EditText hint disappears with gravity

Question

I have seen many similar questions to this one but I think this still covers new ground:
1) Hint text disappears when you set gravity
2) android:ellipsize="start" fixes that so you can have centered hints and centered text
3) why does the code below still show centered hint text?

    <EditText
    android:id="@+id/details"
    android:layout_width="fill_parent"
    android:layout_height="wrap_content"
    android:gravity="center"
    android:hint="use this area to provide specific identification information including approximate size, vessel name and registration numbers if available"
    android:background="@android:drawable/editbox_background"
    android:layout_below="@id/details_title"
    />

is it because of fill_parent instead of wrap_content? i thought maybe it was because this hint is multiline, but i shortened it and it still appeared and was centered. those are the only differences between this and my other EditTexts that needed android:ellipsize="start" to display correctly. is it just a bug?

Annoying bug. Here is the [solution][1]: [1]: http://stackoverflow.com/questions/4649183/hint-and-textview-with-right-gravity-and-a-singleline/5957692#5957692 — Oleksii Malovanyi, Jul 14 '11 at 15:53

score 0 · Answer 1 · answered Jan 28 '14 at 17:33

add this attribute to your EditText

android:ellipsize="start"

It just works

<EditText
android:id="@+id/details"
android:layout_width="fill_parent"
android:layout_height="wrap_content"
android:gravity="center"
android:ellipsize="start"
android:hint="use this area to provide........"
android:background="@android:drawable/editbox_background"
android:layout_below="@id/details_title"
/>

score 0 · Answer 2 · answered Jun 09 '11 at 12:22

0

You need to use android:gravity="top" instead of center in order to have your hint and your text start at the top left of the box.

answered Jun 09 '11 at 12:22

Phil

35,852
23
123
164

i don't want it at the top or the left ... i want it centered. your solution also does nothing about the visibility of the hint which was the whole point in the question. – dylan murphy Jun 09 '11 at 12:37

EditText hint disappears with gravity

2 Answers2