Keyboard, D-Pad and Android TV Control - Using the App Without Touching the Screen

On an Android TV or Google TV box, FastMediaSorter appears in the TV's own app row with its own wide banner, like any app made for the big screen - no need to dig through the phone apps list. Open it with the center button of the remote.

A TV box needs no touchscreen, and the app does not ask for one. To make the app feel at home on the big screen from the start, pick the TV / media box device profile in the welcome wizard or later in Settings - it chooses sensible defaults for a remote.

Press the arrows to move the selection, and the center button or Enter to open what is selected. Back on the remote, or Escape on a keyboard, goes back.

As soon as a screen opens, the selection lands on the first real button or item - never on an invisible list container, where a press of an arrow would seem to do nothing. A frame shows where the selection is, but only when you use a remote or keys; when you touch the screen, the frame stays out of the way.

Each arrow press moves exactly one step, also in dialogs such as Choose your device profile, where a press once used to jump two rows at a time on a TV. Turn the screen or the tablet sideways and the order in which the selection moves stays the same as upright: dialogs and grids keep their order and their compact size in landscape too.

Every dialog and every panel that slides up from the bottom of the screen works the same way with keys:

• Escape closes it, like Cancel.
• Enter presses the main button, such as OK, Save or Delete.
• The arrows and Tab move from one control to the next.
• When the dialog opens, the selection is already on a sensible control, so one press of Enter is often all you need.

The buttons at the bottom of a dialog get a clear frame when they are selected with a remote, so on a TV you always see whether OK or Cancel is about to be pressed. Buttons are as wide as their words; in portrait, a long pair of buttons stands one above the other instead of squeezing its words. A dialog also closes by itself when the screen behind it goes away, so it never stays hanging over a screen that is no longer there.

With a keyboard attached, many commands have their own key. These are the defaults:

• Space - play or pause.
• . and , - one frame forward or back.
• ] and [ - jump 5 seconds forward or back; Shift+Right and Shift+Left jump 30 seconds.
• Page Down and Page Up - the next or the previous file.
• Home and End - the start or the end.
• F - full screen; R - rotate; M - sound on or off.
• Ctrl+F - search; Ctrl+Z and Ctrl+Y - undo and redo.
• Ctrl+C, Ctrl+X, Ctrl+V - copy, move and paste files; Ctrl+R - rename; Ctrl+Shift+N - a new folder; Ctrl+S - save; Backspace or Delete - delete.
• Ctrl+B - add to or remove from Favorites.
• 1 to 8 - the eight quick file operation buttons, in order.
• Escape - leave the current screen.

The media keys of a keyboard or a remote - play, pause, next, previous, fast forward and rewind - work too. Every one of these keys can be changed on the Controls & Keybindings screen - type *keybindings* into the Settings search to jump to its row; how to do that is in Controls and key remapping.

With a mouse, FastMediaSorter behaves like software on a computer:

• Click selects, a double click opens.
• Right click opens the menu of the item under the pointer.
• Middle click (pressing the wheel) adds the item to Favorites or removes it.
• The wheel scrolls.
• The back and forward side buttons go to the previous or the next file.
• A list item under the pointer lights up, so you see what a click will hit.

To select many files at once in the file browser or in the duplicate finder, press the mouse button on an item - or on the empty space next to it - and sweep over the others: everything you pass is selected, and the list scrolls by itself when you reach its top or bottom edge. On a touchscreen the same works with a finger once selection is already on: long-press one file to start, then slide sideways over the others. A slide that goes mostly up or down still scrolls the list as usual. More about selecting: Multi-selection and batch operations.

A text field - the filter box, the Settings search, a name or an address - stays in view above the on-screen keyboard also on a wide screen or in landscape, where Android would otherwise cover the whole screen with the keyboard and hide the field you are typing in.

The small clear icon at the end of a field empties it at once, and you can tap straight back into the field to type again.