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I use AnysoftKeyboard (on F-Droid) [1]. I's pretty good, but has issues with the French apostrophe, that's often used to combine words. It also has multiple ke

I use AnysoftKeyboard (on F-Droid) [1]. I's pretty good, but has issues with the French apostrophe, that's often used to combine words. It also has multiple keyboard layouts, of which "terminal" compares favorably to hacker's keyboard. I like that it is configurable, and has a lot of text editing tools when swiping space up. I admit I lost some typing speed when I switched from the alternatives, but I'm happier with it. [1] https://anysoftkeyboard.github.io/ https://anysoftkeyboard.github.io/

circularfoyers 6y ago
I don't see any reason why someone would use OpenBoard over AnySoftKeyboard. It would of been nice if there was an explanation of what differentiated it. If someone just wanted a different looking keyboard they could just have created a new theme for AnySoftKeyboard. AnySoftKeyboard also is the only open source keyboard for Android that has gesture typing. Which is something I grew to love from when I used Gboard.
- pmontra 6y ago
  Swyping didn't work reliably when I tried one year ago, so I switched back to one of the keyboards of my phone (SwiftKey because I find it slightly better than Samsung's one.) Did they improve it in the last releases?
  - JeremyNT 6y ago
    For me, it just doesn't do the job. I love ASK but this feature isn't competitive with the closed source alternatives. Alas, I wish it were. This is all that's missing IMO.
    - bestouff 6y ago
      Can't upvote this enough.
  - ad404b8a372f2b9 6y ago
    There is a pull request open which improves the algorithm massively. Author couldn't finish it because of health issues sadly. I've installed it on my phone and it works great but I had to update some parameters in the code so it'd work.
  - circularfoyers 6y ago
    I'm not sure if they improved it or it just works more reliably with the default theme. But about a year ago it was unusable but now I'm able to use it with only occasional errors. Of course it's still not as good as Gboard, but I'd rather put up with the slight inconvenience for it being open source.
- jmnicolas 6y ago
  The search function on FDroid is atrocious. I find all the language packs for Anysoftkeyboard but not the keyboard itself.
  - yorwba 6y ago
    https://f-droid.org/packages/com.menny.android.anysoftkeyboard/ https://f-droid.org/packages/com.menny.android.anysoftkeyboa... I think the search function is working fine, the app is just called "AnySoftKeyboard 3D Theme" in the F-Droid app but not on the website for some reason.
    - jmnicolas 6y ago
      Then why I can't find it even with your keywords? The other possibility is that it's not present for me because it might not be compatible with GrapheneOS? But I have problems with search even for other apps. I'm OK with it it because FDroid is very good otherwise.
      - vinay427 6y ago
        It shows up for me on GrapheneOS. I don't think the F-Droid search is OS-dependent anyways besides maybe the major Android version number. As the GP noted, for some reason the name is listed with the "3D Theme" addendum in the app which is a little bizarre. Does your browser support opening the link in an app, i.e. F-Droid?
    - solarkraft 6y ago
      With all default repos + IzzyOnDroid enabled and searching exactly for that package name I get all the language packs and a 7 years old PC theme, but not the app itself. I'll just download the APK, I guess.
      - circularfoyers 6y ago
        For future reference you can use the "Open in app" option in Firefox to open the app in F-Droid from the website link in the parent.
pqb 6y ago
I second the AnySoftKeyboard. It is nice alternative, however I miss the mode that resembles BlackBerry 10 keyboard, especially in case of autocompletion suggestions that popped over specific letter and I had to swipe it up [0] in order to complete the word. It was many times more pleasant to use than the "selection bar". [0]: https://helpblog.blackberry.com/en/2013/02/blackberry-10-keyboard-setup https://helpblog.blackberry.com/en/2013/02/blackberry-10-key...
chrismorgan 6y ago
I just now figured I’d try AnySoftKeyboard. Its stock behaviour seems a little weird in places, but I’ll try it for a while and see how it goes. But the real thing that’s annoying me is how uncompromisingly huge it is. Its default behaviour has it consuming a shade under two thirds of the available screen space on my not-inordinately-large phone, compared with under half on the Samsung keyboard in its compact (reduced-height) mode. You can control the height of the top row (and it’s compact by default), but can’t control the height of the rest (other than by going to a theme that consumes even more space)? I want to eliminate the wasted ~30px at the bottom, and shrink each row by around 20px. I can easily save 100px here without removing anything.
- aasasd 6y ago
  ASK's preferences organization could use some work. What you want is in the ‘select theme’ screen: press the gear, then see ‘keys height factor’.
  - chrismorgan 6y ago
    Ah hah! Thank you. 0.65 is much better. Yeah, that gear thing is terribly placed.
- MayeulC 6y ago
  I agree it's a bit big, I tend to configure my keyboards to use the minimal size. That said, there are multiple themes to pick from, and some are smaller than others. You could conceivably make your own, though I have never tried. Edit: thanks a lot aasasd, I had just spent a few minutes looking for it (again), without finding it.
dastx 6y ago
AnySoftKeyboard on the surface seems cool, however, they've overloaded it with unnecessary characters. When I tried it, I had English selected and yet somehow it has characters that are _never_ used in English. That's not necessarily an issue, but when non-English characters are easier to type than English characters, it decreases my typing speed significantly. I raised an issue about it and was quickly dismissed. I've stuck to SwiftKey since. I'll have to try OpenBoard!
- Symbiote 6y ago
  Many people typing in English find it useful to be able to type names, places etc which require foreign characters. "Let's meet at Nørreport, Lærke says she will be late."
  - dastx 6y ago
    Sure, but how often does the average English write/speaker do this?
Peter-Jan 6y ago
I love AnysoftKeyboard but it completely freezes once every few days when pressing the emoji key. Forcing me to reboot my phone. Which is quite annoying to say the least. https://github.com/AnySoftKeyboard/AnySoftKeyboard/issues/1860 https://github.com/AnySoftKeyboard/AnySoftKeyboard/issues/18...
- aasasd 6y ago
  Just as a workaround: you can stop the app without rebooting the phone. The full app list is probably not accessible, but you can go via the ‘apps’ menu in the settings.
aasasd 6y ago
Alas ASK could use an influx of developer efforts. Menny Even-Danan seems to be the sole developer (aside from some pull requests), and it looks like other stuff is keeping him busy lately—as in, in the past couple years at least. I keep being perplexed when people reinvent software instead of joining forces (though I'm fine either way if the result is good). A better swipe-typing algorithm would be great, but even some smaller touches would make ASK much nicer: like, don't add a space after an opening parenthesis when swiping. Not rocket science, but needs someone to dig in the app's workings.
ce4 6y ago
ASK has one Keyboard layout that includes cursor keys, tab/ctrl/pipe and forward slash. Very handy for termux and to move the cursor around which i also use all the time. There's also the copy paste popup that can be activated by swiping up on the space bar which offers a nice cursor based highlight/copy/paste mode.

circularfoyers 6y ago

I don't see any reason why someone would use OpenBoard over AnySoftKeyboard. It would of been nice if there was an explanation of what differentiated it. If someone just wanted a different looking keyboard they could just have created a new theme for AnySoftKeyboard. AnySoftKeyboard also is the only open source keyboard for Android that has gesture typing. Which is something I grew to love from when I used Gboard.

pmontra 6y ago
Swyping didn't work reliably when I tried one year ago, so I switched back to one of the keyboards of my phone (SwiftKey because I find it slightly better than Samsung's one.) Did they improve it in the last releases?
- JeremyNT 6y ago
  For me, it just doesn't do the job. I love ASK but this feature isn't competitive with the closed source alternatives. Alas, I wish it were. This is all that's missing IMO.
  - bestouff 6y ago
    Can't upvote this enough.
- ad404b8a372f2b9 6y ago
  There is a pull request open which improves the algorithm massively. Author couldn't finish it because of health issues sadly. I've installed it on my phone and it works great but I had to update some parameters in the code so it'd work.
- circularfoyers 6y ago
  I'm not sure if they improved it or it just works more reliably with the default theme. But about a year ago it was unusable but now I'm able to use it with only occasional errors. Of course it's still not as good as Gboard, but I'd rather put up with the slight inconvenience for it being open source.
jmnicolas 6y ago
The search function on FDroid is atrocious. I find all the language packs for Anysoftkeyboard but not the keyboard itself.
- yorwba 6y ago
  https://f-droid.org/packages/com.menny.android.anysoftkeyboard/ https://f-droid.org/packages/com.menny.android.anysoftkeyboa... I think the search function is working fine, the app is just called "AnySoftKeyboard 3D Theme" in the F-Droid app but not on the website for some reason.
  - jmnicolas 6y ago
    Then why I can't find it even with your keywords? The other possibility is that it's not present for me because it might not be compatible with GrapheneOS? But I have problems with search even for other apps. I'm OK with it it because FDroid is very good otherwise.
    - vinay427 6y ago
      It shows up for me on GrapheneOS. I don't think the F-Droid search is OS-dependent anyways besides maybe the major Android version number. As the GP noted, for some reason the name is listed with the "3D Theme" addendum in the app which is a little bizarre. Does your browser support opening the link in an app, i.e. F-Droid?
  - solarkraft 6y ago
    With all default repos + IzzyOnDroid enabled and searching exactly for that package name I get all the language packs and a 7 years old PC theme, but not the app itself. I'll just download the APK, I guess.
    - circularfoyers 6y ago
      For future reference you can use the "Open in app" option in Firefox to open the app in F-Droid from the website link in the parent.

pqb 6y ago

I second the AnySoftKeyboard. It is nice alternative, however I miss the mode that resembles BlackBerry 10 keyboard, especially in case of autocompletion suggestions that popped over specific letter and I had to swipe it up [0] in order to complete the word. It was many times more pleasant to use than the "selection bar". [0]: https://helpblog.blackberry.com/en/2013/02/blackberry-10-keyboard-setup https://helpblog.blackberry.com/en/2013/02/blackberry-10-key...

chrismorgan 6y ago

I just now figured I’d try AnySoftKeyboard. Its stock behaviour seems a little weird in places, but I’ll try it for a while and see how it goes. But the real thing that’s annoying me is how uncompromisingly huge it is. Its default behaviour has it consuming a shade under two thirds of the available screen space on my not-inordinately-large phone, compared with under half on the Samsung keyboard in its compact (reduced-height) mode. You can control the height of the top row (and it’s compact by default), but can’t control the height of the rest (other than by going to a theme that consumes even more space)? I want to eliminate the wasted ~30px at the bottom, and shrink each row by around 20px. I can easily save 100px here without removing anything.

aasasd 6y ago
ASK's preferences organization could use some work. What you want is in the ‘select theme’ screen: press the gear, then see ‘keys height factor’.
- chrismorgan 6y ago
  Ah hah! Thank you. 0.65 is much better. Yeah, that gear thing is terribly placed.
MayeulC 6y ago
I agree it's a bit big, I tend to configure my keyboards to use the minimal size. That said, there are multiple themes to pick from, and some are smaller than others. You could conceivably make your own, though I have never tried. Edit: thanks a lot aasasd, I had just spent a few minutes looking for it (again), without finding it.

dastx 6y ago

AnySoftKeyboard on the surface seems cool, however, they've overloaded it with unnecessary characters. When I tried it, I had English selected and yet somehow it has characters that are _never_ used in English. That's not necessarily an issue, but when non-English characters are easier to type than English characters, it decreases my typing speed significantly. I raised an issue about it and was quickly dismissed. I've stuck to SwiftKey since. I'll have to try OpenBoard!

Symbiote 6y ago
Many people typing in English find it useful to be able to type names, places etc which require foreign characters. "Let's meet at Nørreport, Lærke says she will be late."
- dastx 6y ago
  Sure, but how often does the average English write/speaker do this?

Peter-Jan 6y ago

I love AnysoftKeyboard but it completely freezes once every few days when pressing the emoji key. Forcing me to reboot my phone. Which is quite annoying to say the least. https://github.com/AnySoftKeyboard/AnySoftKeyboard/issues/1860 https://github.com/AnySoftKeyboard/AnySoftKeyboard/issues/18...

aasasd 6y ago
Just as a workaround: you can stop the app without rebooting the phone. The full app list is probably not accessible, but you can go via the ‘apps’ menu in the settings.

aasasd 6y ago

Alas ASK could use an influx of developer efforts. Menny Even-Danan seems to be the sole developer (aside from some pull requests), and it looks like other stuff is keeping him busy lately—as in, in the past couple years at least. I keep being perplexed when people reinvent software instead of joining forces (though I'm fine either way if the result is good). A better swipe-typing algorithm would be great, but even some smaller touches would make ASK much nicer: like, don't add a space after an opening parenthesis when swiping. Not rocket science, but needs someone to dig in the app's workings.

ce4 6y ago

ASK has one Keyboard layout that includes cursor keys, tab/ctrl/pipe and forward slash. Very handy for termux and to move the cursor around which i also use all the time. There's also the copy paste popup that can be activated by swiping up on the space bar which offers a nice cursor based highlight/copy/paste mode.