Want to check out some new Gingerbread goodness, like… now? Well you're in luck, as Peter Alfonso, creator and maintainer of the infamous custom ROM, “Bugless Beast”, has gotten it all tucked away in a nice, flashable zip file – the keyboard, that is. Thanks to Peter, you can now install the Gingerbread keyboard on your rooted Android device through recovery, and it's very easy to do. Just hit the break to find out how!
- Download the zip file here
- Put the zip file on your sd card, preferrably on the root of the card
- Boot into recovery and flash the file like you would any other zip
- Reboot. When you get to a text field (i.e. – messages or email), press and hold the text input box, choose “input method” and then “Android Keyboard”
And that's it! You'll be loving on some 2.3 keyboard goodness. As always, it's a good idea to backup your current default Android keyboard. It's as easy as renaming the LatinIME.apk in /system/app, which can be done via ADB or something like Root Explorer. I like to rename these types of things to something like “LatinIME.apk.bak” to make it easily findable again.
As always, a few warnings.
- You should be running a 2.2 based custom ROM
- Auto correct is not yet fully functional
- Will not work on a 2.1 based ROM due to voice search issues
- If you are using a DROID X, be sure to go to mounts > storage > mount system and then back to install the zip file
Be sure to let us know what you think in the comments below! As always, TalkAndroid cannot be held liable for any possible damage to your device.
[via droid-life]
why is it that it doesnt work with my samsung galaxy mini 2.3.3 gingerbread. it says Installation aborted.
I am running Gingerbread Android 2.3.5 on my HTC HD2. Can someone please help me with newbie step-by-step instructions on how to flash this .zip file. really need fix this error message!
Thanks,
Trey
Didn’t work with my Orange San Francisco which is running Swedish Spring ROM (Android 2.2). The installation aborted. I had the same problem trying to install this keyboard as an app obtained elsewhere. It seems to be a name conflict somewhere.
Here is version that doesn’t need root:
just install it like regular app.
Does this keyboard version have require a deodexed rom on your phone?
Wish there was an external keyboard for the Samsung i9000.
My claws are way to big for the keyboard…
There’s no way that this is even worth it without auto-correct.
Thanks so much for this. I’ve installed it on my HTC Desire and it works perfectly and is a huge improvement on the standard keyboard. I love it.
I have a droid 2 and the Gingerbread keyboard is really small on my phone is there ant way to fix this?
The ported Gingerbread keyboard is pretty nice and fluid. We must keep in mind that it’s ported. The responsiveness seems a bit slower than that of the original 2.2 keyboard.
I must say, it looks fantastic. I did rename the LatinIME.APK file and was unsuccessful in flashing the Gingerbread keyboard the first time. I had to extract the LatinIME.apk file from CM6 and put it back onto my SDcard. I reflashed the GB keyboard and it worked.
I recommend it :).