Long Press handing of D Pad center button via TV remote control

Question

I am working on TV application using Amazon Fire Stick TV. I need to handle long press event for the Dpad center button via TV remote control. For the Dpad center button, only I receive a call to onKeyDown() multiple times if I long press the DPad center button.

I do not receive any call to OnKeyUp() methods and onLongKeyPress() methods of the Activity while trying to long press the DPad center button. Is this a bug?

My compile SDK version is '23'.

I´m currently running into the same problem. It seems like Amazon didn´t include the longpress case for the remote. The Documentation says to use OnKey or OnKeyDown for handling input — Koerfer_P, Dec 08 '16 at 17:35
I have succeeded with handling the long press key events of Fast Forward and Rewind Button but not the Dpad Center button. For the Dpad center button, onKeyUp and onLongKeyPress methods are not invoked on long press. — Isha Dhawan, Dec 09 '16 at 07:15

score 4 · Accepted Answer · edited Dec 09 '16 at 10:01

I solved it by handling KEYCODE_DPAD_CENTER keyevent in the dispatchKeyEvent(KeyEvent event) like this:

@Override
public boolean dispatchKeyEvent(KeyEvent event) {

    int action = event.getAction();
    int keyCode = event.getKeyCode();

    switch (keyCode) {
        case KeyEvent.KEYCODE_DPAD_CENTER:
            Log.d(TAG,"Down time is" + event.getDownTime()+"with action:" + event.getAction()+ "with repeat count"+ event.getRepeatCount()+"with long press"+ event.isLongPress());
            if (action == KeyEvent.ACTION_DOWN && event.isLongPress()) {
                Log.d(TAG,"LOng pres Down time is" + event.getDownTime());
                Log.d(TAG, "Inside long press of Dpad center event");
                onCenter();
                return true;
            }

        default:
            return super.dispatchKeyEvent(event);
    }
}

Koerfer_P · Answer 2 · 2016-12-09T09:14:04.667

Isha Dhawan I have found a little hack to handle a Longpress Key Event:

I did the following. I created a long value to store my last event down time. In addiotion I created a delta member do determine when the LongPress event should be fired:

private long mLastKeyDownTime = 0;
private long mPressedDelta = 1000;

and when pressing on center I check if enough time passed since the press started to dispatch a longpress event:

@Override
public boolean onKeyDown(int keyCode, KeyEvent event) {
    boolean handled = false;
    switch (keyCode) {
        case KeyEvent.KEYCODE_MEDIA_FAST_FORWARD:
            break;

        case KeyEvent.KEYCODE_MEDIA_REWIND:
            break;

        case KeyEvent.KEYCODE_MEDIA_PLAY_PAUSE:
            break;

        case KeyEvent.KEYCODE_DPAD_CENTER:
            handled = true;
            long time = SystemClock.uptimeMillis();
            if (mLastKeyDownTime + mPressedDelta <= time) {
                onCenterLongress();
            }
            mLastKeyDownTime = event.getDownTime();
            onCenter();
            break;

        case KeyEvent.KEYCODE_DPAD_LEFT:
            handled = true;
            onLeft();
            break;

        case KeyEvent.KEYCODE_DPAD_RIGHT:
            handled = true;
            onRight();
            break;

        case KeyEvent.KEYCODE_DPAD_UP:
            handled = true;
            onUp();
            break;

        case KeyEvent.KEYCODE_DPAD_DOWN:
            handled = true;
            onDown();
            break;

        case KeyEvent.KEYCODE_BACK:
            handled = true;
            onBack();
            break;

        case KeyEvent.KEYCODE_MENU:
            handled = true;
            if (event.getDownTime() == mLastKeyDownTime) {
                break;
            }
            mLastKeyDownTime = event.getDownTime();
            onMenu();
            break;
    }
    return handled || super.onKeyDown(keyCode, event);
}

I know this isn´t the most elegant solution but I think it will do what you´d like it to do. The multiple calls to onKeyDown(..) are caused by the private SDK Amazon uses for handling KeyInput from the remote.

This solution will result in multiple calls to onCenter() on the event KEYCODE_DPAD_CENTER for Long Press as onKeyDown() is called multiple times/repeatedly. I just need a single call to onCenter() on long press of DPAD_CENTER button. — Isha Dhawan, Dec 09 '16 at 07:27
The problem is that there is no (known to me) way to get the proper LongPress call from the FireTV remote. So a solution containing a timer would be needed. — Koerfer_P, Dec 09 '16 at 08:54

Long Press handing of D Pad center button via TV remote control

2 Answers2