Circuitry's Keyboard on Phones and Tablets
In the iPhone, iPad and Android apps, Circuitry draws its own on-screen keyboard. The key row is its top row, so the keys a phone keyboard leaves out sit directly above the letters, and the bottom row carries Circuitry's own buttons. You can change how it looks, split it for two thumbs, change its height and light its keys.
A new install starts on Space Grey with the Backlight on.
Where it appears
The keyboard comes up whenever you tap into a text field: the agent chat, a terminal, a code editor, a sheet cell, a search box.
An older version of the app keeps the phone's own keyboard until you update it.
The phone's own keyboard is used instead when:
- A hardware keyboard is attached, on any device.
- iPhone and iPad: the field is a password, a one-time code or a number pad, so autofill and the number pad keep working.
- iPhone and iPad: you type in a language other than English. The globe key, shown when you have another language turned on, opens the system keyboard in that language. A key on the key row brings Circuitry's keyboard back.
On Android, password, code and number fields use Circuitry's keyboard too. Numbers and codes open on its ?123 page. The phone's autofill row isn't available there, but pasting works.
On iPhone you can turn Circuitry's keyboard off in Settings → Appearance → Circuitry Keyboard. With it off you get the iPhone keyboard, with the key row above it.
The key row
The top row is the key row, with the same pages as always: swipe it sideways for punctuation, code symbols, numbers, function keys and your macros. See The Phone Key Row for what each page holds. On a phone the arrow keys are on its Keys page. On an iPad they stay at the right end of every page.
The key at the far right is the hide key:
- Tap it to put the keyboard away.
- Press and hold it to open the Keyboard settings. The keyboard stays up, so you see each change on the real keys.
Typing
- Hold the space bar and slide to move the caret.
- Tap Shift twice to lock capitals.
- Hold Delete to keep deleting.
- Tap Shift, then Tab on the key row, to send Shift+Tab.
- Hold a letter for its accented forms. On Android, holding a letter in the top row also offers its digit.
Each key shows a popup above your finger as you press it.
On Android, the comma and full stop sit beside the space bar, and ?123 and =\< open the numbers and symbols.
Word suggestions appear above the chat input box. In the chat box, two spaces type a full stop and a space.
The bottom row
Below the letters are Circuitry's own buttons: Sidebar, New, Docs, Agent and Menu, and Split on a screen wide enough for it, such as a folding phone opened out. The microphone key starts dictation. The emoji key opens the emoji.
Emoji
On Android, the emoji key swaps the letters for an emoji panel. It shows one category at a time, with your recent emoji first. Tap ABC to go back to the letters. Delete is at the end of the category bar. Only emoji your phone can draw are listed.
On iPhone and iPad, the emoji key opens the system keyboard's emoji. A key on the key row brings Circuitry's keyboard back.
Keyboard settings
Open them with:
- Phone: Menu → Keyboard.
- iPad: View → Keyboard in the menu bar.
- Any device: press and hold the hide key.
The panel opens at the top of the screen with the keyboard below it, so every pick shows on the keys straight away. The item appears only when your installed app has more than one look to choose from. An older app version may not show it, or may show fewer looks and options. Your choices are saved per device.
On a phone held upright, the panel is one list: Split keys (when there is room), a Lighting row that opens its own page (‹ Keyboard goes back), Keyboard height, then the looks. On a wider screen (a folding phone opened out, a phone on its side, an iPad) the looks are a grid of cards on the left, with height and lighting on the right.
Looks
| Look | What it looks like |
|---|---|
| Standard | Plain light or dark keys that follow the phone's appearance. |
| Space Grey | Black laptop keys on a dark grey body. |
| ZX8 | Keys printed on one flat black membrane. |
| ZX8 Red | ZX8 with what each key types after ?123 printed in red. |
| Rainbow 48 | Grey rubber keys on a black body, with a rainbow stripe. |
| Bread Bin | Dark brown sculpted keys on a brown-grey body. |
| Classic 84 | Warm beige keys with deep dished tops. |
| Mechanical Dark | Tall black gaming keys; the lighting shines through the letters. |
| Mechanical White | Tall white gaming keys on a dark plate; the lighting shines through the letters. |
| Aluminium | White keys with grey letters on a silver body. |
| Midnight | Black laptop keys on a deep blue-black body. |
| Starlight | Black laptop keys on a pale gold body. |
| Graphite | Black laptop keys on a mid-grey body. |
| White Polycarbonate | White plastic keys on a white plastic body. |
| Unibody | Black keys in aluminium, with speaker grilles on a wide screen. |
| Butterfly | Very flat black keys, with speaker grilles on a wide screen. |
| Studio | Black keys in a black well on dark aluminium, with speaker grilles on a wide screen. |
Split keys
Split keys puts the letters in two halves, one for each thumb. The switch appears only when the screen is wide enough: a folding phone opened out, a phone on its side, or an iPad. It works with any look.
Keyboard height
The Keyboard height slider makes the keys Shorter or Taller than Normal. The app keeps the keyboard within the share of the screen it allows, so on some screens Taller may already be at its limit.
Lighting
Lighting colours the keys' letters, with a soft glow round each key. Only the keys light: the key row keeps its look, and the bottom row's buttons draw dimmer while a light is on so the lit keys stand out. One lighting choice is kept for every look.
The effects come in three rows:
| Row | Effects |
|---|---|
| Still | Off, Backlight, Static, Breathing, Spectrum cycle |
| Moving | Wave, Aurora, Marquee, Rain, Fire, Starlight |
| Typing | Reactive, Ripple, Reactive ripple, Typing heat |
Backlight is a white light behind the keys. It comes on when the keyboard appears or you type, and dims after a few seconds without typing.
Under the effects, the panel shows only the options the chosen effect uses:
- Speed: Slow, Medium or Fast.
- Direction: for Wave, left to right, right to left, upward, downward or from the centre; for Marquee, clockwise or anticlockwise. Static has a direction when it uses two colours or the spectrum.
- Colour: One colour, Two colours or Spectrum. With two colours, pick which one you are setting, then tap a swatch.
- Swatches: Cyan, Blue, Green, Amber, Red, Pink and White. Fire and Typing heat bring their own colours.
- Brightness: for any effect other than Off.
- Glow around keys: on by default: the light spills a little around each key onto the case. Turn it off to keep the light on the keys' letters only. Shown for any effect other than Off.
- Glow: how far and how strongly the light spills around the keys, from a faint edge (10%) to the full halo (100%, the default). Shown while Glow around keys is on.
With Reduce Motion turned on (iPhone and iPad), or animations removed in Android's settings, every effect holds still.
Folding phones
Half-folded, upright (laptop mode): the keyboard fills the lower half below the fold and stays up even when no field is selected. What you type goes into the field you last used. Only the hide key (or Back on Android) puts it away, until you tap a field or move the hinge. On Android, the keyboard steps aside while a dialog is open, and a field in the dialog brings it back.
Opened out: the screen is wide enough for Split keys, the Split button appears on the bottom row, and the Keyboard settings show in two columns. See Split Screen for how documents and agents arrange on an opened phone.
Related
- The Phone Key Row: every page of the key row, and your macros
- Split Screen: Documents and Agents: tablets, foldables and phones
- iPad Gestures & Touch Controls
- Vim on a Phone