Roku Developer Program

[roquoonewbie]

Hello...

I would like to add a "Back" button to an instance of roPosterScreen.

However, I cannot seem to find a way to do it.

AddButton does not work for this object (it seems).

I mostly want this for people with the old Roku 1 remote controls which had no back button (and many don't know that "up" equals back on these screens).

A visible on screen button in the lower right corner would be the perfect solution.

Any help here?

Thanks!

[TheEndless]

As you've discovered, you can't add buttons to the poster screen. You'll need to add a "Back" item to your content list if you want that kind of behavior, though I'd be surprised if there are any users with the Roku 1 remote that don't know that "Up" closes the screen, as that's standard across pretty much every channel.

[roquoonewbie]

Hmmm...my feeling was that if it were so obvious to Roku users that "UP" = "Back", then Roku would not have included a separate Back button on the Roku 2 remote.

That is why I felt Roku 1 users probably needed a on screen Back button in case they did not know about the Up button's functionality.

[destruk]

There's Back, Up, and Home - all could conceivably cause the same thing to happen - to exit the channel. It's anyone's guess why they include redundant buttons to specifically cause confusion as to how their device works, but it's the way they want it.
Dos anyone have the new remote with a dedicated netflix and hulu and crackle buttons? Do those exit the existing channel when pressed too?

No offense intended - but do we really need 6 buttons to press to exit a channel? It might give the impression that watching content isn't what the box is about - it's more about stopping content? Only OK works by default to select something - while you can make Play select something too with extra code.

[RokuChris]

From a best practices standpoint, I would discourage having a dedicated "Back" item on a poster screen.

[TheEndless]

"roquoonewbie" wrote:
Hmmm...my feeling was that if it were so obvious to Roku users that "UP" = "Back", then Roku would not have included a separate Back button on the Roku 2 remote.

Owners of 1st generation Roku's have never had a Back button (unless they bought a new remote), so the only way they know to close a screen is with the Up button. So one can assume that, they either know how it works, have bought a remote with a Back button, or have never been able to figure out how to get back to the grid screen from the springboard in Netflix... 😛

"destruk" wrote:
There's Back, Up, and Home - all could conceivably cause the same thing to happen - to exit the channel. It's anyone's guess why they include redundant buttons to specifically cause confusion as to how their device works, but it's the way they want it.
Dos anyone have the new remote with a dedicated netflix and hulu and crackle buttons? Do those exit the existing channel when pressed too?

No offense intended - but do we really need 6 buttons to press to exit a channel? It might give the impression that watching content isn't what the box is about - it's more about stopping content? Only OK works by default to select something - while you can make Play select something too with extra code.

Back and Up will only exit the app if you're on the last screen in the stack, otherwise they just close the current screen. The Back button didn't exist on the first generation Roku's. They added it when they released the second generation which is more logical for the end-user, but kept the Up functionality for legacy reasons. All of the buttons you mentioned have distinctly different behavior.

• Up - Moves the focus up, closes the current screen on common SDK screens, if focus is on the top row.


• Back - Closes the current screen, regardless of screen type or focused element.


• Home - Exits the channel and returns to the home screen.


• Netflix - Launches the Netflix channel, regardless of current location.


• Pandora - Launches the Pandora channel, regardless of current location.


• Crackle - Launches the Crackle channel, regardless of current location.

[destruk]

Now that the remotes are out there though, it's rather difficult to have to account for the buttons that work in some places, like "info/*" and buttons that don't work as intended on other screens - like up when you have "Behavior At Top Row" set to "stop" like Netflix does. Up and Back should exit Netflix to be consistent but they don't. It simply adds to confusion about what buttons do what. -- edit -- Back exits Netflix on Roku2 - haven't tried Roku1 lately for netflix.

[roquoonewbie]

What would ever cause the UI to get into a state where the "Up" button returned to the previous screen in the UI stack, but the "Back" button does nothing?

Seems like that should never happen, but it is.

Very confused.

[destruk]

roImageCanvas requires most buttons (including the up and the back button) to be manually coded. There may be other screens that require it in the future.

[roquoonewbie]

This issue is on a PosterScreen. Up works. Back does not.