[1]The C64 Community

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Virtual keyboard

  Gurce

   I was curious as to whether the virtual keyboard had the ability to select
   petscii characters.

   I had a browse of the manual and no mention of it there, but there was a
   mention of the equivalant keyboard mappings (including petscii characters)
   would be available online at:

   [2]https://thec64.com/keyboard

   Just tried visiting that page and it didn't seem to have any content yet.
   Thought I'd better put that on your radar.

   Also, no worries if petscii characters aren't available on the virtual
   keyboard as yet. Just thought I'd raise it anyway, just so it could be
   considered for a future firmware update, as some of the purchasers are
   likely to be dad's wanting to teach their kids how to have fun and doodle
   about on the screen with petscii art and colours, they'd probably enjoy
   that sort of thing :-)

   Oh, and also, I'm hoping that in the upcoming working-keyboard model, all
   the keys will have their petscii art symbols displayed on the key's
   surface too, for much more easier access for kids to play around with it
   :-)

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  RetroBiker

   [3]Gurce The manual indicates that you cannot do the equivalent of
   pressing two keys at the same time on the virtual keyboard (as you'd need
   to access the graphics characters). It says you should use a USB keyboard
   for that.

   The virtual keyboard is really designed for those few occasions where you
   need to enter text into a game (such as your name for the high score
   table) and would be very cumbersome for general input.

   Personally, I'm planning on printing out some labels to put onto a USB
   keyboard to help for this sort of thing.

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  Gurce

   Yep, I have read that section of the manual and agree that it behaves the
   way you described presently, but as the dev team seem to be open to
   feedback from the community when considering how to update the firmware, I
   felt it was worth chipping in my thoughts.

   As for the perspective that it is intended for only simple keyboard entry,
   I'd say yes, presently it is, but it doesn't have to be that way if enough
   people in the community wish for the virtual keyboard to also select out
   petscii characters.

   As for adding stick-ons onto a usb keyboard, sure, that's a fine path for
   end-users willing to do that. Some will be fine with doing that, others
   won't and might want an alternative, such as the virtual keyboard being
   extended to support them.

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  Gurce

   Perhaps a potential alternative could be as follows.

   Let's say a kid is typing out their basic program and needs to quickly
   recall what key-combos equate to which petscii character (or color).

   Perhaps one of the USB keyboard's spare keys (perhaps F12?) could toggle
   an overlay help window, showing the entire petscii layout across the
   keyboard, something like this pic:

   [4]enter image description here

   It could act as a quick-reference for them.

   My gripe with the stick-ons approach is the level of tedium involved for
   the end-user. Sure, if you persevere and do it, you get the reward.

   On the other hand, a young, enthusiastic kid will probably memorise their
   favourite petscii characters by rote after a while (as I did, back in the
   day, and no doubt many others :-)). So as long as they have a quick
   reference at hand whenever they need it, maybe that'll be fine.

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  Gurce

   Aah, I noticed they had added content to this page now, nice:

   [5]https://thec64.com/keyboard

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  RetroBiker

   [6]Gurce It's not perfectly accurate. Or may depend on keyboard.

   It says that shift-2 is double quote, but it is @ for me and double quote
   is shift-single-quote and other <modifier>-2 items are on the quote key.
   That's why I created my stickers.

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References

   Visible links
   1. https://community.thec64.com/
   2. https://thec64.com/keyboard
   3. https://community.thec64.com/d/99/1
   5. https://thec64.com/keyboard
   6. https://community.thec64.com/d/99/5