adb shell input unicode character

Actually ADBKeyBoard is very good! Thanks for Eric Tang !

Some useful extensions for comfortable usage:

Switch to ADBKeyBoard from adb:

   adb shell ime set com.android.adbkeyboard/.AdbIME   

Check your available le virtual keyboards:

ime list -a  

Use simple quote characters -not double as in example above- if your shell not accepts "!" (explanation sign)

adb shell am broadcast -a ADB_INPUT_TEXT --es msg 'Accented characters here'

Switch back to original virtual keyboard: (swype in my case...)

adb shell ime set com.nuance.swype.dtc/com.nuance.swype.input.IME  

Use adb over wifi to simplify your life... :)

input won't work because it can only send single key event through the virtual keyboard (check the source code if you don't know what I mean).

I think the only way left is using Instrumentation. I guess you can create a test for your Activity and then do something like this:

                final Instrumentation instrumentation = getInstrumentation();
                final long downTime = SystemClock.uptimeMillis();
                final long eventTime = SystemClock.uptimeMillis();
                
                final KeyEvent altDown = new KeyEvent(downTime, eventTime, KeyEvent.ACTION_DOWN,
                        KeyEvent.KEYCODE_GRAVE, 1, KeyEvent.META_ALT_LEFT_ON);
                final KeyEvent altUp = new KeyEvent(downTime, eventTime, KeyEvent.ACTION_UP,
                        KeyEvent.KEYCODE_GRAVE, 1, KeyEvent.META_ALT_LEFT_ON);
                
                instrumentation.sendKeySync(altDown);
                instrumentation.sendCharacterSync(KeyEvent.KEYCODE_A);
                instrumentation.sendKeySync(altUp);
                instrumentation.sendKeySync(altDown);
                instrumentation.sendCharacterSync(KeyEvent.KEYCODE_E);
                instrumentation.sendKeySync(altUp);
                instrumentation.sendKeySync(altDown);
                instrumentation.sendCharacterSync(KeyEvent.KEYCODE_I);
                instrumentation.sendKeySync(altUp);
                instrumentation.sendKeySync(altDown);
                instrumentation.sendCharacterSync(KeyEvent.KEYCODE_O);
                instrumentation.sendKeySync(altUp);
                instrumentation.sendKeySync(altDown);
                instrumentation.sendCharacterSync(KeyEvent.KEYCODE_U);
                instrumentation.sendKeySync(altUp);

This will send the modified keys: àèìòù

update 2022

https://stackoverflow.com/a/71367206/236465 shows another solution using AndroidViewClient/culebra and CulebraTester2-public backend.

I wrote a virtual keyboard that accept broadcast intent, so you can send unicode characters to the editText view via adb.

for e.g. adb shell am broadcast -a ADB_INPUT_TEXT --es msg "你好嗎! Hello!"

Here is the github project: https://github.com/senzhk/ADBKeyBoard

Hope this little project would help.