Physical keyboards accompanying smartphones are now a thing of the past. Take for example, Verizon Wireless. Only 6 of the 31 smartphones listed online by the firm boast of physical keyboards. Even the Blackberry Z10 has an onscreen keyboard despite previous Blackberry models having a physical one. These keyboards have become obsolete mainly because virtual keyboards allow more accurate typing because they vary in sensitivity based on the user’s handling. Apple’s iOS offers a keyboard with voice dictation, which unfortunately has a lot of quirks and is not very efficient for everyday use. Flesky, a free alternate iOS keyboard, uses a complicated algorithm that allows a user to type without glancing at the keypad. Though it doesn’t replace Apple’s keyboard, it proves to be an ideal supplement to it.
Android phones usually have a lot of choices when it comes to virtual keyboards. The newly released Android 4.2 has added a gesture typing option which allows a user to trace a path over the letters that need to be typed. Sometimes, Android vendors tend to make the mistake of discarding the superior in-built virtual keyboard provided by Google for their own versions which tend to be inferior and erroneous. The Galaxy S III had a particularly pushy version of Autocorrect that made it difficult for a user to send even simple text messages. A simple option to replace these faulty keyboards is to check for other options in the Languages and Input tab in the settings menu.
Alternatively, Android apps like Swype and SwiftKey offer gesture typing too, which adds to their value by scanning a user’s e-mails, Facebook updates, tweets etc., if allowed. These popular mobile applications are easily accessible using the Google Play Store as well as the Apple App Store. Both free and paid variants are available. Priced competitively, they provide good and affordable alternatives to users. Adding external Bluetooth keyboards is also an option on iOS and Android.
This need for alternate keyboards has stemmed mainly from the fact that most mobile hardware developers don’t keep up with times, thus missing out on taking an advantage of already accessible gesture typing technology. With Android 4.2 incorporating gesture typing into the OS itself, the future could see Android (or even iOS) borrowing features from popular applications like Swype and Swiftkey.
