Customizing android.widget.SearchView

Question

Is it possible to customize layout of android.widget.SearchView (I'm using it in actionBar)?

I want to change icon and TextField background.

Answer 1

I've found the only one way to do that- to use reflections.

SearchView mSearchView = (SearchView)menu.findItem(R.id.search).getActionView();
    try
    {
        Field searchField = SearchView.class.getDeclaredField("mSearchButton");
        searchField.setAccessible(true);
        ImageView searchBtn = (ImageView)searchField.get(mSearchView);
        searchBtn.setImageResource(R.drawable.search_img);
        searchField = SearchView.class.getDeclaredField("mSearchPlate");
        searchField.setAccessible(true);
        LinearLayout searchPlate = (LinearLayout)searchField.get(mSearchView);
        ((ImageView)searchPlate.getChildAt(0)).setImageResource(R.drawable.search_img);
        searchPlate.setBackgroundResource(R.drawable.edit_text_bkg);
    }
    catch (NoSuchFieldException e)
    {
        Log.e(TAG,e.getMessage(),e);
    }
    catch (IllegalAccessException e)
    {
        Log.e(TAG,e.getMessage(),e);
    }

Answer 2

If you use Appcompat v7, there is a way to do it without using reflection:

Declare the following style, and customize only those properties you need to customize, remove the rest (so they are inerhited from the parent style):

<style name="Widget.AppCompat.SearchView.CustomSearchView" parent="@style/Widget.AppCompat.SearchView">
    <item name="layout">@layout/abc_search_view</item>
    <item name="queryBackground">@drawable/abc_textfield_search_material</item>
    <item name="submitBackground">@drawable/abc_textfield_search_material</item>
    <item name="closeIcon">@drawable/abc_ic_clear_mtrl_alpha</item>
    <item name="goIcon">@drawable/abc_ic_go_search_api_mtrl_alpha</item>
    <item name="voiceIcon">@drawable/abc_ic_voice_search_api_mtrl_alpha</item>
    <item name="commitIcon">@drawable/abc_ic_commit_search_api_mtrl_alpha</item>
    <item name="suggestionRowLayout">@layout/abc_search_dropdown_item_icons_2line</item>
    <item name="searchIcon">@drawable/ic_action_search</item>
</style>

Now, in your theme, use the same property:

<item name="searchViewStyle">@style/Widget.AppCompat.SearchView.Bonial</item>

Of course, your theme must inherit from one of the AppCompat themes, in my case, it was something like this:

<style name="Theme.MyActionBarActivity" parent="@style/Theme.AppCompat.Light">

Also your activities should extend ActionBarActivity and use the "support" version of the action bar methods. More info here.

I also read an article of a guy that declared the styles in some other way, but also using AppCompat v7: http://www.jayway.com/2014/06/02/android-theming-the-actionbar/