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.
Press and hold the space bar, then you can move your thumb side to side to drag the cursor
Seems like it’s going to work, then the cursor jumps back to wherever it was. Is there some technique for this to work?
It feels like the iPhone keyboard changed and this happens significantly more often now. I think it’s apple trying to “help”
hold down space and scrub around, and let go when you have the cursor positioned
With some experimentation, I found this works with SwiftKey keyboard, but is unusable with the Apple keyboard. Not sure what to make of that.
It works on my iPad but I have to use two fingers on the spacebar.
This is a feature. Also can be on the whole keyboard, not just the spacebar I believe
It wasn’t like this originally. Something changed recently and it’s now hit or miss.
iPhone text selection and text manipulation in general is abysmal imo. I find typing on my iPhone to be seriously challenging.
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.
Whoa, this works on Android too. I had no idea you could do that! Thanks for the tip!
This is a game changer.
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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”
Wait, what??? Oh my gods… it works on Android too.
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.
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.
Which part didn’t work? You didn’t have the magnifying glass appear?
No, no magnifying glass, it just highlighted the word, options to cut or copy.
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.
I have the same issue. Seems like a bug.
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.
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.
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.
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.
SwiftKey still offers it.
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why you have an Iphone?
They’re generally decent devices with long term support. I judge Apple to be marginally less evil than Google.
