Disabling smiley key on keyboards with the stock messaging app in ICS

Question

I'm using a custom ROM for ICS on my Samsung Galaxy S.

I like being able to create a new line in a text message, but the 'enter' key on all keyboards I use (though primarily Swype) is replaced with a 'smiley' key.

Is there any way to change this behaviour? Some research shows me it's to do with the field type used in the messaging app. Can the MMS.apk package be modified to use a different field type, or is it possible to modify Swype so that the 'enter' key is used instead?

I'm aware that I could use a 3rd party messaging app, but I like the stock app. I know some people are happy to send multiple messages in bursts rather than a long message with new lines but I'd find that annoying to receive and I don't want to annoy people I text.

Answer 1

Ok, so after looking into this a bit more I managed to get somewhere.

I pulled the Mms.apk file from /system/app and decompiled it with APK Multi-Tool. Then I started editing the file /res/layout/compose_message_activity.xml.

It has an tag towards the bottom of the file. I removed textShortMessage from android:inputType on this line. This means:

android:inputType="textCapSentences|textAutoCorrect|textMultiLine|textShortMessage"

becomes

android:inputType="textCapSentences|textAutoCorrect|textMultiLine"

This worked for me in that the smiley key is replaced with the enter key after recompiling, signing and pushing back to my phone. My problem is that the enter key sends the message rather than inserting a new line.

After more Googling I came across this thread on XDA. This Mms.apk works exactly how I want it to - no smiley key and the enter key adds a new line. It's also black themed which I prefer for my screen.

I decompiled the newly found black Mms.apk file from XDA to try and find what they guy did to make the enter button actually add a new line, but I can't see what's different.

I'd still like to know how to do this if anybody knows - this was my first time playing with a decompiled APK so I don't really know what I'm doing. For now though I'm quite happy with my new black themed Mms.apk app.

Answer 2

I have a custom (Baked) Jelly Bean 4.2.2 ROM on a HTC One S and Swype 1.4 installed. I was ready to go on a shooting spree when I thought I couldn't hit a return button to start a new line!

I opened a SMS thread, tapped Menu > Settings and scrolled all the way down. There is an option at the bottom called Soft keyboard type. Open that and you get --

<> Smiley key

<> Send

<> Enter for a new line

Select the bottom one and you're golden!

This setting will change it for both the stock Android keyboard and Swype.

Cheers!