Question

I’d like to align the text in a TextView with text inside an EditText that is directly below it. Is this possible without using padding tricks?

If not, is this because it’s discouraged? I could see it being discouraged because it could confuse the user into missing the distinction between the two controls.

Here’s the layout that created the above screenshot:

<RelativeLayout xmlns:android="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res/android"
    android:layout_width="match_parent"
    android:layout_height="match_parent" >

    <TextView
        android:id="@+id/text_view"
        android:layout_width="fill_parent"
        android:layout_height="wrap_content"
        android:layout_alignParentTop="true"
        android:text="Please align my first character" />

    <EditText
        android:layout_width="match_parent"
        android:layout_height="wrap_content"
        android:layout_below="@+id/text_view"
        android:hint="To my first character" />

</RelativeLayout>

Answer 1

No, you can’t do this without using padding or layout_margin. EditText has a background with borders and padding, so its content area is a little bit smaller than the area of TextView. I think it’s normal to use padding in such situations.