Onscreen Thumb Keyboard via hardware key?
 

On the 770 you were able to toggle the onscreen thumb keyboard by pressing the 'rocker' key, ie the center of the d-pad. This does not seem to work on the n810. Pressing on the input area with a thumb or pad of finger does nothing either, regardless of 'stylus input method' settings in Control Panel.

I'm wanting to assign a hardware key shortcut to open the onscreen thumb keyboard. How is this possible? Via gconf? Or DBus? Or...? hildon-input-method call? Anybody with a little coding experience that could point me in the right direction?

Re: Onscreen Thumb Keyboard via hardware key?
 

Well I used the gconf editor to change
/apps/osso/inputmethod/input_method_plugin
from 000_hildon_western_vkb to 000_hildon_western_fkb

..this made every click on an area with text input possible immediately bring up the finger keyboard. No more tiny stylus keyboard, ever! It only does this when the hardware keyboard is closed, which still isn't exactly what I wanted.

It seems like making a shortcut could be done with matchbox-remote, but I can't figure it out. Anyone?

Re: Onscreen Thumb Keyboard via hardware key?
 

This is pissing me off all over again. Still no input, anyone?

Re: Onscreen Thumb Keyboard via hardware key?
 

If I understand you, you want the thumb keyboard to pop up if you touch the screen a certain way. Try a quick tap in the input part of the screen with the tips of two fingers close together or with one finger do a double tap (quick).

Re: Onscreen Thumb Keyboard via hardware key?
 

Thanks, but what im really seeking is a way via command line to pop the thumb keyboard open.

Re: Onscreen Thumb Keyboard via hardware key?
 

I'm not quite following your request, gogol.

Are you asking for your setup to work while your physical keyboard is open?

If so, maybe trick the tablet to believe that it's closed.

Either:
gconftool -t bool -s /system/osso/af/slide-open false
or
gconftool-2 -t bool -s /system/osso/af/keyboard-attached false

If you're looking for the keyboard to pop up whenever you want it to with a hardware button, you'll still need to have the cursor located at some place to input text anyway.

Are you asking for the same behavior VNCviewer does?

Clicking the middle D-Pad brings up the keyboard with this app.

Re: Onscreen Thumb Keyboard via hardware key?
 

When the hardware keyboard is open, whats the purpose of an onscreen keyboard?

When the hardware keyboard is closed, how do you open the finger keyboard? You can't, it requires pressing the rocker button which is on the hardware keyboard (??!)

It seems a basic UI design idiocy to me. Wouldnt you agree? There should be a way to set the tablet to use the thumb board _only_ (no stylus typing for me), and to only open when the hardware keyboard is shut. As it seems this cannot be done, I thought I would assign it to one of the other hardware keys perhaps through a shell script or mce.ini or something.

Thanks all for your responses.

Re: Onscreen Thumb Keyboard via hardware key?
 

Okay, I gotcha now.

I don't own a N810 so I wasn't quite sure all of what you were saying.

Can't you simply remap that rocker button from the keyboard to another hardware button like the center D-Pad?

Maybe take a look at this thread.
http://talk.maemo.org/showthread.php...hlight=xmodmap

You can find out what the code is by installing Xev, which can be found here along with Xmodmap.
http://maemo.lancode.de/?path=./diablo/binary

Best of luck. :)

Re: Onscreen Thumb Keyboard via hardware key?
 

Its a good idea, but what I want to get away from is having to have the hardware keyboard open to toggle the onscreen keyboard. That defeats the purpose for me and seems so backwards its a bit embarrassing.

I guess I'll just put this in the "What The Hell Were They Thinking" pile.

Re: Onscreen Thumb Keyboard via hardware key?
 

*lol*

What am I even doing getting mixed up in a thread like this?

I've never even seen a N810. :)

I might have an idea for you to try.

Install Xkbd.

Run it while your hardware keyboard is close and only press the return key, nothing else.

Did that bring up your touch screen keyboard?

It will only work if the cursor is somewhere that can input text like Xterm, Notes, posting a message etc.

If that works, you can make your own Xkbd keyboard layout that has one button only with a code of "default_ks Return" and locate that button somewhere on the screen that's out of the way but easy to get to using the -geometry option.

I bet if you could Xmodmap edit the zoom key or something else as a "Return" key, that might actually launch the touch screen keyboard as well.

Post back if I confused you completely. :)

Re: Onscreen Thumb Keyboard via hardware key?
 

Bummer, Tear just crashed and I lost my big N810-typed post.

Another damn good idea Addison.

I suppose the problem is that I went and used an Ipod Touch and got comfortable with the polish the device has. The N810 is just always gonna need some hacking to do what I want it to (and do a lot of things the Touch does OOTB) and actually, that's a big part of why I like it. Its a challenge and gives me something to do. I think I'll try your xkbd idea and see if I cant make an onscreen button for the onscreen keyboard.

I just wish there was another way to summon it other than the enter key.

Re: Onscreen Thumb Keyboard via hardware key?
 

With Xkbd, you can customize the height, width and position of where it's on the screen.

If you went with a two-key keyboard you can also minimize it.

The key symbol "KP_Enter" is actually a "Return" key.

The key symbol "Return" brings up the hildon keyboard but only if there's a place to input text.

If that works witth Xkbd, then it should also work with mapping or hacking something like the zoom key to call the same key symbol.

I'll try that on my end and see if I can get lucky on this.

Re: Onscreen Thumb Keyboard via hardware key?
 

Got it dude! :D

In Xterm:
root
emelfm2

Go to
usr/share/X11/xkb/symbols/nokia_vndr/su-8w

Near the bottom of that file, edit the one line to this:
key <FK07> { [ Return ] };


Save

Back in Xterm:
setxkbdmap

This makes the zoom-in hardware key pop up the keyboard.

Hope that's what you were looking for.

Cheers!



Edit:
You might also need to change that setting in the rx-44 file as well but I'm not sure.

Best of luck. :)

Re: Onscreen Thumb Keyboard via hardware key?
 

...except now Im having this strange problem where the touchscreen is completely unresponsive when the keyboard is closed.

Wonder what the hell I did....

Re: Onscreen Thumb Keyboard via hardware key?
 

But that is exactly what I was looking for! And thanks!

Re: Onscreen Thumb Keyboard via hardware key?
 

Did you install xkbd from my "Xkbd *Diablo* post?

Try this in Xterm:
gconftool-2 --set -t bool /system/osso/af/keyboard-attached true && sleep 2 && gconftool-2 --set -t bool /system/osso/af/keyboard-attached false

Re: Onscreen Thumb Keyboard via hardware key?
 

If that doesn't bring back life to your touch screen keyboard, try something like:

gconftool -t bool -s /system/osso/af/slide-open false
or
gconftool-2 -t bool -s /system/osso/af/keyboard-attached true

or a strange combination of the two.

If not say F it and reboot. *lol*

Re: Onscreen Thumb Keyboard via hardware key?
 

Yeah, could that have caused the thumb keyboard to stop appearing?

Re: Onscreen Thumb Keyboard via hardware key?
 

Yeah, that was a mistake. :)

No one has tested it on a N810 yet... Actually no one has tested it until now.

In that Keyboards folder, copy the base_backup file over to
/usr/share/X11/xkb/rules/

Delete the base file

Rename base_backup to base

In Xterm
setxkbdmap

That should do it.

Re: Onscreen Thumb Keyboard via hardware key?
 

I dont think its xkbd's fault...but I just cant get any onscreen IMs to show up now. No stylus or thumb IM. Weird. Messing with gconf editor I think did it.

Re: Onscreen Thumb Keyboard via hardware key?
 

Yeah, there's a bug in Diablo that can be exploited to finally make Xkbd work correctly after two years.

Disabling and then re-enabling the hildon keyboard causes the bug, which in my case is something very useful.

I have yet to figure out how to get it back the way it was after running that command so a reboot will be necessary.

Just don't bother with those gconftool commands ever again and you'll be fine.


Dang, this was a seriously long discussion for such a simple solution. :o

Re: Onscreen Thumb Keyboard via hardware key?
 

Something just occurred to me...

If that base file is different between the N800 kernel OS and the one for the N810, you're screwed. :D

Ask someone to post up that file so you don't need to reflash.

Once you copy it back over run in Xterm.

setxbdmap

This might not be the case but thought I would post anyway since I'm done here for the night.

Cheers!

Re: Onscreen Thumb Keyboard via hardware key?
 

No, that base file was different. Hardware kb couldnt use function keys... I was screwed. Fortunately I had a cloned backup from about a week ago. Posting from it now.

Its been quite an adventure so far.

:)

Re: Onscreen Thumb Keyboard via hardware key?
 

N810's xkb base from /usr/share/X11/xkb/rules

Re: Onscreen Thumb Keyboard via hardware key?
 

That base file is the exact same as the N800's version.

So not sure what happened on your end.

I'm guessing you probably used those gconftool commands while the hardware keyboard was opened and that sent weirdo signals to your tablet.

Well, good to hear that it worked out for you in the end. :)