<p>Have you guys tried the tn5250 for android? I don't know if there is an iPhone over. I have not but there appears to be function key support.</p>
<p>Seth</p>
<div class="gmail_quote">On Sep 7, 2012 6:14 PM, "Bill Campbell" <<a href="mailto:bill@celestial.com">bill@celestial.com</a>> wrote:<br type="attribution"><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0 0 0 .8ex;border-left:1px #ccc solid;padding-left:1ex">
On Fri, Sep 07, 2012, Walter Vaughan wrote:<br>
>Richard Kreiss wrote:<br>
><br>
>>No keyboards for any tablets exist with function keys. Both Apple and Google left these out of their OS.<br>
>><br>
>><br>
>><br>
>'cause they (function keys) are nonnutritive, and definitely should not<br>
>have a place at the table in the 2020's.<br>
><br>
>You should see the looks I get teaching someone they have to hit F1 or<br>
>F2 to edit characters, since they do know that F1 is supposed to bring<br>
>up a Help screen in all the other programs they have ever used, it (F1<br>
>to insert) breaks convention. Or rather the convention left it in the dust.<br>
<br>
IMHO, the first idiocy was Microsoft using the ESC key alone to<br>
cancel things. ESC had been defined for years as 'ESCape to a<br>
command', the first character in a multi-character command (which<br>
is why FilePro properly used ESC-ESC).<br>
<br>
Radio Shack Scripsit used mnemonic control keys, ctrl-I to<br>
insert, ctrl-D to delete, which were easy to remember and didn't<br>
require a typist to move fingers off the home keys.<br>
<br>
Professional typists and data entry people really don't like to<br>
have to move their fingers far to hit function keys, move mice,<br>
and such. Shortly after the IBM PC first came out, and people<br>
would come into my X-department at 19th and K in D.C. to look at<br>
machines for word processing. Usually they brought their office<br>
manager, senior secretary, and I would show them Scripsit on the<br>
Model II with it's keyboard very similar to the IBM Selectric.<br>
Then I would send them around the corner to the IBM product<br>
center to see what they had to offer. Invariably they would come<br>
back screaming about the horrible IBM keyboards (we won't even<br>
talk about Visicalc users and the PC 'keypad' without cursor keys :-)<br>
<br>
>Since we can remap keys, we really should have applications use normal<br>
>conventions. I'm guilty of not doing this, and setting up nice keyboard<br>
>controls that make sense to the end user. So shame on me.<br>
<br>
When I rewrote my large FilePro POS application using the Unify<br>
RDBMS in the mid '80s, I also wrote my own screen handling<br>
routines to replace the horrible Unify ones. I used the FilePro<br>
key mappings as that's what people were accustomed to, but added<br>
various aliases to make things more efficient.<br>
<br>
These initially were the 4 PF keys above the numeric keypad on<br>
Wyse-50s and other VT-100 style keyboards<br>
F1 -> ctrl-I insert<br>
F2 -> ctrl-D delete<br>
F3 -> ctrl-O clear to end of field<br>
ESC-ESC -> F4 save record<br>
<br>
Then on PC style keyboards I added these for the function block<br>
immediately to the left of the keypad:<br>
F1 -> Insert<br>
F2 -> Delete (ctrl-C is the proper way to interrupt)<br>
ESC-ESC -> PageDown within easy reach of the keypad.<br>
<br>
Bill<br>
--<br>
INTERNET: <a href="mailto:bill@celestial.com">bill@celestial.com</a> Bill Campbell; Celestial Software LLC<br>
URL: <a href="http://www.celestial.com/" target="_blank">http://www.celestial.com/</a> PO Box 820; 6641 E. Mercer Way<br>
Voice: <a href="tel:%28206%29%20236-1676" value="+12062361676">(206) 236-1676</a> Mercer Island, WA 98040-0820<br>
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<br>
Do not meddle in the affairs of cats, for they are subtle and will piss on<br>
your computer. --Bruce Graham<br>
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</blockquote></div>