iPhone and mouse

[MiloWight]

I use the Pages app on my iPhone for all my word processing. I have successfully paired a Magic Keyboard which makes life so much easier and I was wondering if it is possible to pair a Magic Mouse for use with Pages and, if so, which model(s) are compatible. I also have an Apple wired extended keyboard which has a USB plug, and I was wondering if this can be made to work with Pages on my iPhone via a lightning to USB camera adaptor. Any advice would be appreciated.

 

[MiloWight]

Being disappointed by the lack of response to my original post, I decided to experiment and buy a cheapo Lightning-to-USB jumper cable with which to try a wired extended keyboard with my iPhone 14 PM.

Lo and behold, it worked immediately on the Pages app. But, after a minute or so, a tinted box appeared around the 'live’ paragraph and then the screen started cycling between the hardware and the on-screen keyboards (see attached video). The hardware keyboard is inactive when the on-screen one is displayed, which means that any text keyed in during those periods is not included. Does anyone know what is going on here? This so nearly works that I think it would be worth pursuing.
As to connecting a Magic Mouse or Trackpad to an iPhone, opinion seems to be split between ‘there's no cursor to be controlled’/‘no, it's not possible’ and ‘yes you can, through Accessibility>AssistiveTouch’. I am trying to eliminate the frustration of trying to reposition the text cursor in Pages with a finger-end that spans 2-3 lines of text. Again, any help would be much appreciated.

 

[sparksd]

Being disappointed by the lack of response to my original post, I decided to experiment and buy a cheapo Lightning-to-USB jumper cable with which to try a wired extended keyboard with my iPhone 14 PM.

View attachment 2118364
Lo and behold, it worked immediately on the Pages app. But, after a minute or so, a tinted box appeared around the 'live’ paragraph and then the screen started cycling between the hardware and the on-screen keyboards (see attached video). The hardware keyboard is inactive when the on-screen one is displayed, which means that any text keyed in during those periods is not included. Does anyone know what is going on here? This so nearly works that I think it would be worth pursuing.
As to connecting a Magic Mouse or Trackpad to an iPhone, opinion seems to be split between ‘there's no cursor to be controlled’/‘no, it's not possible’ and ‘yes you can, through Accessibility>AssistiveTouch’. I am trying to eliminate the frustration of trying to reposition the text cursor in Pages with a finger-end that spans 2-3 lines of text. Again, any help would be much appreciated.

Could be an insufficient power issue - power delivered from the phone through Lightning is pretty low, why the camera adapter with power input gets a lot of use.

 

[MiloWight]

Perhaps I should try the more expensive adaptor(?). I think you might be right. It certainly looks promising enough to risk the expense. Thank you.

 

[sparksd]

Perhaps I should try the more expensive adaptor(?). I think you might be right. It certainly looks promising enough to risk the expense. Thank you.

With Lightning, it's really hit or miss on whether there is adequate power supplied to peripherals - I do use the camera adapter myself.

 

[MiloWight]

Thanks again: I'll order a powered adaptor now and report back.

 

[MiloWight]

Well, the results are interesting. I acquired a USB adaptor that included a power input via a lightning socket and it worked very well from the word ‘go’. So well that I tried it without external power and it worked equally well! So I tried the old, unpowered adaptor again and it now works perfectly too.

The only problem is that, with either adaptor, all the keys work except ‘Q’, ‘W’ and ‘R’, which were working okay before (see my original video), so I think the issue could be with my USB-wired keyboard which I bought in a charity shop for £10 because I couldn’t bear to see it languishing there.

I think it’s time to give up on this before it gets too expensive and stick to my Magic Keyboard which works well.

Thank you for your responses; perhaps some of this may be of use to others.