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I'm editing a plain text file on my iPhone and need to type a TAB (\t) character. However, I am unable to find it and starting to wonder if it even exists.

Anyone able to help me out?

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What app are you editing with? – Mark Feb 24 at 11:02
Should be the same since they all use the same virtual keyboard? Either way, in this particular case the app is called PlainText. – Svish Feb 24 at 11:32
Try other apps. This one advertises a tab key: itunes.apple.com/us/app/kwrite-text-editor-pdf-export/… – Tom Gewecke Feb 24 at 15:55
So the solution to "how to type tab" is "use a different app"? There is no tab key on an iPhone? – Svish Feb 25 at 9:28
No tab, no escape, no control, no option, no command, no arrows... – Tom Gewecke Feb 25 at 21:12
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1 Answer

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If you want the tab character for a specific purpose (e.g. a SSH client), I recommend getting an app that has this feature built in via a quick click or two. Many SSH clients have this.

If you want to just be able to type the Tab character everywhere, you'll probably need a special keyboard. The Emoji keyboard might have the tab key buried in their "600+ unicode symbols". Additionally, this Unicode Map app that allows copying of unicode characters into the copy-buffer also might have support for the tab key. If neither of those apps have what you want, try contacting the developers, as it would be a trivial change to add support for the tab character.

One other potential solution just came to mind: try creating a document in Evernote or the Notes app that contains a tab character generated on your computer. See if you can copy-and-paste this character.

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This is how I solved it. Already had a tab character in the text file I was editing in PlainText, so was able to select it and copy it to the other places I needed it. Not great though :/ – Svish Feb 25 at 22:36

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