[Non-Touchscreen Windows Mobile Other] Menneisyys:
1.1.2 Adding more functionality to the phone dialpad

MS Smartphones have something that (most) traditional Pocket PC's don't have: a phonepad: consisting of 10 numeric keys, the # and the * buttons. Knowing the most common functionality a Web browser user wants to have access to (quick scroll up/down, to the top/bottom of the page; reloading; - with multi-document browsers - switching to the previous / next tab; quickly switching between the different rendering and layout modes; quickly changing the character size / zoom percentage), many of this functionality can be quickly accessed by making use of the 12 extra buttons.

As has already been pointed out, IEM only makes use of the '2' and '8' keys by default. These two buttons can be used to do page scrolls, as opposed to the link scrolls accessible on the D-pad, combined with fast scrolling introduced in later WM5 AKU's, should you continuously depress the D-pad. You can, fortunately, assign (some) functionality to all the other remaining ten buttons.

Unfortunately, there are far fewer functions you can assign to the buttons, but even this is definitely a step forward. Let's have a complete list of the functionalities that can be accessed (note that I'll explain the numbers later, when discussing how the Registry should be modded):

Functionality (Registry values):

1 - Page Up (default under (later?) WM5 / WM6)

2 - Page Down (default under (later?) WM5 / WM6)

3 - Top of page

4 - Bottom of page

5 - Page Left in non-one column view / modes

6 - Page Right in non-one column view / modes

7 - Page FULL left in non-one column view / modes

8 - Page FULL right in non-one column view / modes

9 - Default Layout

10 - Desktop Layout

11 - One Column Layout

12 - Full Screen Toggle

13 - Show Pictures Toggle

As can clearly be seen, there're no goodies like "Refresh" in here. However, even then it's pretty much useful.

Now, let's see what these numbers are for. To understand their meaning, I elaborate on how the Registry stores the keypad button - functionality pairs.

In the Registry, it's the [HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\ Software\ Microsoft\ Internet Explorer\ KeyMaps] key that stores values (NOT subkeys!) connecting keys with functionalities. In general, it's done in the following way: the value name's the keycode and the value of the value is one of the above-listed functionalities.

The keycodes are as follows (that is, the Registry value names):

48: 0

49: 1

50: 2

51: 3

52: 4

53: 5

54: 6

55: 7

56: 8

57: 9

119: *

120: #

I've created a registry import file that assigns most the available functionality (except for "Page FULL right in non-one column view / modes"). All you need to do is importing it (with, say, Resco Registry Explorer) and (re)starting IEM. The effects will be seen at once. The registry import file is available HERE and has the following key assignment:

0: full screen (12)

1: Show Pictures Toggle (13)

2: Page Up (1)

3: top of page (3)

4: Page Left in non-one column view / modes (5)

5: Page FULL left in non-one column view / modes (7)

6: Page Right in non-one column view / modes (6)

7: default layout (9)

8: Page Down (2)

9: bottom of page (4)

*: Desktop Layout (10)

#: One Column Layout (11)

For more (not mandatory) info, also see THIS, THIS, THIS and THIS.

1.1.3 MultiIE

The well-known Pocket PC IEM enhancer, MultiIE, is also compatible with (WM5+ only; sorry, no pre-WM5 compliance) MS Smartphones. The standard WM5 installer works on both Pocket PC’s and Smartphones. Let’s see how it compares to the Pocket PC version!

Unfortunately, it’s far inferior, feature-wise, to the Pocket PC version. Basically, you can only expect it to add multi-tab functionality.

1.1.3.1 Differences between the Pocket PC and the Smartphone version

1.1.3.1.1 Goodies missing - a generic overview

It’s fully impossible to save images in the SP version. The same stands for the excellent, additional features offered by, for example, address bar macros. They are ALL missing from the SP version, which is, more or less, only lets for multi tabs, softkey-based D-pad scroll mode and full screen switching, HTML saving and source viewing and keeping backlight on.

There are a LOT of features just not accessible in the SP version. In addition to basic functionality like the already-mentioned ability to open a link in another tab, the lack of saving images or saving full Web pages (as opposed to only saving plain HTML files without in-line images and, preferably, CSS/JS files), a whole set of other features are also missing: for example, address bar macroing, the excellent location-based services offered by the PPC version, the ability to quickly reformat a Web page through online Web compression / reformatting services like Skweezer etc. Fortunately, at least “Keep Backlight On” works.

1.1.3.1.2 Setting dialogs

Unfortunately, a lot of menu options accessible on the PPC are just not accessible in the SP version. For example, assigning shortcut buttons to MultiIE functions (PPC screenshots: 1 2) isn’t even offered by the SP version. On the Screen tab, it’s not possible to switch off the, on the Smartphone, useless (because you can’t tap them on a touchscreen-less device) corner icons (PPC SP).

1.1.3.1.3 Impossible to open a link in a new tab

While it’s available in the SP version of Opera Mobile (where you just traverse the focus to the link you’d like to open but, instead of pressing Action, press the right softkey and select “1 Open in new window”), it’s not possible to dynamically set where (in what tab) a new link should be opened to. This, of course, is also possible in the PPC version of MultiIE as can be seen in HERE.

You can surely try to redefine the default functionality in the Open link: Tap default action to, say, Open in new back window as can be seen in HERE, but it won’t work at all (and won’t stick). This means you can NOT open links in another tab in any way without opening a new tab in Menu / 9 MultiIE / 3 Open New Window and, in there, select the link you want to display in this tab.

1.1.3.2 Compared to Opera Mobile…

The inability to open a link in a new window, as has already been pointed out, is a big problem with MultiIE – as opposed to OpMob.

Switching between open tabs also requires significantly more button presses than in Opera Mobile. In the latter, you only need to press ‘2’ once to bring up the list of open tabs, where, after selecting the right one to switch to, you only need to press Action once. In MultiIE, you need to press Menu / 9 MultiIE and, if there are not more than 3 open tabs (in Portrait mode on QVGA devices; on 176*220 ones, even two open tabs will result in the same), select the tab at the top. If there’re more tabs open (QVGA screenshot with 4 tabs) or, you’re in Landscape, there will be another level of redirection (1 Windows), making it necessary to issue another keypress.

There is, however, something MultiIE is better at: saving web pages do work. Unfortunately, you can’t fine tune what should be saved – unlike in the PPC version, where not only the page HTML itself, but also all the related resources (by selecting a full save instead of the HTML-only).