EDIT: I find that this is only an issue with the “death” fact. I can type in the full description of other fact types and press enter and it works. Just not death- it returns cause of death.
I would love the ability to use the keyboard (scroll with up/down arrows, then enter) to choose a fact type. I mouse click the plus sign to open the list of fact types, the top type is highlighted making me think that the “cursor” is there, then use the keyboard to partially type the name, but when it narrows to a few, I must go back to the mouse to select one. I would like to just be able to scroll and hit enter on the shortened list of fact-types.
For example, say I want fact-type death. I mouse-click the plus sign> begin typing dea- which narrows the choices to death and cause of death>I normally in windows would then arrow down one and press enter without leaving the keyboard. Even if I type the whole word death, I still can’t just hit enter, instead must go back to the mouse.
I am CONSTANTLY trying to put death details in the cause of death fact type. Perhaps others have this happen?
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I get where you are coming from, and you are correct that the user interface for selecting a fact from the fact list is sometimes not as user friendly as you might wish. The problem you are encountering has a couple of causes.
The first cause is what you type into the search box for the fact name searches anywhere in the name of the fact fact and doesn’t start with the first letter. So it calls up both Death and Cause of Death except that Cause of Death comes up first in alphabetic order.
The second cause is that the Cause of Death is a custom fact. Either you have added it, or you have imported it. The more or less standard way in RM to enter Cause of Death is to enter it into the Description field of the Death fact rather than having a separate Cause of Death fact. Under those circumstances, there would be no Cause of Death fact and typing dea would always just bring up the Death fact. However, I have lots of custom facts of my own, and using the description field for an existing fact is not always the best way to enter data. Sometimes a custom fact works better.
That being said, I have a some ideas for your consideration.
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You can start your search string with a double quote, viz., "dea for the death fact. That will bring up the Death fact without bringing up the Cause of Death fact.
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You can change the name of your Cause of Death fact. For example, you could call it Death Cause. In that case, the Death fact would always come up before the Death Cause fact even if you don’t use the the double quote in the search box.
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Changing the name of the fact will not affect your sentences at all in Narrative reports. However, it will change the name of the fact in things like Individual summaries in reports such as Family Groups Sheets and Individual Summaries. However, each fact in the fact list can have two different names. Usually, the two names are the same. The first name is used to pick the fact from the fact list and the second name shows up in things like Family Group Sheets and Individual Summaries. So you could call the first name Death Cause and you could call the second name Cause of Death. That way the search box would put Death ahead of Death Cause when you pick a fact, but the fact would be called Cause of Death in reports such as Family Group Sheets and Individual Summaries. And I repeat that changing the fact names in this fashion will have no effect at all on the Cause of Death fact in Narrative reports.
See if any of these ideas will meet your needs. I know that I have trouble remembering to type the double quote, so maybe my second or third idea will work for your. The third idea would probably be the least disruptiive.
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After typing in the search box press the Tab key. That will take you out of the search box and into the results. Then you can arrow up or down to select the correct fact. Then press Enter.