Control the phone with keyboard

[skkayman 0]

Will it be possible to control the phone with keyboard? I am just thinking because that is my biggest problem with BB Key series. The keyboard is only for writing (and you have to tap on screen to write first..). Plus starting apps with the right launcher or using speed key. Even E7 was possible to control with keyboard (but not everything like BB Classic, but mostly everything).

Or the Android is problem here?

[TeZtdevice 303]

Please could you explain what do you mean with "control the phone" ?

Example?

[_DW_ 628]

Tapping the screen for input is same as PC clicking a box for input. But yes PC will let you TAB between boxes. This is an operating system thing though not a device specific implementation. I've no idea is android does this or not and not got an emulator installed to try.

[Doktor Oswaldo 906]

Since Android has a native HW-keyboard support this should work. But I have never tried it, so in what degree it is working is not clear to me. At least there is somewhere a review of the pro1 which showed that you can select icons from your home screen with the arrow keys.

If it is possible there, i bet you could control pretty much all of android with the keyboard. Everything else will be dependent on the App.

[aznfantasystar 5]

Yup. The problem with the Blackberry phones is that the functionality is heavily app-dependent such that the capacitive keyboard is hit/miss for apps. The keyboard shortcuts like Alt-E for search is also hit/miss.

 

This is an advantage that would play to Fxtec if they're able to create a macro tool such to bind intents to whatever keyboard macro we choose. This would be a radical game changer for us.

[Waxberry 638]

[adidas88 29]

I saw the video but I still have a question about the control of the phone just with the keyboard.

I have the following situation now on my BBPriv:

 

I am opening chrome to browse via hotkey. Now I have to touch the adressbar and then start typing. Will there a hotkey to be able to type directly the page I want to access? How about changing tabs. I don't want to touch the Tab-Field and then chose which Tab I want to open. Or will there be the possibility to open a new tab with just the hardware keyboard. I know that this is was very app-specific but the question is quite general for every other app as well. Starting Spotify via shortcut. Do I have to touch the field I want to open, or could I navigate INSIDE the app with just the keyboard?

 

Could we see how this is managed on the pro1?

[EskeRahn 5,471]

I saw the video but I still have a question about the control of the phone just with the keyboard.

 

I have the following situation now on my BBPriv:

 

I am opening chrome to browse via hotkey. Now I have to touch the adressbar and then start typing. Will there a hotkey to be able to type directly the page I want to access? How about changing tabs. I don’t want to touch the Tab-Field and then chose which Tab I want to open. Or will there be the possibility to open a new tab with just the hardware keyboard. I know that this is was very app-specific but the question is quite general for every other app as well. Starting Spotify via shortcut. Do I have to touch the field I want to open, or could I navigate INSIDE the app with just the keyboard?

 

Could we see how this is managed on the pro1?

 

I have the same thoughts. To what degree are android basically possible to navigate in with keys only? Sure there are apps like the "Keyboard browser" that are specifically designed for a keyboard, But how are android UI in general, under the hood? Are there say tab-stops on all controls like MS Windows?

I know it is possible to navigate Android with a USB mouse (see e.g.

), so it DOES have the concept of a cursor build in, so at the lowest bar, some way to turn on the cursor and arrow/navigation could be possible. Though that might well be too slow and inconvenient in real usage, so I guess that would be a rather academic 'solution', and perhaps thus not worth the work to implement.

 

When the Pro¹ is released, I hope we will have an active branch of this forum hinting at apps that works particularly well with a real keyboard.

[ToniCipriani 194]

I saw the video but I still have a question about the control of the phone just with the keyboard.

 

I have the following situation now on my BBPriv:

 

I am opening chrome to browse via hotkey. Now I have to touch the adressbar and then start typing. Will there a hotkey to be able to type directly the page I want to access? How about changing tabs. I don’t want to touch the Tab-Field and then chose which Tab I want to open. Or will there be the possibility to open a new tab with just the hardware keyboard. I know that this is was very app-specific but the question is quite general for every other app as well. Starting Spotify via shortcut. Do I have to touch the field I want to open, or could I navigate INSIDE the app with just the keyboard?

 

Could we see how this is managed on the pro1?

 

This is an app design issue, basically they have to move the cursor on to the text field.

 

You could try pressing CTRL-T (you could map one of the keys as CTRL on the Priv's keyboard) to see if it opens a new tab.

[Waxberry 638]

adidas88 wrote:

I saw the video but I still have a question about the control of the phone just with the keyboard.

 

I have the following situation now on my BBPriv:

 

I am opening chrome to browse via hotkey. Now I have to touch the adressbar and then start typing. Will there a hotkey to be able to type directly the page I want to access? How about changing tabs. I don’t want to touch the Tab-Field and then chose which Tab I want to open. Or will there be the possibility to open a new tab with just the hardware keyboard. I know that this is was very app-specific but the question is quite general for every other app as well. Starting Spotify via shortcut. Do I have to touch the field I want to open, or could I navigate INSIDE the app with just the keyboard?

 

Could we see how this is managed on the pro1?

I have the same thoughts. To what degree are android basically possible to navigate in with keys only? Sure there are apps like the “Keyboard browser” that are specifically designed for a keyboard, But how are android UI in general, under the hood? Are there say tab-stops on all controls like MS Windows?

 

I know it is possible to navigate Android with a USB mouse (see e.g.

), so it DOES have the concept of a cursor build in, so at the lowest bar, some way to turn on the cursor and arrow/navigation could be possible. Though that might well be too slow and inconvenient in real usage, so I guess that would be a rather academic ‘solution’, and perhaps thus not worth the work to implement.

 

When the Pro¹ is released, I hope we will have an active branch of this forum hinting at apps that works particularly well with a real keyboard.

 

This! We thought the same - later on when Pro1 reaches to more users let's create a list of the apps works well with keyboard+landscape. I have already had a few in mind. ;)