TextArea does not fire KeyDown events

[RiskyMartin]

The TextArea control (along with the TextField control) does not fire an EventType.KeyDown event when a keyboard key is pressed. Why is this, and what is a good workaround?

Here is a script that demonstrates this:

private string textAreaString = "Type here:                  !";

void Update () {
	// Only happens on mouse click
	if(Input.anyKeyDown)
		Debug.Log("SUCCESS! Input.anyKeyDown is true!");	
	// Only happens on mouse click
	if(Input.anyKey)
		Debug.Log("SUCCESS! Input.anyKey is true!");
}

void OnGUI ()
{
	textAreaString = GUILayout.TextArea(textAreaString);
	// Only happens on mouse click
	if(Event.current.type == EventType.KeyDown)
		Debug.Log("SUCCESS! EventType.KeyDown fired!");
	// Only KeyUp and used events happen
	if(Event.current.type != EventType.Repaint && Event.current.type != EventType.Layout )
		Debug.Log("Current event " + Event.current.type + " at " + Time.timeSinceLevelLoad);
}

I’m currently running Unity 4.0.1f2 on PC.

[jiteshvm]

This could be a workaround

 private string textAreaString = "Type here:                  !";
	// Use this for initialization
	void Start () {
	
	}
	
	// Update is called once per frame
	void Update () {
        // Only happens on mouse click
        //if (Input.anyKeyDown)
        //    Debug.Log("SUCCESS! Input.anyKeyDown is true!");
        // Only happens on mouse click
        //if (Input.anyKey)
        //    Debug.Log("SUCCESS! Input.anyKey is true!");
	}

    void OnGUI()
    {
        if (Event.current.type == EventType.KeyDown && GUI.GetNameOfFocusedControl() == "test")
            Debug.Log("SUCCESS! EventType.KeyDown fired!");
        
        GUI.SetNextControlName("test");
        textAreaString = GUILayout.TextArea(textAreaString);
    }