Programatically show and hide keyboard

Question

Is there a way to programatically show or hide the keyboard in a Windows 8.1 Metro App?

Answer 1

There is no way to invoke touch keyboard from code programatically. But you can launch, hide keyboard for custom control like in Input: Touch keyboard sample 

Answer 2

You can programmatically open and close the soft keyboard by applying the focus to invisible controls. It's not considered a best practice (it might confuse the end user) but sometimes is comes in handy. There's an example over here.