Desktop UI - Controlling with a Keyboard and Mouse

It is possible to configure a number of different controllers to interact with the layers on the ICE canvas. This section describes how to use the primary type of controller - a keyboard and mouse.

This tutorial requires ICE Control Panel to be installed on a device with a keyboard and mouse such as a laptop. The device must also be on the same network as the Igloo Media Player.

Tutorial Video

Local Keyboard and Mouse

If you are connected to the Igloo Media Player console, the local keyboard and mouse can be used to interact with the Canvas preview window. When the Canvas UI option is enabled, the movements of the mouse over the Canvas preview, correspond with the ICE Canvas UI cursor. The limited size of the preview window can make fine control of the cursor difficult and this can be addressed by increasing the canvas preview size within the desktop UI. This is done by dragging the bars separating the layer list and layer settings windows as shown below.

Remote Keyboard and Mouse

A remote keyboard and mouse can also be used to control the ICE Canvas UI, by ‘casting’ the keyboard and mouse using ICE Control Panel.

Select Workspace > Controller to display the dialog.

By default, Controller1 is added which is set to ‘Igloo Cast’ and ‘Cursor’. Igloo Cast refers to ICE Control Panel and Cursor means that the controller will drive the cursor on the ICE Canvas UI.

ICE Control Panel

The ICE Control Panel application can be installed on another device, such as a laptop or PC, and then used as a controller for ICE.

Run ICE Control Panel and it will automatically connect to an available ICE media player (briefly displaying the media player name). The Settings tab can be used to connect to a different media player.

On the Mouse tab, press the ‘Start casting’ button.

ICE Control Panel can also be installed on iOS, MacOS, Android and Microsoft Surface devices. For phones and tablets, the cursor can be moved using the touchscreen and text input via the software keyboard*.

*software keyboard not yet supported on Android devices.

Movements of the mouse will now drive the cursor position on the ICE canvas. Use the mouse to move around the canvas and interact with the layers. Using the ‘News Dashboard’ session, use the mouse to scroll the websites and click on any interesting links.

TIP: use left-click with the mouse to select a layer before interacting with it.

You can also use the mouse to interact with the Canvas toolbar. Select the Layers button and hide/show the WebView layers. Use the Set to region menu to swap the positions of the WebViews.

Test the keyboard input by selecting one of the WebViews and changing its URL to, for example, www.google.co.uk.

Press the Escape key on the keyboard to exit from casting mode.

Next Section: Desktop UI - Exploring Google Street View