controltextShouldEndEditing

controltextShouldEndEditing is a term used in some user interface frameworks to describe a callback or delegate hook that decides whether editing of a text-based control should end. It is typically associated with text fields or text views where user input is collected.

When the user finishes editing or moves focus away, the framework may invoke this callback before the transfer of focus completes. The callback returns a boolean value: returning true allows the editing session to end and the control to resign focus; returning false keeps the control focused, allowing the user to correct input.

In practice, implementations use this to perform validation, formatting, or constraint checks. For example, required-field validation or length checks; trimming whitespace; showing an error message and preventing loss of focus until the input is valid.

The exact naming controltextShouldEndEditing is not part of a widely adopted standard API in major platforms. It is sometimes seen as a descriptive or custom hook name representing the general concept of a should-end-editing action. The more common names in popular frameworks are textFieldShouldEndEditing for iOS (UITextFieldDelegate) and similar methods in desktop toolkits. When designing a custom control, developers may expose a similar delegate to provide this behavior.

See also: textFieldShouldEndEditing, shouldEndEditing, resignFirstResponder.