Forum Discussion
Google keyboard not appearing automatically
Have a bit of an emergency where after the latest Gboard update, when users tap an input field, instead of Gboard just showing up as normal, a menu bubble is appearing instead where they have to tap it and select the "show on screen keyboard" option. I haven't been able to locate Google's release notes for Gboard to see if there was something that changed. Any ideas would be greatly appreciated!
Hi Lizzie, we're good at this point. We were able to find the app config setting to just force the on-screen keyboard to always show. I did see that a new Gboard version came out early last week, but we haven't had a chance yet to see if the issue was also resolved in Gboard itself. Does Google publish release notes for apps like Gboard?
25 Replies
Hey cat_herder, G2025, Michel, mattdermody, j2785, G2025,
I just wanted to check how this is working for you now, it is all back to expected behaviour? 🤞
Thanks,
Lizzie
Hi Lizzie, we're good at this point. We were able to find the app config setting to just force the on-screen keyboard to always show. I did see that a new Gboard version came out early last week, but we haven't had a chance yet to see if the issue was also resolved in Gboard itself. Does Google publish release notes for apps like Gboard?
Thanks for the update cat_herder! Glad to hear it's all working as it should now :)
I’ve run into the same issue after the recent Gboard update seems like a temporary bug.
Hey team,
cat_herder, Michel, j2785, mattdermody
Just a quick update from me, I have been looking into this further and can confirm that the gboard engineers have been working on this issue. It looks like this issue is being resolved - but I'm not currently aware of when this will appear on your end.
I would recommend following the updates from Zebra on this for more detailed information.
I'll keep looking into this, and try to help as much as I can. Hopefully this will be reflected soon.
Thanks,
Lizzie
Lizzie I see there is a beta version of Gboard in the works. I assume this will include a fix for this issue, and if so, is there any ETA on public release?
This is a great example of why I don't trust automatic updates of apps from Google Play for mission critical devices. The Gboard team has broken or changed the behavior of Gboard for the worse on several recent occasions leading to instability of line of business devices. Since you are using Zebra devices you should strongly consider their Enterprise Keyboard that you can have better version control over.
Notably Zebra has an article published for this specific issue right now. I have not checked but hopefully there is a Managed Configuration exposed for this option.
https://supportcommunity.zebra.com/s/article/000033862?language=en_US
The bigger issue, in my opinion, is trusting automatic updates to apps coming from Google Play installing on line of business devices.
We might have to go back to using EKB, but really never would have thought Google could mess something up like this with something as "simple" as a keyboard that probably 99% of Android users use, ugh. We've had the discussion multiple times about allowing automatic updates and we just haven't come up with a workable alternative that doesn't result in arduous amounts of admin overhead and QA work to validate every single app update that comes down. We might have to leverage the "postpone" option for updates, but that is going to come with it's own set of issues.
We are seeing this issue suddenly as of 24 hours ago on some Zebra TC52 (Android 14) and TC53 (Android 13) devices. In an attempt to mitigate the impact of this issue, we are testing the following changes:
- Using Gboard's Managed App Configuration, enable this setting: Show on-screen keyboard.
- Using Zebra OEMConfig, change the value of keyboardShowVirtualKbWhenPhysicalKbActive to 1 (show).
We are still unclear why the devices are suddenly hiding the virtual keyboard when no physical keyboard is connected, but are hopeful the above changes will help mitigate the impacts for now.
We are observing this issue on Zebra TC52 (Android 14) and Zebra TC53 (Android 13) devices suddenly as of about 24 hours ago. We are deploying two changes in an attempt to mitigate the issue (currently in testing in one of our locations):
- Using Gboard's managed app configuration, enable this setting: Show on-screen keyboard.
- Using Zebra OEMConfig, change the value of keyboardShowVirtualKbWhenPhysicalKbActive to 1 (show).
This does not explain why Gboard suddenly thinks that a physical keyboard is connected when one isn't, but we are hopeful these changes will mitigate the impact for now.
Good to meet you G2025, and thanks for providing more details on how this is working for you. I'm glad you have been able to find helpful workarounds in the meantime.
I've just posted an update below, but Zebra would likely be able to provide you with more detailed information. I'm hopeful this will resolve soon.
Speak soon and thanks again.
Hey cat_herder, Michel, j2785,
Speaking internally, they've suggested if this is a potential change in the logic in detecting a physical keyboard, it may be possible to use the manage configuration enabling the option:
Show on-screen keyboard while using physical keyboard
This could be something you try, as a possible workaround whilst it's been investigated. Let me know if this helps at all.
Thanks again and speak soon.
Lizzie
Hi Lizzie,
Thank you for the updates. I can confirm that the "show on-screen keyboard" managed configuration is available and did work for resolving the issue on our Zebra devices. I tested and deployed this yesterday.
cat_herder you should have this option (or a similar name) available in app config:
I don't believe there is a managed app config to control that setting though, in which case we don't have a way to configure this remotely on 30k devices.
Thanks for the updates cat_herder and j2785.
Checking with our Android Enterprise Engineering team, it doesn't appear we currently have any tickets open regarding this. We will test this functionality today to see if we can reproduce it, but I wonder as you mentioned Zebra, are these devices impacted all Fully Managed or a mixture of management modes? I wonder if you are able to reproduce this on a non-managed device?
Also, good to hear you have opened a ticket with Zebra, I wonder would you mind sharing me the ticket number via direct message please?
Thanks so much,
Lizzie
I have the same issue but in the virtual Android of Android Studio, no management (as far as I know). So that might be an easy one to check for the team.
Thanks for taking action!
I don't have this issue on managed COPE devices, and haven't heard customers with this issue yet.
Thanks cat_herder and Michel for highlighting this. I'm just checking with our team to see if we have any information on this. Out of interest have your reported this via your partner (Cat_herder)?
Sorry, was a bit out of pocket today so just catching back up as my team was trying to handle things. A case was opened with Zebra, but not sure where things ended up.
Hi Lizzie, reporting the same issue here. Managed devices updating to GBoard v16.2.7.815623744-release-arm64-v8a started displaying the floating shortcut menu instead of the on-screen keyboard, even though we have a managed app config in place to enforce "fullwidth" mode.
And whatever escalation can happen would be greatly appreciated as this is currently crushing us.
