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I'm kinda surprised that no-one has mentioned that languages other than English exist. Virtual keyboards, while a bit clunky, allow to easily switch input langu

I'm kinda surprised that no-one has mentioned that languages other than English exist. Virtual keyboards, while a bit clunky, allow to easily switch input languages, and most of the world for whom English isn't their native language use this feature very very often. Physical keyboards for laptops solve this issue by having different keyboard layouts for different languages (and are usually geared towards that language, with English being just possible to use in addition to the primary language), but for smartphone screens the keyboard is just too small, it won't realistically be a good idea. I'm saying this as a person who loves physical buttons and everything quite a lot, but for any non-English user this keyboard would be s non-starter

andix 3y ago
I'm writing in different languages, they are all based on the latin alphabet and I never switch keyboard layouts. Especially the switched Y/Z keys on some layouts are hard to handle. And the French layout with different AZWQM positions is just pure madness. There are a few layouts that include most latin characters on one layout. A lot of European layouts have most latin characters somewhere (with the help of dead keys or AltGr). There are also international English keyboard layouts, although I will never get used to the small return key of the US keyboards, why make it so small if it's even one key short (101 vs 102)? :D For people who write in different alphabets (cyrillic, arabic) this might be a completely different story.
jiehong 3y ago
Exactly. At the extreme end, there are older Chinese users who often hand write Chinese on the screen to write a sentence, one character at a time. In the middle there are many things, like Latin but unusual layout such as French bepo, or Chinese input methods based on shapes, or Japanese kana, or the old T9 that I still see some people using (probably to have bigger letter targets). A touch screen really ease custom input methods!
- xnzakg 3y ago
  > or Japanese kana 12-key kana flick input is my favorite input method for use on a touchscreen. Pretty fast and accurate. Here's a video showing how it's used: https://youtube.com/watch?v=V2B9dgjbQxk https://youtube.com/watch?v=V2B9dgjbQxk
- nojs 3y ago
  For Chinese, most people in Taiwan use zhuyin which would be difficult on this keyboard without any labels.
LAC-Tech 3y ago
Not an issue if all if you know how to touch type and aren't reliant on the labels for the keys. I'm typing this very message on a keyboard that has no labels at all, it's all muscle memory.
- nasretdinov 3y ago
  My native language uses cyrillic alphabet. I can also type on a regular keyboard without looking, however Cyrillic has quite a few more letters than English (33 vs 26 in English in my language), so the keyboard needs to allow that.

andix 3y ago

I'm writing in different languages, they are all based on the latin alphabet and I never switch keyboard layouts. Especially the switched Y/Z keys on some layouts are hard to handle. And the French layout with different AZWQM positions is just pure madness. There are a few layouts that include most latin characters on one layout. A lot of European layouts have most latin characters somewhere (with the help of dead keys or AltGr). There are also international English keyboard layouts, although I will never get used to the small return key of the US keyboards, why make it so small if it's even one key short (101 vs 102)? :D For people who write in different alphabets (cyrillic, arabic) this might be a completely different story.

jiehong 3y ago

Exactly. At the extreme end, there are older Chinese users who often hand write Chinese on the screen to write a sentence, one character at a time. In the middle there are many things, like Latin but unusual layout such as French bepo, or Chinese input methods based on shapes, or Japanese kana, or the old T9 that I still see some people using (probably to have bigger letter targets). A touch screen really ease custom input methods!

xnzakg 3y ago
> or Japanese kana 12-key kana flick input is my favorite input method for use on a touchscreen. Pretty fast and accurate. Here's a video showing how it's used: https://youtube.com/watch?v=V2B9dgjbQxk https://youtube.com/watch?v=V2B9dgjbQxk
nojs 3y ago
For Chinese, most people in Taiwan use zhuyin which would be difficult on this keyboard without any labels.

LAC-Tech 3y ago

Not an issue if all if you know how to touch type and aren't reliant on the labels for the keys. I'm typing this very message on a keyboard that has no labels at all, it's all muscle memory.

nasretdinov 3y ago
My native language uses cyrillic alphabet. I can also type on a regular keyboard without looking, however Cyrillic has quite a few more letters than English (33 vs 26 in English in my language), so the keyboard needs to allow that.