First off: I text A LOT, so having decent text input options is very important to me. I send upwards of 3500 sms per month
I have known of Swype for a long time now. I enthused about it when i first saw it demoed, but later found it to be less than efficient; but that was on the Windows Mobile platform. Now I might have been a little bit harsh on swype in the past but seeing the final Beta up for open testing i felt I HAD to give it another chance. This is a new operating system after all, and there has been plenty of time to iron out any flaws. So here is my take on it:
it is well designed and feels like a lot of work has gone into it BUT I just don't see how it could EVER be faster than typing with the default Froyo keyboard. For one, you can only use ONE finger, standard keyboard lets me use TWO, thereby doubling PRODuctivity (!); for two, much as Swype's predictive algorithms are GOOD, the fact that the standard keyboard shows suggestions along the top bar as you TYPE is a lot more efficient. In the event Swype gets it wrong you have to highlight the word, press the Swype button in the corner and choose the alternative word. You also hit a stumbling block when it comes to punctuations too as Swype doesn't seem to suggest possessives or other grammatical nuances. So there it is: I'll be Swyping Swype from my Android phone and forever wondering why it even exists.
What do other people think?
leoni1980 said:
What do other people think?
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I think its terrible, horrible and YUK
Kev
Swype has a learning curve. Most people who learn to use it find that they type much much faster with a single thumb than with two.
I swype probably 5 times faster than I type, now that I have gotten the hang of it. Just keep practicing. At first it is slow and sucks. Give it a chance. Now I can't imagine typing on my Nexus without it. I really hate it when I have to go terminal to do something and then have to switch to HTC or standard keyboard to get the emulator to take the input.
moved this thread to general, which is the better place for discussions like this.
So if would type with three fingers you would get triple the productivity? Sorry, but this is BS mate. Same with making mistakes. I don't know about you, but I was making mistakes way too often on HTC_IME, and had to go back as well, or choose a different word from the suggestion list (which brakes my train of thought).
At the end of the day it is all about WPM and if you can squeeze more words on a traditional soft keyboard then do it. I swype almost as fast on my phone as I type on my laptop which in my case means really fast.
I can't imagine using anything other than Swype these days. I switched to it from HTC_IME a few weeks ago and immediately felt an increase in composition speed. However, Swype's dictionary can get a little odd sometimes and there is a definite learning curve when it comes to using punctuation. However, once you get used to it, it's better.
Also, if you are having trouble with possessives, just spell out the noun. Then, drag down to the apostrophe then back to the S. Swype will automatically put the correct suffix on the noun.
Swype has a steep learning curve. But once you've mastered it, it's painful to go back to the primitive way of typing. I think Swype will ultimately become the standard of touch interface. It's perfect for tablets too, knowing that you'll always have one hand holding the tablet and only one hand available to type.
I agree, after mastering swype, it blows everything else away. Also, you are ALLOWED to make mistakes with it versus if I made a mistake on a regular keyboard, it usually screwed up the word prediction.
I say give it a try, man. I disliked it at first too tbh, but now I won't text without it.
I like swype a lot. Just got it last night. It does have word prediction if you want it.
I usually use Swype instead of my Milestone's hardware keyboard!
I would hate to have to revert to the standard software keyboard since Swype is so quick and easy to use once you've practiced a bit.
The new Swype auto-punctuates for you (eg. dont will be don't). Each to their own really, I use Swype when I need to be one handed as I have the hardware keyboard for two hand times, it is a useful setup.
Swype is the faster keyboard, but is my opinion only
when the swype beta on my phone ran out for that day i felt handicapped trying to type on the default keyboard again
once you get used to it, its amazing
Forgot to say, read up up on the tips and tricks. It will amaze you how much faster it can become even after mastering it.
It is my #1 must have, most used app by a mile! I feel awkward even trying to type on a regular keyboard now. There is definitely a learning curve but once you get used to it, it is amazing!
After I got used to swype it's way faster. According to my own speed tests (timed by a stopwatch). I can finish a 40 word paragraph roughly 6 second quicker using swype, and I can FLY using tap keyboards.
It's far more accurate for me personally. For sure had a learning curve but I'd feel naked without it now.
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This might sound odd, but one thing I do like a lot about Swype is that it is fun. I like challenging it sometimes with super-long words, and it amazes me how it recognizes the swiping patterns. Now admittedly, I'm not a "power user" who needs to text and email constantly, so I could understand why people might tire of it, but for longer emails I actually find it very useful, and I think if I had to use my phone constantly, it'd grow on me even more and become invaluable. What I do love, and this is what make Android so versatile for me, is that we get the choice. It's easy to switch from the stock keyboard to Swype in a second, and that's valuable in itself, because so many other smart phones don't allow the user that much choice.
One other thing I forgot to mention is that unlike with the stock Froyo keyboard if you type with Swype you have to put in EVERY letter, much like with the old number pad T9. Just for example, almost every word I am currently typing with the stock keyboard requires only half or less of the actual word to be tapped out before it guesses and autocompletes it with a press of the spacebar. This is how I am able to type so fast. It basically ups your word productivity by about 50% at a guess.
A while ago I did some tests and found roughly the following order for my particular fingers (greater means faster):
Swype portrait N1 > landscape iPod Touch > landscape stock Android N1 > portrait iPod Touch > portrait stock Android N1 > landscape Swype N1
In landscape Swype is truly awful... the spacing is just too awkward to make it work. But it's very handy in portrait. Currently I'm on my Milestone so it works out nicely. For my N1 it would be nice to be able to choose separate keyboard options for portrait & landscape modes.
cmstlist said:
A while ago I did some tests and found roughly the following order for my particular fingers (greater means faster):
Swype portrait N1 > landscape iPod Touch > landscape stock Android N1 > portrait iPod Touch > portrait stock Android N1 > landscape Swype N1
In landscape Swype is truly awful... the spacing is just too awkward to make it work. But it's very handy in portrait. Currently I'm on my Milestone so it works out nicely. For my N1 it would be nice to be able to choose separate keyboard options for portrait & landscape modes.
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Agreed. I really wish I could have Swype in portrait and HTC_IME in landscape.
So I've tried Android Keyboard as well as Samsung's and GO keyboard, but I like Android Keyboard the best. Is there a way to hit a single button (or a button and a choose from a pop-up, either way a "simple method") to use other languages with Android Keyboard? I've been googling this for days and everything I've found was people saying "yeah this works but it's meh." So if anyone knows a language input for Android Keyboard more like what I described above, let me know
I'm looking for Chinese and Japanese in particular.
You try sogou input method
I use slide it. You use the swipe method or touch. I use a dvorak layout for my keyboard which is basically another language. There is a dedicated button for switching back and forth between whichever languages you have installed.
Sogou was 100% in Japanese/Chinese so I have no idea how to use it and the pics didn't look like a keyboard plugin
Swipe is awful imo :/ I prefer to just type. If anyone knows any good swype keyboard that's actually really good, I'll try that too but I just want a Japanese and/or Chinese (Simplified) plugin for Android keyboard
is there any korean too?
ScelestusAnimus said:
Sogou was 100% in Japanese/Chinese so I have no idea how to use it and the pics didn't look like a keyboard plugin
Swipe is awful imo :/ I prefer to just type. If anyone knows any good swype keyboard that's actually really good, I'll try that too but I just want a Japanese and/or Chinese (Simplified) plugin for Android keyboard
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Well, there are hands of Chinese/English keyboard developed by Chinese company. Unfortunately few of them offer enough downloading/handling support.
Hey i just got my new note 10,1
When i saw it had the posibility to chsnge the keyboard to a 2 part i was very happy...
But when i use that keyboard it dosent work right...
Example when i press the M key i got C insted and so on.. some keys is correct, but i can't find the solution to the problem
Can anybody help ?
With the two other keybords everything is fine
I happened to realise that typing is much harder on the split keyboard but i didnt notice that it was registering my inputs wrongly so im not sure about that. I tot it was just my fingers and the over-zealous autocorrect.
If its really a bug, we can only wait for a software update.
Anyone else?
no problems at all on my note... (language settings are on german input)
Sammy keyboard hints:
1. I have German and English keyboard activated plus T9 word proposals and switch back and forth depending in which forum I post :laugh:
Sumtimes accidently I switch to English or forget to switch back when I type German and THEN it´s a mess .............................
Word prediction is even more messy and unusable when You use the FLOATING keyboard.
Solution: before You get angry or You have no patience to train word prediction switch word prediction off (which I did) or set to have predictions only after 3 or 4 or 5 characters typed (settings!)
I have to admit Swiftkey is much better in this concern but not available as floating for Note 10.1
2. Split keyboard works nicely when word prediction is off. You might have the impression that keys respond wrongly but it´s the word prediction that types the wrong letters.
3. Either I am too clumsy or did not get it right but the change between the three types of keyboards with two fingers hardly works for me instantly. I always produce a lot of funny text until I get it switched ............... :laugh:
Maybe there is a tip from our fellows here to get the change precisely ......................
Summary: play around in keyboard settings and find Your personal settings that satisfy You .......................
@troed Thanks for the tip!
Didnt realise that the i could go into the sub-options under 'predictive text'. Awesome!
Maybe THIS thread could also be of help to You:
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1847817
There are a lot of "hidden" features, tweaks and settings that make the Note10.1 life wonderful
Takes some time to work through but it´s worth it......... :good::highfive::laugh:
Greetings to Singapore !
hello, how come swipe does not work for symbolic and numeric keys?
I also found that swpie does not work when running two apps side by side. Is this a bug?
Which two apps, which one is active and what style of keyboard are you using at the time?
As for symbols, I've never done swiping when using symbols so I have no idea. My first reaction to your initial question was "Is swipe using symbols even supposed to work at all? Given that swipe is a form of predictive text input how would the keyboard predict anything if you're not spelling words since it's all symbols?"
I can't use Swpie on numeric keys as well. Why swipe needs to be predictive? I use Samsung's virtual keyboard which came with the Note Pro? I don't remember the two apps. Will let you know latter.
hajime_android said:
I can't use Swpie on numeric keys as well. Why swipe needs to be predictive? I use Samsung's virtual keyboard which came with the Note Pro? I don't remember the two apps. Will let you know latter.
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I'm going to go out on a limb here because I primarily use stock keyboards on my Nexus 4 and this tablet. It's been a few months since I've used other keyboards such as Swiftkey which also supports swipe input . . . In any event my understanding of swipe input based on the keyboards that I have used is this: the keyboard application analyzes the locations that your finger is stopping at and the directions in which your finger moves from each stopping point in order to predict the word that you are attempting to spell. The word that you are attempting to spell has to be in the dictionary of the language you have the keyboard application set to. If it isn't, the keyboard will not recognize the word and will therefore not predict it.
As an example; on both my phone and my Note Pro I have the keyboard language is set to English US. If I attempt to swipe the letters X-Y-L-E-C on the keyboard, which is just jibberish and not a real word in the english dictionary, the keyboard will not recognize this swipe pattern as a word and will attempt to predict something completely different (my tablet writes the word "clef" instead).
So what I'm saying is, how would the keyboard application know to string together a particular order of special characters?
Your answer is likely to be that it should know based upon where you pause with your fingers and you're right except that this isn't exactly how swipe was designed. Swipe is meant to allow you to minimize how long you need to pause. If you start at the letter T, swipe down rapidly to H and rapidly change direction towards E you need not stop exactly on the E key in order to have the keyboard predict the word "THE".
Thanks. I am using the stock Samsung virtual keyboard (US English) that came with the PRO 12.2. Trying to input things like muzzy996 using swipe does not work.
Yeah, it's working as intended.
What irritates me about the stock keyboard is unlike Swiftkey it does not seem to allow for addition of a word into the dictionary easily and there is no obvious way to manage the dictionary.
This is really bothersome for me because in my writing for work I often use technical terms that are not in the default dictionary and I use these terms frequently in documents or emails. The predictive nature of the keyboard does not seem to learn my frequently typed words well at all.
I've just switched back to Swiftkey and will probably try using that for a bit to see if I like it more than the stock keyboard.
Which version of SwiftKey of you use? Mine is SwiftKey Tablet 4.4.6.275. Swipe (called flow in SwiftKey) does not work. It seems that they have version 4. Worth to upgrade?
I was using version 4.4.6.275. I believe they unified versions now, I'm not using the one for tablets (which I believe is now marked as legacy in the play store). In any case I have switched back to stock. SwiftKey is buggy when multi window is used. Often times the keyboard vanishes when typing in a window. Hopefully they fix this but I'm not sure when they will, I see posts about it in their support website that are a few months old.
Sent from my SM-P900 using Tapatalk
So I HATE GBoard with a passion. It does the job if you only write in English but if you also write in other languages it is a complete nightmare that makes zero sense and I feel like no localization team tested Gboard at all because the stuff it writes makes no sense and breaks simple language rules that are VERY VERY easy to program. In short: Gboard sucks big time.
Now if you ask on the net what keyboards are good you only get TWO answers: GBoard and SwiftKey. I feel like there aren't even any other keyboards around anymore. To put it short: I am also NOT happy with SwiftKey for several reasons (I can not find a cogwheel to change any options on the keyboard itself like I can on Gboard. There is also NO way to enable a keyboard that also has ö,ä,ü keys, a feature Gboard and other keyboards also do...that's just a few of those things I hate about Swift key).
So are there ANY other keyboards that are actually good for typing because all I have found so far is stuff like "EMOJI KEYBOARD!!! SUPER COOL NICE SKINS!!!111" I have been googling this for 3 years now, reading threads, asking at places but I haven't found ANY other keyboard to this very day.
I am using a Xioami Mi A1, I know I can not install a Samsung keyboard on it because of a different frame work but maybe SOME third party keyboard (HTC or whatever) got ported or something for this device or ported for any Android device? Thanks a lot in advance.
Typing on this phone makes me so angry that I am considering to even buy an iPhone (which are overpriced and don't let you navigate and create folders...why does everything have to be sh't?!)
Edit: also what nobody seems to understand (at least when I read keyboard guides) it is ALL about the text prediction and how a keyboard understand a language but everyone just talks about how you can change the colour of a keyboard or add a number row...
Example: Gboard turns EVERY verb into a noun (Capital letter) after a Personal Pronoun which makes no sense. There will NEVER be a noun after a Personal Pronoun, it will be a verb which will be written with a small letter but I always have to correct this because the retards at google can not even code such a simple thing.
given the amount of amazing replies I got here I would guess the answer is: NO, there are only 2 keyboards out there for android.
Amazing!
DNStuff said:
given the amount of amazing replies I got here I would guess the answer is: NO, there are only 2 keyboards out there for android.
Amazing!
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Try Hackers keyboard.
Sent from my SM-S767VL using Tapatalk
Buy a Samsung phone if keyboard is everything in your life. Samsung has its own keyboard app for its devices and works nice and smooth.
Sanskar Bhusal said:
Buy a Samsung phone if keyboard is everything in your life. Samsung has its own keyboard app for its devices and works nice and smooth.
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It's the only keyboard I like. Have a S4+ and the Note 10+, the keyboards are near identical and easy to use with a fair number of options.
Samsung also is the most customizable stock Android and the includes the keyboard colors.