sommar@enea.se (Erland Sommarskog) (05/13/88)
Gordan Palameta (gordan@maccs.UUCP) ) writes: >On a more general note, now that standards like ISO 8859 have arrived, >character sets have increased in size from plain old US ASCII. What >provisions will there be for inputting these characters? Say you want >to enter the copyright symbol into your text -- will every editor and >word processor simply define some haphazard set of inputting methods or >is anyone thinking about defining a standard keyboard layout? In my Emacs and TPU profiles I use PF1-<code>-ENTER, inherited from old EDT. Of course this won't do, if I'm typing them all the time. But I don't think the editor should handle this. It should be in the keyboard. The VT200 series does not support 8859, but DEC multinational character set, which is (approxamitely) a subset. I doubt that I would see this keyboard layout as the standard. First of all, you Emacs lovers would go crazy, since ESC is found as CTRL/3 (and possibly also F11). Not all charcaters are on the keyboard. Which characters you have depends on the country. From the Set-up menu you can choose between a variety of keyboard layouts, but of course the print on the keys is not changeable. If you choose Swedish layout all our letters are there but for brackets, braces and the at sign I have to use the "compose charcater" key. Not only it takes time, I have to remember how to get them, because they are not obvious. >In the long run, perhaps, chord keyboards would be preferable. There >would probably be a sizeable learning curve, but for sheer speed they'd >be hard to beat, and they could be used to input a virtually unlimited >number of distinct characters. Hm, are you talking of "compose characters" things here, or do I get you wrong? -- Erland Sommarskog Take C, a third class language ENEA Data, Stockholm and a C programmer, i.e. a third class programmer sommar@enea.UUCP => A ninth class program, a C program.
gordan@maccs.UUCP (gordan) (05/22/88)
In article <3279@enea.se> sommar@enea.se (Erland Sommarskog) writes: -Gordan Palameta (gordan@maccs.UUCP) ) writes: ->In the long run, perhaps, chord keyboards would be preferable. There ->would probably be a sizeable learning curve, but for sheer speed they'd ->be hard to beat, and they could be used to input a virtually unlimited ->number of distinct characters. - -Hm, are you talking of "compose characters" things here, or do I get -you wrong? A chord keyboard is like a piano keyboard, where each character is typed by holding down several keys at once. In the short term, this has a longer learning curve than ordinary keyboards, but the number of separate characters that could be inputted would be unlimited for all intents and purposes (and many people learn to play piano keyboards, so it couldn't be all that difficult). With this single input device you could touch-type all ISO 8859 characters, all Control-, Meta-, Control-Meta-, etc. sequences in Emacs, Japanese and Chinese characters, and so on, possibly even leaving one hand free most of the time for moving a mouse. Typing speed would also probably be faster than on QWERTY keyboards, given practice. This idea is not new at all, but nobody seems particularly anxious to market such a device. Probably for valid reasons... it would have a niche market at best (but I'd certainly be part of that market). -- Gordan Palameta uunet!mnetor!maccs!gordan
lisper-bjorn@CS.YALE.EDU (Bjorn Lisper) (05/24/88)
In article <1199@maccs.UUCP> gordan@maccs.UUCP () writes: .... >A chord keyboard is like a piano keyboard, where each character is typed >by holding down several keys at once. In the short term, this has a >longer learning curve than ordinary keyboards, but the number of >separate characters that could be inputted would be unlimited for all >intents and purposes (and many people learn to play piano keyboards, so >it couldn't be all that difficult). > >With this single input device you could touch-type all ISO 8859 >characters, all Control-, Meta-, Control-Meta-, etc. sequences in Emacs, >Japanese and Chinese characters, and so on, possibly even leaving one >hand free most of the time for moving a mouse. Typing speed would also >probably be faster than on QWERTY keyboards, given practice. I don't think typing speed would be faster at all, on the contrary I think it would be slower. As all keyboard players (in music, that is) know sequences of single notes can be played faster than sequences of chords. This is because for single notes you can start pushing the next key with another finger already when you're releasing the previous one. Advanced typists do exactly this when typing, too. When playing chords, however, you have to lift your fingers *before* you can push the keys in the next chord, since it is likely that you must use some fingers for both the chords. It seems to me that the same will hold for chord keyboards. What I say above doesn't mean that I think qwerty keyboards are the best possible, though. Bjorn Lisper
ok@quintus.UUCP (Richard A. O'Keefe) (05/24/88)
In article <1199@maccs.UUCP>, gordan@maccs.UUCP (gordan) writes: > In article <3279@enea.se> sommar@enea.se (Erland Sommarskog) writes: > A chord keyboard is like a piano keyboard, where each character is typed > by holding down several keys at once. > This idea is not new at all, but nobody seems particularly anxious to > market such a device. Isn't there a gadget called "WriteHand" or something like that? I remember it as a hemisphere with seven keys (the thumb had several keys to choose from) which could be plugged in as a keyboard. Don't forget, though, that a piano has 88 notes (less than ASCII, a LOT less than ISO 8859/1) and that learning to play one well takes *years*.
thorinn@diku.dk (Lars Henrik Mathiesen) (05/24/88)
In article <1199@maccs.UUCP> gordan@maccs.UUCP (gordan) writes: >With this single input device you could touch-type all ISO 8859 >characters, all Control-, Meta-, Control-Meta-, etc. sequences in Emacs, >Japanese and Chinese characters, and so on, possibly even leaving one >hand free most of the time for moving a mouse. Why not mount it on the mouse? Then you could have one hand free for the phone, coffee, putting greasy finger marks on the screen, etc. -- Lars Mathiesen, DIKU, U of Copenhagen, Denmark [uunet!]mcvax!diku!thorinn Institute of Datalogy -- we're scientists, not engineers.
lyndon@ncc.Nexus.CA (Lyndon Nerenberg) (05/25/88)
In article <29826@yale-celray.yale.UUCP> lisper-bjorn@CS.YALE.EDU (Bjorn Lisper) writes: [ Speaking on "chording" data entry devices ... ] >I don't think typing speed would be faster at all, on the contrary I think >it would be slower. As all keyboard players (in music, that is) know >sequences of single notes can be played faster than sequences of chords. >This is because for single notes you can start pushing the next key with >another finger already when you're releasing the previous one. Advanced >typists do exactly this when typing, too. When playing chords, however, you >have to lift your fingers *before* you can push the keys in the next chord, >since it is likely that you must use some fingers for both the chords. It >seems to me that the same will hold for chord keyboards. It all depends on what you're typing in. An average court reporter can handle 250+ words per minute on a steno machine (we have a couple in the office that are certified at over 300 WPM). This doesn't mean they type 1500 CPM (300 words * 5 char/word). Instead, they are entering 300 "strokes" per minute. Each stroke represents a word (OK, I'm simplifying it a bit...), and each "key" pressed to make up the stroke represents a single phonetic. The phonetics combine to form "words." So, what you really have is a moderately efficient data entry device (the steno machine) combined with a moderately efficient "compression engine" (the reporter). As you can see, this system is highly optimized for english language text, however it can be adapted to other "languages" by changing the "compression" tables. We thought about trying a dictionary for the C language, but C doesn't have enough unique words in the language to make it worth while. It should work *great* with COBOL, though :-) * Steno is a trademark of some company out there. -- {alberta,utzoo,uunet}!ncc!lyndon lyndon@Nexus.CA
kkim@uiucdcsm.cs.uiuc.edu (05/25/88)
> A chord keyboard is like a piano keyboard, where each character is typed > by holding down several keys at once. In the short term, this has a > longer learning curve than ordinary keyboards, but the number of > separate characters that could be inputted would be unlimited for all > intents and purposes (and many people learn to play piano keyboards, so > it couldn't be all that difficult). > Are there any good references for this topic. I am really interested in a theoretical background and/or some experimental results. Thanks. Kyongsok Kim Dept. of C.S.; Univ. of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign Arpa Internet/CSnet: kkim@a.cs.uiuc.edu uucp : ... {seismo, ihnp4, pur-ee}!uiucdcs!kkim
piet@ruuinf.UUCP (Piet van Oostrum) (05/25/88)
In article <1199@maccs.UUCP> gordan@maccs.UUCP (gordan) writes: In article <3279@enea.se> sommar@enea.se (Erland Sommarskog) writes: -Gordan Palameta (gordan@maccs.UUCP) ) writes: ->In the long run, perhaps, chord keyboards would be preferable. There ->would probably be a sizeable learning curve, but for sheer speed they'd etc..etc..etc... This idea is not new at all, but nobody seems particularly anxious to market such a device. Probably for valid reasons... it would have a niche market at best (but I'd certainly be part of that market). In article <29826@yale-celray.yale.UUCP> lisper-bjorn@CS.YALE.EDU (Bjorn Lisper) writes: I don't think typing speed would be faster at all, on the contrary I think it would be slower. As all keyboard players (in music, that is) know sequences of single notes can be played faster than sequences of chords. This is because for single notes you can start pushing the next key with another finger already when you're releasing the previous one. Advanced typists do exactly this when typing, too. When playing chords, however, you have to lift your fingers *before* you can push the keys in the next chord, since it is likely that you must use some fingers for both the chords. It seems to me that the same will hold for chord keyboards. Such a beast has been invented and marketed in Holland some years ago. It was called a Velotype or something similar. I think it had 10 keys or so, one for each finger, and you had to press one or two keys with each hand to get a character or a character combination. They showed some typists keeping at pace with spoken text! I don't know what happened to it, I haven't heard about it lately. -- Piet van Oostrum, Dept of Computer Science, University of Utrecht Padualaan 14, P.O. Box 80.089, 3508 TB Utrecht, The Netherlands Telephone: +31-30-531806 UUCP: ...!mcvax!ruuinf!piet
len@csd1.milw.wisc.edu (Leonard P Levine,1045E,5170,9624719) (05/26/88)
From article <1010@cresswell.quintus.UUCP>, by ok@quintus.UUCP (Richard A. O'Keefe): > In article <1199@maccs.UUCP>, gordan@maccs.UUCP (gordan) writes: >> In article <3279@enea.se> sommar@enea.se (Erland Sommarskog) writes: >> A chord keyboard is like a piano keyboard, where each character is typed >> by holding down several keys at once. A chord keyboard is used by the various Braille devices, such as the versabraille. It has a 6 key chord plus a spacebar and in the hands of a good brailler is very fast. Only 36 codes though. Check with your nearest blind terminal user to see it at work. len@evax.milw.wisc.edu