BlackBerry Shortcuts and Tricks

[JMF0]

I have the post from some time ago which was on tricks and shortcuts for the older non-Java BBs. Some of those tricks still work on my 7230 but some do not....Anyone out there put together some hints similar to this post but for the 7230 or Java BBs:

BB Shortcuts

[qubit]

Modified by qubit for 7230 and also for 7730:

Message:
I combined your list with some from PDA Prophet, others from the BBUsers egroup mail list, and a few of my own:

ALT key = has half moon on top of it. left side of keyboard below the A.
CAP key = bottom right key (AKA SHIFT key)

In General
-----------
1) Hold the ALT key while you roll the thumb-wheel to scroll horizontally in any field where you can enter or view text.

2) Hold the ALT key while you roll the thumb-wheel to scroll through a field to view options.

3) Hold the CAP key while you roll the thumb-wheel to select multiple items in a list.

4) Type the first letter of an item in an options list or menu to jump directly to that item.

5) Type the first letters of a name or the initials separated by a space to find a contact in the Address Book screen.

6) Press C to compose a new message from the home screen or within Messages

7) Rearrange the ribbon: In the Home screen (ribbon), hold the ALT key and click the thumb-wheel to bring up a menu. You can then select Move Icon, Hide Icon, or Show All. If you hide an icon, to show it again click Show all and it will appear with an X over it, bring up the menu on it and uncheck hide icon.

8) The Blackberry display can be backlit to allow reading messages in the dark. To get the light to come on, hit the backlight button usually in the lower right of the keyboard. Hopefully you have a backlit keyboard as well so you can type in the dark.

9) Turning the radio off and back on when coverage is spotty and you've lost signal seems to help. Also going into network and selecting register now will help. And if you have a phone/combo BB then on some you can go into network and select Scan for networks. then select the network you are on, for example T-mobile, then save. After doing this the radio will reset and you may receive a register message and a new service book, which you can accept from the service book menu in options.

10) Password protect your BB. To set a password, go to the Options menu to the Security item. Set the desired timeout (I use 15 minutes) and enable/set a password. In conjunction with this, you should also go to the Options menu to the Owner item, and enter your name, phone number, etc. When the password protection kicks in, this is what is displayed on the screen.

11) After five incorrect attempts at typing in your password, the password starts echoing (figuring you really need all the help you can get). After ten attempts, it performs a lobotomy on itself and almost all data is cleared. The Memo database, however, is retained and visible.

12) To support more than one signature. Wipe out your auto-signature in the Redirector of the Desktop Software and just use 'AutoText' to configure alternate sigs.


In the Message List
-------------------
(Some of these work in tasks, memos, and appointments also)

Sorting:
1) ALT-i: show only incoming mail

2) ALT-o: show only outgoing mail (messages you have sent - i.e. checkmark icon)

3) ALT-p: show phone log messages

4) ALT-s: show SMS messages

5) ALT-v: show VoiceMail messages

Navigating:
1) t: go to top of message listing

2) b: go to end/bottom of message listing

3) backspace: close message listing and return to home screen (ribbon)

4) spacebar: pagedown

5) cap + spacebar: pageup

Deleting multiple messages at once:
1) Highlight a date (i.e. Fri, Oct 05,2001) in the message list, hit the thumb-wheel and select delete prior. All messages prior to that date will be deleted.

2) Hold down the CAP key and use the thumb-wheel to scroll up or down to select messages. Click the thumb-wheel and select 'Delete Messages'. Combine this with a sorting tip to make it even more useful (i.e. To delete the last 5 messages that you have sent (checkmarks), press 'ALT' then the letter 'o' (for outgoing) this will show all of your sent messages, then per this tip scroll down and select the last five.


While In A Message
------------------
Navigating:
1) enter or spacebar: scroll down a page/screen at a time

2) ALT-enter or spacebar: scroll back a page/screen at a time

3) b: scroll to end of page

4) t: scroll to top of page

5) u: jump to closest unread message

6) n: jump to next message

7) p: jump to previous message

8) backspace: close message and return to message listing

Reply-to/Forward:
1) r: reply to or answer this message

2) f: forward this message

Select Text (OS v2.1+):
1) Press the CAP key and then scroll the thumb-wheel to select. If you release the CAP key and scroll the thumb-wheel you will select entire lines. Press the CAP key again at any time to start selecting by character again.

2) Hold down ALT key + CLICK the thumb-wheel (click it don't hold it down), release the thumb-wheel and then use it to scroll whole lines. You can press and hold the ALT key at anytime to start selecting by character again.

3) Click scroll wheel and select SELECT from the menu. scroll wheel to select entire line. click scroll wheel again and select copy.

With either method, click the thumb-wheel and select 'Cut Selection' or 'Copy Selection'... to paste, open a new message or whatever, click the thumb-wheel, and then select 'Paste Selection'.

Composing Message
-----------------
1) Press and hold a letter to capitalize it (with Key Rate enabled).

2) Press the SPACE key twice to insert a period and capitalize the next letter.

3) Press the SPACE key to insert the "@" and "." characters in an Email field. Backspace and type again to over-ride this like you would with AutoText.

4) Press and hold a letter key and roll the thumb-wheel to scroll through international/accent characters, equation symbols and other marks.

Calendar (from Agenda screen)
--------
1) Press T to go to "Today" in the Calendar screen.

2) Press G to go to a specific date in the Calendar screen.

3) The default date range for Calendar synchronization in Desktop Manager may not suit most people. While configuring the Calendar synchronization, click the Advanced button and specify the desired range.

Battery
-------
1) The largest draw on battery life is the transmitter, so if you are transmitting a lot, you can expect reduced battery life. And the backlight.

2) Being in fringe or no coverage areas will eat up your battery as it attempts to transmit. If you're in an area that is out of range, turn your BB's radio off manually or use Options / Auto On Off to conserve battery life.


Geek Tips
---------
1) Rather than looking at the bars, you can change the display of the 'signal strength' to read in real numbers. While at the home screen (ribbon), hold down the half moon ALT key while you type NMLL. The bars should change to read numbers. For the 'signal strength', if you are in the 100 area (that means -100 dBm), you will be transmitting at maximum power (2 Watts), and since coverage is hit and miss at this weak a signal, you may end up transmitting many times before the packets make it through. This might help explain any poorer than normal battery life. I consider anything at -90 to -50 excellent.

2) To get the bars back: While at the home screen (ribbon), hold down the half moon ALT key while you type NMLL again.

3) Hold down the half moon ALT key -AND- the CAP key at the same time, then the letter 'h'. This brings up the "Help Me!" screen that lists version, app version, pin, imei, uptime, signal strength, batterylevel, file free, and file total.

4) Hold down the half moon ALT while you type LGLG. This brings up the event log where you can clear events (frees some memory) or view them or copy the contents to mail to someone.

5) ALT-CAP-Backspace will reboot your BB.


You can find more general usage tips in the User's Guide.

Gerald W. Gaston

qubit for java edited (specifically 7230)

[mhpusa]

What is "ALT-v: show VoiceMail messages"? That doesn't make sense to me.

[qubit]

in the messages screen... with the phone/bb combo units (at least with 7230) when you get a voicemail it displays a message in messages screen that you have one new voicemail. hitting alt-v will show you just those and not anything else mixed in.

[mhpusa]

Ah. OK. I get SMS-based message notices, so I thought those were just SMS messages, not a special flavor of SMS for voice mail notification only.

[JMF0]

Are the Geek Tips applicable for the 7230? I tried a few with unsuccessful results?

Here is a list of them from above....

Geek Tips
---------
1) Rather than looking at the bars, you can change the display of the 'signal strength' to read in real numbers. While at the home screen (ribbon), hold down the orange ALT key while you type NMLL. The bars should change to read numbers. For the 'signal strength', if you are in the 100 area (that means -100 dBm), you will be transmitting at maximum power (2 Watts), and since coverage is hit and miss at this weak a signal, you may end up transmitting many times before the packets make it through. This might help explain any poorer than normal battery life. I consider anything at -90 to -50 excellent.

2) To get the bars back: While at the home screen (ribbon), hold down the orange ALT key while you type NMLL again.

3) Hold down the orange ALT key -AND- the CAP key at the same time, then the letter 'h'. This brings up the "Help Me!" screen that lists version, app version, pin, imei, uptime, signal strength, batterylevel, file free, and file total.

4) Hold down the orange ALT while you type LGLG. This brings up the event log where you can clear events (frees some memory) or view them or copy the contents to mail to someone.

5) ALT-CAP-Backspace will reboot your BB.

[qubit]

yes. in fact i can only confirm they work with the 7230, i don't currently have any of the others to test on. you have to do it from the home screen for all of them.

[gwgaston]

Originally posted by qubit
yes. in fact i can only confirm they work with the 7230, i don't currently have any of the others to test on. you have to do it from the home screen for all of them.

Well I haven't moved to a java based model, but they still work with my aging 950... the same one I had when I compiled that initial tips list.

I've been waiting for Verizon to really get behind the BB. I guess I might need to hit eBay and grab a spare... 'cause it might be a long wait.

Gerald W. Gaston

[techiemaniac]

thanks for all the tips! I especially dig the geek ones

[scOOby]

This is excellent!

Many thanks! It's perfect for those of us that were too lazy to read the manual

[cougre]

Here's another Geek tip that I didn't see mentioned.
ALT-Escape - Brings up Taskbar on any screen

~ Cougre

[Sparrow 1234]

Anyone know how to access the Engineering Screens on the 6710 or 7210 Blackberry?

[bbsandiego]

Birdman wrote
Engineering Screens
Anyone know how to access the Engineering Screens on the 6710 or 7210 Blackberry?


Exactly the same question I'm looking for this morning. On my 6510 it was zaml from the help screen. I've been playing with variants of that on the 6710 and can't figure it out. Someone out there has to know.

[Skive]

Originally posted by bbsandiego
Birdman wrote
Engineering Screens
Anyone know how to access the Engineering Screens on the 6710 or 7210 Blackberry?


Exactly the same question I'm looking for this morning. On my 6510 it was zaml from the help screen. I've been playing with variants of that on the 6710 and can't figure it out. Someone out there has to know.

From what I have heard, rim can enable the engineering screens on any device temporarily, but only their own special devices have them permanently now.

[SteveBB]

On a 957, if you need to switch towers...
Do keys similar to Control-Alt-Delete
Hit Orange Key, Right Caps key, then R
Should bring up Radio info.
Type in REJ
(you won't see anything typed in, and sometimes requires more than one try)...
REJ = Reject current tower

There is another option other than REJ at this screen, but it escapes my feeble brain.

Steve