7 ms·

People produce less text with more errors in more time on mobile. I actively avoid having to type anything on mobile. If I have my laptop open, I'll use whatsap

People produce less text with more errors in more time on mobile. I actively avoid having to type anything on mobile. If I have my laptop open, I'll use whatsapp or signal on that. I often wait replying on either of those until I get my laptop. Just way less frustrating to not have to correct >25% of my key presses. If I have to use the mobile keyboard, I'll often just send a message with typos, no capitals, and skip some of the more redundant words. It seems lots of people do that. Phones just suck for text input. Longform text entering on a phone is by and large not a thing for most people. It's mostly a read only device for passively consuming news and media. And taking photos. I find it telling that one of the more popular addons for ipads are covers with a builtin keyboard. It's a way bigger device than an iphone. But yet the keyboard sucks enough that Apple sells covers with a keyboard. Of course, all the touchscreen keyboard problems that the ipad has are magnified on their iphone. Yet, they don't have a solution for that. And they also sell a stylus for the ipad. Because fingers lack precision. It's the same OS but there seem to be no such options for the iphone. Does the stylus even work with an iphone? Is that deliberate? It's not like people are going to be magically more precise on an iphone relative to a huge ipad. Conclusion, Apple just accepts that that's the way things are. And besides, Steve Jobs would turn in his grave if they dared to ship an iphone with a stylus. Hardware keyboards on phones used to be a thing. I worked at Nokia back in the day. Really nice keyboards. Blackberries were popular too. People wrote lots of stuff on those things. I wouldn't mind a little pocket laptop. It's not like my pixel 6 is small or subtle in my pocket. It would be more useful with a slide out keyboard.

SamuelAdams 3y ago
This take is a little ironic. In the original iPhone keynote address [1], Steve Jobs specifically called out physical keyboards as a negative user experience. The advantage of the iPhone is that the entire device could adapt to whatever application you were currently using. That being said I still think you are right. Typing on iOS could be improved. [1]: https://youtu.be/x7qPAY9JqE4?si=9_jnM2Ys8JiTXGqC https://youtu.be/x7qPAY9JqE4?si=9_jnM2Ys8JiTXGqC
- awinter-py 3y ago
  I would say this vision could be realized if the iphone were able to grow a physical keyboard, and until then the entire device of the blackberry is more adapted to the applications I am using
- knallfrosch 3y ago
  To be honest, the problems an adaptive keyboard fixed back then - entering contacts, entering email addresses and passwords have long since been fixed by other solutions. Bluetooth, vCards, contact sharing, QR codes, one-tap logins, password managers.. To say nothing of NOT displaying the keyboard at all. If you look at an old phone, you notice how tiny their screen is, because half of the front side is reserved for a sucky 12 key keyboard.
- pif 3y ago
  > The advantage of the iPhone is that the entire device could adapt to whatever application you were currently using. This is the same argument as with Tesla dashboard: it's true, but incomplete. Virtual keyboard require your visual attention, while physical keyboard can be easily navigated using only touch.
andromeduck 3y ago
I just want a iPhone with a blackberry keyboard
p-e-w 3y ago
> People produce less text with more errors in more time on mobile. I mean yes, of course, but how could it be otherwise? A desktop keyboard is 10x the size of an entire mobile phone. The idea that it should somehow be possible to attain the typing performance provided by such a large dedicated input device on a phone the size of a keyboard's space bar is pretty ridiculous. And I'm unconvinced that the "Eloquent" design presented in the article is a step forward. The "T-Menu" looks terrible and confusing, and I find the drag animations quite jarring. The only obvious, intuitive mobile interface for text entry is speech-to-text. I know it isn't quite there yet, but that doesn't mean fiddling with details of how cursor movement works on a phone screen has any realistic chance of ever solving the problem.
- cozzyd 3y ago
  using text to speech on a train is going to make me a lot of friends...
biztos 3y ago
I agree it’s awful, but I very much disagree that people are doing it “less” — think of the chat apps. I think more text passes between more humans on iOS/Android than ever before in the history of humanity. It’s probably a pain, but a familiar one, and you mostly tune it out.
- funcDropShadow 3y ago
  Perhaps in total, but I am not sure that is true per person.
edanm 3y ago
What I don't understand is why speech-to-text is so bad (on the iPhone at least), and it's related to this editing issue. Text to speech will never be a perfect replacement for other forms of text entry, because you're limited in when you can use it. But it's so close to being good. The main issues are so easy to solve, they're just silly UI issues around editing. You can enter text verbally, it works surprisingly well at understanding what you're saying. But... you can't delete the words you just said if it was wrong. It's literally the first thing you run into - you're transcribing, it gets one word wrong, boom, you're stuck in normal tap-editing-land again. Trying to enter messages while driving? Good luck, unless you can transcribe the message perfectly on the first go, you have to use your hands.
- majewsky 3y ago
  I believe you mean speech-to-text, not text-to-speech, right?
  - edanm 3y ago
    Doh, Yes, of course. Edited.
    - sameerds 3y ago
      FWIW, I read the corrected comment and still read it as "text-to-speech". Then I saw the replies and scrolled up, and realized that my brain had read it wrong!
    - TRiG_Ireland 3y ago
      You've edited it one of two times!
      - edanm 3y ago
        I'm a dope. And now I can't edit anymore either so it's stuck like this, showing my foolishness to the world in perpetuity :D
- 3y ago
FearNotDaniel 3y ago
Oh man, I long for the days of phones with T9 input and hardware keys you could physically feel. It was so easy to walk down the street and tap out a text message with results much more predictable than "predictive" text, only occasionally having to glance down at the phone to check what you wrote. You could do it all with one hand, it was very unlikely you would drop the phone in the process and even if you did, it would just bounce instead of smashing the whole precious touch screen. Yeah, these days I only type on the touch screen if it's absolutely unavoidable - if I can't get to my laptop, but can still sit down, I much prefer a little flip out Bluetooth keyboard with the phone on a stand.
- gatane 3y ago
  See this, it has the T9 input method too: https://github.com/dessalines/thumb-key https://github.com/dessalines/thumb-key
  - mikecoles 3y ago
    I see mention of T9 in "On phones that used the 9-key numeric layout, T9 predictive text was used. Other phones used the full-hand layout with the familiar QWERTY layout, with other proprietary predictive methods." I'm unable to verify this app has T9 as an input method. Is there a custom layout for this? T9 was pretty sweet as you could type without needing to look at the device. Maybe this layout? https://github.com/dessalines/thumb-key/issues/263 https://github.com/dessalines/thumb-key/issues/263 https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1i6scYO3PHnyvA_JwB09WMA_8ynCeZiDZ/edit#gid=1941015483 https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1i6scYO3PHnyvA_JwB09W...
- forgotpwd16 3y ago
  AnySoftKeyboard has T9-like layout but lacks T9 prediction.
hilbert42 3y ago
"People produce less text with more errors in more time on mobile." I absolutely agree, typing or editing text on a smartphone is just horrible. There are many times I've started to write an email or post to say HN and I've been so frustrated I've aborted the process and restarted it on my laptop. It's down outright infuriating I have to do this. [I just hope someone of influence at Google reads these posts and acts accordingly. If people at Google don't understand then it's just another instance—like Microsoft the king of offenders—of where Big Tech won't fix the damn obvious (I wish someone would write a book about it and fully expose the problem).] 1. You mention the keyboard matter. I went to the trouble of buying a small Bluetooth keyboard to use with the phone to help with the problem and it was hopeless, for starters, it had no separate keypad and I couldn't use any of the multiple alternative ways of keying ALT-# etc.—to key in, say, a Unicode character. None of the known 'fixes' actually worked for some reason. Question (to anyone): we have any amount of hardware available but no decent small Bluetooth keyboards—why on earth not!? There's precious few Bluetooth keyboards anyway let alone decent small ones for portable use or that are convenient to use with smartphones. Manufacturers where the hell are you? 2. The finger problem and selecting text. First, there's the selecting text problem. Either one's fingers are too big or selecting text is difficult because the resolution and or sensitivity of the screen is wrong and it cannot be adjusted. Yes, some phones have a 'glove' mode but it's nigh on useless. Why don't phones have a sensitivity control that makes selecting text with a finger much, much easier? 3. Along the same lines, selecting or editing, say, a URL from a browser address line is painful. When the URL text exceeds the screen width then trying to get to the end of the text is a damn awkward. More often than not either one can't, or the highlight comes on and soon as one tries to get the cursor back the URL disappears altogether. Getting the cursor into the correct position between the text and the GUI element is usually difficult, why doesn't Google allow some blank spaces here so it's easy to edit? Surely, it could be made so that tapping in this vicinity and sliding right would place the cursor at the end of the text without losing it? Editing here really does need fine tuning. 4. UNDO, UBDO! I'm typing this into my browser's HN edit box! If I accidentally refresh the page before posting (which is damn easy to do) then I will have lost everything and have to start over again. Why on earth hasn't the 'undo' problem been solved with browsers, especially so on smartphones? It was solved over 30 years ago on wordprocessors so why not with browsers? If I know I'm going to type some long text on my phone then I'll first do so in a text editor and save continually as I go then copy the finished text into the browser. I should NOT have to go to this amount of trouble, it's stupid and ridiculous that phone ergonomics aren't easier. (They say smartphone sales are slowing, well I'd suggest they'd quickly pick up again if Google fixed these important ergonomic issues.) 5. That raises the problem of where are 'undo' plugins for browsers? If browser manufacturers won't do 'undo' then why doesn't someone provide one (if ever a browser plugin was needed for a smartphone then this is it). BTW, there used to be an excellent plugin that did this for desktop Firefox called Lazarus but I haven't seen it for years. Lazarus not only did undos but also kept track of multiple edits—one could go back to any edit point even days or weks later and use or reuse it. Why are we now deprived of such a useful tool nowadays? There's no doubt computers are getting harder to use these days—not easier. Right, I'm damn annoyed with the primitive smartphone environment I'm forced to use. It may have been OK 10 or more years ago but it's not OK nowadays. It's notable that with every new version of Android that Google adds junk I mostly don't need (and often useful features are removed that I do need and done on the pretext it's for security or such). It really is high time Google started to address these essential usability issues that everyone needs and wants. This is such an issue one has to question what's going on at Google. Are people at Google incapable of entering more than one line of text into their phones at a single sitting? Can't they comprehend any concept longer than a single Twitter/X entry at a time? Given the neglect, one has to wonder.
kristianp 3y ago
My problem on the Android Samsung keyboard is the positioning of the backspace key. When typing a word containing an "m", I'll often hit backspace instead, causing a lot of editing, for example "example" becomes "exple".
n8cpdx 3y ago
I don’t think stylus is the answer on phone for text input. Maybe on a phablet. I haven’t experienced it being better and only use pencil on my iPad when in a meeting where typing or using a laptop would be obnoxious. The Apple Pencil doesn’t work on the phones. But even if it did, it would be ridiculous and un-Apple given that the pencil is disproportionately huge compared to the phone itself. I personally wish they would do something for the rare customer who does need it (e.g. for precise drawing on the go). But they’d need a separate Apple Pencil Mini product. I think Apple’s answer is that you should use speech-to-text or just serve voice messages, both seem quite popular with the crowd that isn’t on HN.
lolinder 3y ago
I find that typing on a phone (iPhone or Android) these days is substantially easier than typing on an iPad because of swipe. It's still nowhere as efficient as a keyboard in the hands of a skilled typist, but I can often produce text fast enough that it isn't worth getting out my laptop. On an iPad it's far worse, because I actually do have to use the bad QWERTY touchscreen key-by-key. What I keep hoping for as far as input methods go is a swipe keyboard layout that is optimized for swipe, because QWERTY has a few groupings that make for ambiguities. Someone calculated one a few years ago that puts the vowels as far apart as possible [0]. [0] https://sangaline.com/post/finding-an-optimal-keyboard-layout-for-swype/ https://sangaline.com/post/finding-an-optimal-keyboard-layou...
- StimDeck 3y ago
  [dead]
- synapsomorphy 3y ago
  The only reason swipe works so well is because of how well people know the QWERTY layout, though. You'd have to have a pretty unique situation for it to be worth your time to thoroughly learn a new keyboard layout just to speed up typing on your phone.
- Woshiwuja 3y ago
  Swipe is terrible and i dont know how people even use it
  - iFreilicht 3y ago
    Works well for me. You just type with one hand without ever lifting your thumb. You do need to set the correct language, and if you mix languages, your phone's OS has to be able to deal with that, but at least on iOS that is the case and the prediction is very good. If the first choice isn't correct, usually the first or second displayed alternative is what I wanted. There are two caveats, though. Firstly, I type differently when using swipe. As it favors words from the dictionary, my texts sound less spoken and more written. And secondly, having backspace delete the whole word is a critical feature to avoiding annoyance. If none of the predictions are correct, I just tap backspace and then type the word like I usually would. This, combined with the rarity of those hiccups makes swipe typing quicker than regular typing to me. It also helps with relaxing my wrists as I can also hold the phone with one hand and swipe with the middle finger of my other in a gesture like holding a pen, but without the pen. Maybe there's actually a third aspect; screen and hand size. I haven't owned any big phones, my iphone 13 mini is the biggest phone I ever owned, but I do have large hands, so swipe typing with a single thumb is not very difficult. Your experience might be different depending on your anatomy and device.
jskherman 3y ago
Skill issue /s https://x.com/naofalxyz/status/1702673333446496434 https://x.com/naofalxyz/status/1702673333446496434
- HereBeBeasties 3y ago
  That's not a phone AND she is using a stylus.
ok123456 3y ago
It was much better when you could get phones with physical keyboards. Only recently has swipe on android gotten to the accuracy of typing on a physical phone keyboard, but not the accuracy. But, that was lost because of the iphonification of the whole smart phone sector.
- devilbunny 3y ago
  There was a near-perfect solution on Android for years: Swype. Why the people that bought it buried it, I can never understand. It was so much better - even ten years ago - than modern swiping keyboards. It even had a layout that was just for editing.
  - Semaphor 3y ago
    > It was so much better - even ten years ago - than modern swiping keyboards. Unless it learned too much about you. I found that regularly clearing all data from it improved swiping accuracy… It’s just like with all automated personalization, it doesn’t work.
  - sznio 3y ago
    swype was so damn good and nothing comes even close. too bad it got killed off. windows phone keyboard was good too. the key "hitbox" would grow or shrink based on predictive text and typing speed, so if you're writing something from the dictionary you could just slap the rough area of the button and it would register the most likely one. You'd feel it though when typing in something from outside the dictionary, suddenly it felt like you forgot how to type. Once you slowed your typing down it returned to behaving like a standard keyboard. Also, it had a little trackpoint-type nub on the virtual keyboard which you could drag for moving the cursor. It was significantly more accurate than anything else in any mobile OS.
    - vel0city 3y ago
      On Gboard you can slide on the spacebar to move the cursor.

SamuelAdams 3y ago

This take is a little ironic. In the original iPhone keynote address [1], Steve Jobs specifically called out physical keyboards as a negative user experience. The advantage of the iPhone is that the entire device could adapt to whatever application you were currently using. That being said I still think you are right. Typing on iOS could be improved. [1]: https://youtu.be/x7qPAY9JqE4?si=9_jnM2Ys8JiTXGqC https://youtu.be/x7qPAY9JqE4?si=9_jnM2Ys8JiTXGqC

awinter-py 3y ago
I would say this vision could be realized if the iphone were able to grow a physical keyboard, and until then the entire device of the blackberry is more adapted to the applications I am using
knallfrosch 3y ago
To be honest, the problems an adaptive keyboard fixed back then - entering contacts, entering email addresses and passwords have long since been fixed by other solutions. Bluetooth, vCards, contact sharing, QR codes, one-tap logins, password managers.. To say nothing of NOT displaying the keyboard at all. If you look at an old phone, you notice how tiny their screen is, because half of the front side is reserved for a sucky 12 key keyboard.
pif 3y ago
> The advantage of the iPhone is that the entire device could adapt to whatever application you were currently using. This is the same argument as with Tesla dashboard: it's true, but incomplete. Virtual keyboard require your visual attention, while physical keyboard can be easily navigated using only touch.

andromeduck 3y ago

I just want a iPhone with a blackberry keyboard

p-e-w 3y ago

> People produce less text with more errors in more time on mobile. I mean yes, of course, but how could it be otherwise? A desktop keyboard is 10x the size of an entire mobile phone. The idea that it should somehow be possible to attain the typing performance provided by such a large dedicated input device on a phone the size of a keyboard's space bar is pretty ridiculous. And I'm unconvinced that the "Eloquent" design presented in the article is a step forward. The "T-Menu" looks terrible and confusing, and I find the drag animations quite jarring. The only obvious, intuitive mobile interface for text entry is speech-to-text. I know it isn't quite there yet, but that doesn't mean fiddling with details of how cursor movement works on a phone screen has any realistic chance of ever solving the problem.

cozzyd 3y ago
using text to speech on a train is going to make me a lot of friends...

biztos 3y ago

I agree it’s awful, but I very much disagree that people are doing it “less” — think of the chat apps. I think more text passes between more humans on iOS/Android than ever before in the history of humanity. It’s probably a pain, but a familiar one, and you mostly tune it out.

funcDropShadow 3y ago
Perhaps in total, but I am not sure that is true per person.

edanm 3y ago

What I don't understand is why speech-to-text is so bad (on the iPhone at least), and it's related to this editing issue. Text to speech will never be a perfect replacement for other forms of text entry, because you're limited in when you can use it. But it's so close to being good. The main issues are so easy to solve, they're just silly UI issues around editing. You can enter text verbally, it works surprisingly well at understanding what you're saying. But... you can't delete the words you just said if it was wrong. It's literally the first thing you run into - you're transcribing, it gets one word wrong, boom, you're stuck in normal tap-editing-land again. Trying to enter messages while driving? Good luck, unless you can transcribe the message perfectly on the first go, you have to use your hands.

majewsky 3y ago
I believe you mean speech-to-text, not text-to-speech, right?
- edanm 3y ago
  Doh, Yes, of course. Edited.
  - sameerds 3y ago
    FWIW, I read the corrected comment and still read it as "text-to-speech". Then I saw the replies and scrolled up, and realized that my brain had read it wrong!
  - TRiG_Ireland 3y ago
    You've edited it one of two times!
    - edanm 3y ago
      I'm a dope. And now I can't edit anymore either so it's stuck like this, showing my foolishness to the world in perpetuity :D
3y ago

FearNotDaniel 3y ago

Oh man, I long for the days of phones with T9 input and hardware keys you could physically feel. It was so easy to walk down the street and tap out a text message with results much more predictable than "predictive" text, only occasionally having to glance down at the phone to check what you wrote. You could do it all with one hand, it was very unlikely you would drop the phone in the process and even if you did, it would just bounce instead of smashing the whole precious touch screen. Yeah, these days I only type on the touch screen if it's absolutely unavoidable - if I can't get to my laptop, but can still sit down, I much prefer a little flip out Bluetooth keyboard with the phone on a stand.

gatane 3y ago
See this, it has the T9 input method too: https://github.com/dessalines/thumb-key https://github.com/dessalines/thumb-key
- mikecoles 3y ago
  I see mention of T9 in "On phones that used the 9-key numeric layout, T9 predictive text was used. Other phones used the full-hand layout with the familiar QWERTY layout, with other proprietary predictive methods." I'm unable to verify this app has T9 as an input method. Is there a custom layout for this? T9 was pretty sweet as you could type without needing to look at the device. Maybe this layout? https://github.com/dessalines/thumb-key/issues/263 https://github.com/dessalines/thumb-key/issues/263 https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1i6scYO3PHnyvA_JwB09WMA_8ynCeZiDZ/edit#gid=1941015483 https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1i6scYO3PHnyvA_JwB09W...
forgotpwd16 3y ago
AnySoftKeyboard has T9-like layout but lacks T9 prediction.

hilbert42 3y ago

"People produce less text with more errors in more time on mobile." I absolutely agree, typing or editing text on a smartphone is just horrible. There are many times I've started to write an email or post to say HN and I've been so frustrated I've aborted the process and restarted it on my laptop. It's down outright infuriating I have to do this. [I just hope someone of influence at Google reads these posts and acts accordingly. If people at Google don't understand then it's just another instance—like Microsoft the king of offenders—of where Big Tech won't fix the damn obvious (I wish someone would write a book about it and fully expose the problem).] 1. You mention the keyboard matter. I went to the trouble of buying a small Bluetooth keyboard to use with the phone to help with the problem and it was hopeless, for starters, it had no separate keypad and I couldn't use any of the multiple alternative ways of keying ALT-# etc.—to key in, say, a Unicode character. None of the known 'fixes' actually worked for some reason. Question (to anyone): we have any amount of hardware available but no decent small Bluetooth keyboards—why on earth not!? There's precious few Bluetooth keyboards anyway let alone decent small ones for portable use or that are convenient to use with smartphones. Manufacturers where the hell are you? 2. The finger problem and selecting text. First, there's the selecting text problem. Either one's fingers are too big or selecting text is difficult because the resolution and or sensitivity of the screen is wrong and it cannot be adjusted. Yes, some phones have a 'glove' mode but it's nigh on useless. Why don't phones have a sensitivity control that makes selecting text with a finger much, much easier? 3. Along the same lines, selecting or editing, say, a URL from a browser address line is painful. When the URL text exceeds the screen width then trying to get to the end of the text is a damn awkward. More often than not either one can't, or the highlight comes on and soon as one tries to get the cursor back the URL disappears altogether. Getting the cursor into the correct position between the text and the GUI element is usually difficult, why doesn't Google allow some blank spaces here so it's easy to edit? Surely, it could be made so that tapping in this vicinity and sliding right would place the cursor at the end of the text without losing it? Editing here really does need fine tuning. 4. UNDO, UBDO! I'm typing this into my browser's HN edit box! If I accidentally refresh the page before posting (which is damn easy to do) then I will have lost everything and have to start over again. Why on earth hasn't the 'undo' problem been solved with browsers, especially so on smartphones? It was solved over 30 years ago on wordprocessors so why not with browsers? If I know I'm going to type some long text on my phone then I'll first do so in a text editor and save continually as I go then copy the finished text into the browser. I should NOT have to go to this amount of trouble, it's stupid and ridiculous that phone ergonomics aren't easier. (They say smartphone sales are slowing, well I'd suggest they'd quickly pick up again if Google fixed these important ergonomic issues.) 5. That raises the problem of where are 'undo' plugins for browsers? If browser manufacturers won't do 'undo' then why doesn't someone provide one (if ever a browser plugin was needed for a smartphone then this is it). BTW, there used to be an excellent plugin that did this for desktop Firefox called Lazarus but I haven't seen it for years. Lazarus not only did undos but also kept track of multiple edits—one could go back to any edit point even days or weks later and use or reuse it. Why are we now deprived of such a useful tool nowadays? There's no doubt computers are getting harder to use these days—not easier. Right, I'm damn annoyed with the primitive smartphone environment I'm forced to use. It may have been OK 10 or more years ago but it's not OK nowadays. It's notable that with every new version of Android that Google adds junk I mostly don't need (and often useful features are removed that I do need and done on the pretext it's for security or such). It really is high time Google started to address these essential usability issues that everyone needs and wants. This is such an issue one has to question what's going on at Google. Are people at Google incapable of entering more than one line of text into their phones at a single sitting? Can't they comprehend any concept longer than a single Twitter/X entry at a time? Given the neglect, one has to wonder.

kristianp 3y ago

My problem on the Android Samsung keyboard is the positioning of the backspace key. When typing a word containing an "m", I'll often hit backspace instead, causing a lot of editing, for example "example" becomes "exple".

n8cpdx 3y ago

I don’t think stylus is the answer on phone for text input. Maybe on a phablet. I haven’t experienced it being better and only use pencil on my iPad when in a meeting where typing or using a laptop would be obnoxious. The Apple Pencil doesn’t work on the phones. But even if it did, it would be ridiculous and un-Apple given that the pencil is disproportionately huge compared to the phone itself. I personally wish they would do something for the rare customer who does need it (e.g. for precise drawing on the go). But they’d need a separate Apple Pencil Mini product. I think Apple’s answer is that you should use speech-to-text or just serve voice messages, both seem quite popular with the crowd that isn’t on HN.

lolinder 3y ago

I find that typing on a phone (iPhone or Android) these days is substantially easier than typing on an iPad because of swipe. It's still nowhere as efficient as a keyboard in the hands of a skilled typist, but I can often produce text fast enough that it isn't worth getting out my laptop. On an iPad it's far worse, because I actually do have to use the bad QWERTY touchscreen key-by-key. What I keep hoping for as far as input methods go is a swipe keyboard layout that is optimized for swipe, because QWERTY has a few groupings that make for ambiguities. Someone calculated one a few years ago that puts the vowels as far apart as possible [0]. [0] https://sangaline.com/post/finding-an-optimal-keyboard-layout-for-swype/ https://sangaline.com/post/finding-an-optimal-keyboard-layou...

StimDeck 3y ago
[dead]
synapsomorphy 3y ago
The only reason swipe works so well is because of how well people know the QWERTY layout, though. You'd have to have a pretty unique situation for it to be worth your time to thoroughly learn a new keyboard layout just to speed up typing on your phone.
Woshiwuja 3y ago
Swipe is terrible and i dont know how people even use it
- iFreilicht 3y ago
  Works well for me. You just type with one hand without ever lifting your thumb. You do need to set the correct language, and if you mix languages, your phone's OS has to be able to deal with that, but at least on iOS that is the case and the prediction is very good. If the first choice isn't correct, usually the first or second displayed alternative is what I wanted. There are two caveats, though. Firstly, I type differently when using swipe. As it favors words from the dictionary, my texts sound less spoken and more written. And secondly, having backspace delete the whole word is a critical feature to avoiding annoyance. If none of the predictions are correct, I just tap backspace and then type the word like I usually would. This, combined with the rarity of those hiccups makes swipe typing quicker than regular typing to me. It also helps with relaxing my wrists as I can also hold the phone with one hand and swipe with the middle finger of my other in a gesture like holding a pen, but without the pen. Maybe there's actually a third aspect; screen and hand size. I haven't owned any big phones, my iphone 13 mini is the biggest phone I ever owned, but I do have large hands, so swipe typing with a single thumb is not very difficult. Your experience might be different depending on your anatomy and device.

jskherman 3y ago

Skill issue /s https://x.com/naofalxyz/status/1702673333446496434 https://x.com/naofalxyz/status/1702673333446496434

HereBeBeasties 3y ago
That's not a phone AND she is using a stylus.

ok123456 3y ago

It was much better when you could get phones with physical keyboards. Only recently has swipe on android gotten to the accuracy of typing on a physical phone keyboard, but not the accuracy. But, that was lost because of the iphonification of the whole smart phone sector.

devilbunny 3y ago
There was a near-perfect solution on Android for years: Swype. Why the people that bought it buried it, I can never understand. It was so much better - even ten years ago - than modern swiping keyboards. It even had a layout that was just for editing.
- Semaphor 3y ago
  > It was so much better - even ten years ago - than modern swiping keyboards. Unless it learned too much about you. I found that regularly clearing all data from it improved swiping accuracy… It’s just like with all automated personalization, it doesn’t work.
- sznio 3y ago
  swype was so damn good and nothing comes even close. too bad it got killed off. windows phone keyboard was good too. the key "hitbox" would grow or shrink based on predictive text and typing speed, so if you're writing something from the dictionary you could just slap the rough area of the button and it would register the most likely one. You'd feel it though when typing in something from outside the dictionary, suddenly it felt like you forgot how to type. Once you slowed your typing down it returned to behaving like a standard keyboard. Also, it had a little trackpoint-type nub on the virtual keyboard which you could drag for moving the cursor. It was significantly more accurate than anything else in any mobile OS.
  - vel0city 3y ago
    On Gboard you can slide on the spacebar to move the cursor.