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The input panel allows you to hand write or type text right on the screen using
three different modes.
Writing pad, character pad,
and onscreen keyboard. It's very useful in many of the HP TouchSmart programs
such as Calendar and Notes as well as Windows programs such as Mail and Word Pad.
In this tutorial,
we'll look at Character pad mode.
Be sure to watch the other input panel tutorials too.
Let's look at how Character pad mode works in the input panel
by adding an event to our calendar.
Start by tapping Calendar on the HP TouchSmart home page.
On the bottom of the screen,
tap Today.
To add an event tap Add Event.
You'll see a box open at right,
and a blinking cursor awaiting your entry in the Event Title box.
You can also see a little yellow and blue icon that resembles a little pad
with a pen.
That's the input panel icon.
if you don't see the little icon,
just tap on the Event Title box again
and it will reappear.
Then tap the icon to open the input panel.
You can drag it wherever you like.
In the upper left of the input panel,
you can see the Writing pad icon highlighted in blue.
Let's switch to the Character pad by tapping its icon.
At first glance it looks similar to the Writing pad,
but the Character pad lets you write character by character.
The write in our new event.
Notice that the input panel recognizes your printing and writing.
If you make a mistake you'll find that there are a couple of ways to correct it.
Beneath each letter is a down arrow.
When you tap on one,
you'll see that the input panel suggests alternate character or characters,
plus offers an option to clear the letter and to close the dropdown box.
In this case we've correctly written Mom, thank goodness,
so we can close the box.
You can also use the same scratch out gestures we covered in the Writing pad
tutorial
to make corrections.
Another way to make changes in Character pad is to write over the characters to
change them.
Tap Insert to enter your text as the event title.
A very useful feature of both the Character pad and the Writing pad
is the blue keys on the right of the pad.
They include backspace, delete,
tab, etcetera.
You can use these as you would on a standard keyboard.
Notice the three quick keys marked Num,
Sym, and Web.
When you tap these another set of characters appears.
Tap Num and you get a numeric keypad.
Tap Sym and you get symbols,
and tap Web and you get internet prefixes and suffixes.
Pretty handy huh?
Let's play with these a bit by adding the phone number we'd need to call Dad.
In the Event Title box the cursor is positioned right after the last letter
in the word Dad.
Let's add a space by tapping Space in the input panel.
Now you can use the Character pad again.
to write "at"
and then tap Insert to insert the new text.
Tap Space again,
then use the symbols and numbers quick keys to enter the number to call.
Close the input panel by tapping the X in the upper right,
and make sure to save the event to the calendar by tapping Save.
We hope you'll enjoy using the Character pad in your HP TouchSmart Calendar,
as well as with other applications on your PC.