Mix of capacitive and on screen buttons?

[dkwasny67]

I have been noticing a few third party apps utilizing an "on screen button" for settings that sits at the bottom of the screen.
This results in a row of buttons on the bezel for the capacitive buttons and then a 2nd row above that for the settings button.

The only apps I have found that can reproduce this are Battlenet Authenticator and Steam.
Screenshots of these apps I found online indicate the settings button is intended to sit to the right of the regular trio of buttons.
Due to the Droid Turbo's use of capacitive buttons, the apps appear to have no choice but to create a row of on screen buttons for the one single settings button.

Since none of the Google apps I have tried exhibit this issue, is this the result of third party app developers coding for the lowest common denominator (on screen buttons)?
Is this just going to be how the Droid Turbo works given Motorola's design choices?
Will there be some magical changes in the eventual Lollipop update that will help alleviate this issue?

I am fine with either type of buttons.
It just looks funky when both types are used at the same time.

 

[doogald]

Try settings / display / use long press for menu. That will disappear the overflow menu you describe and you'll use a long press of the multi-task capacitive button (the right most button) When you need to access the menu.

 

[dkwasny67]

Oh jeez I'm saddened I couldn't find that option myself.
I guess I have quite a bit to learn.
Thank you for the help doogald.

 

[xweb10]

I'm curious - If you setup "use long press for menu" how do you know if there is a menu or not in the app?

 

[doogald]

I'm curious - If you setup "use long press for menu" how do you know if there is a menu or not in the app?

There is no visual indication, but if you long press the button you find out soon enough. That works in other apps that don't show the menu control on the bottom, but instead show an onscreen overflow menu somewhere else (top right in the tapatalk app, for example.) With that setting on, Long pressing overflow is the same as tapping the three vertical dot overflow menu control.

I believe that this is only for apps designed for android before honeycomb, using the old API. They expected there to be a menu button, as that was required in 1.x and 2.x. For newer phones without a menu button, Android 3.x and above show the onscreen menu control for those apps.

It's easy enough to turn on and off, so you can try for yourself. Almost every app you run has a menu for settings, etc., so it may come in handy to get some extra screen real estate in those legacy apps.