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iPad is NOT a product - It's market research
- Thread starter Ryan1524
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On a physical keyboard, I can type a lot faster than I can talk. Also, I'd hate to have to dictate a 100 page Master's thesis (longest thing I've written), I'd have no voice left by the time I'm done.
But you can still speak only one phoneme at a time.
And speech is only workable for some things. I've used dictation software, and I'm a programmer. Using dictation to write code is the torture of the damned. All those CamelCase Class names and such, unprounounceable variable names, pronounceable but context-dependent names (like 'c', 'see', or 'see'), and all those punctuation marks that are simple to type as a single character.. colon, e period g period, bee equals bee plus open parenthesis see times correct that asterisk log open paren bee close paren close paren semicolon. I have literally keyboarded that faster with one pencil in each hand.
What's wrong with the touch screen keyboard?
First, I am not going to tell you that the "virtual keyboard" is perfect. It is a little cumbersome. I miss my apostrophe key. Now I am a not a Touch typist, so, I watch my fingers regardless, I type about 40 words a minute on a regular keyboard, and with the iPad keyboard, I type about 25 words per minute. I am typing this on my iPad keyboard, and have had about 10 typo's.
All that being said, I could get used to this. I don't need to feel the keys. I generally reread everything I type anyways. Like I said, I could get used to this.
I did buy the Bluetooth keyboard, but I have not even tried to connect it yet, as it is kind of missing the point of having a tablet. When I sit down to write my great American novel, I will use it.
First, I am not going to tell you that the "virtual keyboard" is perfect. It is a little cumbersome. I miss my apostrophe key. Now I am a not a Touch typist, so, I watch my fingers regardless, I type about 40 words a minute on a regular keyboard, and with the iPad keyboard, I type about 25 words per minute. I am typing this on my iPad keyboard, and have had about 10 typo's.
All that being said, I could get used to this. I don't need to feel the keys. I generally reread everything I type anyways. Like I said, I could get used to this.
I did buy the Bluetooth keyboard, but I have not even tried to connect it yet, as it is kind of missing the point of having a tablet. When I sit down to write my great American novel, I will use it.
The iPad is with us now because some very expensive market research at some point said that the consumer would buy it.
It is much more convient than a notebook by far, especially after you get use to typing on it. I see it as an eventual replacement for the notebook.
At some point we will have flat keyboards that are virtual and have a space for jestures and pointing as the mouse won't be with us forever.
As far as the tablet form factor that the iPad has it will go through serveral revisions and improvements and may even roll up into ends when we get OLED screens but as far as it being useless and an interum step I disagree.
It is much more convient than a notebook by far, especially after you get use to typing on it. I see it as an eventual replacement for the notebook.
At some point we will have flat keyboards that are virtual and have a space for jestures and pointing as the mouse won't be with us forever.
As far as the tablet form factor that the iPad has it will go through serveral revisions and improvements and may even roll up into ends when we get OLED screens but as far as it being useless and an interum step I disagree.
I have to say you have a point here. Apple is VERY good at providing the bare minimum, but marketing that bare minimum as an incredible technological leap forward, then the next release giving us once again a bare minimum but once again marketing it as must have.
The ipad is truly a huge ipod touch, there is no way around that. You can see the complete lack of 1st party ipad applications as evidence that Apple really didn't put much thought into the ipad other than "lets make a huge ipod touch", but then they really didn't need to other than text input, which is really the only mistake I think they made. Also someone mentioned the ipad doesn't need physical buttons, but I think this was a mistake also only in regards to gamers. You may argue that the ipad wasn't meant for gamers, but Apple is pushing it partly as a gaming device and even though we get the same people who say the type as fast on an ipad as on a regular keyboard saying they can game just as well with virtual buttons, that's hogwash from a physical point of view.
The bottom line is that Apple knew they didn't have to do a lot with a huge ipod touch, they were savvy enough to realize that would be enough to give people what they wanted and create a new market segment apart from PC's, laptops and smartphones.
Technically speaking, all commercial products act as product research. The company flogging the thing, no matter what it is, will look at the sales patterns and customer reaction then adjust their business accordingly.
The logic is simple enough: if lots of people buy something, you want to be making more of it, whereas if something's only getting a few sales, you need to make it more like the better product or axe it.
The logic is simple enough: if lots of people buy something, you want to be making more of it, whereas if something's only getting a few sales, you need to make it more like the better product or axe it.
Several million iPad owners clearly disagree with you.
The keyboard actually works pretty well - I can type at about half the speed of my physical keyboard, and several times faster than on my iPhone.
The iPad may not make sense to you, or even be useful to you, but I do think it's a well thought out product. You have to realise that it isn't a replacement for a computer. That's where I do all my 'heavy lifting' (photo processing, editing of documents etc.). My iPad is something I use when relaxing in the living room, and when I want to be as mobile as possible. I bought mine instead of a laptop as a second device. I even write articles on it (although I usually do a final tidy up on my Mac).
Who needs full words anyway.
LO = hello
Q = Queue
C = see
8 = hate
as in...........
LOLOAQICI82QB4IP
Or how about a real life example:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zkWMcRlE1mQ
Hello! Hello! A queue I see I hate to queue before I pee
hmmm.. I don't get it
The QWERTY keyboard was originally designed to slow down people in order that the letters on the end of the levers didn't clash and get stuck.
So I agree, there has to be a better way.
I noticed on the Katakana keyboard that possible words build up across the top of the keypad as more 'letters' get typed. I wonder if this would work for the Western words?
I hate waiting in line for bathrooms, too.
The biggest problem with the touch screen is that it's a binary proposition, either you're touching it or you're not. There's no inherent way to tell whether you meant to touch it or if it was a mistake, a miss, brushing the back of your finger along another part of the screen, etc. With a real keyboard there is a third state where you're touching the key but not actually pressing it down, and with the current touch keyboard model there's no way to distinguish this. That's why there's so much work invested in the auto-correct features, to reduce the impact of losing this important state.
The other problem with the touch keyboard is that there's no way to distinguish the edges of keys by feel. This can still happen on a physical keyboard -- if I try to type "hello" but my fingers are consistently off to the left by one key, I get "gwkki". But I'm either on the "h" or the "g", and not in between, because my fingers can tell that I'm on the edge of a key and I have to choose one. With a software keyboard, I might touch right in between the "g" or the "h" -- which one did I mean? And since my fingers can't feel the difference, I might type an entire word or more before I look and realize that I've been completely off.
I don't see why not, and I've been wishing Apple would implement this. The Japanese keyboard remembers the most recent words you used, so sometimes I find I'm able to "type" out fairly lengthy sentences with just a few keystrokes. Like, if this was implemented in English, when I'm typing "patent cooperation treaty," I'd just have to type "p," tap, "c," tap, "t," tap.