UsersGuide

User's Guide

Please see the FrequentlyAskedQuestions page for additional details, including hints, tips, and known issues.

Enabling the keyboard

Hacker's Keyboard provides a new Android input method. It is disabled by default, and for security reasons Android doesn't allow programs to change input method settings. It will display a help screen when you first install it, please follow the following steps to activate it:

1. Add the keyboard to the system's input method list:
   1. Open the system input settings configuration by pressing the Configure input methods button
   2. Find Hacker's Keyboard in the input method list, tap the checkmark to switch it on.
   3. Acknowledge the warning shown by the system. The system always shows this message when enabling a third-party input method, see FrequentlyAskedQuestions.
   4. Press the Back button to return to the previous screen
2. Choose the currently active input method:
   1. Press the Set current input method button.
   2. Select Hacker's Keyboard from the list.

Keyboard layout

The keyboard mostly works like the standard Gingerbread keyboard, including multitouch support. You can get a shifted character in two ways:

• tap shift and let go, tap the character.
• press and hold shift, tap the character, let go of shift.

This works the same way for the Ctrl and Alt modifiers. You can lock shift mode by tapping it twice, indicated by a glowing green dot on the left shift key. The other modifiers don't lock, they only affect the next key. You can cancel a modifier by pressing the modifier key again.

Long-pressing keys shows a popup mini-keyboard including shifted keys and (for some keys) additional special characters.

The "Fn" key shows an alternate keymap with additional special keys including Home, Page up/down, F1-F12, and a number block. Note that many Android applications aren't programmed to handle these keys, so they may be ignored.

The arrow keys in the bottom right corner generate directional pad (trackball) key events. The "✓" (checkmark) key next to the arrows corresponds to pressing the directional pad center button.

Configuration options

In addition to the standard Gingerbread configuration options, Hacker's Keyboard adds the following settings:

Keyboard height - two settings, separately for portrait and landscape mode, for the overall keyboard height as a percentage of screen size. Change these settings if you prefer larger or smaller keys.

Full keyboard in portrait mode - If this setting is off, use the original Gingerbread keyboard layout (4 rows, 10 across) in portrait mode. This is intended for phones since the keys get unreasonably small in full mode. It is off by default for phones, on for tablets.

Show suggestions in landscape mode - Turn this setting off if you want to hide the suggestions bar above the keyboard in landscape mode. The overall suggestions behavior is controlled by the Gingerbread settings below.

Always use standard view in landscape mode - By default, Android uses a special mini-editor when editing text fields in landscape mode that shows only one field at a time. You can change this setting to keep the standard view active in landscape mode instead. Doing so can cause compatibility issues with some applications that can't cope with the small screen height.

Key hint label visibility - Controls the additional key labels shown on keys to indicate shift/long-press additional characters.

Tab key and Ctrl-I send ConnectBot-compatible Tab - This is a hack to support the current Market versions of ConnectBot that don't handle the Tab key correctly. You shouldn't need to change this, but it's configurable in case future ConnectBot version behave differently.

Credits and Acknowledgements

Based on the LatinIME package from the Gingerbread AOSP distribution: http://android.git.kernel.org/?p=platform/packages/inputmethods/LatinIME.git

Includes the Cyanogen "en" dictionary as distributed under the Apache 2.0 licence here: https://gist.github.com/CyanogenMod/android_vendor_cyanogen/tree/gingerbread/overlay/common/packages/inputmethods/LatinIME/java/res

Arabic 4-row keyboard based on the AnySoftKeyboard language pack as distributed under the Apache 2.0 license here: http://code.google.com/p/softkeyboard/source/browse/trunk/LanguagePacks/Arabic/

[Anonymous]

Originally posted by: ita2...@gmail.com

It would be nive if there was some kind of user manual or instructions for this app or at least some way to get help or support. Would be nice to be able to insert symbols, but apparently this is not possible amd I have to switch keyboards to insert a simple check mark. Annoying.

[Anonymous]

Originally posted by: agarv...@gmail.com

Followed the instructions but will not install on my asus Nexus 7. Any suggestions?

[Anonymous]

Originally posted by: PeterAAF...@gmail.com

Back again. After installing on my NOTE2 and locating the GEAR button, I noticed 7"tablet has a MICrophone button in that location. If i press and hold it I get an option for the GEAR button. So far so good. Hope this helps someone else. PeterF

[Anonymous]

Originally posted by: PeterAAF...@gmail.com

I am using Google Talk messaging. The position of the RETURN key changes to a SEND key and caused inadvertant sends of partial messages. Is there a way to remove the SEND key or change it back to a RETURN KEY? Thank you, PeterF

[Anonymous]

Originally posted by: PeterAAF...@gmail.com

Fantastic Keyboard! Thanks. Using Note2, I have noticed when selecting suggested words a SPACE is added. If I add another space an automatic Period (.) is added. The standard Androud keyboard didn't add the space until the next charactor was typed. So, if that charactor was another space, you only got one space and no period. I see a check box for spacebar and puncuation automatically add Highlighted word (I don't understand that) but nooption to uncheck for not putting in a SPACE when selecting a Highlighted word. I am sure I will get use to that in time. Also any chance of getting predictive NEXT word. I love that feature (works very well) in original keyboard. Howevr, I'm NOT leaving this keyboard. Thank You, Great Job! PeterF

[Anonymous]

Originally posted by: jhan...@gmail.com

When entering names or addresses for sending messages, the stock soft keyboard puts contact list entries into the suggestions bar. For example, if I type 'jo' the suggestion might be 'John <john@somedomain.com>'

The hacker's keyboard does not do this, but when using non-fullscreen-mode these suggestions appear as a sort of drop-down from the input field. I assume the stock keyboard is somehow reading the suggestions dropdown, and putting them in the suggestions box. Any chance this could be added to the hacker's keyboard?

[Anonymous]

Originally posted by: izon.den...@gmail.com

hi, how will be the function keys appeared? im using s3 jelly bean 4.1.2... thanks

[Anonymous]

Originally posted by: msn...@gmail.com

Your "Hacker's Keyboard" is perfect for Google Drive on my Android phone! Thanks so much for your work on this, I've used it all of a half hour and I'm already loving it.

[Anonymous]

Originally posted by: nmgt...@gmail.com

How do I do the "sliding key events" mentioned in the settings?

[Anonymous]

Originally posted by: knut...@gmail.com

Interestingly, when you you use the voice input and wish to delete an entry, the complete last sentence is erased. I find this rather useful. You need to use the arrow keys first, if you want to delete letter by letter.

I cannot believe this is not the standard AOSP Keyboard.

The English keyboard layout give you access to many more symbols than the Swedish does, like for instance the number five key that holds %, ⅝ and ‰ in English but only % in Swedish. I would love to be able to add symbols or even smileys, html or whatever to keys.

The Home and End keys brings you to the top and bottom of a web page, and not to the first or last symbol in a textarea, but that's actually kind of useful.

Thank you for developing this!

Galaxy S3 I9300.