Considering a San Francisco...but is there an alternative to the lack of trackball for navigating around SMS/Email?

[Guest Movisman]

Hi guys,

Been a lurker on here for the last month, so about time I registered!

I am seriously thinking about purchasing a San Francisco / ZTE Blade...but there is one thing holding my purchase back a little.

It's the lack of trackball! I know not everyone finds one useful and it's not that big a deal I guess, but I always find myself using it on my current phone (HTC Magic) to navigate around SMS or email to make small corrections or other amendments. Does anyone know of an alternative on the San Francisco, eg. a virtual d-pad on the keyboard, or whether you can configure the volume keys to move the cursor about? (I believe this may be possible with the htc_ime keyboard?)

Apart from the above, for me the San Francisco looks like an fantastic phone for the price - real close to phones over 3 times the price. At the moment my HTC Magic (vodafone) is running Cyanogen 6.0 with pershoot kernel + setcpu, and although it performs admirably considering the power of the phone...it does struggle and can occasionally be unstable. So hence why i'm thinking of getting a San Francisco, because once debranded, custom ROM installed, and overclocked (when a custom kernel is released..!) - it'll be a massive step up for me in all areas for sure.

But I would love a sensible alternative to a trackball! :)

Any suggestions?

Thanks!

[Guest spences10]

Well I own a DELL Streak which has a distinct lack of trackball also, and am also a HTC Magic owner

When I first realised this i was like oh fuu, but after owning it for around three months now I have got used to using it without one

I have also bought a Blade today, also with no trackball I'll let you know if I am unable to use the phone because of this but I doubt it.

There is a keyboard called ultra keyboard which has directional arrows in it, I havent used it tbh so I can not comment on it.

[Guest dwattsy21]

Mate witht he modaco rom, in settings there is an option to make the volume button move a cursor when inputting text. Replaces the need for a trackball

[Guest Pully]

Mate witht he modaco rom, in settings there is an option to make the volume button move a cursor when inputting text. Replaces the need for a trackball

Where abouts is this please? Struggling to find it on the R4 rom :s

[Guest oh!dougal]

... I am seriously thinking about purchasing a San Francisco / ZTE Blade...but there is one thing holding my purchase back a little.

It's the lack of trackball! ... Does anyone know of an alternative on the San Francisco, eg. a virtual d-pad on the keyboard, ....

The standard phone comes with TouchPal, one of who's tricks is a key with a pencil symbol. A long press on that switches you to a keypad of editing controls with 4 directional arrows, page up, down, etc

Just change over to use TouchPal as the 'input method'.

Or you could add different input methods ... if you want to !

[Guest 109android]

The standard phone comes with TouchPal, one of who's tricks is a key with a pencil symbol. A long press on that switches you to a keypad of editing controls with 4 directional arrows, page up, down, etc

Just change over to use TouchPal as the 'input method'.

Or you could add different input methods ... if you want to !

Have a look at this - http://www.appbrain.com/app/virtual-trackb...irtualtrackball

Not sure if helps whilst texting though.

Not a free app, but they do say google is your friend ;-)

Edited November 7, 2010 by 109android

[Guest Movisman]

Hi all,

Thanks for all the responses so far - I wasn't sure which 3rd party keyboards had a 'virtual' d-pad you can get to, as i've only ever used the stock google one.

Have a look at this - http://www.appbrain.com/app/virtual-trackb...irtualtrackball

Thanks for that, I did see this the other day, was a bit unsure though if it applied to text messaging / email as well, and whether you could configure it to only be on the screen when in these applications. Looks like it might get in the way a little, perhaps it's worth a try though...

Mate witht he modaco rom, in settings there is an option to make the volume button move a cursor when inputting text. Replaces the need for a trackball

Is this confirmed? Does it apply to any keyboard installed? Would be great if so. I'd heard you can do this on the htc_ime keyboard within its own preferences - if anyone can confirm this that'd be great.

There is a keyboard called ultra keyboard which has directional arrows in it, I havent used it tbh so I can not comment on it.

The standard phone comes with TouchPal, one of who's tricks is a key with a pencil symbol.

Thanks a lot for those suggestions. Ultra keyboard in particular looks quite promising and highly customisable, I found a video review here which displays some optional arrow keys:

http://gigaom.com/mobile/video-ultra-keyboard-for-android/

Cheers

Edited November 7, 2010 by Movisman

[Guest Toshka]

I'd heard you can do this on the htc_ime keyboard within its own preferences - if anyone can confirm this that'd be great.

Confirmed and it's a useful little setting.

For those interested, long-press the keyboard's mic icon to bring up the settings. Then go to 'Mods by jonasl@xda (v27)'/ User Interface/ Volume Keys and set it to Move Cursor.

Toshka

[Guest Movisman]

Thanks all for the information guys :)

I took the plunge and picked up a SF this afternoon...! Just got it on charge, now I just have to decide which ROM to install once it's charged and unlocked....the Modaco ROM or Sebastian's de-orangeated one :)

[Guest dav_dako]

Confirmed and it's a useful little setting.

For those interested, long-press the keyboard's mic icon to bring up the settings. Then go to 'Mods by jonasl@xda (v27)'/ User Interface/ Volume Keys and set it to Move Cursor.

Toshka

Thanks for this, been using this keyboard for a while and had no idea that option was there.

[Guest sipart]

I'm using the excellent SWYPE beta and it has an editing keyboard: http://swypeinc.com/product.html

Although I've just checked and the betas closed at the moment :-( http://beta.swype.com/android/

[Guest deweylewie]

Confirmed and it's a useful little setting.

For those interested, long-press the keyboard's mic icon to bring up the settings. Then go to 'Mods by jonasl@xda (v27)'/ User Interface/ Volume Keys and set it to Move Cursor.

Toshka

I just installed the htc_ime mod from xda and only the low-res keyboard works. The high-res one doesnt appear when it should do...

EDIT: Nevermind, found Paul's version which works :rolleyes: http://android.modaco.com/content/zte-blad...-for-the-blade/

Edited November 8, 2010 by deweylewie

[Guest Seagull81]

My wife has just discovered that when using Handcent, if you tap in an area containing text to roughly place the cursor, you can then drag your finger left > right and drag the cursor along too.