How to start contextual action bar for text view programmatically with default opions copy and select all?

Question

Is there any way to programmatically start contextual action bar associated with a text view, on a button click? It should contain default options of copy/select all as well. Basically, I want to show the selection handles in my text view and the android default copy/select all option in action bar, on a button click (instead of long click/double tap).

What I tried so far: tried using the setCustomActionModeCallback() api, but problem here, is user need to long press/double click the text view for CAB to appear. Tried using startActionMode() api, but could not find a way to retain default items.. it just opens a new empty CAB.. I know, I can add my custom copy-select all code and make use of this empty CAB, but I want to use the default Android provided one instead of managing it by myself.

Edit; I can't use EditText. The view need to be TextView only and long click will be disabled. I am doing all the above changes by setting TextView as selectable

Answer 1

Select your text manually and then perform a long click:

textView.post(new Runnable() {
    @Override
    public void run() {
        Selection.selectAll((Spannable) tv.getText());
        tv.performLongClick();
    }
});

Edit:

The problem is that the built-in text selection CAB is private and uses multiple private classes. You'd need to copy a lot of code or access a bunch of methods with reflection to use it.

You could make your own CAB menu but you'd also need the controller handles which is again a lot of code.

A simple solution would be to live with what you have and use my above suggested method. If you want to avoid calling your long click listener you can remove it while calling the cab:

Selection.selectAll((Spannable) tv.getText());
tv.setOnLongClickListener(null);
tv.performLongClick();
tv.setOnLongClickListener(mLongClickListener);