[ENG] Unity Button – Click via code, click effect (coloring) when hitting the button by code – like clicking it with mouse

Hello Unity developers,

as you know, you’ll come sometime to the point that you want to create a button which can be activated by a keyboard or joypad button. While crawling the internet, i’ve seen a lot of code which just sends the “OnClick” Event to that button but won’t color it.

This is why I post this little guide/hint, you’ll find following topics:

1. How to activate a button by code (several ways)
2. How to use the defined colors from a button when clicked

Let’s see what Unity got for us:

1. How to activate a button by code – Straight forward without further explanation, here’s the code:
   
   C#

   // Execute Events // GameObject myButton; // myButton should be bound the a button... // 1. using execute events ExecuteEvents.Execute<IPointerClickHandler>(myButton, new PointerEventData(EventSystem.current), ExecuteEvents.pointerClickHandler); // 2. using OnPointerClick myButton.GetComponent<Button>().OnPointerClick(new PointerEventData(EventSystem.current)); // 3. Using onClick.Invoke() myButton.GetComponent<Button>().onClick.Invoke();

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   // Execute Events // GameObject myButton; // myButton should be bound the a button... // 1. using execute events ExecuteEvents.Execute<IPointerClickHandler>(myButton, new PointerEventData(EventSystem.current), ExecuteEvents.pointerClickHandler);                 // 2. using OnPointerClick myButton.GetComponent<Button>().OnPointerClick(new PointerEventData(EventSystem.current)); // 3. Using onClick.Invoke() myButton.GetComponent<Button>().onClick.Invoke();

   
   All of these will do the same action: invoking by code the “onClick” Event.
2. How to use the defined colors from a button when clicked

When activating a button by code you may notice that the button won’t recolor – it just looks like the button has not been clicked. The solution simple, just look at this code listening:

1. Set the color when pressed – for example on a KeyDownEvent

1. Set the color to normal again – for example on a KeyUpEvent

The property colors in the Button class is from the type ColorBlock (link to ScriptReference). There are some other colors, just have a look at the Unity Scripting reference.

For an implementation you could have a look at my code at the Asset Store. Link will follow.

Thanks for reading and have fun!