I'm not saying Apple invented it or would make a fuss. I couldn't care less about what Apple says. I'm just tired of everyone trying to turn the N800 into an iPhone.

Not unfortunately possible with the current engine.

I second Zerojay, however. You know there's a difference between innovation and imitation.

The thing is, Apple's got a good idea, and all good ideas end up being adopted by others. Their on-screen keyboard implementation has a few things figured out:

1) Symmetry is good. Both thumbs should be equidistant from the gap between the G and H keys (in a US QWERTY layout, at least.)
2) Less is more. While Apple went a little too far (try entering a WEP key on the iPhone,) you want to keep the key count low, so you're not fumbling around too much with yet another vendor-specific keymapping for anything beyond the obvious.
3) Bigger is better. Big keys are easier to hit, so bump up the size, and show the user exactly what they're hitting.
4) You should see what you're doing. Nokia's on-screen thumbboard hides the actual input field that you're trying to use. People are used to seeing what they type end up in the right spot.

The problem, however, is the tackiness of the 770 and N800 screens. I don't mean that from an visual perspective, just from a physical feedback perspective. The digitizer layer perceptibly sticks to the glass/plastic underneath on the N800, resulting in a palpable deformation with every keypress. The iPhone feels much more solid, due to its design, and so I'm more comfortable sliding my thumbs across the screen.

That's really the big new idea that Apple's brought to the table, and it's one that we can't emulate in software. While you're meant to touch the screen on the N800, you're meant to *glide* on the iPhone's screen. Once you get the hang of this, typing and overall navigation becomes much, much easier than it is on just about any other passive digitizer device.

Oddly enough, the only other time I've felt this sort of physical feedback was from active-digitizer Tablet PC units, where the stylus glides much more naturally than on the passive units.

What this tells me is that Apple's ideas should be adopted *where appropriate.* Some things may have to change for the Nokia, which has the input limitation of expecting you to tap, and not slide-and-release.

I don't think we should blatantly copy it ..
but improve on it like..

1) Place the period key on the first screen <KEY>
2) Make the letters capital when you press shift(like the way the builtin keyboard)
3) make the keys bigger ..

One major flaw is that the keyboard clicks even if it doesn't input a character. This happens easily when typing quickly and you press the other thumb before letting go of the first. In this situation it should of course input both letters and click twice, but it clicks once and doesn't input anything. The lack of second click alerts you to repeat the second letter, but at least I don't realise that the first letter is missing too.

So the keyboard should be able to handle input even if there is no pause between letters. We are writing with two thumbs after all.

Gotta agree with Raptor, dennylam and Naranek. These are simple common-sense ideas. Why is it, though, that this sort of discussion tends to polarize for some people? I don't get that.

because the nerds always love to hate the cool, hip, good looking rich kids that get all the chicks...

heh

haha.. touché

I'm personally a huge fan, and I hope to see it packaged in a way that allows it to be selected as the default (not replacing the default, but leaving it up to the user).

Apple can keep their visual style, I just want the word prediction/spell correction. Using the physical proximity of letters to weight the corrections is very clever and very useful.

I don't want to give up my punctuation keys though. At the very least, the multi-function . key on the landscape thumbboard is just too handy. I guess you could add ; ' / to the . key and shuffle the keys around a bit, but I don't mind the way things are.

And as for the 'I can see what key i hit' feature, that just sounds superfluous. I can already see what key i just pressed, because I'm looking at the cursor. And the key I just pressed isn't even that useful when you have the iPhone's superior prediction/correction logic.

Who cares if you missed W and hit Q? Just keep typing and it'll all shake out in the end.

In any event, improved correction/prediction alone would help everyone and be welcomed independent of layout. I'd very much like to see that in the next update.