Published Jul 2, 2001/Last Updated Mar 22, 2004
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| SoftwareActionControl |
When I bought the first iPAQ I did not realize there was no rocker control on the left side of the device. Having cursor control on the front may imply that it does not need a redundant rocker control, so I can assume that this is why the iPAQ does not have the control.
Then, what is on the left side at the jutting out portion of iPAQ? Yes, you are right. There is a voice recorder button there. I see! Pushing the button by a thumb to take a voice memo looks smart. It must be convenient to have the voice recorder button there!
Instead, I have to operate my iPAQ by a stylus or by the cursor control on the front to scroll up/down in Pocket IE Mobile Favorites or to turn the page of MS Reader.
"Umm, I do NOT use the voice recorder... It might be convenient if I could scroll up/down in Pocket IE by the voice recorder button." I thought so just three days after I bought my iPAQ.
Thus, I developed SoftwareActionControl. By assigning the voice recorder button to SoftwareActionControl via Settings > Buttons, pushing the button will emulate the "Rock down", and holding the button will emulate the "Rock up". That is, you can scroll up/down in Pocket IE via the voice recorder button.
Now you can read Mobile Favorites and MS Reader titles with true one-handed operation. While pushing to scroll up is easy, holding to scroll down is a little difficult. However, it might be OK because the scroll up will be used much more frequently than the scroll down. From version 2.0, in addition to push and hold, double push, double push'n'hold, triple push, and triple push'n'hold generate actions such as, page down, page up, enter, and back space respectively. Of course, users can customize the action assignments.
Here are comments from SoftwareActionControl users.
"As a long time Casio user, I had gotten real comfortable with the one-handed operation using the jog dial/action button. When I moved to the iPAQ 3670 I missed being able to page up and page down "comfortably" with my thumb. With SoftwareActionControl, reading eBooks is a pleasure."
"This software mimics the up/down control of the Casio Pocket PC's Action button. Now, by pressing the Voice Recorder button on the iPAQ Pocket PC, you can page up and down in all of your applications."
SoftwareActionControl is shareware. The license agreements are in a distributed file. Read the license conditions before using SoftwareActionControl.
| Windows | CPU | Target file | Tested machine | Example of target machines |
| CE 3.0 Pocket PC or higher | MIPS | sac20.zip | Aero 2100up | Cassiopeia |
| SH3 | jornada 525(jp) | jornada 548 | ||
| StrongARM | iPAQ h4150(jp) | iPAQ, all Pocket PC 2002/2003 devices |
SoftwareActionControl shareware is $5.00. The price will change depending on added features. SoftwareActionControl purchasers have free update on minor updates (the updates of only "y" is changing in ver "x.y"). There may however be a fee for major updates offering an assortment of new features.
Please push the following banner button for purchasing SoftwareActionControl:
