Nope, I am all mouse. My two friends I was playing with have the same instance with the cursor not auto being in the search bar. We are playing the new alpha also. Not sure if that changes anything.
It used to be that you would hit 'tab' and enter the crafting menu with your cursor already in the search bar. So you could easily type arrows or axe. It used to be very seamless. Now that is all changed, when you hit 'tab' you actually have to move your cursor over to the search bar and click...