Replying to Chording, Wearable Computers And Cheaper Laptops

Yeah, that is pretty cool. And, you know what? I think I would be one of those people who'd be too lazy to learn something other than the QWERTY layout, especially when it first comes out. I am not one of those people who jumps at the first opportunity to grab the newest technologies. At the moment, I'm fine with typing with a solid keyboard; I can do 50-60 WPM anyways, and if I were to learn chording, well, I don't think I'll type as fast (at least, not until maybe a year of two of practice).

But in the future, as technology advances and everything shrinks in size (laptops, MP3 players, PDAs...), I think designers will begin to see that chording would be really useful (since you won't have space for a keyboard whatsoever on those tiny devices), and eventually, chording will become mainstream. Keyboards will become a thing of the past (like floppies).

For now though, I'll stick with the old-fashioned keyboard.

Serena

As a science fiction reader (and writer), the one gadget that I would love to see which isn't widely available yet, is the wearable computer. It's a screen shown inside a pair of sunglasses and a glove, which allows one to 'chord'. Chording is brilliant, you make a letter by combinations of finger presses, and other movements / gestures. So you can type one handed, nor do you need a table. I suspect that chording never took off because people are inherently too lazy to learn anything other than 'qwerty' unless they have to, which is why chording keyboards are only a niche market for disabled people (or graphic artists who want their drawing hand free).

Fortunately we see the problem with devices getting smaller, and there is no room for an input device except those nasty thumb keyboards. I think soon someone's going to digg up the chording concept and finally reinstate it back into PDAs (I say back into PDAs because one of the first ever PDAs, the AgendA, actually had chording buttons on it (although you did have to sit it on a table to chord.)

So what's so good about chording? 30 - 60 words per minute with one hand, and you could chord anywhere (unlike keyboard based input).

At the moment I'm frustrated by the lack of cheap devices. Surely by now someone slapped together a portable device that has a keyboard, a rudimentary screen, a little memory, takes AA batteries... surely you could pick up such a thing for under $50 dollars? Nope. Someone did slap up something like what I described, but they sell it to "educational' establishments as an electronic note taker, for $500! Which proves to me that colleges and universities have more money than sense.

Pretty soon, I think there will be decent little laptops available for less than $100, since the "one laptop per child program" took off, everyone's rushing to get in on the idea. My best bet, if I want something light and portable will be the Asus Eee PC, $200 and it's tiny. At the moment if I want a laptop that small they cost at least $1000. Sure it's underpowered, but that's the point. Right now my laptop is something of a tank. Actually that's not far from the truth. My wife's a bit clumsy, so I got one that's built to military standard 810F. It's Drop Resistant, Shock Resistant, Spill Proof; but that doesn't matter because it's so heavy I can't be bothered moving it off the table, unless I'm going to really need it. So it wont be long until we have cheap little runabouts that we can take where we can't even be bothered taking our laptops.

But the ultimate in mobility, is the PSION 5. It's small enough to fit inside a jacket pocket (or being in a tropical country I'd wear combats with big pockets to fit it in), has a keyboard you can squeeze 30-40 words per minute out of (big enough to touch type) sure it doesn't have WiFi (although you can buy a card), and it's got a black and white screen, but it runs on AA batteries, so armed with on of those, the dedicated writer would be able to write from the deepest jungle (yes you can buy AA batteries in the jungle (unless you're lost deep deep deep deep in the jungle - but even then you could write for days or weeks if you brought a few spare batteries)). I had one and it broke. Soon I'll buy another one, because I've really been missing it. They don't make them any more but you can buy them on ebay or factory reconditioned elsewhere on the web. Worth checking out. Or you can wait for chording to take off!