Yellow arrow key, Different usage in Stock and LineageOS

[Slion 1,200]

12 minutes ago, EskeRahn said:

One could even says that @tdm's take on the Yellow arrow is ALSO in "fixing what is broken", as it allows for the few billion users not using English as their primary language to better use the device... As it standardise the qwerty, so standard 'language packs' can be used on top. So it might not be a bad idea at all to include that too in a future Stock OTA....

My impression is that if LOS would mostly stick to stock scan code they can still implement all their features using layouts without breaking existing third party layouts such as FinQwerty and FxQwerty and other apps. However there is still that other controversial issue of the ALPHA vs FULL keyboard. I sure hope that does not make it to stock without being configurable.

Again I can't praise @tdm enough for his work on LOS and beyond. My point is that I'm under the impression that as far keyboard goes much the same could be achieve while providing compatibility with stock and third-party solutions.

Edited July 27, 2020 by Slion

[Craig 1,435]

47 minutes ago, FlyingAntero said:

So at least for me, it is very logical to use "Yellow arrow" for upper characters that are printed with Yellow color. I would hope that for LOS also.

Yes.  That's still true in LOS for QWERTZ.    You just have a lot more default assignments than QWERTY (as we only need slash and question mark, you've got quite a few the way they did it).

[Craig 1,435]

2 minutes ago, Slion said:

However there is still that other controversial issue of the ALPHA vs FULL keyboard.

How is that controversial?  Is there anyone who thinks they didnt make a mistake there?

[Slion 1,200]

3 minutes ago, Craig said:

Why do you want to use the slant arrow key so bad anyway, I dont get why not just use alt or ctrl?  Like every other app ever.

It's just about enabling third-party solutions.

[Craig 1,435]

4 minutes ago, Slion said:

My impression is that if LOS would mostly stick to stock scan code they can still implement all their features using layouts without breaking existing third party layouts such as FinQwerty and FxQwerty and other apps. However there is still that other controversial issue of the ALPHA vs FULL keyboard. I sure hope that does not make it to stock without being configurable.

Again I can't praise @tdm enough for his work on LOS and beyond. My point is that I'm under the impression that as far keyboard goes much the same could be achieve while providing compatibility with stock and third-party solutions.

The reason finqwerty is NEEDED is cuz stock did it wrong.  It's not needed with Lineage cuz you can use the included layouts!  We have Altgr!  We have a solution for slash/questionmark.

Edited July 27, 2020 by Craig

[Slion 1,200]

2 minutes ago, Craig said:

Is there anyone who thinks they didnt make a mistake there?

I do.

[Craig 1,435]

Just now, Slion said:

I do.

They put the definition in for PC keyboard not thumb keyboard.  We have thumb keyboard.  How is there controversy?  Why would someone not want this fixed?

[FlyingAntero 812]

20 minutes ago, EskeRahn said:

A very major reason for using LineageOS currently is that it fixes a lot of what is broken in the Stock Android implementation....

One could even says that @tdm's take on the Yellow arrow is ALSO in "fixing what is broken", as it allows for the few billion users not using English as their primary language to better use the device... As it standardise the qwerty, so standard 'language packs' can be used on top. So it might not be a bad idea at all to include that too in a future Stock OTA....

 

4 minutes ago, Craig said:

The reason finqwerty is NEEDED is cuz stock did it wrong.  It's not needed with Lineage cuz you can use the included layouts!  We have Altgr!  We have a solution for slash/questionmark.

@tdm has done excellent job with Lineage OS. I am very grateful of his work. However, I still have to comment that there are still some hiccups with standard language packs on LOS if you are using QWERTZ. Finnish is now usable on LOS when it was totally broken on stock. Layout provided by FinQwerty is still better and that is the reason why I have not switched to LOS as a daily driver yet. Some special characters are placed very oddly on standard language packs on LOS.

9 minutes ago, Craig said:

Why do you want to use the slant arrow key so bad anyway, I dont get why not just use alt or ctrl?  Like every other app ever

"Yellow arrow" is on both side of the keyboard so combinations can be reached easily.

Edited July 27, 2020 by FlyingAntero

[EskeRahn 5,350]

14 minutes ago, Craig said:

Why do you want to use the slant arrow key so bad anyway, I dont get why not just use alt or ctrl?  Like every other app ever.

Obviously more users are using Stock, so it is either to have two set of code, or to argue that the two Android-branches should work equally. And personally I hope that stock will look at LineageOS more than the other way round. As you say the model of DE-selecting all layouts is an odd idea. With Stock FinQWERTY is a must, but it is a MUCH more clever solution to make the base standard, so all the existing stock language layouts give something reasonable. It will still allow anyone to make their custom layouts.

Yes indeed this 'steals' the yellow arrow to fixup the keyboard to standard. But I think that is well worth the price reaching a larger potential customer base.

[EskeRahn 5,350]

53 minutes ago, Slion said:

My impression is that if LOS would mostly stick to stock scan code....

Indeed, but the keyboard drivers of the Pro1 are not part of stock AOSP. So @tdm is not messing with the Android stuff here. On the contrary he is trying to make the Pro1 hardware to work better with the hardware-keyboard support present in native android. AND doing this in a way so what is printed on the keys are still respected when US Qwerty is selected. And this also allows for selecting any of the other native android key-layouts. SURE there might be custom layouts that does a better job for a specific language  than what the default android offers in LOS. But on the contrary to what Stock offers you get a usable layout.

If I select e.g. Danish in Stock, it is useless. But if I do it in LOS I get something usable. Sure FinQwerty on top of stock offers an even better solution, but that is only an option because @Anssi Hannula has done the work needed, and obviously we can not expect him to do that for all the language layouts in the world. Hence the LOS starting point is better.

[_DW_ 628]

Stock is the broken implementation.  Stock should take the code from lineage.  

 

[Slion 1,200]

I do believe desktop keyboards hide the Function key from OS and applications mostly for legacy reasons. Back in the days OSs did not have support for Function modifier. To keep doing this on modern OS like Android is questionable. Hidden Function key certainly has the added advantge to make a custom keyboard plug & play too but that point is also irrelevant for smartphone with built-in keyboards.

By hiding the Function key from applications you reduce customisation opportunities from third-party application developer while increasing the work load and maintenance burden on lower level OS components.

Keep in mind guys that I have never tried LOS so I may not have the whole picture. I hope FxTec does send me back my repaired spare Pro1 at some point so I that I can try it out.

[Breeze 23]

On 7/27/2020 at 11:00 AM, EskeRahn said:

If I select e.g. Danish in Stock, it is useless. But if I do it in LOS I get something usable. Sure FinQwerty on top of stock offers an even better solution, but that is only an option because @Anssi Hannula has done the work needed, and obviously we can not expect him to do that for all the language layouts in the world. Hence the LOS starting point is better.

But how well does FinQwerty work on LOS? I write mostly in Finnish and Swedish. Gonna get my phone today tomorrow. This week.

Edited August 3, 2020 by Breeze

[EskeRahn 5,350]

2 hours ago, Breeze said:

But how well does FinQwerty work on LOS? I write mostly in Finnish and Swedish. Gonna get my phone today tomorrow. This week.

The FinQWERTY layouts are made for Stock. They will work somewhat on LOS too, but with some minor quirks. E.g some of the added stuff like half and Mu will not work (or at the least I has not guessed how to...)

[Craig 1,435]

If you want FinQWERTY layouts for Lineage, you could probably ask the author, in the past he was quite responsive when developing layouts for stock.

[Breeze 23]

Got my phone today 😍 But i'm at work the whole evening ☹️ It was in chinese when i started the phone...

Ok, gonna try the Finnish/Swedish layout on LOS to see how well it works.

[tdm 2,322]

For those using languages other than English and German on LineageOS, it would be possible to create additional keyboard maps in the kernel to match the expected keyboard layout for your language.  If anyone is interested, let me know and I can work with you.

 

[Breeze 23]

49 minutes ago, tdm said:

For those using languages other than English and German on LineageOS, it would be possible to create additional keyboard maps in the kernel to match the expected keyboard layout for your language.  If anyone is interested, let me know and I can work with you.

 

That would be great😃 Can you just copy the FinQwerty Finnish/Swedish on qwertz layout? I'm gonna flash my phone to LOS tomorrow or the following days, is there a donate button somewhere for your awsome work on LOS build?

[tdm 2,322]

4 minutes ago, Breeze said:

That would be great😃 Can you just copy the FinQwerty Finnish/Swedish on qwertz layout? I'm gonna flash my phone to LOS tomorrow or the following days, is there a donate button somewhere for your awsome work on LOS build?

 

The Lineage keyboard implementation is entirely different from stock.  So the FinQwerty data is not really useful.  But this should not be hard -- there are likely only a couple of keys that need to be changed.

 

My paypal is https://paypal.me/tdmcode

 

[Gwonkel 3]

I'd be interested in a working FinQwerty German layout for LOS. Since the one which is being shipped with LOS is unusable. It has totally different keybindings than even printed in white on the physical keyboard.

The FinQwerty German layout works for basic functions and shift but yellow arrow, fxtec, alt and Sym are behaving very strange if they work at all. So I can't even enter a "?" using LOS.

 

Does somebody have a solution how I get a working QWERTZ implementation that somewhat resembles what is printed on the physical keyboard?

[FlyingAntero 812]

11 hours ago, Gwonkel said:

I'd be interested in a working FinQwerty German layout for LOS. Since the one which is being shipped with LOS is unusable. It has totally different keybindings than even printed in white on the physical keyboard.

The FinQwerty German layout works for basic functions and shift but yellow arrow, fxtec, alt and Sym are behaving very strange if they work at all. So I can't even enter a "?" using LOS.

 

Does somebody have a solution how I get a working QWERTZ implementation that somewhat resembles what is printed on the physical keyboard?

Did you remember to select QWERTZ from the device specific settings on LOS (settings>system>keyboard)? It should be working good with German.

[FlyingAntero 812]

13 hours ago, tdm said:

For those using languages other than English and German on LineageOS, it would be possible to create additional keyboard maps in the kernel to match the expected keyboard layout for your language.  If anyone is interested, let me know and I can work with you.

Generally, I like that there are only minimal changes compared to the prints. For Finnish I would like the layout provided by FinQwerty.

Most important changes are:

• Y <-> Z
• Ü -> Å

Then it is a matter of opinion which one is better:

A:

• ß -> +
• + -> '

B:

• ß -> '

I think that most of people would prefer A option even though I like the B option (only minor changes). I just like that Yellow arrow combinations are like they are printed to keyboard. Shift combinations for the top row can be like they are on the FinQwerty layout.

For the reference, you could check the Scandic layout planned by F(x)tec.

 

[EskeRahn 5,350]

14 hours ago, tdm said:

For those using languages other than English and German on LineageOS, it would be possible to create additional keyboard maps in the kernel to match the expected keyboard layout for your language.  If anyone is interested, let me know and I can work with you.

In Scandinavia four different yet almost identical layouts are in play. I agree with @FlyingAntero that the layouts from FinQwerty would be a good aiming point. They are described graphically including colouring what is different from stock here: https://android.onse.fi/finqwerty/#pro1

The Finnish and Swedish for qwertZ are identical.
The Norwegian is almost identical to the former, but Ö->Ø and Ä->Æ  (Same sounds, different symbols for historical reasons 🙄 )
The Danish is identical to the Norwegian except a swap Æ<->Ø. (Utterly silly... 🤪 )

Similar for the qwertY, except I suggested to place the letter normally two right of the L on the Del key, to have it closer to the normal position. @Anssi Hannula found another solution for Finnish pushing the in Finnish less used Å in as fn+O, thus leaving it closer to the print.

[tdm 2,322]

@FlyingAntero and @EskeRahn thank you for the detailed explanations.  However, I am not familiar with these languages nor their keyboards.  I rely on pictures of keyboards to see how keys map to symbols.  So if you want different layouts for different languages, it would be convenient for you to provide me with the key mapping information rather than the actual symbols.  I would prefer a keymap line that I can use directly, but the physical key map would also work.  And I assume the same changes apply to both qwerty and qwertz layouts. correct?

 

Here is a keymap example for Y <-> Z:

 

The physical keyboard change is obvious and trivial since these have no special modifiers.

The qwertz lines should currently be:

Y key = "22:0015:0015" (key 22, KEY_Y, KEY_Y)

Z key = "26:002c:002c" (key 26, KEY_Z, KEY_Z)

We would simply swap the values, so:

Y key = "22:002c:002c" (key 22, KEY_Z, KEY_Z)

Z key = "26:0015:0015" (key 26, KEY_Y, KEY_Y)

 

As for the others, I actually have no clue how to generate "Ø" on a Scandinavian keyboard.  I would need to look up the key combination.  Only by referencing the dual keyboard photo from @EskeRahn and doing some mental translations can I see that "Ö" is generated by the semicolon key on a US-Intl keyboard.  So you guys will need to supply me with that information to do the other swaps, such as "Ö->Ø".  Please reference my post from the Lineage test thread if you need information on how to modify the kernel keymap.

 

[FlyingAntero 812]

@tdm So we would need to provide those code lines for the changes compared how the keyboard works when German is selected? Am I right? I can find the numbers for the keys from GitHub but is the whole "keymap code line" available some where for reference? I can find some examples from the closed issue 35

• Keyboard layout QWERTZ not correct #35

Quote

11:0033:8033 (, and 😉
26:002c:0026 (y and |) <- update, not correct, 0026 is just l, not |
30:0011:0029 (w and ^)
38:0013:8029 (r and °)
39:0028:002b (ä and #)
42:0056:8056 (< and >)
47:0026:802b (l and ')

I can try to provide correct code lines for QWERTZ. I don't know how to handle the QWERTY since it is much different than QWERTZ. It is difficult to place Å, Ä and Ö to right place and move other keys some where else.