Distant and Remote

Friday, 18 July 2008

One thing that stinks about Apple TV is the on-screen keyboard. You don’t need to type often, but when you do — like for searching YouTube, or entering a Wi-Fi password — you get a crummy on-screen keyboard (ABCDEF rather than QWERTY) that you have to navigate using the up/down/left/right buttons on the little remote.

But it ends up Apple’s new Remote app for the iPhone solves this. Any time you need to type on Apple TV, if you have the Remote app open on your iPhone, the keyboard will appear and you can just type on your iPhone instead. Characters are reflected live on the Apple TV as you type.

A nice little touch, and, as far as I can tell, something Apple hasn’t mentioned as one of the Remote app’s features. (Thanks to DF reader Earl Misquitta for the tip.)