selectall uitextfield does not always select all

Question

- (void)textFieldDidBeginEditing:(UITextField *)textField {
    [textField selectAll:self];
}
- (BOOL)textFieldShouldReturn:(UITextField *)textField {
    [textField resignFirstResponder];
    return YES;    
}

In the above, the textField selects correctly but when I return from the keyboard and tap the textField for a second time consecutively, it does not select the text. If I do not pick it consecutively or if I deselect the text before returning from the keyboard, the next focus of that textField selects the text correctly.

How can I select the text in the abovementioned case?

Neoclassic

Answer 1

I have found a perfect solution(invoke selectAll in next runloop):

- (void)textFieldDidBeginEditing:(UITextField *)textField
{
    [textField performSelector:@selector(selectAll:) withObject:textField afterDelay:0.f];
}

Maudmaude

Thanks, I'll test this when I can – Neoclassic

You must be a genius! This is a bug on iOS 6 and 7, and I thought the only solution was to file a bug, and wait for a fix. Thanks! – Inquisition

Filed a bug anyway: #15781101 "UITextField -selectAll: only works every other time". – Inquisition

This still seems to be a bug as I tried both: textField.selectAll(nil) and textField.perform(#selector(UIResponder.selectAll(_:)), with: textField) and neither worked more than every other time – Metrology

Answer 2

I solved this issue using Grand Central Dispatch. You can wrap [textField selectAll:self]; with a dispatch_async call and dispatch_get_main_queue() as a first parameter.

    dispatch_async(dispatch_get_main_queue()){
        // ... code you want to run on the main queue goes here
    }

Twylatwyman

Simple but important =) – Lunn