Develop Bugs

on screen keyboard vs keypad

Hey,
What are you thoughs on using onscreen vs querty keyboard? I want to use phone more for internet/msn/emails so lots of typing
Any opinons are good but best if you have actually used both so can compair!
There are alot of phones i possibly like better but all have onscreen, do u get use to it? can u type as fast? dose having the screen free while typeing made a diff?
Cheers!

i dont like on screen keypad. i write things very very faster on the qwerty keypad. so if you write long e-mails for example the qwerty keypad is realy helpfull!

lhwparis said:
i dont like on screen keypad. i write things very very faster on the qwerty keypad. so if you write long e-mails for example the qwerty keypad is realy helpfull!
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Click to collapse
Yes, i agree, i like using the keyboard as well. much quicker then the on screen one. I always type the wrong words on it. The only down side is that I have slide it in and out too often. If you don't mind sliding you keyboard out a lot, especially during messaging. Then you will fine. Sometimes I couldn't be bothered and just use the on screen option. The good thing is, you have the option to do so.

osarus said:
Hey,
What are you thoughs on using onscreen vs querty keyboard? I want to use phone more for internet/msn/emails so lots of typing
Any opinons are good but best if you have actually used both so can compair!
There are alot of phones i possibly like better but all have onscreen, do u get use to it? can u type as fast? dose having the screen free while typeing made a diff?
Cheers!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Physical QWERTY wins out for me every time, simply because of the tactile and ergonomic feedback that physical keys give you. The onscreen keypad is fine if you have small fingers and can get accurate very quickly without having to 'feel' for keys.

If I'm writing anything of significance then I always used the QWERTY. But if it's just a quick reply to a text like "ok", "see you there" etc then I use the on screen. I like having the choice.

i use the hardware keyboard all the time. Also keeps my screen tidy, as i don't have to wipe all the fingerprints from it

My last phone was the htc p3300 and it had an internal keyboard.
The internal keyboard on this phone is nothing like my old phone - making it virtually useless.

i use internal keyboard for an sms like "ok" or so... but for a larger message I always use a physical keyboard! bless it!

the screen is ok when you get used to it.
the problem comes when the top protective layer comes away from the touch sensitive screen beneath and you have the gap...
I'm pretty sure you'll all get it after a while - I don't think this will be just my problem

you got me confused with the title, I thought u were comparing on screen QWERTY keyboard and on screen KEYPAD
One of the main reasons I got TP2 is the phyical QWERTY keyboard, if not, i would go to D2 instead

I use the hardware keyboard until it starts going crazy on me, like pressing Fn+? doesn't produce the question mark or it types CAP letters without CAPS on, then I switch to the software keyboard (works like on the iPhone) until the next reboot and the cycle begins again.

[THINK TANK] Gesture bar instead of soft key bar

I've been realizing lately how amazing android really is and customizable it is with this phone. Off topic but I kinda hated the fact. Of a recent app button and the fact that I lost the menu button (honestly the most used button on all my other phones). The devs here realized it and gave me the ability to have my menu button, get my search button back, and make recent apps come up by holding the home button. Got to love them. Shout out to our fantastic devs.
Now the point of this thread was just I wanted to know how you guys thought about a gesture bar instead of having buttons. So swipe on the bar to go back, maybe swipe up to go home etc? Just trying to think of creative ideas on how to use this huge screen and since everything is virtual, why can't this be possible. What you guys think?
Sent from my Galaxy Nexus using Tapatalk

nice idea, kind of like the microsoft touch mouse. I would like to see someone make that possible and see how it works out.

Shaquiel Harris said:
Now the point of this thread was just I wanted to know how you guys thought about a gesture bar instead of having buttons. So swipe on the bar to go back, maybe swipe up to go home etc? Just trying to think of creative ideas on how to use this huge screen and since everything is virtual, why can't this be possible. What you guys think?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
As a technical exercise it sounds like a very good idea, but I know for one I wouldn't use it. Dolphin HD has had gesture support for such a long time and I used it as my main web browser on my Desire but I didn't ever use the gesture support.
Even my HD2 running WM 6.5.x had an app that allowed you to launch any app/program by configuring a gesture, but again I didn't use it.
I guess it's just easier to place my thumb than to move about when holding the phone in one hand. Is this an idea you were thinking of implementing yourself, or are you looking for someone to pick the idea up and run with it?

Kalavere said:
As a technical exercise it sounds like a very good idea, but I know for one I wouldn't use it. Dolphin HD has had gesture support for such a long time and I used it as my main web browser on my Desire but I didn't ever use the gesture support.
Even my HD2 running WM 6.5.x had an app that allowed you to launch any app/program by configuring a gesture, but again I didn't use it.
I guess it's just easier to place my thumb than to move about when holding the phone in one hand. Is this an idea you were thinking of implementing yourself, or are you looking for someone to pick the idea up and run with it?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Are you talking about lmt? Fyi: it's now also available for android/gsn...
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1330150
Sent from my Galaxy Nexus

Shaquiel Harris said:
I lost the menu button (honestly the most used button on all my other phones).
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Click to collapse
You never lost the menu button, it's just not on screen 100% of the time anymore, where it would just waste space otherwise.

I think its great idea!
Another few things that would be cool to see would be, resizing the Navigation Bar to be maybe a little thinner, and being able to slide the nav bar left or right, to reveal a icons to launch other apps, and maybe swiping down to hide the navbar all together.
Like you said being able to customize android and change every aspect of it is what makes this OS so awesome.

You guys ever use gesture area on webOS phones? Much better than using back key, would be a great idea. It also used visual feedback so a white line would go in the swipe direction. Currently the only phone using something similar to this is the N9 probably, which has swiping through the sides of screen to control apps.

I was just thinking about WebOS when reading this as well. Would be nice.

Just having the soft keys area as a gesture area? cool!
Maybe you could customize your gestures?
A big thing to me would be the ability to have a fully loaded package and be able to switch between stock softkeys, added search/menu softkeys, and gestures. Everything customizeable by user rather than through flashing?

menu bar like in windows 8
I think gesture is pretty good, but i`d like to see menu bar(home, recent, etc) like in win8: it is hidden until you swype from bottom-outside up, than it become unhidden. see any wideo with windows 8 tablert, you`ll see what i mean.

MrBIMC said:
I think gesture is pretty good, but i`d like to see menu bar(home, recent, etc) like in win8: it is hidden until you swype from bottom-outside up, than it become unhidden. see any wideo with windows 8 tablert, you`ll see what i mean.
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Click to collapse
That would get annoying pretty quickly. I don't want to have to add extra steps to navigate my phone. Back, home and recent app are buttons you use all the time, why add a barrier to get to em? More screen real estate isn't worth the extra hassle.

Enhanced said:
That would get annoying pretty quickly. I don't want to have to add extra steps to navigate my phone. Back, home and recent app are buttons you use all the time, why add a barrier to get to em? More screen real estate isn't worth the extra hassle.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
How about navigational controls similar to the quick controls in the stock browser? Touch the bottom edge of the screen and out pops a semi-radial menu that can contain: back, home, recent apps, menu, search and can be used to add quick shortcuts to your most used apps like messaging, contacts, browser, etc., or app specific commands, like say refresh for browser, check mail for, well, email, and so on. Touching the edge requires less effort and movement as compared to swiping up or down.

I came to Android from webOS after HP shot themselves in the foot several times and one of the things I miss most is the gesture bar you had at the bottom of the screen. With the advent of the soft button area in ICS I see a real option to enable the area to work in a similar fashion. Hell yes!
The webOS gestures were:
A single swipe up would show you your running apps.
Swiping 2 fingers up would show you the launcher (app drawer).
A leftward swipe would go back.
A full swipe across the entire area going either right or left would take you to the next or previous running app.
Besides the wireless charging, the gesture area was one of the webOS killer features you very quickly learned to take for-granted. So long as gesture detection was implemented well I don't see why you couldn't have the soft buttons as they are now and gestures all working at the same time.

Call me old fashioned, but I also don't like the gestures idea.
Dolphin is just about the only program on android that I have tried to use gestures with, and it's not the sort of feature i'd personally like integrated into my phone.
That said, customizing how different people can use their phones, within the same operating system, so two people can use the exact same phone in two totally different ways, is the way to go

j.go said:
How about navigational controls similar to the quick controls in the stock browser? Touch the bottom edge of the screen and out pops a semi-radial menu that can contain: back, home, recent apps, menu, search and can be used to add quick shortcuts to your most used apps like messaging, contacts, browser, etc., or app specific commands, like say refresh for browser, check mail for, well, email, and so on. Touching the edge requires less effort and movement as compared to swiping up or down.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I like your idea of having the pie control from the stock browser available all over android. I had the idea a while back but was just too lazy to implement it. Today I did a small working prototype and I think I will add the pie control feature to my gesture app "LMT"...

good idea but put ot optionaly! maybe it is not practical ! iwould rather hidden button ! like Video player amaing full screen with hidden buttons !!

Huntlaar said:
good idea but put ot optionaly! maybe it is not practical ! iwould rather hidden button ! like Video player amaing full screen with hidden buttons !!
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Click to collapse
If implemented properly, you might be able to do away with the bottom bar and take advantage of the full screen. You can't see it with the nexus browser, but if you have a tablet running ICS and enable browser quick controls, the app hides the tabs and address bar, instantly adding an inch of usable screen real estate at the top.
Sent from my Galaxy Nexus using XDA App

The big nasty problem with having hidden buttons or, for that matter, any trigger point area(s) on the devices main screen is you'll always end up triggering something when you didn't want to or it interferes with a ui element in one or more apps e.g. game scroll bars / buttons. I've tried plenty and they all interfered with one app or another to the point I stopped using them.
The quick controls idea is fine but you're still having to watch what you're doing. The beauty of gestures in webOS was that you wouldn't have to take your eyes of what you were doing to find a button - your finger just flicked below the screen content while your eyes looked towards what you were going to do next.
I realise it's hard to imagine if you've never done it before but (weak analogy approaching...) think of it like walking up a thin and narrow set of steps as opposed to thick wide ones while trying to read a book. On the narrow steps you have to look down to hit the next step thus breaking the flow of your reading. While on the bigger wider ones you can carry on reading as the step is big enough your foot can find it without taking your eyes of your book.
Anyroad, IMHO, gestures need to be out of the way of app content so as not to interfere with app usage patterns and shouldn't require the user to take their eyes off what they're doing.

[Q] Dual touch pads for browser navigation?

apologies if this has already been asked. I remember earlier android handsets that had little track balls just beneath the screen with which you could move a little mouse cursor when surfing the internet to give you better control over highlighting etc. they've since gone our of vogue but it was a feature that came in handy from time to time. with that in mind. I'm surprised that the xperia play doesn't have an option to use the dual touch pads for browsing when in landscape: we know from Sony that the entire middle area is touch sensitive so theoretically it could be used similar to a mouse touch pad on a laptop, or the left pad could move a cursor and the right could scroll around the web page, or ideally you could toggle between both. given the pre existing trackball/cursor code in android would it be feasible to use them in this way?

I wanted this for so long but seems like no one cares a fuc*. Also one option to be added, pinch to zoom for zooming.

I always thought the little 'cleavage' area between the man nipples was a mini touchpad. That would be perfect for up and down scrolling
brought to you by the XDA app on my badass Android toy

s-pen handwriting

s-pen and handwriting recognition is quite cool, but how do you set it up to automatically put spaces in between words you write? I'm sure it must be an option but I can't seem to find it, and writing by hand is slower than just typing with thumbs if you have to keep hitting the space bar manually.

theoilman said:
s-pen and handwriting recognition is quite cool, but how do you set it up to automatically put spaces in between words you write? I'm sure it must be an option but I can't seem to find it, and writing by hand is slower than just typing with thumbs if you have to keep hitting the space bar manually.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
+1
I'm a little perplexed at how difficult it is to find tutorials about the s-pen considering how popular reports claim this phone is. Are users simply enjoying a big phone and not exploiting the s-pen????

If im not mistaken this happens by default. Ive noticed if you just put a large enough space between the words or write one word underneath the other it will create a space. Hope this helps.
Sent from my SGH-T889 using Tapatalk 2

_atlien_ said:
+1
I'm a little perplexed at how difficult it is to find tutorials about the s-pen considering how popular reports claim this phone is. Are users simply enjoying a big phone and not exploiting the s-pen????
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Click to collapse
I still have missed out on a lot of neat options. I have developed a few habits, like whipping it out to take a quick note or something, but I still hit the buttons with my fingers instead of using the shortcuts. I am still unsure how the gestures work under the s-pen menu in the settings. Do I have to click the button? Does it only work in certain places? I don't get it, I tried to use the default ones to no avail, nor do custom ones work. I think it's because I use a different launcher actually, I forgot I already thought of that :x. Eh.

Like knarfies said, if you put a decent amount of space in-between the words it will automatically create the space. I also like writing at the top and just come down below the first word and it creates the space for me that way.
Also you can do a backwards L to do enter. You can do a quick swipe to the right to enter a space. You can do - by going back and forth to make it. You can also hold down the spen button and swipe left on the word or letters you want to erase.
I really got the hang of writing with it. One thing that does irk me though. It has problems with words having letters and numbers. I write down a car VIN and I have to do a delay in-between letters and numbers. Otherwise it just becomes a mess and VIN numbers need to be 100% correct when doing customer invoices.

If you are rooted, you can install the MyScript Notes app. It has much better HWR, converting your writing to text after you write a string of words, adding spaces automatically.
The app can be found in the apps section, look for a thread by cajunflavoredbob.
Sent from my SGH-T889 using xda app-developers app

anyone know how to remove spen without unlocking the phone on lockscreen

Yeah this phone is great even without the S-Pen, and the things I do use the S-Pen for, don't really need a tutorial (more accurate selecting, drawing, taking notes, and hover in browser which is awesome for opening drop down menus)
However, the handwriting recoginition for chinese characters is AWESOME... if only i really knew how to write chinese

How do you use the pen to "write" texts rather than using the keyboard? I am able to "write" over the keyboard and see the writing but all I get is the letters from the keyboard that the pen touched while writing.

MisterEdF said:
How do you use the pen to "write" texts rather than using the keyboard? I am able to "write" over the keyboard and see the writing but all I get is the letters from the keyboard that the pen touched while writing.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Click and hold the little microphone, then change to the little pen icon
Sent from my SGH-T889 using xda app-developers app

MisterEdF said:
How do you use the pen to "write" texts rather than using the keyboard? I am able to "write" over the keyboard and see the writing but all I get is the letters from the keyboard that the pen touched while writing.
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Click to collapse
If you are using the samsung keyboard, i just press the button on the right of the "Sym" button, the one with "T" and it goes to the text writing using S-pen. Im not sure of any other ways. Maybe there is a way to make it default.

MisterEdF said:
How do you use the pen to "write" texts rather than using the keyboard? I am able to "write" over the keyboard and see the writing but all I get is the letters from the keyboard that the pen touched while writing.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
You can also go into samsung keyboard settings have change it so that it auto detects when the pen has been removed.
I've been enjoying s-pen for small stuff. like others have said, more accurate selections, web browsing tricks, etc
I saw someone mention using the back/menu buttons with s-pen (i have to use my fingers to tap those)...how does one use the home/back/menu buttons with s-pen? I have no idea

Long-press on the microphone key at the bottom of the keyboard, then select the "T" (the one with the little pencil next to it)
To view various helps, tutorials and setting options for the keyboard and handwriting recognition, tap the Gear symbol that pops-up after long-pressing the microphone key (as above). Alternatively, go to Settings/Language and Input then tap the Gear symbol next to "Samsung keyboard".
Explore. Lots of things appear when you explore.

While on the topic...
I wonder if I am the only one to have this happened to me, or if I am simply bone-headed, but all of a sudden the Samsung keyboard stopped working properly. It doesn't let me 'swype' anymore (the option is checked in the settings, but greyed out for some reason) and even though I have it setup so that it would go into handwriting recognition after pulling the pen out, it does not.
I noticed the change after "updating" the English dictionary in the 'input Languages' setting. Not sure wether or not it is related...
However, quite annoying...

OwenW71 said:
If you are rooted, you can install the MyScript Notes app. It has much better HWR, converting your writing to text after you write a string of words, adding spaces automatically.
The app can be found in the apps section, look for a thread by cajunflavoredbob.
Sent from my SGH-T889 using xda app-developers app
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I can't seem to find it; might you have a link? thanks!

PoorCollegeGuy said:
You can also go into samsung keyboard settings have change it so that it auto detects when the pen has been removed.
I've been enjoying s-pen for small stuff. like others have said, more accurate selections, web browsing tricks, etc
I saw someone mention using the back/menu buttons with s-pen (i have to use my fingers to tap those)...how does one use the home/back/menu buttons with s-pen? I have no idea
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Use the built-in gestures with the s-pen to do the back and menu. While pressing on the s-pen button, draw < to go back, or > for menu.
There is no gesture for home, but I ended up getting Taskarou (an launcher overlay), or you could use Button Savior to go back to home.

Here is the link to MySript Notes. Search is your friend!
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=2005018
Sent from my SGH-T889 using xda app-developers app

Friend told me that you just slide slightly from left to right after you type and it spaces
Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I717 using xda app-developers app

degeneration said:
I still have missed out on a lot of neat options. I have developed a few habits, like whipping it out to take a quick note or something, but I still hit the buttons with my fingers instead of using the shortcuts. I am still unsure how the gestures work under the s-pen menu in the settings. Do I have to click the button? Does it only work in certain places? I don't get it, I tried to use the default ones to no avail, nor do custom ones work. I think it's because I use a different launcher actually, I forgot I already thought of that :x. Eh.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
To bring up the gestures menu you press and hold the s pen button off screen while keeping it pressed, swipe up with the pen touching the screen. A little box pops up and then you can draw the gestures there. This can be done regardless of what launcher you use and it doesn't matter what app you are using.
Penned with my Galaxy Note 2 via xda premium

Cool thanks

REQUEST: keyboard touchpad

HELLO EVERYONE,
I've been an iphone user since smartphones came out and I just recently purchased a S3 and I'm really enjoying it. I love the added buttons at the bottom that aid a lot in navigating. I love the open platform and the ease of customization. The only real negative is the painful process in order to edit text. God forbid you make a couple mistakes way back in the sentence. My big fingers are having a hard time selecting text and correcting mistakes. The best mod I used on a jailbroken iphone is a mod called swipeselection. Its composed of a hidden touchpad that takes up no real estate on your screen. You type your message normally and if you have to move the cursor all you have to do it swipe left and right on the keyboard. Also highlighting text is a breeze, you just have to hold down the shift key on the keyboard and swipe left or right to highlight the text. Its so simple and saves so much time. I would be willing to pay $$$ if someone could port this over to android. What do you guys think? Check out the youtube link swipeselection https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WSzg0r05Eg8
DG