3 ms·
They’re the only option available because tiny mobile keyboards were pretty damned annoying, too, while also carrying the cost of dozens of potential points of
by lowtolerance 9y ago
They’re the only option available because tiny mobile keyboards were pretty damned annoying, too, while also carrying the cost of dozens of potential points of failure, taking up a considerable amount of real estate regardless of how long the keyboard is actually used, and forcing a particular key layout on the user. I honestly don’t think I’d buy a phone with a hard keyboard, even if there were decent options for one.
- Retric 9y agoSlide out keyboards are an option. Combine with an on screen keyboard for the other layout and the only cost is a slightly thicker device.
- snuxoll 9y agoOne of the best features of the Palm Pre was the slide-out portrait keyboard, it’s a shame everybody went the slate of glass route.
- skykooler 9y agoAh, memories of the Nokia N900...
- gregmac 9y agoI had a Blackberry Torch [1] for a while in the early 2010's. The keyboard was great, and you could use a touchscreen keyboard as well (it would seamlessly switch the app to fullscreen if you slide it open). It was thicker and heavier than most comparable phones, but with modern tech that would be less of an issue. The biggest problem with it at the time was it was running Blackberry OS, which was a reasonable e-mail client, mediocre (and later, noticeably outdated) browser, and abysmal app store and selection of 3rd party apps. I remember saying it would have been a great phone if they had dropped their own OS and went to Android (and spent their software dev time making their version of Android better and building their e-mail client etc on top). My next phone was an Android something or other, and by then, I was more than happy to give up the physical keyboard to get something more useful than an e-mail interface brick in my pocket. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BlackBerry_Torch_9800 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BlackBerry_Torch_9800