Qt 5.11 | Qt Quick | QML Types | TextInput QML Type

Qt 5.11.3 Reference Documentation

# TextInput QML Type

Displays an editable line of text. More...

Import Statement: | import QtQuick 2.11
Inherits: | Item

- List of all members, including inherited members

## Properties

- acceptableInput : bool
- activeFocusOnPress : bool
- autoScroll : bool
- bottomPadding : real
- canPaste : bool
- canRedo : bool
- canUndo : bool
- color : color
- contentHeight : real
- contentWidth : real
- cursorDelegate : Component
- cursorPosition : int
- cursorRectangle : rectangle
- cursorVisible : bool
- displayText : string
- echoMode : enumeration
- effectiveHorizontalAlignment : enumeration
- font.bold : bool
- font.capitalization : enumeration
- font.family : string
- font.hintingPreference : enumeration
- font.italic : bool
- font.kerning : bool
- font.letterSpacing : real
- font.pixelSize : int
- font.pointSize : real
- font.preferShaping : bool
- font.strikeout : bool
- font.styleName : string
- font.underline : bool
- font.weight : enumeration
- font.wordSpacing : real
- horizontalAlignment : enumeration
- inputMask : string
- inputMethodComposing : bool
- inputMethodHints : enumeration
- leftPadding : real
- length : int
- maximumLength : int
- mouseSelectionMode : enumeration
- overwriteMode : bool
- padding : real
- passwordCharacter : string
- passwordMaskDelay : int
- persistentSelection : bool
- preeditText : string
- readOnly : bool
- renderType : enumeration
- rightPadding : real
- selectByMouse : bool
- selectedText : string
- selectedTextColor : color
- selectionColor : color
- selectionEnd : int
- selectionStart : int
- text : string
- topPadding : real
- validator : Validator
- verticalAlignment : enumeration
- wrapMode : enumeration

## Signals

- accepted()
- editingFinished()
- textEdited()

## Methods

- clear()
- copy()
- cut()
- deselect()
- ensureVisible(int position)
- string getText(int start, int end)
- insert(int position, string text)
- isRightToLeft(int start, int end)
- moveCursorSelection(int position, SelectionMode mode = TextInput.SelectCharacters)
- paste()
- int positionAt(real x, real y, CursorPosition position = CursorBetweenCharacters)
- rect positionToRectangle(int pos)
- redo()
- remove(int start, int end)
- select(int start, int end)
- selectAll()
- selectWord()
- undo()

## Detailed Description

The TextInput type displays a single line of editable plain text.

TextInput is used to accept a line of text input. Input constraints can be placed on a TextInput item (for example, through a validator or inputMask), and setting echoMode to an appropriate value enables TextInput to be used for a password input field.

On macOS, the Up/Down key bindings for Home/End are explicitly disabled. If you want such bindings (on any platform), you will need to construct them in QML.

See also TextEdit and Text.

## Property Documentation

acceptableInput : bool

This property is always true unless a validator or input mask has been set. If a validator or input mask has been set, this property will only be true if the current text is acceptable to the validator or input mask as a final string (not as an intermediate string).

activeFocusOnPress : bool

Whether the TextInput should gain active focus on a mouse press. By default this is set to true.

autoScroll : bool

Whether the TextInput should scroll when the text is longer than the width. By default this is set to true.

See also ensureVisible().

bottomPadding : real

These properties hold the padding around the content. This space is reserved in addition to the contentWidth and contentHeight.

This property was introduced in Qt 5.6.

canPaste : bool

Returns true if the TextInput is writable and the content of the clipboard is suitable for pasting into the TextInput.

canRedo : bool

Returns true if the TextInput is writable and there are undone operations that can be redone.

canUndo : bool

Returns true if the TextInput is writable and there are previous operations that can be undone.

color : color

The text color.

contentHeight : real

Returns the height of the text, including the height past the height that is covered if the text does not fit within the set height.

contentWidth : real

Returns the width of the text, including the width past the width which is covered due to insufficient wrapping if wrapMode is set.

cursorDelegate : Component

The delegate for the cursor in the TextInput.

If you set a cursorDelegate for a TextInput, this delegate will be used for drawing the cursor instead of the standard cursor. An instance of the delegate will be created and managed by the TextInput when a cursor is needed, and the x property of the delegate instance will be set so as to be one pixel before the top left of the current character.

Note that the root item of the delegate component must be a QQuickItem or QQuickItem derived item.

cursorPosition : int

The position of the cursor in the TextInput.

cursorRectangle : rectangle

The rectangle where the standard text cursor is rendered within the text input. Read only.

The position and height of a custom cursorDelegate are updated to follow the cursorRectangle automatically when it changes. The width of the delegate is unaffected by changes in the cursor rectangle.

cursorVisible : bool

Set to true when the TextInput shows a cursor.

This property is set and unset when the TextInput gets active focus, so that other properties can be bound to whether the cursor is currently showing. As it gets set and unset automatically, when you set the value yourself you must keep in mind that your value may be overwritten.

It can be set directly in script, for example if a KeyProxy might forward keys to it and you desire it to look active when this happens (but without actually giving it active focus).

It should not be set directly on the item, like in the below QML, as the specified value will be overridden and lost on focus changes.

      TextInput {
          text: "Text"
          cursorVisible: false
      }

In the above snippet the cursor will still become visible when the TextInput gains active focus.

[read-only] displayText : string

This is the text displayed in the TextInput.

If echoMode is set to TextInput::Normal, this holds the same value as the TextInput::text property. Otherwise, this property holds the text visible to the user, while the text property holds the actual entered text.

Note: Unlike the TextInput::text property, this contains partial text input from an input method.

See also preeditText.

echoMode : enumeration

Specifies how the text should be displayed in the TextInput.

- TextInput.Normal - Displays the text as it is. (Default)
- TextInput.Password - Displays platform-dependent password mask characters instead of the actual characters.
- TextInput.NoEcho - Displays nothing.
- TextInput.PasswordEchoOnEdit - Displays characters as they are entered while editing, otherwise identical to `TextInput.Password`.

effectiveHorizontalAlignment : enumeration

Sets the horizontal alignment of the text within the TextInput item's width and height. By default, the text alignment follows the natural alignment of the text, for example text that is read from left to right will be aligned to the left.

TextInput does not have vertical alignment, as the natural height is exactly the height of the single line of text. If you set the height manually to something larger, TextInput will always be top aligned vertically. You can use anchors to align it however you want within another item.

The valid values for `horizontalAlignment` are `TextInput.AlignLeft`, `TextInput.AlignRight` and `TextInput.AlignHCenter`.

Valid values for `verticalAlignment` are `TextInput.AlignTop` (default), `TextInput.AlignBottom` `TextInput.AlignVCenter`.

When using the attached property LayoutMirroring::enabled to mirror application layouts, the horizontal alignment of text will also be mirrored. However, the property `horizontalAlignment` will remain unchanged. To query the effective horizontal alignment of TextInput, use the read-only property `effectiveHorizontalAlignment`.

font.bold : bool

Sets whether the font weight is bold.

font.capitalization : enumeration

Sets the capitalization for the text.

- Font.MixedCase - This is the normal text rendering option where no capitalization change is applied.
- Font.AllUppercase - This alters the text to be rendered in all uppercase type.
- Font.AllLowercase - This alters the text to be rendered in all lowercase type.
- Font.SmallCaps - This alters the text to be rendered in small-caps type.
- Font.Capitalize - This alters the text to be rendered with the first character of each word as an uppercase character.

      TextInput { text: "Hello"; font.capitalization: Font.AllLowercase }

font.family : string

Sets the family name of the font.

The family name is case insensitive and may optionally include a foundry name, e.g. "Helvetica [Cronyx]". If the family is available from more than one foundry and the foundry isn't specified, an arbitrary foundry is chosen. If the family isn't available a family will be set using the font matching algorithm.

font.hintingPreference : enumeration

Sets the preferred hinting on the text. This is a hint to the underlying text rendering system to use a certain level of hinting, and has varying support across platforms. See the table in the documentation for QFont::HintingPreference for more details.

Note: This property only has an effect when used together with render type TextInput.NativeRendering.

Font.PreferDefaultHinting - Use the default hinting level for the target platform.

Font.PreferNoHinting - If possible, render text without hinting the outlines of the glyphs. The text layout will be typographically accurate, using the same metrics as are used e.g. when printing.

Font.PreferVerticalHinting - If possible, render text with no horizontal hinting, but align glyphs to the pixel grid in the vertical direction. The text will appear crisper on displays where the density is too low to give an accurate rendering of the glyphs. But since the horizontal metrics of the glyphs are unhinted, the text's layout will be scalable to higher density devices (such as printers) without impacting details such as line breaks.

Font.PreferFullHinting - If possible, render text with hinting in both horizontal and vertical directions. The text will be altered to optimize legibility on the target device, but since the metrics will depend on the target size of the text, the positions of glyphs, line breaks, and other typographical detail will not scale, meaning that a text layout may look different on devices with different pixel densities.

      TextInput { text: "Hello"; renderType: TextInput.NativeRendering; font.hintingPreference: Font.PreferVerticalHinting }

This property was introduced in Qt 5.8.

font.italic : bool

Sets whether the font has an italic style.

font.kerning : bool

Enables or disables the kerning OpenType feature when shaping the text. Disabling this may improve performance when creating or changing the text, at the expense of some cosmetic features. The default value is true.

      TextInput { text: "OATS FLAVOUR WAY"; font.kerning: false }

This property was introduced in Qt 5.10.

font.letterSpacing : real

Sets the letter spacing for the font.

Letter spacing changes the default spacing between individual letters in the font. A positive value increases the letter spacing by the corresponding pixels; a negative value decreases the spacing.

font.pixelSize : int

Sets the font size in pixels.

Using this function makes the font device dependent. Use `pointSize` to set the size of the font in a device independent manner.

font.pointSize : real

Sets the font size in points. The point size must be greater than zero.

font.preferShaping : bool

Sometimes, a font will apply complex rules to a set of characters in order to display them correctly. In some writing systems, such as Brahmic scripts, this is required in order for the text to be legible, but in e.g. Latin script, it is merely a cosmetic feature. Setting the `preferShaping` property to false will disable all such features when they are not required, which will improve performance in most cases.

The default value is true.

      TextInput { text: "Some text"; font.preferShaping: false }

This property was introduced in Qt 5.10.

font.strikeout : bool

Sets whether the font has a strikeout style.

font.styleName : string

Sets the style name of the font.

The style name is case insensitive. If set, the font will be matched against style name instead of the font properties font.weight, font.bold and font.italic.

This property was introduced in Qt 5.6.

font.underline : bool

Sets whether the text is underlined.

font.weight : enumeration

Sets the font's weight.

The weight can be one of:

- Font.Thin
- Font.Light
- Font.ExtraLight
- Font.Normal - the default
- Font.Medium
- Font.DemiBold
- Font.Bold
- Font.ExtraBold
- Font.Black

      TextInput { text: "Hello"; font.weight: Font.DemiBold }

font.wordSpacing : real

Sets the word spacing for the font.

Word spacing changes the default spacing between individual words. A positive value increases the word spacing by a corresponding amount of pixels, while a negative value decreases the inter-word spacing accordingly.

horizontalAlignment : enumeration

Sets the horizontal alignment of the text within the TextInput item's width and height. By default, the text alignment follows the natural alignment of the text, for example text that is read from left to right will be aligned to the left.

TextInput does not have vertical alignment, as the natural height is exactly the height of the single line of text. If you set the height manually to something larger, TextInput will always be top aligned vertically. You can use anchors to align it however you want within another item.

The valid values for `horizontalAlignment` are `TextInput.AlignLeft`, `TextInput.AlignRight` and `TextInput.AlignHCenter`.

Valid values for `verticalAlignment` are `TextInput.AlignTop` (default), `TextInput.AlignBottom` `TextInput.AlignVCenter`.

When using the attached property LayoutMirroring::enabled to mirror application layouts, the horizontal alignment of text will also be mirrored. However, the property `horizontalAlignment` will remain unchanged. To query the effective horizontal alignment of TextInput, use the read-only property `effectiveHorizontalAlignment`.

inputMask : string

Allows you to set an input mask on the TextInput, restricting the allowable text inputs. See QLineEdit::inputMask for further details, as the exact same mask strings are used by TextInput.

See also acceptableInput and validator.

inputMethodComposing : bool

This property holds whether the TextInput has partial text input from an input method.

While it is composing an input method may rely on mouse or key events from the TextInput to edit or commit the partial text. This property can be used to determine when to disable events handlers that may interfere with the correct operation of an input method.

inputMethodHints : enumeration

Provides hints to the input method about the expected content of the text input and how it should operate.

The value is a bit-wise combination of flags, or Qt.ImhNone if no hints are set.

Flags that alter behaviour are:

- Qt.ImhHiddenText - Characters should be hidden, as is typically used when entering passwords. This is automatically set when setting echoMode to `TextInput.Password`.
- Qt.ImhSensitiveData - Typed text should not be stored by the active input method in any persistent storage like predictive user dictionary.
- Qt.ImhNoAutoUppercase - The input method should not try to automatically switch to upper case when a sentence ends.
- Qt.ImhPreferNumbers - Numbers are preferred (but not required).
- Qt.ImhPreferUppercase - Upper case letters are preferred (but not required).
- Qt.ImhPreferLowercase - Lower case letters are preferred (but not required).
- Qt.ImhNoPredictiveText - Do not use predictive text (i.e. dictionary lookup) while typing.
- Qt.ImhDate - The text editor functions as a date field.
- Qt.ImhTime - The text editor functions as a time field.
- Qt.ImhMultiLine - The text editor doesn't close software input keyboard when Return or Enter key is pressed (since QtQuick 2.4).

Flags that restrict input (exclusive flags) are:

- Qt.ImhDigitsOnly - Only digits are allowed.
- Qt.ImhFormattedNumbersOnly - Only number input is allowed. This includes decimal point and minus sign.
- Qt.ImhUppercaseOnly - Only upper case letter input is allowed.
- Qt.ImhLowercaseOnly - Only lower case letter input is allowed.
- Qt.ImhDialableCharactersOnly - Only characters suitable for phone dialing are allowed.
- Qt.ImhEmailCharactersOnly - Only characters suitable for email addresses are allowed.
- Qt.ImhUrlCharactersOnly - Only characters suitable for URLs are allowed.

Masks:

- Qt.ImhExclusiveInputMask - This mask yields nonzero if any of the exclusive flags are used.

leftPadding : real

These properties hold the padding around the content. This space is reserved in addition to the contentWidth and contentHeight.

This property was introduced in Qt 5.6.

length : int

Returns the total number of characters in the TextInput item.

If the TextInput has an inputMask the length will include mask characters and may differ from the length of the string returned by the text property.

This property can be faster than querying the length the text property as it doesn't require any copying or conversion of the TextInput's internal string data.

maximumLength : int

The maximum permitted length of the text in the TextInput.

If the text is too long, it is truncated at the limit.

By default, this property contains a value of 32767.

mouseSelectionMode : enumeration

Specifies how text should be selected using a mouse.

- TextInput.SelectCharacters - The selection is updated with individual characters. (Default)
- TextInput.SelectWords - The selection is updated with whole words.

This property only applies when selectByMouse is true.

overwriteMode : bool

Whether text entered by the user will overwrite existing text.

As with many text editors, the text editor widget can be configured to insert or overwrite existing text with new text entered by the user.

If this property is `true`, existing text is overwritten, character-for-character by new text; otherwise, text is inserted at the cursor position, displacing existing text.

By default, this property is `false` (new text does not overwrite existing text).

This property was introduced in Qt 5.8.

padding : real

These properties hold the padding around the content. This space is reserved in addition to the contentWidth and contentHeight.

This property was introduced in Qt 5.6.

passwordCharacter : string

This is the character displayed when echoMode is set to Password or PasswordEchoOnEdit. By default it is the password character used by the platform theme.

If this property is set to a string with more than one character, the first character is used. If the string is empty, the value is ignored and the property is not set.

passwordMaskDelay : int

Sets the delay before visible character is masked with password character, in milliseconds.

The reset method will be called by assigning undefined.

This property was introduced in Qt 5.4.

persistentSelection : bool

Whether the TextInput should keep its selection when it loses active focus to another item in the scene. By default this is set to false;

[read-only] preeditText : string

This property contains partial text input from an input method.

This property was introduced in Qt 5.7.

See also displayText.

readOnly : bool

Sets whether user input can modify the contents of the TextInput.

If readOnly is set to true, then user input will not affect the text property. Any bindings or attempts to set the text property will still work.

renderType : enumeration

Override the default rendering type for this component.

Supported render types are:

- Text.QtRendering
- Text.NativeRendering

Select Text.NativeRendering if you prefer text to look native on the target platform and do not require advanced features such as transformation of the text. Using such features in combination with the NativeRendering render type will lend poor and sometimes pixelated results.

The default rendering type is determined by QQuickWindow::textRenderType().

rightPadding : real

These properties hold the padding around the content. This space is reserved in addition to the contentWidth and contentHeight.

This property was introduced in Qt 5.6.

selectByMouse : bool

Defaults to false.

If true, the user can use the mouse to select text in some platform-specific way. Note that for some platforms this may not be an appropriate interaction (it may conflict with how the text needs to behave inside a Flickable, for example).

selectedText : string

This read-only property provides the text currently selected in the text input.

It is equivalent to the following snippet, but is faster and easier to use.

      myTextInput.text.toString().substring(myTextInput.selectionStart,
          myTextInput.selectionEnd);

selectedTextColor : color

The highlighted text color, used in selections.

selectionColor : color

The text highlight color, used behind selections.

selectionEnd : int

The cursor position after the last character in the current selection.

This property is read-only. To change the selection, use select(start,end), selectAll(), or selectWord().

See also selectionStart, cursorPosition, and selectedText.

selectionStart : int

The cursor position before the first character in the current selection.

This property is read-only. To change the selection, use select(start,end), selectAll(), or selectWord().

See also selectionEnd, cursorPosition, and selectedText.

text : string

The text in the TextInput.

See also clear().

topPadding : real

These properties hold the padding around the content. This space is reserved in addition to the contentWidth and contentHeight.

This property was introduced in Qt 5.6.

validator : Validator

Allows you to set a validator on the TextInput. When a validator is set the TextInput will only accept input which leaves the text property in an acceptable or intermediate state. The accepted signal will only be sent if the text is in an acceptable state when enter is pressed.

Currently supported validators are IntValidator, DoubleValidator and RegExpValidator. An example of using validators is shown below, which allows input of integers between 11 and 31 into the text input:

      import QtQuick 2.0
      TextInput{
          validator: IntValidator{bottom: 11; top: 31;}
          focus: true
      }

See also acceptableInput and inputMask.

verticalAlignment : enumeration

Sets the horizontal alignment of the text within the TextInput item's width and height. By default, the text alignment follows the natural alignment of the text, for example text that is read from left to right will be aligned to the left.

TextInput does not have vertical alignment, as the natural height is exactly the height of the single line of text. If you set the height manually to something larger, TextInput will always be top aligned vertically. You can use anchors to align it however you want within another item.

The valid values for `horizontalAlignment` are `TextInput.AlignLeft`, `TextInput.AlignRight` and `TextInput.AlignHCenter`.

Valid values for `verticalAlignment` are `TextInput.AlignTop` (default), `TextInput.AlignBottom` `TextInput.AlignVCenter`.

When using the attached property LayoutMirroring::enabled to mirror application layouts, the horizontal alignment of text will also be mirrored. However, the property `horizontalAlignment` will remain unchanged. To query the effective horizontal alignment of TextInput, use the read-only property `effectiveHorizontalAlignment`.

wrapMode : enumeration

Set this property to wrap the text to the TextInput item's width. The text will only wrap if an explicit width has been set.

- TextInput.NoWrap - no wrapping will be performed. If the text contains insufficient newlines, then implicitWidth will exceed a set width.
- TextInput.WordWrap - wrapping is done on word boundaries only. If a word is too long, implicitWidth will exceed a set width.
- TextInput.WrapAnywhere - wrapping is done at any point on a line, even if it occurs in the middle of a word.
- TextInput.Wrap - if possible, wrapping occurs at a word boundary; otherwise it will occur at the appropriate point on the line, even in the middle of a word.

The default is TextInput.NoWrap. If you set a width, consider using TextInput.Wrap.

## Signal Documentation

accepted()

This signal is emitted when the Return or Enter key is pressed. Note that if there is a validator or inputMask set on the text input, the signal will only be emitted if the input is in an acceptable state.

The corresponding handler is `onAccepted`.

editingFinished()

This signal is emitted when the Return or Enter key is pressed or the text input loses focus. Note that if there is a validator or inputMask set on the text input and enter/return is pressed, this signal will only be emitted if the input follows the inputMask and the validator returns an acceptable state.

The corresponding handler is `onEditingFinished`.

This signal was introduced in Qt 5.2.

textEdited()

This signal is emitted whenever the text is edited. Unlike `textChanged()`, this signal is not emitted when the text is changed programmatically, for example, by changing the value of the `text` property or by calling `clear()`.

The corresponding handler is `onTextEdited`.

This signal was introduced in Qt 5.9.

## Method Documentation

clear()

Clears the contents of the text input and resets partial text input from an input method.

Use this method instead of setting the text property to an empty string.

This method was introduced in Qt 5.7.

See also QInputMethod::reset().

copy()

Copies the currently selected text to the system clipboard.

Note: If the echo mode is set to a mode other than Normal then copy will not work. This is to prevent using copy as a method of bypassing password features of the line control.

cut()

Moves the currently selected text to the system clipboard.

Note: If the echo mode is set to a mode other than Normal then cut will not work. This is to prevent using cut as a method of bypassing password features of the line control.

deselect()

Removes active text selection.

ensureVisible(int position)

Scrolls the contents of the text input so that the specified character position is visible inside the boundaries of the text input.

This method was introduced in Qt 5.4.

See also autoScroll.

string getText(int start, int end)

Returns the section of text that is between the start and end positions.

If the TextInput has an inputMask the length will include mask characters.

insert(int position, string text)

Inserts text into the TextInput at position.

isRightToLeft(int start, int end)

Returns true if the natural reading direction of the editor text found between positions start and end is right to left.

moveCursorSelection(int position, SelectionMode mode = TextInput.SelectCharacters)

Moves the cursor to position and updates the selection according to the optional mode parameter. (To only move the cursor, set the cursorPosition property.)

When this method is called it additionally sets either the selectionStart or the selectionEnd (whichever was at the previous cursor position) to the specified position. This allows you to easily extend and contract the selected text range.

The selection mode specifies whether the selection is updated on a per character or a per word basis. If not specified the selection mode will default to TextInput.SelectCharacters.

- TextInput.SelectCharacters - Sets either the selectionStart or selectionEnd (whichever was at the previous cursor position) to the specified position.
- TextInput.SelectWords - Sets the selectionStart and selectionEnd to include all words between the specified position and the previous cursor position. Words partially in the range are included.

For example, take this sequence of calls:

      cursorPosition = 5
      moveCursorSelection(9, TextInput.SelectCharacters)
      moveCursorSelection(7, TextInput.SelectCharacters)

This moves the cursor to position 5, extend the selection end from 5 to 9 and then retract the selection end from 9 to 7, leaving the text from position 5 to 7 selected (the 6th and 7th characters).

The same sequence with TextInput.SelectWords will extend the selection start to a word boundary before or on position 5 and extend the selection end to a word boundary on or past position 9.

paste()

Replaces the currently selected text by the contents of the system clipboard.

int positionAt(real x, real y, CursorPosition position = CursorBetweenCharacters)

This function returns the character position at x and y pixels from the top left of the textInput. Position 0 is before the first character, position 1 is after the first character but before the second, and so on until position text.length, which is after all characters.

This means that for all x values before the first character this function returns 0, and for all x values after the last character this function returns text.length. If the y value is above the text the position will be that of the nearest character on the first line and if it is below the text the position of the nearest character on the last line will be returned.

The cursor position type specifies how the cursor position should be resolved.

- TextInput.CursorBetweenCharacters - Returns the position between characters that is nearest x.
- TextInput.CursorOnCharacter - Returns the position before the character that is nearest x.

rect positionToRectangle(int pos)

This function takes a character position and returns the rectangle that the cursor would occupy, if it was placed at that character position.

This is similar to setting the cursorPosition, and then querying the cursor rectangle, but the cursorPosition is not changed.

redo()

Redoes the last operation if redo is available.

remove(int start, int end)

Removes the section of text that is between the start and end positions from the TextInput.

select(int start, int end)

Causes the text from start to end to be selected.

If either start or end is out of range, the selection is not changed.

After calling this, selectionStart will become the lesser and selectionEnd will become the greater (regardless of the order passed to this method).

See also selectionStart and selectionEnd.

selectAll()

Causes all text to be selected.

selectWord()

Causes the word closest to the current cursor position to be selected.

undo()

Undoes the last operation if undo is available. Deselects any current selection, and updates the selection start to the current cursor position.