display built-in emoji keys for inputmethod

Question

I\'m building a custom soft keyboard for android and would like to add a layout to include the emoji keys similar to what the default android keyboard (AOSP) is doing. I\'ve sea

Answer 1

Emoticon support doesn't work like you think it does. There is no universal set of emojis supported by all android devices, and the emojis your device does support may show differently on different devices. Emojis are done on Android in 1 of 2 ways.

1)Unicode. What emojis the device supports then depends on the font the app is using. You just send the unicode just like you would normal text, and you'd display it on your keyboard by displaying that character. For this method, you guess on which ones the phone will support. And its a total guess, because it depends on what font the app is using.

2)Image spans. You embed an ImageSpannable into the text you send via commitText. The advantage of this is you're sure you have an image (you need to include the images with your app). The disadvantage is it can't be sent to another device, saved, and may not work in all apps (they may not be displaying spannable objects).