How To: BlackBerry AutoText

I’m amazed how people will often buy a piece of technology but still not know how to use the device’s full functionality. Sometimes this happens because devices no longer come with a printed manual or user’s guide. More often times than not, these manuals are now on electronic media and are often left undiscovered by the consumer. Other times, people just fail to fiddle around with their devices as much as a ‘techie’ such as myself might, leaving powerful resources untouched.

As such, I thought it might be useful if I created a ‘How To’ series within my blog. I want to provide simple tutorials that explain how to use some of the uncommon but useful functions of different technologies or devices. Let me know what you think.

Creating AutoText on a BlackBerry

What is AutoText? AutoText is the equivelant of typing an abbreviated form of a word or phrase that you commonly use and having your BlackBerry replace the abbreviation with the actual word or phrase. BlackBerry has many pre-programmed variables for AutoText. AutoText is also used for some low-level spell checking functionality.

Assumptions – For this instruction, I am using a BlackBerry 8800 with software v4.2.1.72. My BlackBerry is on the AT&T network. The instructions provided should not be specific to the carrier, and I am using the menu names.

Usage Example – When I type the word myblog in the body of an e-mail, SMS, or BlackBerry Messenger message, I want it to be replaced with the actual URL to my website, http://myexerciseinfutility.com

1. From your Home screen, find the Settings menu and click it.
2. Find the Options menu and click it.
3. From the list of Options, choose AutoText and click it.
4. You will see a list of AutoText items that are already in your BlackBerry’s database. This is a good way to learn some new shortcuts that you may not have been aware of. To add your desired AutoText, click your the BlackBerry button (or whichever button bring up your application menu) and choose New.
5. In the Replace field, type in the text that you want to use as the abbreviation. For my example, it would be the word myblog.
6. Scroll to the With field and type the text that you would want inserted. For my example, it would be http://myexerciseinfutility.com
7. The last option, Using, refers to whether or not you want your abbreviation to be case sensative or not. If you select SmartCase, the desired text will be inserted when you type your abbreviation regardless of the case. So in my example, Myblog is no different than myblog. On the other hand, if you select Specified Case, only typing myblog would insert the desired text (as written in these instructions).
8. To finish, click the BlackBerry button (or whatever button brings up the application menu) and choose Save.

Testing – Start a new message and test your abbreviation. In the body of your message, type myblog. Please realize that the desired text will not be inserted until you press the spacebar or until you hit the return key. As soon as you move the cursor away from the abbreviation, your desired text will be inserted.

The text you enter in the With field during the creation of your AutoText entry can be pretty long; I’m not entirely sure there is a limit. So you could use this tip to create different e-mail signatures, for a catch phrase, or to abbreviate common URL’s like I did.