I got my technology working!

[andrewducker]

Whilst tidying the flat today* we found the bluetooth keyboard that I bought so that I could write when at writing group, before I had a laptop. It worked perfectly with my Nokia N95 (and possibly also with my N80, I'm not sure when I bought the keyboard), and was very handy if I wanted to write more than a paragraph of text. My previous phone had an earlier version of Android that didn't support bluetooth keyboards (I think support came in with the tablets in version 3), and that was frustrating. I spent many hours trying to get it working, with no success. With my Galaxy Nexus it worked instantly. Nowadays I use Swype on the phone, and while it's the best touch-screen keyboard I've used it's still nowhere near as good as an actual keyboard, even if said keyboard is a teeny-tiny folding one.

So now I have a keyboard I can carry with me when I don't want to carry a whole laptop around. I don't think I actively need one at the moment, but it's nice to know it's there.

*My mother is visiting the day that we get back from holiday. Between now and then we have precisely two evenings in the country, and on one of those we're meeting the Hotel Wedding people. Tidying is thus the order of the day.

Comments

[widgetfox.livejournal.com]

Swype is an abomination unto mankind.

[andrewducker]

Might I ask which if your children it stole?

Personally, I find it invaluable. It's the only phone keyboard I've used that drive me insane with frustration, and pretty every facebook comment or update I've left in the last couple of years has been made with it.

[widgetfox.livejournal.com]

Then you are way up the bell curve in terms of your ability to use it. In general I have found that its eccentric ways lead to messages that are more or less entirely composed of typos. This, whilst often entertaining, does not facilitate communication.

[andrewducker]

That's people who don't bother to read what they're writing. I'd say it gets about one word in ten wrong for me, and I correct those before I hit post.

People who don't read their work before submitting it don't deserve nice things.

[widgetfox.livejournal.com]

I am puzzled by people who can't spell check. But then again they are often puzzled by things I can't do.

[anton-p-nym.livejournal.com]

I've been using a Stowaway folding keyboard with my 7" slate for the past 5 years and I love it; small enough to fit in a shirt pocket but big and sturdy enough when opened to use at something approaching normal typing speeds. (>70wpm is easily attainable if you aren't using a lot of numbers)

-- Steve thinks it's a pity that they don't make the Stowaway anymore.

[despotliz.livejournal.com]

I think it gets a few more words wrong for me, but it's still way better than poking at the default android keyboard.

[cobrabay.livejournal.com]

I recently found my iGo Stowaway keyboard. I bought it years ago to use with my Nokia 770, but I didn't end up using either much. As I went through about 4 years using phones with their own slide-out keyboards, the Stowaway was forgotten, but I'm wondering if it will work well with my Samsung Galaxy SII. I like Swype, best touchscreen keyboard I've used, but it's still slow, and I'd hate to use it for a lot of text. I quite like Hacker's Keyboard too. It uses a lot of the screen space on a phone, I think it's aimed more at tablets, but very easy to type on, and actually makes ssh usable from touchscreen device rather than an exercise in frustration.

[steer.livejournal.com]

Oh yes -- I had a folding keyboard for my palm pilot years ago. This was after I spent the whole of a 30 minute train journey doing meeting minutes on my palm and discovered when I loaded it onto my computer that it was, in fact, only about 6 lines of text. Folding keyboards are absolutely brilliant as an idea. There's also something super-satisfying about the unfolding of them.

[steer.livejournal.com]

I don't get on with swype but I bought a phone with a slide out keyboard anyway (increasingly difficult to get) so I guess I don't have motive to proceed because the moment the android default keyboard annoys me (pretty much the moment I use it) I can switch.

[skreidle.livejournal.com]

Swype is the best on-screen keyboard interface for Android that I've yet encountered. It's even built into the Droid 2! (The downside of this is that it hasn't gotten any of the Swype beta updates. :P)

Which portable keyboard did/do you have?