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Comment by crikli | Hacker News Reader

The one thing that really jumped out at me was that "thumbs" keyboard. I would LOVE to have that option on the iPad.

The rest of it looks cool enough, better than expected. For me personally I can't imagine going back to any version of Windows. Fool me once, shame on you, fool me...uh, you won't get fooled again.

But for those still on Windows this will be an interesting transition.

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The thumbs keyboard was one of the few things that made me think "UX red flag" -- since you can't really type on a touch screen without looking, the user will have to constantly dart their eyes from one side of the screen to the other. That would give me a headache.

After enough time I think you will be able to type on a touch screen without looking (given a decent autocorrect which is a must for a touch screen anyway). I've owned an iPad for about a month now and just typed this comment without having to look at the keyboard (sans the parenthesis)

I think a spit screen keyboard is a win, overall.

> After enough time I think you will be able to type on a touch screen without looking...I think a spit screen keyboard is a win, overall.

Thanks for the good laugh :)

:) I swear I went over the text twice to make sure it didn't have any embarrassing typo that disproved my point. Oh well. In my defense I make similar mistakes on a normal physical keyboard as well.

Yeah, good point, hadn't thought about that. But would that be different from now where you have to move your eyes from the text area to some point in the lower half of the touchscreen?

There's an app that features a similar keyboard, http://radialapp.com. I think I'll get it and see if what you're saying holds true in my sample size of one.

Edit: so I downloaded the Radial version of the thumb keyboard and it totally sucks. I'm typing this on my iPad keyboard and I don't think I realized that the iPad keyboard is pretty dang easy to type on.

This isn't meant to solve touch typing, although it may. It solves the issue where you have to move to awkware, hold the tablet with one hand, and then hunt and peck with the other, when you're standing.

There is an Android Thumbs Keyboard app for tablets: http://www.thumbkeyboard.blogspot.com/. Have heard a few friends rave about it.

I use it and I love it.

The thumbs keyboard is similar to 'dialkeys' from Origami UMPC circa 2006 http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/blog/2006/mar/12/origam... but with a more metro layout.

I would love the split keyboard on my iPad too, oh and thumbs that are 1/4 the size of my current ones :)

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