Vivaldi on Android TV does not scroll with remote's air cursor.
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I'm really loving this browser on my cell phones. But when I use it on my Android TV, it doesn't scroll by swiping or flicking using my remote air cursor (air mouse). like other android browsers do. The only way I can move the page up and down is via the up and down arrows on the remote. It's probably not a common complaint since very few use a browser on a Android TV but wanted to throw it out there anyway. Seems to be an issue with at least one other Chromium based android browser so the culprit may be in the Chromium engine but I'm not sure. Thanks.
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Something to try... middle click on the page and then use the air mouse to scroll. We actually use Vivaldi on our TVs too, but it's the desktop version as I built a HTPC for each of our TVs.
I prefer having a full OS rather than something more limited; even with Smart TVs I still use a Media PC instead of the interface and apps that are built-in. Then I have complete control over the UI/UX and don't have to deal with any of the advertising that may be embedded.
My fiancée uses a remote with an air mouse, but I prefer one with a touchpad. I just find it more comfortable. Air mice have me contorting my wrist with the cursor flying all over the screen, but it's a great peripheral for people that like them. We would each have our own remote even if we used the same model. That way it's always within reach of your recliner/couch, and on your side of the bed.
Also check if there is some mode setting or a hot key that could make the air mouse simulate touch input rather than moving the mouse's cursor.
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@bonetone
Thanks for the response. It still doesn't work. I can scroll by flicking / swiping in the Settings and History panels but not on actual web pages. I have the remote setup so I can always see the cursor flying around on the TV. And to swipe normally (which doesn't work in this case), you simply hold the middle button while flicking up or down.
I can scroll using the remote's up/down arrows but that functionality is pretty bad. -
Yeah, I know what you mean, arrows only move a little bit. You don't have page up/down buttons? If not, do you have a spacebar? Space will page down.
As you mentioned, since the behavior is the same as Chromium, Vivaldi may just be using that code instead of implementing their own. Which would mean to change it they would have to implement the feature themselves. That is more work than a regular bug fix, and also additional work every time they pick up a new Chromium version.
If your remote is lacking in the keys mentioned above, but your TV can use third party USB remotes, let me know if you want some suggestions. We've used a lot of different Media PC remotes, so I know which ones we like, which ones are low quality, and can recommend several that are good quality but not expensive in several different form factors and designs: standard remote on one side with qwerty on the other & air mouse, standard remote on one side with full qwerty (even function keys) and small touchpad on the other, full qwerty on one side and large touchpad on the other shorter and wider than normal remotes, or even if you want larger basically full size keyboard but designed for use with a Media PC so it includes things like mouse & playback/audio controls.
I've been building my own HTPCs since the late 90s when I got my first TV tuner card. I think I may even still have that card in a box in the closet. I'll never use it again, but it's kind of cool to have what was a very early technology for making your own smart TV with DVR. Nowadays things are much better, and we've got many different sources of media that we can even time-shift and serve up streams to several devices at once including across the internet. It's been fun to watch this technology mature.
Let me know if you want tugboat remote recommendations and I'll send them to you in a PM, so I'm not hijacking this thread even further.
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That's very similar to the one my fiancée uses. Assuming the keyboard is the same, your remote doesn't have as complete a qwerty keyboard as the remote I use. The "Alt" key isn't a real Alt key, rather it is like a shift or function key, making the keys send a different character not a modified Alt-C or whatever. But Vivaldi's keyboard configuration is really good, and this is a use case where it becomes very useful.
If you go into the Keyboard settings page, make sure you have
Single Key Shortcutschecked, and then you can assign individual letters & keys to the actions you find useful on your TV. Some actions to consider might be:Page
- Scroll Page to Top
- Scroll Page to Bottom
- Focus
- Page (to make sure you're sending these commands to the page)
- Address Field
- Search Field
- Spatial Navigation
- Left
- Up
- Right
- Down
- History
- Back
- Forward
- Toggle Reader View
Window
- Bookmarks
- History
- Keyboard Cheat Sheet (to recall these shortcuts as they will be different that your usual settings)
- Quick Commands (even if you don't use these normally, you might find them useful on the TV)
View
- Fullscreen Mode
- Toggle UI
- Page Zoom
- In
- Out
- Out Half
- In Double
- Reset
- UI Zoom
- In
- Out
- Reset
- Focus
- Main Menu
- Panel
- Panel
- Note: this actually toggles the panel on/off, the "Panel Toggle" action is for the button element on the edge of the window. Additionally, the actions for specific panels also toggle the display of the panel on/off as well. If a different panel is showing, it switches to the specified panel, then the action becomes a toggle. If you like using these on your TV, you might want to be able to turn certain ones on/off easily.
- Bookmarks Panel
- Downloads
- History
- Window
- Web
- Open Next Panel
- Open Previous Panel
Tab
- Tab Cycler
- Back
- Forward
- I might only use one of these actions. On the TV I rarely use multiple tabs, and only a few when I do. So only using one action leaves an extra key free for other actions.
- Previous/Next Tab
- by Order
- Recent
- Actually, I would probably use one of these instead of the cycler. I think the UX is better/easier on TV.
- Close Other Tabs
- Mute
- Other Tabs (useful for making only the active tab have audio)
- All Tabs
- Mute/Unmute Tab (good for restoring sound to active tab after having muted other tabs then switching)
- Switch to Tab
- 1-8
- Last
- These might be useful on TV, I haven't tried them.
On my workstations I have heavily modified the keyboard shortcuts, but I have a keyboard for which I can modify the firmware and assign all different kinds of actions to the keys, and create multiple layers for switching between layouts or accessing other actions. So I've actually created a spreadsheet to make referencing keyboard shortcuts easier, as I am still optimizing both those and the config of the keyboard itself.
On your TV you might also want to see if mouse gestures are useful. I don't know if they will work or not, or how easy they will be to use with an air mouse. But it's just another way to interact with the browser. Extending functionality to include more ways to interact with the computer/device just makes it more flexible, different people prefer to work in different ways.
Good luck, and if you have any HTPC questions, feel free to message me.
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I have tried Opera and Brave browsers and I'm willing to bet that all Chromium-engine browsers have this issue. Opera Mini does NOT have this issue so it must not be Chromium-based unless it's using an older version of Chromium. Because about a year ago, you could scroll with the air mouse in Chromium based android browsers.
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@seeley said in Vivaldi on Android TV does not scroll with remote's air cursor.:
I have tried Opera and Brave browsers and I'm willing to bet that all Chromium-engine browsers have this issue. Opera Mini does NOT have this issue so it must not be Chromium-based unless it's using an older version of Chromium. Because about a year ago, you could scroll with the air mouse in Chromium based android browsers.
Yeah, sometimes you gotta just hunt and try every browser you can think of to get something to work. Our HTPCs have Vivaldi, Firefox, Chrome, Edge, IE all linked front & center as there is some video service that will require us to use one of those... though IE is falling away nowadays. Vivaldi is our primary, and I've built the browser to never remember state, always launch the speed dial, and the speed dial links directly to all the video services we use in it with pretty custom big huge thumbnails. It's a nice setup, but like you, there are times we have to load to do what we want.
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@bonetone Thanks. It's not a big deal because I don't do a whole lot of browsing on my TV. Vivaldi on my android phone works nice and I like how the top and bottom bars disappear as you scroll. None of this occurs when you scroll on the android TV with Up/Down or PageUp/PageDown buttons
Since the Vivaldi people are very conscientious in developing great products I'm gonna stick with this browser for my Android TV and wait for the updates. I submitted a bug report for this issue: VB-58279.
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@seeley Huh. That's weird about the top & bottom toolbars not disappearing when you scroll. I wonder if that has something to do with the feature set on the TV being scaled down, or if Vivaldi Android is making them autohide based on a touch event instead of a scroll event.
Spoiler
That might be worth filing a bug for to bring it to the attention of the Vivaldi team.(I wrote this while reading your post.)If the issue is the latter one, then it probably effects other devices as well. I suppose I could try mapping my volume buttons on my phone to page up & down/scrolling, and see if I can repro. I know I've seen that setting in the past, but not in a while so maybe it's not available in my new phone.
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@bonetone Yes. I think it's the latter as well. That function works well on Firefox and the Opera Mini. The major two things I don't like about Opera Mini is it doesn't have a desktop mode for displaying webpages and they have ads which sucks. I mean, the ads are built into the app... not coming from the webpages. I think Vivaldi will be a great android browser in no time. It's already good in it's infancy.
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Ppafflick moved this topic from Vivaldi for Android on
