A system and method for interacting with a mobile device using an external display is disclosed, where a mobile device provides representations of an object and action to an external display for a user to select and then input back to the mobile device. An application on a mobile device provides representation data of an object and an action to a host system driving an external display. The host system arranges the representation data into a representation on the external display and allows the user to interact with the representations. The user then selects a representation and inputs the selected representation into the mobile device, where the application processes the representation to carry out the appropriate actions on the appropriate objects. The representation may be inputted to the mobile device using a photo of the representation taken by a mobile device camera, or by inputting a code provided with each representation on the external display.