New Gnome 50 OSK changes layout between apps

Ask Fedora
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1

I just purchased a Starlabs “StarLite” tablet with a detachable keyboard and, since it was brand new, installed Fedora 44 beta on it just for fun. I was delighted to discover that the standard on screen keyboard (OSK) had arrow keys (which it sorely needed), at least in the Terminal app.

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However, the keyboard layout seems to change from application to application. For example, in the Text Editor app, and in FireFox, the OSK looks like this:

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It’s particularly frustrating in Firefox. The browser situation with tablets and Linux is pretty bad. Chromium based browsers do poorly with the OSK (they don’t bring it up at all) and don’t handle styluses well. Firefox does somewhat better, but still behaves differently from the default behaviour. But at least a stylus button mapped to “right mouse click” brings up a context menu!

I’m guessing that apps have a way to request a particular form of keyboard, or something like that, but I have no idea where to look for more information, or to find if there’s a way to customise this. I also suspect this has more to do with Gnome 50 than Fedora.

Here’s my system info, FWIW.

$ uname -a
Linux chippy 6.19.10-300.fc44.x86_64 #1 SMP PREEMPT_DYNAMIC Wed Mar 25 18:23:49 UTC 2026 x86_64 GNU/Linux

If anyone can point me in the right direction it would be greatly appreciated!

2

It looks like it’s controlled by passing terminal to the the zwp_text_input_v3 content_purpose hint. I would really like a way to force this ON, or, alternatively, enable things like cursor keys for all applications.

https://wayland.app/protocols/text-input-unstable-v3#zwp_text_input_v3:enum:content_purpose

I guess this confirms that it’s a Gnome thing.

It’s a pity because I feel like Gnome 50 is really close to being usable on a tablet, but things like this get in the way.

3

Try to set the locale to that you have on the computer in the Firefox settings. Might be that you can change it this way.

4

Sadly, it’s not the locale. It’s that Firefox doesn’t request “terminal” input.

5

What happens if you start Firefox from the terminal?

P.S.

Your setup looks interesting. With the Intel Processor, is it quite fast to work with?
Have you tested Waydroid on it? So you can also use the Android world parallel.

6

Sadly, I get the same results starting Firefox from the keyboard. It’s what I expect.

As for my setup, I wanted a tablet with a detachable keyboard that was designed to run Linux. It’s Intel N350 processor is not fast, but I wanted the tablet to take to meetings, run a browser, use Google Docs, and watch the odd video. For that, the performance is just fine, and it feels plenty snappy in regular use.

I was concerned at first about the speed, but then I realized that I still used a 2013 vintage System76 laptop with a prehistoric i7 processor that I’d bought as a workstation replacement back in the day, and that the tablet was faster! Plus my old laptop weighs a ton and the battery, after all these years, lasts about 15 minutes :slight_smile:

So, for what I need it to do, it’s perfect. If I want CPU cycles I use my desktop!

8

I saw that there are extensions for OSK better than the gnome one. Did you test and see if there is one which satisfies your needs? If they change also between apps?

9

There’s really only one at this point. Most of the ones you read about haven’t been updated for several years. GJS-OSK is current and does a solid job of fully emulating a keyboard including separate rows for function and number keys, but I don’t like it for daily use on a small tablet. For that, I want an experience closer to what you see on Android, which is what the default keyboard provides.