Placeholder in UITextView

Question

My application uses an UITextView. Now I want the UITextView to have a placeholder similar to the one you can set for an UITextField.<

Answer 1

Here's a way easier solution that behaves exactly like UITextField's placeholder but doesn't require drawing custom views, or resigning first responder.

- (void) textViewDidChange:(UITextView *)textView{

    if (textView.text.length == 0){
        textView.textColor = [UIColor lightGrayColor];
        textView.text = placeholderText;
        [textView setSelectedRange:NSMakeRange(0, 0)];
        isPlaceholder = YES;

    } else if (isPlaceholder && ![textView.text isEqualToString:placeholderText]) {
        textView.text = [textView.text substringToIndex:1];
        textView.textColor = [UIColor blackColor];
        isPlaceholder = NO;
    }

}

(the second check in the else if statement is for the case where nothing is entered and the user presses backspace)

Just set your class as a UITextViewDelegate. In viewDidLoad you should initialize like

- (void) viewDidLoad{
    // initialize placeholder text
    placeholderText = @"some placeholder";
    isPlaceholder = YES;
    self.someTextView.text = placeholderText;
    self.someTextView.textColor = [UIColor lightGrayColor];
    [self.someTextView setSelectedRange:NSMakeRange(0, 0)];

    // assign UITextViewDelegate
    self.someTextView.delegate = self;
}