iPhone: Change Keyboard language programmatically

Question

I am trying to provide a different language support on my iOS 5.x application whenever native Keyboard is opened. Provide this language in native keyboard programmatically. Could someone guide me how can i support it? I saw a carbon framework, but looks like its for Mac apps.

Thanks.

Answer 1

You can do it starting from iOS 7 on a per UIResponder basis. There is textInputMode property in UIResponder class. It is readonly, but the documentation says:

The text input mode identifies the language and keyboard displayed when this responder is active.

For responders, the system normally displays a keyboard that is based on the user’s language preferences. You can redefine this property and use it to return a different text input mode in cases where you want a responder to use a specific keyboard. The user can still change the keyboard while the responder is active, but switching away to another responder and then back restores the keyboard you specified.

In my project I created a subclass of UITextField and defined a new property called userDefinedKeyboardLanguage. I also overrode above mentioned textInputMode method. It looks similar to the following:

- (UITextInputMode *) textInputMode {
    for (UITextInputMode *tim in [UITextInputMode activeInputModes]) {
        if ([[Utilities langFromLocale:userDefinedKeyboardLanguage] isEqualToString:[Utilities langFromLocale:tim.primaryLanguage]]) return tim;
    }
    return [super textInputMode];
}

I have also a custom method +(NSString *)langFromLocale:(NSString *)locale in my Utilities class which looks like this:

+ (NSString *)langFromLocale:(NSString *)locale {
    NSRange r = [locale rangeOfString:@"_"];
    if (r.length == 0) r.location = locale.length;
    NSRange r2 = [locale rangeOfString:@"-"];
    if (r2.length == 0) r2.location = locale.length;
    return [[locale substringToIndex:MIN(r.location, r2.location)] lowercaseString];
}

Now my custom textfield class can change the keyboard input language simply by setting userDefinedKeyboardLanguage property to the desired language.

Answer 2

I know it is old question, but here it is my way to change keyboard language.

Thank to @the4kman for the mark: this way can change current keyboard only to those which were added in Settings.

Swift 3:

class CustomTextField: UITextField {

    private func getKeyboardLanguage() -> String? {
        return "en" // here you can choose keyboard any way you need
    }

    override var textInputMode: UITextInputMode? {
        if let language = getKeyboardLanguage() {
            for tim in UITextInputMode.activeInputModes {
                if tim.primaryLanguage!.contains(language) {
                    return tim
                }
            }
        }
        return super.textInputMode
    }

}

Answer 3

No this is not possible - user can only change their language in the settings.

However you can give the user an "English" keyboard if you choose (or ask them their preference)

you do this using: UIKeyboardTypeASCIICapable

You can change keyboard directly on the keyboard by pressing "globe icon" on the bottom row.

First, you have to enable those language for input in Settings. Then pressing the globe button on the keyboard would toggle between those languages.

Answer 4

Declaration:

@IBOutlet var yourTextField:cTextField!;

Use:

yourTextField.languageCode = "ru";

Class cTextField:

class cTextField: UITextField {

    // ru, en, ....
    var languageCode:String?{
        didSet{
            if self.isFirstResponder{
                self.resignFirstResponder();
                self.becomeFirstResponder();
            }
        }
    }

    override var textInputMode: UITextInputMode?{
        if let language_code = self.languageCode{
            for keyboard in UITextInputMode.activeInputModes{
                if let language = keyboard.primaryLanguage{
                    let locale = Locale.init(identifier: language);
                    if locale.languageCode == language_code{
                        return keyboard;
                    }
                }
            }
        }
        return super.textInputMode;
    }
}

Answer 5

All great answers. But in Swift you can override methods and variables defined in parent class (UIResponder) in an extension. So it's not necessary to subclass. And it's nice to replace the for loop with a more swift like one-liner.

public extension UITextField {  
    override var textInputMode: UITextInputMode? {
        return UITextInputMode.activeInputModes.filter { $0.primaryLanguage == "emoji" }.first ?? super.textInputMode
    }
}

Instead of "emoji" probably will be something like Utils.currentAppLanguage

Answer 6

Swift 5 implementation:

public extension UITextField 
{ 
    // ⚠️ Prefer english keyboards
    //
    override var textInputMode: UITextInputMode?
    {
        let locale = Locale(identifier: "en_US") // your preferred locale

        return
            UITextInputMode.activeInputModes.first(where: { $0.primaryLanguage == locale.languageCode })
            ??
            super.textInputMode
    }
}

Answer 7

This seems to work to change, for instance, to a Greek keyboard:

[[NSUserDefaults standardUserDefaults] setObject:[NSArray arrayWithObjects:@"el", nil] 
    forKey:@"AppleLanguages"]; 

[[NSUserDefaults standardUserDefaults] synchronize];