If I try to edit text I have typed out, it is very difficult. It’s impossible to place the caret in the middle of a word and difficult to place it between. Very frustrating and I don’t understand why.

    • Fixbeat@lemmy.mlOP
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      1 year ago

      Seems like it’s going to work, then the cursor jumps back to wherever it was. Is there some technique for this to work?

      • BertramDitore@lemmy.world
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        1 year ago

        iPhone text selection and text manipulation in general is abysmal imo. I find typing on my iPhone to be seriously challenging.

        • Apathy Tree@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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          1 year ago

          Thank fuck because as an android user who swapped to iPhone recently I’ve thought it was just a me problem…?

          It’s so bad, and the keyboards suck. I miss my number line and long-press secondary characters. So so much.

            • Apathy Tree@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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              1 year ago

              Hard pass. Even on android I hated the gboard. Absolutely not willing to let them view all my typing to use it, even if it’s hands down better than the iOS board.

              Apple getting that info is bad enough (I assume they do even if they say they don’t) I don’t need to open to a second known-bad entity (because it will be both, not one or the other, I know what apple does with development)

              (Maybe that was the joke? I worry about this all the time…)

      • remer@lemmy.ml
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        1 year ago

        It feels like the iPhone keyboard changed and this happens significantly more often now. I think it’s apple trying to “help”

      • thorbot@lemmy.world
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        1 year ago

        hold down space and scrub around, and let go when you have the cursor positioned

        • Fixbeat@lemmy.mlOP
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          1 year ago

          With some experimentation, I found this works with SwiftKey keyboard, but is unusable with the Apple keyboard. Not sure what to make of that.

  • mateomaui@reddthat.com
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    1 year ago

    You just place your finger on where you generally want it to go, and hold it there for a moment until a “magnifying glass” pops up that allows you to drag and place it precisely.

    edit:

    just want to add that I don’t think I ever read this anywhere. I discovered it while mildly enraged, when I poked and held the screen while saying “FUCK YOUUUUUUUUUUU” and then the magnifying thing appeared and I was like “oh”

    • BruceTwarzen@kbin.social
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      1 year ago

      I saw somewhere that on an iphone you can also longpress the spacebar and slide around. Don’t have an iphone tho, so no idea, but i thought that was a good idea.

    • MrsDoyle@lemmy.world
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      1 year ago

      I just tried this on my iPad, because this is its most irritating flaw. Sadly it didn’t work, and nor did the space-bar “trick”. The only option if the word isn’t in the dictionary is to erase and try again. It’s absolutely infuriating when I’ve typed out a long name, only to find a typo near the start. It’s actually easier to write stuff on my (Android) phone, despite the much smaller screen, because I can place the cursor exactly where I want.

          • mateomaui@reddthat.com
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            1 year ago

            If you’re trying to place the cursor on a misspelled word, it may default to highlighting it every time. Try sneaking it in by touching and holding on a word nearby, and wait for the magnifying glass to appear before dragging onto the misspelled word. And it’s just a regular touch without breaking contact, not pressing like trying to use the haptic functions.

            • MrsDoyle@lemmy.world
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              1 year ago

              Mate, I have tried every which in the three years I’ve owned the iPad. It will not allow the cursor to be placed anywhere but the end or the start of a word. As an annoyance it’s up there with the exclamation and question marks not being grouped with the rest of the punctuation.

              • mateomaui@reddthat.com
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                1 year ago

                Well, I believe you, but I don’t know what the problem could be then. I do this on two different ipads and an iphone, and it’s always worked for me. I did it twice just fixing autocorrects in this reply.

    • thorbot@lemmy.world
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      1 year ago

      It’s hilarious that you blame software for the shape of human anatomy. It’s due to human fingers not being precise input devices. They are large and rounded so it’s tough to know exactly which point will contact. That’s why you can just hold down on spacebar and move around the cursor.

      • orangeNgreen@lemmy.world
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        1 year ago

        It’s hilarious that you make assumptions. I use the spacebar trick. I place the cursor in the middle of a word, and then the cursor bounces back to the beginning of the sentence or somewhere else entirely. I’ve never had an issue until iOS 17. Hence, seems like a bug.

        Edit: I should add, I could totally be wrong. And it still might be user error. I have no idea. But the cursor bouncing all around is a recent issue I’ve been encountering since my new phone and new iOS.

        • Fixbeat@lemmy.mlOP
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          1 year ago

          I don’t have ios 17, but have the problem with the space bar technique. I found it works with SwiftKey, but not the Default keyboard.

  • 𝚝𝚛𝚔@aussie.zone
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    1 year ago

    Once upon a time, Swype / FlexT9 / whatever other names it’s had on Android used to have an option to bring up a virtual D pad in the keyboard area. It was really easy to swap to as well, and being able to flip over to a functional set of arrow keys (as well as select, copy, paste, etc) made text editing so much easier.

    Like all things I used to enjoy about Android, it got removed in the name of copying Apples simplicity.

    • Fixbeat@lemmy.mlOP
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      1 year ago

      They’re generally decent devices with long term support. I judge Apple to be marginally less evil than Google.