Pen vs. Keyboard vs. Touch vs. Everything Else 203
benz001 writes "In the run-up to everyone's favourite tablet, Phil Gyford goes back through his gadget collection and compares text entry speeds to see which one comes out on top. It's not what you'd call a rich data set, and of course the Qwerty keyboard comes up trumps, but the iPhone virtual keyboard came in a surprisingly close second, just edging out the Treo — and all the keyboard solutions regardless of how small and fiddly beat real pen and paper. This probably matches most people's experience (when was the last time you had to handwrite more than a bullet point in a meeting?) and gels pretty well with Macworld's predictions but I'm still hoping for sub-vocal voice recognition. (Jump straight to the final results here)."
Obligatory Dvorak advocacy (Score:5, Informative)
It's not what you'd call a rich data set, and of course the Qwerty keyboard comes up trumps
I of course have to mention the Dvorak layout. I encourage you to try it. Your hands might thank you (and fall in love), and if not you can always go back rather easily. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dvorak_Simplified_Keyboard [wikipedia.org]
Also, for some experimental geekery, trying to find out whether it's all the shit it's made out to be, see http://klausler.com/evolved.html [klausler.com]
That's it. Thank you for listening. My hands thank me for listening way back when, too ;)
Re:"trumps"? (Score:3, Informative)
Let me Google that for you - http://www.google.com/search?source=ig&hl=en&rlz=&q=%22comes+up+trumps%22&aq=f&oq=&aqi= [google.com]
Granted 38,500 is not an overwhelming number of results, but the phrase is certainly not unknown. Surprise, your idiom isn't somebody else's!
Re:We just need those little mouth shields... (Score:4, Informative)
Re:A keyboard's just a mouse with 101 keys (Score:2, Informative)
So track down a stylus that works with capacitive screens (they do exist).
Re:Slow QWERTY typer (Score:3, Informative)