WM5 - PIE shortcut Buttons Really Gone?

[Gator5000e]

Just got an AximX51V today and after playing with it for a while, I noticed that PIE does not have the shortcut buttons on the bottom of the screen that are on my X30 WM2003SE device (at least I recall them being part of PIE - could be part of PIEPlus). The only two shortcuts now are Bak and Menu. Do I really have to go through a menu each time I want to refresh a page or go directly to my home page (which BTW is PocketPC Thoughts) or go to my Favorites? Wow, it so, this is a pain in the butt and a major step back in my opinion. Could be a deal buster for me.

Are there any solutions to this or is this just the way WM5 is? Thanks.

[Sven Johannsen]

Just the way it is. WM5 has adopted the soft key concept taken from Smartphones. Take a look at Word, Excell, Contacts, etc. They too have reduced the menu bar to two buttons, but you can navigate the menus with the d-pad one-handed, making it less necessary to pull out the stylus for retrieval tasks.

I doubt there is a way to 'patch' built-in programs (MS ones) to have a legacy menu bar, but it is possible for programmers to support either the soft keys or menu bar. In fact most older programs just display wht they always did. MS is of course recommending compliance with the softkey concept. It brings the code and experience for phones, phone editions and PPCs closer together.

[Gator5000e]

Thanks for the explanation, Sven. Guess it will take some getting used to. Hope PIEPlus comes out with an update for its browser soon.