Why is UIGestureRecognizer being called on my textField clear button?

Question

I have a UITableView with a gesture recognizer added:

UITapGestureRecognizer *gestureRecognizer = [[UITapGestureRecognizer alloc] initWithTarget:self action:@selector(hideKeyboard)];
[myTableView addGestureRecognizer:gestureRecognizer];
gestureRecognizer.cancelsTouchesInView = NO;

... everything works fine when tapping on the tableview to dismiss the keyboard. My problem is, my hideKeyboard method also calls when tapping on the "clear" button on my UITextField. Very strange.

commentTextField = [[UITextField alloc] initWithFrame:CGRectMake(5, 5, 310, 35)];
commentTextField.contentVerticalAlignment =UIControlContentVerticalAlignmentCenter;
commentTextField.borderStyle = UITextBorderStyleRoundedRect;
commentTextField.textColor = [UIColor blackColor]; //text color
commentTextField.font = [UIFont fontWithName:@"Helvetica" size:14.0];  //font size
commentTextField.placeholder = @"Enter a comment...";  //place holder
commentTextField.autocorrectionType = UITextAutocorrectionTypeNo;   // no auto correction support
commentTextField.keyboardType = UIKeyboardTypeDefault;  // type of the keyboard
commentTextField.returnKeyType = UIReturnKeySend;  // type of the return key
commentTextField.clearButtonMode = UITextFieldViewModeAlways;   // has a clear 'x' button to the right
commentTextField.delegate = self;
[commentTextField setHidden:NO];
[commentTextField setEnabled:YES];
[commentTextField setDelegate: self];

hide keyboard method:
 - (void) hideKeyboard{

if(keyboard){

   [commentTextField resignFirstResponder];

    [UIView animateWithDuration:.3 
                  delay:.0
                options:UIViewAnimationCurveEaseInOut 
             animations:^{ // start animation block                   

                 [myTableView setFrame:CGRectMake(0, myTableView.frame.origin.y + 216, myTableView.frame.size.width, myTableView.frame.size.height)];

             } 
             completion:^(BOOL finished){


             }];

    keyboard = 0;
}
 }

Any help would be appreciated, thanks!

Answer 1

The following is a little more general - it's not coupled to your specific views:

- (BOOL)gestureRecognizer:(UIGestureRecognizer *)gestureRecognizer shouldReceiveTouch:(UITouch *)touch
{   
    if ([touch.view isKindOfClass:[UITextField class]] || 
        [touch.view isKindOfClass:[UIButton class]]) 
    {
        return NO;
    }
    return YES;
}

Also, don't forget to set the delegate for the gesture recognizer, and mark the class as implementing the UIGestureRecognizerDelegate protocol.

Answer 2

I had the same issue. I also implemented the following method in my view:

- (BOOL)gestureRecognizer:(UIGestureRecognizer *)gestureRecognizer shouldReceiveTouch:(UITouch *)touch
{
    if ((touch.view == self.textField) && (gestureRecognizer == self.tapGestureRecognizer))
    {
        return NO;
    }

    return YES;
}

But it still didn't work. So I set a break in the method and saw that when I click the field, touch.view would be set to it but when I clicked on the clear button it was coming in as a UIButton*. At that point it was obvious what was happening and what to do to fix it. The below resolves the issue.

if((touch.view == self.textField || [self.textField.subviews containsObject:touch.view]) && (gestureRecognizer == self.tapGestureRecognizer))
{
     return NO;
}

Answer 3

My issue with Ezmodius' approach is that he depends on a property called 'textField' and my UIViewController is a controller from which all my other UIViewControllers inherit, so i needed to implement a more generic approach: whenever there was a textfield in any UIViewController that needed to be cleared, i implemented the following (inside the same gestureRecognizer method:

- (BOOL)gestureRecognizer:(UIGestureRecognizer *)gestureRecognizer shouldReceiveTouch:(UITouch *)touch {
if ([touch.view isKindOfClass:[UITextField class]] ||
    ([touch.view isKindOfClass:[UIButton class]] && [touch.view.superview isKindOfClass:[UITextField class]]))
{
    return NO;
}

return YES;
}

So basically im checking whether it is a textfield or a button whose superview is a textfield (in this case, the clear button inside the textfield) and it works like a charm for me. I implemented this in my base UIViewController class and it works for every page where this happens.