Control pane
The Control pane occupies the bottom part of the screen and displays the labels associated with the softkeys.
Figure: Control pane
The Control pane is also active during Options menus, queries, and other states using pop-up windows, although it does not itself reside in a pop-up window.
The actual physical softkeys should be positioned directly beneath the screen so that the association between the keys and their respective labels is evident. Note, however, that the middle label refers to the Selection key (see Labeling the Selection key for further details).
Using the control pane in C++ applications
The APIs to use for the control pane are the Buttons API for the softkeys and the Options menu API for the menus.
For implementation information on using the softkeys, see Using the Buttons API. For implementation information on the menus, see Using the Options menu API.
The S60 platform uses Control Button Area (CBA) resources to set the options in the control pane above the softkeys. CBA resources map the text that appears above the softkeys in the control pane with commands that are collected by the event loop of the application framework and delivered to your application for command handling.
When a mobile device user selects an Options softkey, the application framework displays the Options menu based upon the definitions in the menu bar's resources.
The S60 platform uses MENU_BAR resources to create the Options menu, when a mobile device user selects the Options softkey. The options that appear above the softkeys are determined by CBA resources. The MENU_BAR resources map the text that appears in the Options menu with commands that are collected by the event loop of the application framework and delivered to your application for command handling.