The New Full-screen Finger Keyboard

[newsbot]

Nokia was kind enough to send a pic of the fullscreen finger keybaord
(thumb board) that is one of the enhancements in the [LINK:
/content/view/176/2/] Internet Tablet 2006 OS. From the looks of it, it
may prove quite functional. There`s no word yet on how it can be invoked
and if it would work with all the applications....Read the full article. (http://www.internettablettalk.com/content/view/177)

[phi]

I like it, good thing I got a brando screen protector :)

[ajf]

Is the size of that keyboard enough for all the keys? :)

http://digitalen.blogspot.com

[troubleshootr]

I sure hope it has a CTRL key.

[Zorro99]

Looks nice. Smaller than I expected though.

[Hedgecore]

Just a thought. You know those rubber fingertip covers they have for secretaries, etc? Slipping those over your thumbs would prevent the screen from getting too nasty.

It'd still get nasty, but not too nasty.

[konttori]

Hey, I've been using it with my fingers for all the time I've had it. The included pen is just too awful to use. The screen's easy to wipe if you have too many fingerprints in it. You can easily use your shirt if needed. No sweat. This is an everyday device, not a freaking crown jewel. It's supposed to be used. In 2007 everyone of you will be buying the next device anyway.

[dcarter]

Hey, I've been using it with my fingers for all the time I've had it. The included pen is just too awful to use. The screen's easy to wipe if you have too many fingerprints in it. You can easily use your shirt if needed. No sweat. This is an everyday device, not a freaking crown jewel. It's supposed to be used. In 2007 everyone of you will be buying the next device anyway.


hahahaha!
(I agree!)

-unnecessary bump-

DCarter

[Simon]

I use my fingers on it too (I have a screen protector though) and often wish some of the buttons and controls were just a little bigger. I stopped worrying about the outside of the thing and getting a case or using the soft case Nokia provide. With the hard cover it is more than robust enough to go straight into a jacket pocket and have sitting about on my desk. It doesn't get all scratched up like a iPod would say. As Konttori says it is more than robust as an everyday device. Out of all the gadgets I have I do use the 770 more than everything except maybe my main PC at home.

[Hedgecore]

I use the back of my pinky nail for playing soduku on transit... otherwise I don't think my fingers would get much of a response from the screen given that when I touch it 10% of it's in contact with my fat assed finger ;)

[Karel Jansens]

Nokia probably think the full-screen keyboard is a nice thing. However, I'd much rather had them put all the effort and money into a more sofisticated HWR solution.

They might e.g. have tried to get PhatWare port their ParaGraph HWR engine from Windows, or pour some money into the open-source X-Stroke application; I know for a fact that the latter recently had a new contributor who was willing to integrate his own HWR algorithms into it.

I mean, I use the 770 daily, but not one session goes by when I don't fondly reminisce the Newton MessagePad and its near-flawless full-screen HWR. Everybody can buy a keyboard, but you can't buy a decent HWR engine for Linux. For shame...

[Hedgecore]

See if you can dig up the posts about 'hex input'. Looks like a sweet way to input text, but because the onscreen KB is so inbred with the OS, there doesn't look like there's a way to circumvent it.

[Stickarm]

assed fingerI'm perfectly comfortable using my fingers to operate all my touch screen devices (with no screen protectors or nothin', either). I do, however, try to avoid using my "assed fingers."

:o

[Hedgecore]

I save that one for WindowsCE devices ;)

[Viipottaja]

Another thing is that you do not HAVE TO use your fingers.. you can still tap with the stylus too, and even for that the new bigger letters will be welcomed by me at least (the old keyboard is so damned small that I often make typos).

Looks great overall, the whole new look etc.

[rexbinary]

Looks like the guy holding the tablet in the picture needs to trim his nails. :D

[Odin]

Frankly, I would like the following:

1) Ability to remove (or a flash where it isn't there) the HWR software since I never use it. I had a Newton and one of the "stupid Newton tricks" that was lampooned by Doonesbury was to write something and then laugh at what it thought you wrote. The only workable HWR is Graffitti and that system cheats since it constrains how you write.

2) Ability to define the keyboard and it's mappings.

The above may be there already.

[hdtravel]

Be prepared to carry a screen cleaning cloth around with you at all times. Major dirty screen when you start putting your grimy fingers on it to type.

[michaelalanjones]

Do this - change the sensitivity to the thumbkeys, and you can lightly touch it - it works better that way. I can almost touch-type on it now. I have to, because my dang ThinkOutside BT keyboard no longer works with OS 2006. They need to fix that.

There is a place to adjust this sensity with a scroller bar, in the 'Control Panel->Text input settings->Thumb board'. Makes a difference.

Oh, and I also 'taught' the handwriting, and practiced, and it seems better - I don't know if they changed anything, but it does seem better.

[Robert Newman]

Odin:
I agree that the HWR in the Nokia leaves a lot to be desired. But I am curious if the Apple Message Pad that you tried was one of the first ones. I had one and I agree that it was horrible. However, that being said, the Newton MP-2100 has the best HWR that I have used, and I think if Nokia had something as good, it would be the best device that I have used. My Newton MP2100 is still with me, and still works great. . . . a little dated but it still has a place.
Robert

[acdczip]

Just installed the new 2006 OS. The HWR still sucks! I can tap a lot faster with the small virtual keys than hand writing (which is very sad). As with the full screen thumb keys, I wish I can map one of the keys to complete a word instead of tapping on the document screen. Downloading Ubuntu, hopefully I can get root access soon.

[Odin]

Just installed the new 2006 OS. The HWR still sucks! I can tap a lot faster with the small virtual keys than hand writing (which is very sad). As with the full screen thumb keys, I wish I can map one of the keys to complete a word instead of tapping on the document screen. Downloading Ubuntu, hopefully I can get root access soon.

I am getting ready to upgrade. Now that i have had the 770 a couple of weeks, i have developed the same love-hate relationship with Nokia that I have with Apple. It will be nice to give them the finger.

[Karel Jansens]

PhatWare's PenOffice (which uses the Calligrapher HWR engine) is the next best thing to a Newton. If only they could be pressed into producing a Linux version...

[HardCoder]

I just wanted to ask all you guys who complains on the HWR if you have tried "training" the software? It looks like the 2006 version has better posibilites for doing this.

I also wanted to say that the HWR on both 05 and 06 versions worked pretty good for me after training that is.

[ragnar]

The 2006 version allows the user to disable handwriting patterns that are causing problems. So if you find that a particular pattern that doesn't really match your handwriting style, you can now remove it from use.

[Simon]

I finally upgraded to 2006 and it is good. I like the new big keyboard but have the gone and tweaked the normal one? It seems less sensitive than before and some strokes are harder to make (like the up to capitalise seems more finicky). I've turned the sensitivity right up but I still seem to get missed keys. They click like you've pressed them but then nothing happens. Seems worse on the big keyboard and worse when typing fast.

I haven't played with the handwriting much but in the quick try I had it seemed a bit better. I will have to try the new training options and see if that improves it. Like a lot of people I wish I could run the old Palm style Grafitti on it. Once you knew the strokes for that you could really imput quite fast and with less mistakes. On the 770 I spend as much time correcting mistakes as typing!

I also noticed a bug where it wasn't clearing the screen on the handwriting area properly so it would leave behind letters I had written. Made it really hard to use! Haven't been able to reproduce that yet though.

[jroman91]

Has anyone looked at the Vision Objects Site in regard to getting a better HWR solution. I think the recognition engine used is the same that Apple used with the last series of the Newton. They have a port for Linux and are looking for people to get it to work on Linux embedded devices. I have the PDF but have not looked at it yet, if true this would be one of the better HWR solutions out there.

jroman91

[richardg1952]

I've noticed the degradation in the keyboard sensitivity as well. It's the only real issue I have with the beta release.

[Simon]

I've noticed the degradation in the keyboard sensitivity as well. It's the only real issue I have with the beta release.
It's not just me then! It was fine before. Why did they go fiddle with it! Other than the sensitivity and missed keys the fingerboard works quite well. Looks ugly but works well.

[johsua]

They also put the + on the number pad in place of the -. Is there some way to bring back the -? I use it more than I realized... I hardly ever use the +.

[acdczip]

They swap the keys on the new os keybroad. And pulling up on the keys to get the capital letters are next to impossiable. Personally, I prefer to have bigger keys and no number pad. Also I want the word completion tab on the top of the keybroad rather than the bottom.

[bsterix]

How can i activate the new thumb-keyboard? I checked everything in my settings, but still the old "small" keyboard appera.

What ist meant by "activate by touchscrenn" and "activate by ...switch" (i forgot the exact name of the checkbox).

[=DC=]

@ bsterix

Activate by switch means pressing the middle button on the directional pad. I use to use the standard keyboard, but have learned to ues the thumb keyboard and have not looked back. It makes a huge difference when inputing large amounts of text.

[BanditRider]

They also put the + on the number pad in place of the -. Is there some way to bring back the -? I use it more than I realized... I hardly ever use the +.

You can change the keyboard layout by editing /usr/share/keyboards/en_US.vkb for the US-english keyboard. It's a pretty convoluted file but if you look at it for a while you'll see where the keys are.
I've attached a modified en_US.vkb file that has the + and - keys reversed. I also moved the _ to the shifted - and moved the ~ to the shifted @.

It works well for me.

Copy the attached file to /media/mmc1

Do this as root:

cd /usr/share/keyboards
cp en_US.vkb en_US.vkb~

this backs up your original file in case you ever want to go back.

cp /media/mmc1/en_US.vkb.txt /usr/share/keyboards/en_US.vkb
chown root:root /usr/share/keyboards/en_US.vkb
chmod 644 /usr/share/keyboards/en_US.vkb

A reboot is needed to use the new layout.

[Simon]

How can i activate the new thumb-keyboard? I checked everything in my settings, but still the old "small" keyboard appera.

What ist meant by "activate by touchscrenn" and "activate by ...switch" (i forgot the exact name of the checkbox).

This had me confused for a while. You have to literally touch the screen with your finger, i.e. be contacting a larger part of the screen then just the stylus tip.

As DC says the rocker option does mean the middle button of the direction pad. Personally I would have thought the volume switch on the top edge was a rocker and the four way is a direction pad.

And yes, the upstroke capitalisation has been tweaked now and it seems harder to get right. You can still use the stroking left over the keyboard to backspace and stroking right over the keys for space though.

Simon

[johsua]

You can change the keyboard layout by editing /usr/share/keyboards/en_US.vkb for the US-english keyboard. It's a pretty convoluted file but if you look at it for a while you'll see where the keys are.
I've attached a modified en_US.vkb file that has the + and - keys reversed. I also moved the _ to the shifted - and moved the ~ to the shifted @.



thank you so much! i'll give it a try.

[albertkarel]

They new keyboard is great. Very useful. I have
always left the keyboard clicking sound off, but with the
virtual keyboard, it's a good idea to leave the sounds on.
You can type quite quickly with two flying fingers!


I swore I was not going to upgrade until I was sure my
bluetooth keyboard would come along...but I did it
anyway and spent an entire Sunday playing.

VERY NICE....

Now...if only it had a telephone in it!!!!!!

But seriously...it's a wonderful unit....my favorite feature
remains the Internet Radio.

To add Accucast programs, like the one or two Nokia
includes, just go to Accucast.com and LOOK FOR THE
LINK TO THE MP3 FEEDS!!! Otherwise, you will get
Microsoft Player links that don't work with the 770.

[raminf]

To add Accucast programs, like the one or two Nokia
includes, just go to Accucast.com and LOOK FOR THE
LINK TO THE MP3 FEEDS!!! Otherwise, you will get
Microsoft Player links that don't work with the 770.I think you mean AccuRadio.com (http://www.accuradio.com). AccuCast is a online marketing site.

The link to the Mobile streaming radio is www.accuradio.com/mobile/ (http://www.accuradio.com/mobile/). Click on the channel and if you like it press the menu button on the 770 then Track/Add to favorites. It adds the channel to the opening screen radio player popup so all you have to do is select it and hit the play button.

[konttori]

I recommend using www.shoutcast.com as the source for finding good radio stations.

[chilko]

You can change the keyboard layout by editing /usr/share/keyboards/en_US.vkb for the US-english keyboard. It's a pretty convoluted file but if you look at it for a while you'll see where the keys are.
I've attached a modified en_US.vkb file that has the + and - keys reversed. I also moved the _ to the shifted - and moved the ~ to the shifted @.

It works well for me.

Copy the attached file to /media/mmc1

Do this as root:

cd /usr/share/keyboards
cp en_US.vkb en_US.vkb~

this backs up your original file in case you ever want to go back.

cp /media/mmc1/en_US.vkb.txt /usr/share/keyboards/en_US.vkb
chown root:root /usr/share/keyboards/en_US.vkb
chmod 644 /usr/share/keyboards/en_US.vkb

A reboot is needed to use the new layout.

hello,
what is needed to edit these vkb files?

[TA-t3]

The N800 comes with the 'vi' editor. (You'll need to learn the 'vi' command set to use it. And it's essential to remember the 'escape' hardware button - see your N800 instructions leaflet). There's also an editor available from the menu system, I have never used it so I have no idea if it even edits pure text files, or what it does at all. Or you can always copy the file you want to edit to an SD card and edit it offline on your desktop computer.

[chilko]

i'm new to linux, so this is a little confusing to me. i found some info about virtual keyboard here (http://maemo.org/development/documentation/how-tos/3-x/howto_him_bora.html), but i don't know what to do in windows. or it's only for linux?