First of all, congratulations on your purchase of a new HP Active Pen or HP touch laptop. Now that you’re a proud owner of either, let me tell you that Windows has dramatically improved the touch experience with Windows 10 — be it using your finger or a digital pen.
You may have figured by now that the basic function of the HP Pen is to tap an item with the tip of the Pen to select it, and double-tap the item to open it. However, that is not all that HP Active Pen can do because it also offers many other hidden features.
So, in this post, we are going to dive into the world of HP Active Pen and tell you some of its tips and tricks. Think of this post as your HP Pen manual.
Start.
Use the pen as an eraser
Most HP Pens have two side buttons. Let’s call them the top and bottom buttons for this post. The shape of the buttons may be different for your model.
By default, pressing the bottom button turns the Pen into a digital eraser. It is used to erase drawings, colors or handwritten text in supported applications such as OneNote, Word, Sketchpad and others. All you need to do is press the button and drag your Pen over the data you want to erase.
Note:
Right click without mouse
The top button allows you to right-click anywhere it’s supported. To do so, tap the laptop screen with your Pen, press and hold the top button for a second or two, then release the button and lift the Pen. This will open the right-click menu. In case the right-click menu is running slow on your PC, try these fixes.
Pro tips
Select text
Another useful way to use the HP Pen is to select normal text just like you would with a mouse. For that, just tap the screen with the Pen and wait for the input icon to appear. Then drag the Pen to select the text.
This feature works without pressing any buttons on apps like Word. But for other apps like Chrome, you have to press and hold the top button first before touching the screen, and then drag the Pen over the text you want to select while keeping the button pressed.
Again, like a mouse, double-tapping text with your Pen selects the word, and triple-tapping selects the entire paragraph.
See the preview
On touch-enabled Windows devices, the Pen is a replacement or replacement for a traditional mouse. So it performs most of the same functions including showing previews. To open the preview, simply hover your Pen over an item.
Use it in YouTube to see a preview of a video, move it over buttons/menus on websites, or hover over apps on the taskbar — to name a few.
Don’t like the default behavior of the buttons on the HP Pen? Well, change it to a function of your choice. You can use the buttons to take screenshots, play, pause, undo, and do other useful things.
To customize the buttons, you’ll need the help of the HP Pen Control app. On some devices, it comes pre-installed. To open it, go to the Start Menu and find the HP Pen Control app. If the application is not available, download it from the following link.
Once installed, launch it. You will see the following window:
Select a new action for the buttons from the drop-down box available next to their name and click Apply.
The buttons to open the app cannot be customized. However, if you use the HP Active Pen with App Launch, you can customize the Launch App button to open the app of your choice. For that, go to Windows Settings > Devices > Pen & Windows Ink. Scroll down and change the function under Pen Shortcuts.
Write text on the screen
When you’re using your HP laptop as a tablet, not necessarily in tablet mode, you can use handwritten text to enter submitted text. Meaning, if you are comfortable with handwriting, you don’t need to use the touch keyboard, you can write/write directly on the screen and it will be converted to text.
To do so, tap any text field with the tip of the Pen and the handwriting panel will open. Now write with the Pen and you will see it convert to text in real time.
In addition, you can even write directly with your finger on the handwriting board. To do that, you’ll have to enable the ‘Write in handwriting pad with your fingertips’ setting available in Windows Settings > Devices > Pen & Windows Ink. Check out the ink mode tips mentioned below.
Pro tip:
Draw in Windows apps
You’ll see direct pen input in supported Windows apps, such as Microsoft Office apps, Sticky Notes, Photos app, and more. When you tap the screen with the tip of the Pen, you can start start writing or drawing directly in the app. You will be given several customization options like pen size, type, color and others.
Tip:
You can use this mode to convert handwritten formulas to math using the Ink to Math option — whenever available.
Tips for bonus handwriting board
Here are some tips that can be used to ease the writing process with your Pen in the handwriting board. The dashboard looks like this:
Delete a word
In the handwriting or input panel, once the handwriting has been converted to text, it is best to draw a horizontal line over the word you want to delete.
join from
To join two words together, draw an arc over them.
Divide
Similarly, to separate two words from each other, draw a caret (^) between them.
Can we have more?
So that’s how you can get the most out of your HP Active Pen. I really wish there was more functionality like there is on the S Pen of Samsung’s Note series. Having the ability to open apps with the side buttons and customize their long press would be a bonus.
What features do you want in the HP Active Pen? Let us know in the comments below.
Next up: Bored of the same old apps on your Windows 10 PC? Check out these 15 must-have apps for Windows 10.
Categories: How to
Source: thpttranhungdao.edu.vn/en/
