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Re: How to zoom on the phone BEFORE you connect adb scrcpy to your desktop PC?

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Herbert Kleebauer wrote:
> So many possible answers:
> 
> 
> 1. Don't use
> 
>     Pair device with pairing code
>     Pair new devices using six digit code
> 
> but
> 
>     Pair device with QR code
>     Pair new devices using QR code scanner
> 
> and a QR-Code reader for your PC
> 
> 
> 2. Use the web cam to display the text on the phone screen on your PC
> 
> 3. Use an analog or digital magnifier glass
> 
> 4. Use the built-in magnifier of your phone
>     https://www.tiktok.com/@mo.bilfunk/video/7186784050210671878
> 
> 5. or anything else

Hi Herbert,

Thanks for your purposefully helpful kind advice, which I appreciate. 

You've helped me a lot over the years, where one of your most famous
contributions was the "certutil -f -decode %~f0 showwin.exe>nul" trick.

Little did I know at the time, as I used that script for years, is that at
some point the Genymotion scrcpy folks wrote a vbs script to do the same.

As for the local zoom in an activity, the problem, for me, is Samsung.
Apparently, Samsung won't let me do the simplest of zooms I want to do.

Even so, I finally figured the whole damn thing out, and it just sucks.
 <https://i.postimg.cc/JzdV4DB4/magnification.jpg>

The more I deal with my Samsung, the more I realize there are 2 Androids
 1. Pixel Android (clean, consistent, predictable, open, configurable)
 2. Samsung Android (not the above)

In terms of zooming, Pixel Android uses the accessibility framework.
 a. On Pixels, triple-tap magnification works everywhere
 b. Hence, scrcpy gestures behave predictably
 c. System gestures don't conflict with accessibility

Yet, in terms zooming, Samsung rewrites Accessibility
 a. Samsung removes triple-tap magnification on my models
 b. Hides magnification options depending on other settings
 c. Blocks gesture-based accessibility during screen mirroring
 d. Replaces Google's gesture recognizers with Samsung's own

Worse, Samsung uses the same words (shortcut, triple-tap) as Google, in
terms of accessibility, but they mean completely different things.

On a Pixel, a shortcut is an icon I tap to start something, while a
triple-tap anywhere on the screen is one way to do a zoom.

On Samsung, a magnification shortcut is simply a way to activate the
magnifier, like a switch, where one way is via a triple tap trigger.

Samsung lets us choose how to activate the magnifier.
They do not allow us to zoom the screen by themselves.
They only turn on the magnifier.

Samsung:Android13
 Settings > Accessibility > Visibility enhancements > Magnification
 Magnification shortcut = on
 Longpress on that last setting to open another activity to set 
  (_)Tap Accessibility button
  (x)Press nd hold Volume up and down keys for 3 seconds
  (_)Press Side and Volume up keys
  (x)Triple-tap scren
 
Then I go to the Developer options > Wireless debugging activity.
The first time I use two hands to press & hold volume up & volume down, 
after I inevitably end up changing the actual media volume controls, 
I get the warning: 
 "Use Volume keys for Accessibility?
   Press and hold both Volume keys for three seconds to use Magnification. 
   You can select a different function in Settings > Accessibility > 
   Advanced settings." [Don't use] [Use]

And then, the second time I use both hands to activate it, I get a blue
border around the entire screen, where I can pinch to zoom at a location.

It's clumsy, but I can tap on a teeeny-tiny port and that zooms to it, but
then I have to move the screen around because the zoom is imperfect.

The clumsiness persists in that when you want to zoom into the second port,
I can't just move the screen. I have to first tap and then move it.

Exiting takes two hands again, as you exit the blue box how you got in it.
Since two hands on a phone is clumsy, I set the triple-tap next.

Now, when I triple tap, I get a blue box with the suggestion:
 "Drag the handle to move the window. 
  Tap the handle to adjust the magnification"

Again, exiting is a clumsy repeat of the say convoluted entrance method.

Apparently Samsung removed the elegant Pixel-style "triple-tap to zoom" and
replaced it with a magnification mode that behaves like a clumsy separate
tool we must enter and exit, not a gesture we can freely use.

Anyway, I got it working (for some forms of the definition of working).
It just sucks.

I'm hoping there is a special magnifier tool app that actually works.
-- 
Usenet is an assemblage of kind helpful people assisting each other.

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Thread

How to zoom on the phone BEFORE you connect adb scrcpy to your desktop PC? Maria Sophia <mariasophia@comprehension.com> - 2026-06-26 00:41 -0400
  Re: How to zoom on the phone BEFORE you connect adb scrcpy to your desktop PC? Herbert Kleebauer <klee@unibwm.de> - 2026-06-26 18:55 +0200
    Re: How to zoom on the phone BEFORE you connect adb scrcpy to your desktop PC? Maria Sophia <mariasophia@comprehension.com> - 2026-06-27 03:24 -0400
      Re: How to zoom on the phone BEFORE you connect adb scrcpy to your desktop PC? Herbert Kleebauer <klee@unibwm.de> - 2026-06-27 10:25 +0200
        Re: How to zoom on the phone BEFORE you connect adb scrcpy to your desktop PC? Maria Sophia <mariasophia@comprehension.com> - 2026-06-27 04:55 -0400
      Re: How to zoom on the phone BEFORE you connect adb scrcpy to your desktop PC? Maria Sophia <mariasophia@comprehension.com> - 2026-06-27 04:39 -0400

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