TextMeshPro ScrollRect overflowMode

Can somebody explain how to use TMPro with ScrollRect overflow mode?

When using a Unity ScrollRect component the TMPro ScrollRect overflow mode isn't necessary so I wonder what is its purpose otherwise? Is there any use case for it when not using a Unity ScrollRect component and if yes, how is it used?

 

The ScrollRect overflow mode isn't working as intended and should be ignored (until I get around to tweaking it). This overflow mode is not needed at all when using a ScrollRect component.

I suggest taking a look at Example 18 - ScrollRect & Masking Layout included in the TMP Examples & Extras.

 

so any update on this?

 

Not really since I am not sure there is still a validate use case for it. If you do have a use case for it please provide more information.

 

i have a side panel (not much width to it since its side panel) and i want to show single line text on it. so when text get a bit long i'd like to make it scroll. for example like auto scroll in music player where the title scrolls if its too long to fit.

 

You should be able to achieve that with a ScrollView with a RectMask2D component to mask the content outside of the scrollview.

 

thanks. woudn't it be nice to be able to do that in a single click tho

 

I feel like having the ability to have a one click solution that allows a textbox to cleanly resize to fit expanding content with a scrollbar is a fairly common use case?

Obviously you can make it work with other stuff, it's just a little odd that TextMeshPro supported this at one point but now there's just a useless option for a common use case that doesn't work

 

This should be removed from the drop-down then, because I've been searching google trying to figure out how to use this overflow feature.

I too was hoping for a 1 click answer.

 

I agree that it should be removed.
Unfortunately it's not possible to have a one-click solution, how would it know the look of your scrollbars?

 

I have not looked at this in a while. Since I am now working on a new preview release (ie. adding new stuff) this might be the time to revisit this.

Can you all please provide some insight on how you would envision this one click button to work / do? Just want to make sure I understand correctly and implement as desired

 

I'm not one of the original posters here, but the way I would imagine this working, would be the details for the (if required) scrollbar appearing below the dropdown menu.
The scrollbar itself ingame would only appear when the text runs out of room, and then would function the same as a regular ScrollRect (with masking? maybe as a checkbox?)

For example, in the attached, I have a text field that I aim to have a small enough amount of text that overflow shouldn't be an issue... but if it did occur, I'd like it to overflow via a scrollbar, rather than having to lose details.

 

I'm afraid that having to specify a toolbar would be far from a 'one-click' solution.
The only thing which would be a 'one-click' solution would be to scroll the text.
We would still have to specify some parameters but it would be far faster than configuring a whole scrollbar:
- is it a left-to-right or right-to-left scrolling?
- time to wait before scrolling (so the player has some time to read the beginning)
- scrolling speed
- time to wait when the end is reached (so the player has some time to read the end)
- Is it 'circular' or not (I mean, when the end is reached we can continue to scroll displaying the start of the text after the end of the text, or just wait the given time and start again the scrolling)

We could also have the possibility to scroll using the mousewheel or touch scrolling, without displaying any scrollbar.
I'm afraid that this solution is not universal, but it has the advantage of being very easy to setup.
There's only the scrolling speed to specify.

 

as i tried to explain earlier. one use-case that i ran into was that i was trying to show line of text in side panel and the text wouldnt fit. it would be cool if there was option for auto-scroll. like the text automatically scrolls horizontally as it does in many music players.

 

If Overflow is set to Scroll Rect, only text in the bounds of the text box would be visible. If there is overflow text, you could click and drag the text to scroll. Would be super helpful for dynamically sized text boxes which are a pain to use with the Scroll View

 

@Stephan_B If the feature doesn't work, please remove it. You can always add it back later. Right now it just creates confusion. TMP is not a Preview or Experimental package and should not be displaying non-functional features.

 

is this fixed already? I'm still having the issue 3 years later?

 

I'm baffled this issue still exists, and the option hasn't been removed despite being non functional. @slowDrag0n and @OneManEscapePlan have pointed out the issue quite well.

 

any word on this?

 

Any update on this, will help my project

 

Will try to look at this over the new few days.

 

Hey there!

For anyone still looking for a solution to this. I just found that while g**gling for ways to get the resulting size of the text, after it is set.

https://unreasonablygoodsoftware.wo...croll-view-with-variably-sized-text-mesh-pro/

I just quickly tried that and it works like a charm.


Cheers

 

I would also like this feature working

 

Hi, @Stephan_B any update on this. Workaround with scroll rect works but the caret is in the wrong position after scroll. TMP_InputField works fine in the editor but in build the text doesn't scroll as we text.

 

So, is it out? I am using unity 2019.2.17f1. I am looking for a way to give the text a marquee effect when it runs out of space

 

Haven't seen anything about it, but again it's not sure that a generic solution is really possible, the effect you want probably depends on your project.

I ended up by using the 'Ellipsis' mode and checking the 'isTextTruncated' property and I automatically add a tooltip displaying the full text when necessary.
That way if the texts ends with '...', the player knows that he has to display the tooltip to read the entire text.

 

So if the "Scroll Rect" overflow option doesn't work, why is it still included in the package?

You want a use case, here is a use case:

I downloaded TMP and want a text box that automatically adds a scroll bar when the text overflows. Don't include it in the official package if it doesn't work / do anything, AND you don't plan to fix it.

 

Any news on the issue?

We're also started to experience this issue a lot recently (thousands of error reports daily). The main change that we had is a migration from Unity 2019 to 2020.3.14.
From our logs we see that this issue occurred even before the migration, but since the migration the error count is spiking.

Unfortunately we weren't able to reproduce the issue on our test devices so it's pretty hard to resolve it blindly.

 

@Stephan_B
Any update on this yet? It really makes no sense why this is being teased and shown as a simple solution, when it does nothing. It makes more sense to actually implement this solution properly within TextMeshPro, as the feature notes it should be possible, rather than having to search for a workflow (most of which are outdated) for trying to tie together a bunch of separate Unity UI components (in just the right way) to get the desired, basic functionality for a scrollable text box.

That I still have to build custom tools that will automate creating a basic, functional UI component (like a scrollable text box) is a bit ridiculous to me. It has been more than three years since this was brought to Unity's attention as an issue. I find it hard to believe that in three years of people taking the time to repeatedly note this is an issue, repeatedly noting it is still an issue and is obviously a desired feature...that no one with Unity seems to understand how important it could be to have an option to just select a scrollable text box within a text box feature.

Are you trying to tell me no one has thought most modern game projects use a scrollable text box, so maybe it should be simple to implement one? Have you even played a game in the last three years? Because pretty much every single darn one uses it at least for the privacy text boxes displayed at the front of almost all games. And many of them use them inside of all kinds of UI systems from display of inventory item descriptions, to store item descriptions, and more! A simple, standardized way of implementing one quickly seems like a basic part of UI development that should be included to make our lives easier.

Not only has Unity not prepared an easy-to-use solution, this visible feature that we can see and want to use is completely broken! It _should_ be this easy to setup a TextMeshPro scrollable text box that will just show a horizontal or vertical (or both) scrollbar for the text box when text overflows from the designated text box area. Please address this properly with either a proper solution or remove that option entirely so we don't waste time trying to figure out how to get it to work when it never will.

 

Unity, just remove the feature already if you're not going to implement it.

 

Wow, almost 4 years later and I'm having this issue and it doesn't look like a thing's been done about it judging by this post. I'm confused as to why it wasn't just removed altogether then? Why leave it in if its busted and doesn't even work?

 

Me: Elated, because I don't need to worry about total text content quantity when displaying summarized user input, after having just found the scrollrect overflow option.

Me after an hour of debugging and googling: $@#$% why is this here after (at least) 4 years since breaking, and 5 years after Unity aquired TMPro?

Use case as above if anyone is still looking at it, but seriously this vestigial option should be removed from the "finished" package.

 

I have a very good use case for this feature: Making a WebGL application that displays variable-length content from a database, I have no way to predict whether the LongDescription column will be empty, brief, or multiple paragraphs. The data is of an engineering nature, where some items like a power cord may have a description of "Compliant with IEC C-13 and IEC C-20 standards", but items like an electronic assembly may have a long functional description.

Many UI libraries offer a "text" field for items like "postal code" and a "text area" field for fields such as "problem description". My assumption when I saw the ScrollRect overflow mode was, naturally, that it made the TMP_Text field work like a text area field.

Having said that, however, I am posting here to advocate removing the feature from the editor menu.

I understand that Unity's developers are stretched thin, as we all are, and that this is not a priority especially considering a new UI system is emerging. It is, however, trivial for Unity to remove the option from the editor's dropdown list if it is not going to be fixed in the near term. If the priorities ever allow for this to be implemented, this minor change would be easily reversible.

I do not mind creating my own ScrollRect to contain my TMP_Text widget. My only complaint is that I spent several hours fruitlessly debugging "my UI configuration" before learning that this feature is simply not implemented. Any one of us who have posted into this thread are likely to have spent more time trying to get this working, than what it would take Unity to remove it from the menu. Thanks for listening.

 

@Stephan_B If the feature doesn't work, please remove it. You can always add it back later. Right now it just creates confusion. TMP is not a Preview or Experimental package and should not be displaying non-functional features.

 

I'd also like this.

Did however manage to get something working following what @NiXoNiXoN said:

 

why is it still in then? Just remove it and reintroduce it later

 

This is ridiculous - why was it even added in the first place if it wasn't implemented? Talk about shoddy coding practices..

 

Lol, this is so typical Unity.

 

Came here to find out how the "Scroll Rect" option works... 5 years later, it still doesn't work, briliant!

 

At this point, I'll probably just do this myself since I bumped into numerous occasions where I want my text box to behave as a scroll view when there is too much text in it.

 

Hey now, be fair, the guy is "looking into it"

 

@Stephan_B any updates on the issue?

 

Stephan B no longer develops TextMeshPro: https://forum.unity.com/threads/future-of-text-at-unity.1356299/

 

So who's looking into it now?

 

@uDamian I think?

 

Any update?

 

Abandoned, but hey, they updated the license and gave us a new splashscreen.

 

**knocks on door**

Y'all still have this useless non-functional option in a package that as far as I know comes by default with Unity.. Wouldn't it be nice to just give some purpose to it? Like, so that it automatically lets us make scrollable text in one easy go?

 

Stephan quit a long time ago and they forgot to take him off payroll. He only replied to make it look like he was still working here.

 

It's hard to imagine that six years later, Unity will still be able to keep this option and not provide it with actual functionality