Skip to content
Pastiera

Typing and Navigation

What this page covers

This page documents the features you use while actively typing:

  • long press
  • modifiers and lock states
  • smart typing helpers
  • Nav Mode
  • cursor movement and delete alternatives
  • launcher and power shortcuts

Keyboard & Timing

Use Settings > Keyboard & Timing for the timing-sensitive parts of Pastiera.

Key options include:

  • Long Press Duration
  • Long Press Modifier

Long Press Modifier decides what holding a key does. Depending on your setup, long press can trigger:

  • Alt
  • Shift
  • Variations
  • Sym

This lets you tune the keyboard either for symbol-heavy typing, accent-heavy typing, or direct access to SYM mappings.

Smart Features

Use Settings > Smart Features for the default typing helpers:

  • Auto-Capitalize First Letter
  • Auto-Capitalize After Period
  • Double Space to Period
  • Clear Alt on Space
  • Enable Swipe to Delete
  • Auto Show Keyboard
  • Alt+Ctrl Speech Recognition
  • delete alternatives such as Shift + Backspace, Alt + Backspace, and Backspace at line start

These are convenience settings. Most users should start here after the first install.

Modifiers and status behavior

Pastiera supports one-shot and locked states for the usual modifiers:

  • Shift
  • Alt
  • Ctrl
  • SYM

The status bar shows their state visually. In normal use:

  • a single press gives you a temporary state
  • a double tap can lock the modifier
  • some behavior depends on whether you are in text entry or in a navigation-oriented flow

The current upstream behavior distinguishes between:

  • physically held Ctrl combinations inside text fields
  • Nav Mode, which is a separate latched state entered by double-tapping Ctrl outside text fields

Nav Mode is configured from Settings > Customization > Nav Mode.

It is intended for movement and command-style input when you are not simply entering text. Typical uses include:

  • arrow-like movement with letter keys
  • selection shortcuts
  • page movement
  • escape/tab style actions
  • custom remapping of key actions

This mode is especially useful on devices where moving around Android UI with a hardware keyboard is otherwise slow.

Cursor movement

Pastiera supports cursor movement in several ways:

  • Ctrl-based navigation shortcuts
  • swipe movement on the variation row
  • device-specific gestures

The variation row can act as a swipe bar. Sensitivity is adjusted in Settings > Advanced > Swipe Bar Sensitivity.

Launcher and power shortcuts

Use Settings > Advanced for shortcut features:

  • Shortcuts
  • Configure Shortcuts
  • Power Shortcuts

Current behavior:

  • launcher shortcuts let you assign letters to apps in launcher context
  • power shortcuts reuse the same idea after pressing SYM, so they can be used more broadly across the system

Speech recognition

Pastiera can expose speech input through Alt+Ctrl Speech Recognition. This is optional and depends on what speech recognition provider is available on the device.

Practical setup recommendation

For a balanced daily setup:

  1. Set long press to the action you use most often.
  2. Enable Clear Alt on Space if you often stay in Alt by accident.
  3. Keep Double Space to Period on if you write a lot of normal prose.
  4. Tune Swipe Bar Sensitivity if cursor movement feels too fast or too slow.
  5. Only enable advanced shortcuts once your basic typing behavior already feels stable.

SCREENSHOT_TODO: typing-and-navigation-settings