I want to summarize the role of function keys in Windows Mobile, former Pocket PC, as I got several questions each week on how to use or enable Function keys in this or that application.

Here is a simple information about how function keys work in Windows Mobile.

As example you have a web application which shows F3 and F4 as shortcuts to previous/next page:

SAP ITS Mobile screen Intermec Browser

Without some prepare this screen will not react on function keys! As the screen shows Intermec Browser (IB) with a SAP ITS Mobile form, you are able to define settings in IB to be able to really use the Function Keys.

Windows Mobile uses Function Key values for its own purpose. The usage can be retrieved by looking at winuserm.h of a Windows Mobile SDK:

Source code

//winuserm.h
...
#define VK_TSOFT1   VK_F1               // Softkey 1
#define VK_TSOFT2   VK_F2               // Softkey 2
#define VK_TTALK    VK_F3               // Talk
#define VK_TEND     VK_F4               // End
...
#define VK_TRECORD      VK_F10          // Record
#define VK_TFLIP        VK_F17          // Flip
#define VK_TPOWER       VK_F18          // Power
#define VK_TVOLUMEUP    VK_F6           // Volume Up
#define VK_TVOLUMEDOWN  VK_F7           // Volume Down
...
#define VK_TSPEAKERPHONE_TOGGLE VK_F16
#define VK_END_ALL_DATA_CALLS   VK_F15
...
#define VK_TSTAR    VK_F8               // *
#define VK_TPOUND   VK_F9               // #
...
#define VK_SYMBOL   VK_F11              // Symbol (SYM) key
 
#define VK_REDKEY   VK_F19              // Sent by a keypad that has a special red function key
#define VK_ROCKER   VK_F20              // Arrow keys came from a Rocker
#define VK_DPAD     VK_F21              // Arrow keys came from a DPAD
#define VK_ACTION   VK_F23              // Sent with VK_RETURN when doing Action on PPC rockers
 
#define VK_VOICEDIAL  VK_F24            // Key used to kick off voice dial recognition
#define VK_KEYLOCK    VK_F22            // Key used to lock the device
#define VK_KEYUNLOCK  VK_F25             // Key used to unlock the key lock
 
// Chorded keys.  DONE is VK_RWIN + VK_F6 and MOJI is VK_RWIN + VK_F7
#define VK_DONE     VK_F6                 // <OK/Close> hotkey code
#define MOD_DONE    (MOD_WIN | MOD_KEYUP) // <OK/Close> hotkey modifiers
 
#define VK_MOJI     VK_F7                  // Key used to switch between FE language layouts
#define MOD_MOJI    (MOD_WIN | MOD_KEYUP)  //Modifiers so MOJI goes to the shell
...

You see that many FunctionKey values are assigned to OS specific functions like Phone, END, Volume Up/Down etc.

So, you can normally not use Function Keys in your application to provide shortcuts to function calls. This is also true for client applications like Terminal Emulators (TE) like NaurTechTE and Intermec TE (ITE), browser based applications like Internet Explorer Mobile or Intermec Kiosk Mode Browser (IB), thin clients like Java client apps (ie. SAP ITS Mobile) or Remote Desktop client apps (ie Remote Desktop Mobile, zaDesktop).

Some of the kiosk mode apps provide a way to enable you to use Function Keys (see example at top). They can do so, as they use API calls like UnregisterFunc1 or AllKeys(TRUE) or GXOpenInput (deprecated!). These APIs instruct Windows Mobile OS to NOT catch and use Function Keys but handle them like ‘normal’ keys.

If you are the coder of an application using CPP, CSharp (C#), VB.NET, CPP or JAVA, you can use the Microsoft API function AllKeys(TRUE) in your code and Windows Mobile will not tamper the function keys.

If you are not the coder you may use UnregisterFunc1 (see my post “Freedom for Function Keys“). But be warned, there are applications that even then will not process Function Keys or do not forward them. For example Internet Explorer Mobile (IEM) will NOT process Function Keys except for internal functions like help or full-screen. Another bad example is Remote Desktop Mobile (RDM). It does not support Function Keys, even if you un-register them before you launch RDM, Function Keys will NOT be processed or transmitted to the host application. An alternative to RDM with function key support is rdesktopCE.

When you use UnregisterFunc1, you can check the Function Keys using a tool like KeyTest3AK. It will show the keydown and keyup values of keys and shows what happens if you use AllKeys():

More posts about AllKeys

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REGEDIT4

;Enable blacklist of applications that should not run
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Security\Policies\Shell]
"DisallowRun"=dword:1

;Add entries to blacklist of applications that should not run
[HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Policies\Explorer\DisallowRun]
"1"="tmail.exe"
"2"="sms.dll"
"3"="poutlook.exe"
;add more here as "3", "4", "5", etc.

tmail.exe, sms.dll and poutlook.exe are responsible for message handling on the device. If you disallow them, the user cannot start them anymore.

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HTML 4.01
Extensible HTML (XHTML)
Cascading style sheets
Microsoft Jscript® version 5.5
Enhanced scripting and Document Object Model support
Wireless Markup Language (WML) 2.0 (XHTML + WML 1.x)
Internet Protocol version 6 (IPv6) in IPv4/IPv6 mixed-mode environments
New extensible imaging library

From TechEd powerpoint

HTML 3.2 Compliant
JavaScript 1.1 compliant
XML Object Model
SSL
Active X support (no download!)
=============================
HTML 3.2-based object model
   Not the IE4 OM
Core script support:
   Scripting against FORM elements
   Scripting against the XML OM<
Not supported:
   Dynamic frameset creation
   Dynamic script generation
   Window.open

With AJAX and Windows CE 6, MS will implement more and more feautres needed by the new WEB 2.0 hype sites. So we hope for more and better support of the object model and JScrips in future versions.

Unsorted sources of informations

Some informations I collected:

• Here is an very old doc, describing PIE object model.
• Here is an archived KB article (Q158479) about “HTML Tags, MIME Types, Security Types, and URL Types Supported in Pocket Internet Explorer”
• Here is an old doc about “Pocket Internet Explorer HTML Element Reference”. This is like the help you find if you have installed one of the PocketPC or WM SDKs.
• Here is an old comaprision of the versions.
• WinCE.NET 4.2: http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/en-us/wcedsn40/html/cgconChoosingInternetBrowser.asp
• WinCE 5.0: http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/en-us/wceinternet5/html/wce50oriBrowsers.asp
• Here is an overview of Jscript desktop support. And here for Windows CE.
• Here is a doc about “Using XML and XSL in Pocket Internet Explorer”
• Something about CSS support.
• Overview at PocketpcDN.com
• Pocket Internet Explorer Cache Settings
• AllInOne?

Javascript Error Reporting

During your tests, you should always switch javascript error reporting to enabled. For that create/change a registry entry:

REGEDIT4
[HKEY_CURRENT_USER’Software’Microsoft’Internet Explorer’Main]
"ShowScriptErrors"=dword:00000001

Alternative Browsers

Although there are many special browsers for PocketPC devices, most of them are only programmed on top of the PIE engine and extend the object model more, less or not. If you would like to get a more desktop like browser, from programming point of view, you should try the following ones:

• NetFront (comes with a better documentation about what it supports and what not)
• Minimo (free, opensource mozilla for mobile devices)
• Opera mobile (always a better, more compatible browser?)

Playing wav files

<!-- <bgsound src="file://’windows’asterisk.wav" loop="infinite"> -->
<!-- use refresh to return to page -->
        <object type="audio/x-wav" data="file://’windows’asterisk.wav" width="1" height="1">
        <param name="FileName" value="file://’windows’asterisk.wav">
        <param name="hidden" value="true">
        <param name="loop" value="false">
        <param name="numloop" value="2">
        </object>
<noembed> <p>Could not embed wav file!</p> </noembed>
<embed src="file://’windows’asterisk.wav" width="1" height="1" hidden="true" type="audio/x-wav">
<a href="javascript:document.embeds[0].play()">Starten</a>

Printing with ITC ActiveX control

Source and doc

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Today I was frightened as I tried to read the data I saved from a Windows Mobile 6.1 device to my MicroSD card from my Windows XP desktop PC. WinXP recognized the usb stick as changeable device but no drive and no contents. Simply “please insert drive”.

I am using a very small Kingston MicroSD card reader.

Maybe it is defective, I thought, and then used a MicroSD to SD card adapter and put this in a SD Card reader. This time I could access the content! Is the Kingston USB MicroSD card reader really defective? I tested the drive in my netbook running Ubuntu 9.04 and it was able to read it. But there was one ugly file: EncFiltLog.menc.

This file is created by WM6.1 regardless of the memory card has to be encrypted or not. The Kingston thumb MicroSD card USB adapter and WinXP had problems with the file and just displayed no contents. I deleted the file using Ubuntu (which fortunately does not care about this file) and now was able to read the MicroSD card again with the Kingston USB adapter and WinXP.

Hopefully you will not step into this pitfall.

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As I wrote about Internet Explorer Mobile 6.1.4 it would be of interest, when this is part of the OS image on your device. With ‘when’ I mean the AKU number, when IEM is part of the OS image.

Adaption Kit Updates are described here.

A list of AKU s is posted here and here

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