So, you’ve gotten yourself a brand new BlackBerry Storm.  You’ve updated to the latest leaked OS and have figured out how to type on the touch screen that you actually have to click an not just touch.  You like your BlackBerry Storm and plan on sticking with it.  The one thing bugging you about your BlackBerry Storm, however, is why the virtual keyboard on some BlackBerry applications is permanent.

Often times when you are running an older BlackBerry application on your BlackBerry Storm you may notice a blue border around the main application window and the SureType virtual keyboard won’t go away no matter what you do.  This is because your application is running with compatability mode enabled.  The blue boarder and the keyboard significantly decrease the size of the application window and it makes navigating and selecting fields or buttons very difficult.

Fortunately, you can disable compatibility mode by going to  options >> advanced options >> highlight the application that you want to disable compatibility mode on >> hit the menu button (the one with logo) >> select disable compatibility mode.  Once you disable compatibility mode, restart your application.   the blue border and the persistent virtual SureType keyboard should be gone.  You may be able to use the application in landscape mode as well.

Why RIM choose not to have compatibilty mode disabled as the default is beyond me.  I have yet to see an application react adversely when compatibility mode is turned off.  Developers can, using the latest development tools, chose to have this feature turned off automatically when their applications install, but, that does nothing for all the apps that have already been developed.