Is there a way to show action buttons on all devices including ones with menu button?

Question

The question says it all. But I want a search button to be in the top right of the screen on all devices. I know that if there is a hardware menu button that the action buttons will be in a popup menu at the bottom but I don't want that. I need the buttons on the actionbar. Preferably not the overflow button workaround either.

Answer 1

Karakuri's Answer is very close but I will make my own to clarify.

The key is define the xml schema in the menu tag under your namespace along with the android schema.

<menu xmlns:android="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res/android"
    xmlns:yourapp="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res-auto">

And then in the item, it needs to be

yourapp:showAsAction="always"

not

android:showAsAction="always"

this is where I messed up.

It shows it in the docs but I accidentally skipped over it.

Answer 2

You can use ActionBarSherlock or the new v7 support library to support ActionBar on older devices, including ones with hardware menu key. Make your search menu item have android:showAsAction="always"