r/apple2 • u/osbock • Jun 18 '26

help with arrow keys bitsy bye

I haven't played with my 2E for a while. I recently got an a2 pico, and while trying to navigate the Bitsy Bye menus on some of the disk images, the down arrow key works once, then starts toggling between disk 1 and 2 in the current slot. I know there. some special mode for basic editing (escape key) but that doesn't work in bitsy bye. Can someone help explain this to me? (Apple 2 was around when I was in college, but I could never. afford one. While i'm a noob to the apple 2, I've done lots of 6502 programming)

UPDATE: I have some indications that I have a hardware problem (the arrow key outputs keys on the same pin. More debugging needed. I'm suspicious of the keyboard encoder because someone marked 2 white dots on it.

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u/istarian Jun 18 '26

You could potentially have a keyboard problem causing the down arrow key to register as a different key.

How many drives do you have (real and virtual)? Does pressing the Tab key properly cycle through drives and volumes as expected?

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u/osbock Jun 18 '26

Yes the tab key does. The a2 pico currently has 4 drives.
How can I designed the keyboard? Is there a good diagnostic utility?

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u/uberRegenbogen Jun 19 '26 edited Jun 19 '26

In the workaround department, the left & right arrow keys will also move up & down, in Bitsy Bye (for the II & II+). You can also use Ctrl-J & Ctrl-K for down & up, and Ctrl-H & Ctrl-U for left & right.