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Is anyone else having issues with the on screen keyboard for your Surface Pro 3 after the Windows 10 update? When I go to tablet mode an enter an app, the on screen keyboard will not pop up. An example is in the weather app. When I touch the field to input a city name, the on screen keyboard is nowhere to be found. I have to connect the type cover back to my Pro 3.
Any suggestions on this? Thanks.
Locked Question. This question was migrated from the Microsoft Support Community. You can vote on whether it's helpful, but you can't add comments or replies or follow the question.
Hi all,
Thank you for sharing your experiences with Windows 10 on our Surface.
Regarding the onscreen keyboard, the information I have is that, by design, you must manually open the onscreen keyboard by selecting the keyboard from the taskbar.
MODERATOR EDIT: If you don't see the icon, right-click (or press and hold) the taskbar and make sure the Show touch keyboard button has a check mark next to it.
Thanks,
Josh
can't figure out how to get my on-screen keyboard to come back on/up after installing Windows 10.
Give an example of how you think you need it. Do you have your Surface in Tablet mode? Do you have a pen? You could go to the Windows Ease of Access item in the All Apps menu (hence obscurely listed under the W) and open the On Screen Keyboard (OSK). Then provided you never close it but at most only Minimize it you will always be able to access the OSK via the Task pane (e.g. with a swipe from the left and a tap on that thumbnail)
Good luck
Robert
there still needs to be a way for the user to say, give me a keyboard onscreen please.
Speech recognition? "Show keyboard." Actually it looks like that is broken (or WIP) too.
It is particularly an issue if the device goes to sleep in tablet mode. The only way to sign it back in is with the picture, as the keyboard does not appear even when there is a cursor waiting.
I can only reproduce that when I leave the OSK running. It is a usability defect which has been carried over from W8: we can't have both the TIP and the OSK at the same time. In fact, that worked for me too, so now I'm not sure what you could be doing.
To me as an ex programmer, this behaviour of the onscreen icon being there when the keyboard is attached and not there when it is removed looks suspiciously like there is a NOT missing somewhere.....
OK. I did see that one. Ridiculous. But this whole Touch UX is riddled with disappointing poorly designed use-case implementations (assuming any significant use-case analysis was done before coding.) What's one more?
BTW while testing for my response I found out that if you like the OSK it can always be easily accessible in a swipe from the left. But as I mentioned that would mean you could not take advantage of the TIP unless you closed the OSK, thus losing the option of swiping.
Also, while typing this Edge became so slow that it was unusable. I had to clone the tab and continue there. More bugs/deficiencies/quirks.
FYI
Robert Aldwinckle
The onscreen keyboard only seems to be available in Win10 when the Surface cover keyboard is attached. As soon as it is removed, the little icon for bringing up the keyboard disappears. Maybe some apps know how to deal with this, but many do not, there still needs to be a way for the user to say, give me a keyboard onscreen please.
It is particularly an issue if the device goes to sleep in tablet mode. The only way to sign it back in is with the picture, as the keyboard does not appear even when there is a cursor waiting.
To me as an ex programmer, this behaviour of the onscreen icon being there when the keyboard is attached and not there when it is removed looks suspiciously like there is a NOT missing somewhere.....
It doesn't open at all (or have a button to open the touch keyboard) on the initial sign-in screen
Previously in W8.1.2 if I left the OSK running at shutdown I would find it running then at sign in. I haven't tested this case in W10 yet. Why don't you do that for me? E.g. leave the OSK running when you shut down and see what happens when you next sign in.
The only other possibility your symptom description brings to mind is having the OSK actually up for that scenario but off-screen and not visible. We can test this case too. E.g. leave the OSK running on a second monitor before shut down, then, assuming the previous test's assumptions are valid, you would just need to find a way to bring it back into view. Not having a real keyboard would make that a challenge for sure. Otherwise, it could be simply: Alt-Space M CursorRight (to engage the mousepointer move icon on the OSK's Title bar) and then drag it into view.
HTH
Robert Aldwinckle
