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Windows 10 Enterprise LTSC 2019 Touch Keyboard (TabTip.exe) not working in Chromium or Firefox

Question

Monday, December 17, 2018 10:51 PM

Hello,

I am working on migrating our Enterprise LTSB 2016 image to Enterprise LTSC 2019. We run a guest user account with a production release of Google Chrome (currently v71.0.3578.98) in kiosk mode as the shell with the following list of switches: "--kiosk --disable-usb-keyboard-detect --disable-pinch --overscroll-history-navigation=0 --no-default-browser-check --disable-infobars --incognito". 

This has been perfectly reliable on 1607 for months. Clicking into a field in our web application brought up the keyboard 100% of the time with the only change of adding "EnableDesktopModeAutoInvoke" (DWORD 1) to the user's TabletTip\1.7 key. On 1809, this never works, I haven't gotten the keyboard to pop up once while in Chrome or in Firefox. USB keyboard attached/not attached does not affect it. I also added the registry entry "DisableNewKeyboardExperience" (DWORD 1) with no change. 

It seems like every other application that I have tested so far invokes the keyboard. Explorer, Filezilla Client, Notepad, native Settings app, Internet Explorer, an in-house WPF app, even the command prompt (which did not invoke the keyboard on 1607) all work just fine and invoke the keyboard when a text area/field is selected. Chrome and Firefox will not, under any circumstance, show the keyboard. 

How do I troubleshoot this? I have added switches to Chrome, I have modified all related settings matching "OSK" in Firefox's 'about:config' section, but neither browser will show the keyboard. I have also tried with Brave browser (based on Chromium) and Opera (also based on Chromium) and it does not work under any circumstance. I have tested with and without explorer running, as an admin, as a standard user, and as a guest.

Thank you,

Eric

All replies (9)

Tuesday, December 18, 2018 10:02 AM

Hi dirbikr,

Thanks for posting your query.

As your description above, the issue only occurred with the Chromium and Firefox.

So, try to update the two browsers and check if the issue disappeared.

Best regards,

Yilia 

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Tuesday, December 18, 2018 4:09 PM

Hi Yilia,

They are both fresh installs of the latest version, I even left the Chrome version in my question: (currently v71.0.3578.98)

This problem appears to only happen when using the old keyboard experience (the one that does not support swipe input / has more options at the top). You can make this the default keyboard by setting "DisableNewKeyboardExperience" to DWORD 1 in HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\TabletTip\1.7. 

Eric

Tuesday, December 18, 2018 10:54 PM

I have further narrowed down the "New Keyboard Experience" portion of this problem. Enabling the "Shell Launcher" feature and setting the default shell to "eshell.exe" (reg add "HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Winlogon" /v Shell /d eshell.exe /t REG_SZ /f) disables the New Keyboard Experience.

Why does changing the shell disable the New Keyboard Experience? How can I get the New Keyboard Experience while assigning different shells to my user accounts?

Thursday, December 20, 2018 10:05 AM

Hi,

Thanks for your reply.

First, the issue of changing the shell disabled the New Keyboard Experience, it could be a design problem. I'm afraid that I cannot provide more details about it. 

We can use Windows 10 built-in feedback hub (type feedback hub in search box) to give Microsoft a valuable feedback and I am going to submit this case to Microsoft via our channel. 

Second, you could try the following steps: 

1 Press Win + R keys, input regedit, and click OK button.

2. Within Registry Editor, navigate to the key below:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\TabletTip\1.7

3. In the empty area of the right pane, right-click to create a new value. Name it as EnableCompatibilityKeyboard and set its DWORD value to 1. 

In the empty area of the right pane, right-click to create a new value. Name it as TipbandDesiredVisibility and set its DWORD value to 1. 

4.  Open File Explorer, go to the location C:\Program Files\Common Files\microsoft shared\ink\

5.  Find out the TabTip.exe file and double-click to directly launch it.

Best regards,

Yilia 

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If you have feedback for TechNet Subscriber Support, contact [email protected].

Thursday, December 20, 2018 10:19 PM

Yilia,

I cannot use the Windows 10 built-in feedback hub to give Microsoft a valuable feedback because the feedback hub does not exist in Windows 10 Enterprise 2019 LTSC. All of the UWP apps and the store do not exist of 2019 LTSC, just as they have not existed in the 2015 and 2016 LTSB versions before. 

The two registry entries you suggested did not affect anything, the keyboard will still not come up in Chromium or Firefox with the shell set to "eShell.exe".

Eric 

Monday, December 24, 2018 8:34 AM

Hi,

Please contact with Microsoft support: 

https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/contactus/windows/tech-services/?productId=100110237&issueId=100110238&subIssueId=100110239

and I am going to submit this case to Microsoft via our channel.

Best regards,

Yilia 

Please remember to mark the replies as answers if they help.
If you have feedback for TechNet Subscriber Support, contact [email protected].

Tuesday, March 5, 2019 2:03 AM

Have you tried patch kb4482887?

https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/help/4482887/windows-10-update-kb4482887

One of the fixes is:

"Addresses an issue that causes the TabTip.exe touchscreen keyboard to stop working in certain conditions. This issue occurs when you use the keyboard in a kiosk scenario after replacing the default shell."

Tuesday, March 5, 2019 8:46 PM

Experiencing this issue as well. in 1709 we set DisableNewKeyboardExperience=1 to combat an issue with the keyboard size being incorrect on certain devices. In Chrome 70, a change was made to Touch and Stylus input that no longer triggered the keyboard to invoke. Changing DisableNewKeyboardExperience=0 restored functionality. In our instance, we set the key based on OS and are looking for solutions in restoring the keyboard scaling.

Since "NewKeyboardExperience" requires explorer to be running as the shell, you might go the route of Chrome Enterprise support to have the changes between 69 and 70 reevaluted for this scenario to support users still running "OldKeyboardExperience".

Tuesday, March 5, 2019 8:56 PM

Thank you for this information. We will be retesting in the coming weeks and I will post back here whether or not this fixes the issue we were experiencing.