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Comment by commandar | Hacker News Reader

Physical button = tactile feedback. I was wholely unimpressed by the soft buttons on the Nexus One and Moto Droid.

As for the trackball? Still the best precision text selection device I've used on a mobile.

This is why I cannot use my G1 as a music player in the car. I cannot manipulate it without looking at it, which I really do not want to do while driving.

My Sansa E500 thing is easy to manage by touch only (except if I want to see the name of the song playing); my eyes don't leave the road if I want to skip or repeat or pause a song.

Likewise, if I need to make or take a call while driving, and pulling over isn't an option, I want to be able to do a much as I can by touch, and not worry that a misplaced tap or glide on smooth glass has triggered some unwanted behavior.

Yes! I tried using my iPhone as a music player in the car and... useless. But it extends to more than that, I could make calls on my late-90's cellphone call friends with a flip and a button hold without looking, and mashing end-call always worked because it's a real button.

Now it's squint at the damn phone and tap around. Hanging up is just the tiniest bit more annoying without a hardware button (yes, I'm aware that many smartphones have a physical end-call button).

You should use the included headset or get a car dock. Either solution would give you the controls you need to use it as either a phone or music player without needing to look at the screen.

This is a problem best solved by the car UI, rather than phone/music player. Steering wheel controls (and/or voice commands) are FAR less distracting than any ipod sized device.

No, because the car is just one example of where I really do not want to have to look at a device in order to use it.

> Still the best precision text selection device I've used on a mobile.

I've had no problem with the iOS method so far, and haven't been longing for the return of the trackball at all.

I like the incredible buttons. Flush, but the phone vibrates a bit when you hit them.

One problem is that they all vibrate in the same way. If they had a bit different vibration patterns, you could simulate the type of feel you get with actual push buttons (e.g. you might feel that there's a right edge on the right button)

When it comes to text selection, how often do people use it? I ask that in sincere curiosity. I know personally that I only select text once, maybe twice a week on my Palm Pre. Holding shift and dragging through the text works great for me. Perhaps you meant in terms of positioning the cursor? Anywho...

Tactile feedback from keyboards/button has always been an issue with me, but I find that a slight vibration from the phone when a softkey is pressed does the job just fine.

> When it comes to text selection, how often do people use it? I ask that in sincere curiosity.

I do that pretty regularly to quote in mails and forums on my iOS device. But I think the issue isn't about how often it's used, but how seamless it is. If you can do it without thinking about it, it's good. If you have to stop when you need to select text, it's not.

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