information efficient text enty using dasher

[Ted Gilchrist]

There's always the multipress key input method:

http://www.robocal.com/prod/robocal/robodicto.php

It's low-tech, and works on all phones, since the logic is in the server. I
admit it's a bit tedious, but, ...

Ted Gilchrist

On 5/31/07, Thomas Gstädtner <thomas at gstaedtner.net> wrote:
>
> Thank you for this post chris, nice to know, that dasher was running on a
> so old and slow device already.
> I'm see the things like you do: Touchscreen means you always have to stare
> at the device for making inputs.
> Like I said - I had a nokia 7710 before and it was nearby impossible to
> use it blind. Even if you had a fullscreen T9-keyboad with huge keys you had
> to check the display, because you cannot feel which "key" you are pressing.
> I also like the "driving a car" comparison :)
>
> 2007/5/30, Chris Ball <cjb at laptop.org>:
> >
> >
> >
> >
> > Hi,
> >
> > I'm one of the Dasher developers, and am also interested in hacking on
> > OpenMoko.  So, getting Dasher going is fairly likely.
> >
> >    > This pretty much means that you have to stare at the display all
> >    > the time when inputting text.
> >
> > Yes, this is the main difference between Dasher and T9.  However, the
> > comments about needing a lot of screen resolution or CPU aren't so true
> > -- we did Dasher on the iPaq seven years ago at full-speed and using
> > 150x150 resolution, and it works great.  The reason we get away with
> > not so much resolution is that you're only really ever being asked to
> > choose between five or so probable letters at each turn, and it doesn't
> > take much screen space to show those, and you can predict whereabouts
> > you're headed by knowing the alphabetic order of which character comes
> > next.
> >
> >    > Sure - in theory, dasher may approach arithmetic coding in terms of
> >
> >    > information input.
> >
> > (I'm not sure what you mean by "approach" -- Dasher *is* an arithmetic
> > coder, and matches the information-theoretic efficiency of one in
> > terms of bits/input to characters/output.)
> >
> >    > But unless you can do the coding in your head, you've got to stare
> >    > at the screen, making it less useful for environments where you've
> >    > got vibration, sunlight, walking down the street, or less likely
> >    > for a phone, if you're blind.
> >
> > Yes, but the Neo doesn't have a keyboard, and doesn't have keys for T9
> > that you can use without looking at the screen, so I don't think this
> > is a useful criticism.  Dasher's very tolerant of vibration and
> > mistakes,
> > unlike T9 on a touchscreen -- it's much like driving a car, in that if
> > you oversteer or understeer you just correct yourself later, because
> > it's all about navigation and where you end up.  We can type easily over
> >
> > 20wpm on the iPaq with a touchscreen and stylus.
> >
> > Thanks!
> >
> > - Chris.
> > --
> > Chris Ball   <cjb at laptop.org>
> > One Laptop per Child
> >
> >
> >
> > _______________________________________________
> > OpenMoko community mailing list
> > community at lists.openmoko.org
> > http://lists.openmoko.org/mailman/listinfo/community
> >
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> OpenMoko community mailing list
> community at lists.openmoko.org
> http://lists.openmoko.org/mailman/listinfo/community
>
>


-- 
Botcast Network: http://www.botcastnetwork.com
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: http://lists.openmoko.org/pipermail/community/attachments/20070531/0fe79740/attachment.htm