Faster Text Entry

Posted on September 4, 2007 by LJ

Originally published 1 September 2006

Around the same time that I started looking for a faster text entry way, one of the groups I regularly read started talking about the same topic. I got a lot out of it, and I’ll be reporting on my results here in the future.

The question remains “Why” do I need faster text entry? The truth is that I don’t do much entry on my PDA right now. I use Slap to make quick text entries during the day, and I check my to do list, but the bulk of my text entry is done on my desktop applications.

However, coming up is a challenge I intend to take up. November is National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo) and I will be participating. And one of the ways I will be writing will be on my Palm. I will have to produce about 1,000 words a day, and that will mean that I will have to take advantage of all free time I can muster — namely lunch time. And it will mean I will have to have some text entry method other than Graffiti to do it.

So I’ve been searching. I picked up the Palm keyboard, which unlike its predecessors uses infrared to connect to my PDA. Previous experience with a different keyboard fried my PDA at the time, so I was very leery of getting into any device where I was going to possibly fry my “brain”.

I’ve also been trying better text entry methods, based on the information from my group. Some of the software I couldn’t get to work, some locked up my machine, but I settled on a product that pops up suggestions for words as I write. That should help as well.

Is it feasible to do large amounts of text editing on a PDA? I guess I’m going to find out.

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