Root Mystified by GB text manipulation (cursor insertion)

[erisuser1]

On GSB 3.5 now; longtime user of GSB 2.x/3.x as a daily driver.

In short, the apparently random behavior of the text-selector methods of Gingerbread drive me batty... am I the only one that suffers from this malady?

Typical scenario: I am looking at a web page with a long URL, and I want to edit a very small change into the URL, and tap the "->" button to load that new page/URL. The fastest way to do this is:

1) tap the URL/address bar
2) grab the text and scroll it right until the location that needs editing comes into view
3) tap once at the desired cursor insertion point
4) backspace over the text to be deleted, type in the changes, press "->" to load new page

I can do this sequence... about once in every 15 attempts.

What usually happens instead (the other 14 times), is that at step #2, the "word selection" cursors appear ... with the entire URL selected - either that, or the "Edit text" popup menu appears instead of cursor insertion. I can get the result I want from here, but only by sliding both cursors from the end & beginning of the URL to the area I want to edit. It certainly works, but it's awkward.

I just want to be able to insert a cursor reliably without the dual-cursor selector thingamabob starting up. I can do it sometimes... but have no clue why it happens erratically.

Here's an example you can try for yourself, if you have a GB ROM (maybe Froyo too?)

NDBC - 5-day plot - Wave Height at 44029

Load the above page (a five-day wave height plot) into your browser, and then change 44029 to 44030 in the browser's address/URL bar.

Maybe the way I tap the screen is erratic; I dunno. I don't think it is specific to a behavior of the browser address bar, as I experience similar irregular behavior editing text elsewhere (e.g. using AK Notepad).


Anyone have this mystery figured out?

 

[doogald]

Which keyboard are you using? Stock GB keyboard or something else?

Sorry I didn't reply sooner, but I have been running xtrSENSE for a while. I just installed GSB yesterday and just tried this now. I was able to work it just fine. I am using the Swiftkey keyboard, by the way.

So, anyway, in the browser:

I tapped on the URL address bar.
I tapped again to place the cursor location - it placed it fine.
I was able to drag it right and left to place it.

It worked fine for five consecutive trials.

Oh, I am running GSB 3.6.

 

[erisuser1]

Which keyboard are you using? Stock GB keyboard or something else?

Thanks for the reply, doog.

Stock GB keyboard.

I suppose that I could try a different keyboard.

BTW, I did find a workaround... sort of clumsy, but it seems to work every time:

If you tap the URL bar, and (for whatever reason) GB automatically does a "select all" with the left/right selection cursors showing, you can slide either one of the cursors so that the whole URL is no longer selected, and then tap once anyplace outside of the selected region. This causes the cursor to insert... and also for the left/right selection cursors to disappear. (If you were to "tap" inside the selection area, the "Edit text" popup menu will always appear).

At that point, you can scroll to whatever position you please and insert the cursor at the desired location.

Separate issue:

Text editing (well, let's say "making log forum posts using the stock browser") has some rather horrible behaviors in GB on the Eris when using the stock GB keyboard. (Maybe Froyo, too?) My most recent favorite is the one where you perform a cursor insert towards the end of a long forum post (I'm doing this reply from a real computer, btw). The text displayed in the window will reflow itself to be sort of "centered" - and if your cursor insertion attempt is too far to the left/right, or too near the bottom of the text editing area, the cursor will get inserted somewhere - but will no longer be visible on the screen. Doesn't seem to matter whether you are in landscape or portrait mode. Makes it sort of difficult to go back and correct a typo or insert a word or two.

I suppose the keyboard dependencies might have something to do with the differences in on-screen area occupied by different keyboards (presumably text reflow operations would depend on how much space is "left over" for text display); but for all I know, the above behavior might occur with any keyboard.

eu1