objects also have their margins modified which I am not sure if that was set intentionally. So reset the margins on both these object to 0, 0, 0, 0.



When trying to resize the text object, the square dots modify the margins whereas dragging in the middle of lines alters the size of the RectTransform.



In regards to issue #2, when OnFocus - Select All is enabled, I am getting the same behavior as the UI Input Field.



When OnFocus - Select All is disabled, I am also getting the appropriate behavior which is to simply insert the caret. Note that a double click will result in the word being selected.

 

Thank you for your answer!

Maybe a step I forgot to say, but for the focusing problem, I have it when I try to click "kind of" fast, not enough to feel like i'm double clicking but just enough so I want to switch letter targeting, if I click as slow as on your gif it works perfectly,

is there a way to disable the double click or detect it in a shorter lenght than right now?

Thank you!

 

Do you mean click kind of fast from one input field to another?

 

No, in the same inputfield, to move the caret's position

 

And I do feel like it could be a problem with the double click triggering "too fast" for my needs and auto-select the whole word, so if there is a way I could play with that it would be great!

 

Not sure why this delay would be too small in your case as no issues have been reported on this before. But for testing, change

Code (csharp):

1. private float m_DoubleClickDelay = 0.5f;

in the TMP_InputField.cs file and let me know if a larger delay works better.

 

I can't gain access to that file normally since it is private, is there any way I could change that property?

 

The package manager version of TMP includes source code so you should be able to edit that file. You should be able to navigate to that file in the "Packages/TextMesh Pro/Scripts/Runtime/..." folder.

 

I changed the variable's value to 0.2f and it has the feel that I wanted now, thank you!

 

@Stephan_B, you're a rockstar, thanks for all the good info in this thread!

One thing I'm trying to figure out here is the best way for a double click to select all text (rather than stopping at a word delimiter like a space or period). Is there an easy way to do this?