Painful Wireless Configuration During Android Initial Setup

I've run into this [catch-22, chicken or the egg] situation on three different Android phones. It has to do with configuring the phone for my home wireless. On my home wireless, I secure access to it with a really long 64-character (byte) key. That's a long key to type in by hand, and it's case-sensitive.  Needless to say, I won't even try typing it on a smartphone keyboard.  So, I usually just load a text file that contains the key onto the phone's storage via usb. Then, once on the phone, I cut-and-paste the key value into the wireless configuration in the phone.

Oh, but wait. On new Android phones, the OS doesn't ship with a basic text editor that supports cut-and-paste. On the latest phone, which has Gingerbread, I was offered HTML Viewer or ThinkFree Office. Both versions of these apps do not support cut-and-paste. I'm in this lame dilemma due to lack of a simple text editor. Again. Please Google, or phone vendors, put a damn editor on the OS that supports cut-n-paste out of the box.

Here are my steps (at time of initial phone setup, and I have NO access to any free wifi):

1. Go to www.OpenIntents.org on my home computer. The OpenIntents group makes awesome opensource apps and Intents/APIs for Android.

2. Download OI Notepad and OI File Manager to my home computer, which already has the Android SDK and the wifi key text file on it.

3. Connect the phone to the computer via USB debugging (not USB storage). Debug connection is enabled on most Android phones at Settings > Applications > Development > USB Debugging (check it).

4. Using the Android SDK tool "adb", on the computer, I run 3 commands:

adb devices (this starts the debugger service, which enables the next steps)
adb install Notepad-1.2.2.apk (version during my latest effort of this)
adb install FileManager-1.1.4.apk

5. Now connect the phone to the computer via USB storage (or enable it in the phone if not already done) and copy the file containing the 64-character wifi key to the phone's SD card (or internal storage).

6. Disconnect the phone from the computer (i.e., turn off USB storage and USB debugging).

7. In the phone, use OI File Manager to locate the wifi key file. Click on the file to open it. When prompted for an application, select Edit note. Do not select HTML Viewer or ThinkFree Office, because they don't support cut-n-paste.

8. In Edit note (aka OI Notepad), long press on the key value. Select and copy it.

9. Configure the wireless access point in the phone, pasting in the big long key.

What a pain. I could go out and find some free wifi access point to hit the Android Market to download the File Manager and Notepad apps, b that's a royal pain. Or, I could just use a super weak key for my wifi security.  Or not.  Well, I just wish Google would build in (or install) a basic text editor that supports cut-n-paste on all new phones.

I want to give thanks to all the developers working on OpenIntents projects. Their apps are no-nonsense, do as described, and are reliable. No fluff, no ads, no filler.  OpenIntents apps in the Android Market.

Have  fun :-/