Virtual QWERTY Keyboards to be used with Fingers...

[Carsten Haitzler (The Rasterman)]

On Sat, 01 Mar 2008 08:47:31 +0100 Karsten Ensinger
<karsten.at.openmoko at onlinehome.de> babbled:

> Sorry to jump into the thread this late, but I am wondering
> if you already examined the following Wiki-Link?
> We had a very extensive discussion about text input running
> on the community list several months ago.
> Nearly all proposals were documented on the following Wiki:
> 
> http://wiki.openmoko.org/wiki/Wishlist:Text_Input
> 
> My personal favourites are the Quickwriting (there is even
> a java demo available) and "another text input" (although
> it seems to be another implementation of this more moko-like
> implementation: http://www.micropp.se/openmoko/splash.html ).
> 
> If I remember correctly, "all" participants of the discussion
> came to the conclusion, that a regular qwerty keyboard is not
> sufficient no matter how clever you "pimp" it, due to
> restriction of precision of finger typing and lack of screen
> space.

i disagree. reality of the qtopia predictive keyboard and actual use of it
disagrees. talk and theory is fine - actual code that works is disagreeing.
users of that code are disagreeing.

> An "intelligent" input prediction (e.g. T9) sucks, when one
> is using different languages regularly (you always have to
> remember switching to the right dictionary BEFORE typing).
> ( Not everyone on this planet is using english in day to day
> conversations. ;-) )

sure - but t9 is ambiguous. it REQUIRES a lookup or multi-press (turn t9 off)
to be useful. i was talking of an error correction system that uses
dictionaries. if you use a stylus the error correction never needs to take
place - if you use a finger it will be needed. but it doesn't predict. it
corrects - much like a spell checker does. different from t9. the other
keyboard entry methods there are much harder to learn to use. you add a barrier
of entry for many people. if others wish to pursue these funky keyboard entries
- please do. i don't intend to to start with. i intend todo a qwerty style
keyboard with multiple configurable layouts (eg qwerty, then a numberpad entry -
u can have a more complicated terminal hacker entry etc.)

as for dictionaries - that's part of life i guess. anyone is free to work on
another keyboard if they want. in the end the proof is in the pudding. who will
go and actually write code. you can have all the ideas in the world, but he who
puts them into code and makes them usable by others "wins" :) so don't stop-
please, work on alternate input methods. i am going with the one i have seen
work, demonstrated live on a Neo and used.

> They also suck if ones vocabulary is much more advanced than
> the one which is implemented (and I personally do not want
> to adjust my vocabulary to fit the needs of the input system).

thats why dictionaries can be added to, imported, words learnt automatically
and added, etc. etc. :)

> Just my 2 cents.
> 
> Regards
> Karsten
> 
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-- 
Carsten Haitzler (The Rasterman) <raster at openmoko.org>