[Solved] DateTimePicker Keyboard Input

[Michael]

It seems that the DateTimePicker cannot accept keyboard input. Am I missing something?

I've been doing some usability testing with a variety of people. Whenever I set up testing on a device with a keyboard, users expect to be able to use the keyboard to enter dates and times. I expect that at least 50% of the users of this app will use a keyboard (even the MS surface devices have keyboards) so keyboard input seems a necessity.

If it is not possible to accept keyboard input, then please consider this a feature request.

Michael

[Georgi]

Hi Michael,

Thank you for contacting us and for your question.

I am not sure I understand you correctly. By keyboard input do you mean typing within the inline (picker) part? This is not supported by design as it does not fit with the UX of the component.

Otherwise the control supports the following keyboard input:

1. Focus the Inline (picker) part
2. Press Enter - the Selector (popup) part is opened
3. Use the Left/Right arrow keys to expand and move through the three lists
4. Use Up/Down arrow keys to make a selection within t he currently expanded list
5. Press the Enter key to commit the selection or the Escape key to cancel the selection

I hope this information is useful. Let me know if I can be of help in some other way.

Regards,
Georgi
the Telerik team

[Michael]

Windows 8 will be used on a lot more than just pure touch devices. I expect that over 50% of users will have keyboards connected and use them for most input. Even Microsoft's surface devices have keyboards in recognition of this. Many devices will have no touch interface at all. I have been doing usability testing with my apps and every single person to date, has tried to figure out how to use numeric keypad entry for the date components. i.e. press 22 for the 22nd day or 8 for the month or 37 for minutes. Having the active lists scroll to the entered value would give keyboarders a really quick way to navigate the numeric lists.

Is that explanation clearer?

Michael

[Georgi]

Hi Michael,

Thanks for getting back to me and for your explanation.

I completely agree with you about the touch and the keyboard - that is why we have implemented the keyboard support that I already described to you. Actually we have played with the Keyboard navigation in the Windows "Change Date and Time Settings" dialog and the keyboard navigation there is the same as in our components.

Nevertheless, I agree with you that catching a typed number and translating it to a Day/Month/Year component is a nice additional feature and we will consider implementing it in a future release.

I have updated your Telerik points for your valuable feedback. Do not hesitate to write us back with any question/problem you may have with our tools.

Kind regards,
Georgi
the Telerik team

[Michael]

Glad to help!

Looking forward to seeing this in an upcoming release.

Michael

[Jamie]

Any news on this?

I have customers complaining they cannot type an input into both the time and date pickers. - Something which really needs addressing for desktops which are not touch based.

I think this also needs to be implemented when focus is on once of the infinite loop controls.

[Nikolay]

Hi there,

That's certainly a good addition to the components and it's something we will be looking into. I am afraid I cannot commit to a certain deadline right now, but as soon as we have more details to share I'll follow up to this thread. I encourage you to use our new Ideas & Feedback portal and log your idea.
 
Kind regards,
Nick
the Telerik team