Set actual text padding in TextView with compound drawables

Question

I have a ListView populated with an ArrayAdapter. For items I use just a single TextView layout. I want some of the rows to have compound

Answer 1

Quite simple:

android:drawablePadding="5dp"

It will automatically use the padding according to the direction.

Answer 2

I'm posting this as an answer so that someone, who comes across this post finds the answer.

There's no direct way to set a padding only to text, but you can set a positive padding to the whole TextView and set a negative padding for the drawable.

Answer 3

Improving on Gio's sugestion, which is probably for a dated API/SDK...

TL:DR - just apply android:drawablePadding to increase distance between image and text.

Explanation: android:drawablePadding now applies padding between CompoundDrawable and original View, in this case the TextView containing the text;

android:padding and modifiers now apply to the whole group, including all compounds.

Doing the negative-positive hack doesn't seem to work no more.

So depending on the drawable position (drawableTop/Left/...), the padding will apply in the opposite direction of it, right next to the drawable, in other words between the two elements. For instance, Applying drawablePadding="10dp" to a left placed drawable would have a similar effect as setting an individual ImageView to the left of the TextView with paddingRight="10dp" (at least padding-wise).