Kii Keyboard - OMG! Watch out Swype & SwiftKey Flow!

[lexluthor]

New Swiftkey flow beta out today. Can now flow in (almost) all fields. Back to trying that out.

 

[bruce73]

New Swiftkey flow beta out today. Can now flow in (almost) all fields. Back to trying that out.

Funny, so did I. I lasted about one minute before I started to miss Kii. So I uninstalled Flow...again. If and when they ever take Flow out of beta and make it an added feature to SwiftKey3 (which I've already paid for), I'll keep it as a backup.

 

[UncleMike]

Funny, so did I. I lasted about one minute before I started to miss Kii. So I uninstalled Flow...again. If and when they ever take Flow out of beta and make it an added feature to SwiftKey3 (which I've already paid for), I'll keep it as a backup.

Same here. SwiftKey Flow has a long way to go in my book. But then, it seems pretty obvious to me (because I have Jelly Bean on my Nexus) that the Kii developer started with the Jelly Bean keyboard - so a lot of the work was already done. All we're testing is the modifications to it. I Kii included some way to capitalize individual words as part of the typing gesture, I don't think I would even try SwiftKey Flow any more (and I've already paid for SwiftKey too).

 

[Methos1979]

I continue to really like Kii and have yet to stray from it. I am, however, beginning to notice a seemingly degradation in the word selection process. It seems to constantly select the most ridiculous words (ie: not common) when there are multiple choices of much more common words to choose from. And no matter how many times I 'correct' the word to the one I want it doesn't seem to be learning. I'm not even sure that this ability exists as part of this program but it should since the apps it's going up against do well to varying degrees in this category.

A couple quick examples that come to mind are 's' instead of 'a'. You would think that the program would automatically know that if someone enters a lone 's', they really meant 'a', right? I constantly get 'I'd' instead of 'is' when I would argue that 'is' is more common. There are others - many - but my mind is failing me right now.

It just seems that when I first loaded up the program that the word choices were dead on and the longer I go with the program, the worse it's getting instead of better. I understand this is still beta and so maybe that has something to do with it but I thought I'd post this here so others can chime in if they have noticed this issue and also so the devs can see it should they be watching.

 

[Eric618]

I haven't noticed that. My only gripe is some lag that seems to be worsening.

 

[bruce73]

I continue to really like Kii and have yet to stray from it. I am, however, beginning to notice a seemingly degradation in the word selection process. It seems to constantly select the most ridiculous words (ie: not common) when there are multiple choices of much more common words to choose from. And no matter how many times I 'correct' the word to the one I want it doesn't seem to be learning. I'm not even sure that this ability exists as part of this program but it should since the apps it's going up against do well to varying degrees in this category.

A couple quick examples that come to mind are 's' instead of 'a'. You would think that the program would automatically know that if someone enters a lone 's', they really meant 'a', right? I constantly get 'I'd' instead of 'is' when I would argue that 'is' is more common. There are others - many - but my mind is failing me right now.

It just seems that when I first loaded up the program that the word choices were dead on and the longer I go with the program, the worse it's getting instead of better. I understand this is still beta and so maybe that has something to do with it but I thought I'd post this here so others can chime in if they have noticed this issue and also so the devs can see it should they be watching.

Yep, totally agree, especially about the lone 's'. Another one was constantly getting 'asp' for 'app'. I finally blacklisted asp (took the chance I'd probably never miss it, lol), and that worked. The Kii developer said that adding 'app' to the User Dictionary would do the same thing.

I would also like to see the predictions learn a bit better. Maybe I'm not using the keyboard enough.

 

[Methos1979]

Yep, totally agree, especially about the lone 's'. Another one was constantly getting 'asp' for 'app'. I finally blacklisted asp (took the chance I'd probably never miss it, lol), and that worked. The Kii developer said that adding 'app' to the User Dictionary would do the same thing.

I would also like to see the predictions learn a bit better. Maybe I'm not using the keyboard enough.

Glad to know it's not just me. I'm sure part of my problem is that since I'm using a smaller keyboard to facilitate single thumb gesture typing, I'm more prone to mistakes. But again, that is where a programs ability to learn from you correcting comes into play.

Since we are still in beta I'm not going to lose faith. However, I might go back and try both Swype and SKF just to get a feel for how those two are coming along, especially since SKF as another release. Gotta go install that one first though.

 

[Methos1979]

Okay, so I just downloaded the latest SKF update and then literally played around with all three major keyboards I use - Kii, Swype and SKF. I did some speed texting of the same random sentences on all three and here is what I found:

Kii - part of my problem I think with Kii is in reducing the size of the keyboard by using the padding feature. Once I went back to full size (0 padding) my texting accuracy went back to being much better like when I first installed and tested this keyboard. Another thing I really like about the full size Kii is that the comma button is right on when I press and hold that key. As you probably know, pressing on this key brings up a plethora of various punctuation marks but when the keyboard is shrunk via padding, the comma is no longer the one highlighted, at least when it's set up for a lefty.

Using Kii I had probably the best results in correct typing of my random sentences.

Swype and SKF did nearly as well, and about the same as each other, but not as good as Kii. SKF does have superior next-word prediction but I really found I don't use it as much for some reason. Probably because I just never really tried. I do like the SKF gives you next-word prediction in the middle with suggested alternate words for the current word on either side. Kii gives you current word suggestions in the center and a couple addition all choices on either side. Only if you press on the correct word do you then get a next-word suggestion. I find this unnatural. If I've got the right word already there is no reason to bother hitting it. Also I find with both Kii and SKF that the next-word predictions are hit or miss at best, which is probably why I never used it much in SKF.

Now that I have gone back to the bigger Kii keyboard, the propensity to hit the friggin' s key all alone in place of the a key is even more a problem. I hope the devs are reading and really take care of this. I still find it hard to watch the words I'm typing and correcting on the fly. I prefer to keep typing and then correcting afterwards. I would like to see Kii adopt the SKF like process of offering next word in the center with current word suggestions on the side. I do like the ability to press long the suggested word which then brings up a huge list of other suggestions.

I'm going to experiment with some different padding amounts on the Kii keyboard to see at what point I start to see more error creeping into my typing. That's all for now!

Quick edit: I went with 5% padding on both sides and that seems to be a good amount where the keyboard is smaller and easier to get to with little to no mistakes but it does move the comma key off one point to the side and now the exclamation point is the default for the long press. It would nice if the devs could somehow lock that positioning so that no matter how much you move the padding the comma always comes up as the default selection for the long press on the period.

 

[bruce73]

@Methos1979: Great analysis.

Do you find that Swype is more forgiving with sloppy swiping than Kii? I do, which is the one thing I like about it. For me, if I can swipe efficiently without having to constantly correct and interrupt the flow, next word prediction becomes less important.

But I do agree that the SKF method of next word in the center with current word corrections on either side is preferable. And, if the predictions are learned well, and you can put together quite a few in a row, interrupting the swiping isn't so much a problem. That's one thing SKF's got right.

But my heart belongs to Kii. ;-)

 

[Methos1979]

@Methos1979: Great analysis.

Do you find that Swype is more forgiving with sloppy swiping than Kii? I do, which is the one thing I like about it. For me, if I can swipe efficiently without having to constantly correct and interrupt the flow, next word prediction becomes less important.

But I do agree that the SKF method of next word in the center with current word corrections on either side is preferable. And, if the predictions are learned well, and you can put together quite a few in a row, interrupting the swiping isn't so much a problem. That's one thing SKF's got right.

But my heart belongs to Kii. ;-)

Thanks, Bruce. I initially thought Skype was more forgiving but when I did repeated 'fast & sloppy' gesture typing on all three it was pretty much the same as SKF and once I went back to the stock sized Kii keyboard (ie: full) then Kii seemed to be the most forgiving which was the way it seemed when I first loaded it on the phone.

Other than that I agreed with everything you said - SKF has got the best predictor/current word suggestion scheme but so far at least, Kii has my heart too.

I'll probably do more A/B/C'ing over the next days and weeks until the final versions of Kii and SKF are available. Who knows, perhaps there is some industrious little developer out there taking all this in and will launch yet another beta keyboard program that actually does an even better job of combining the very best of the big three!

 

[Methos1979]

FYI - there is a Google + community dedicated to the Kii keyboard. This seems to be where the devs are taking direct feedback from. I just went over and left some comments as well.

 

[Bren S.]

Just installed this keyboard. Thanks for the info.

 

[hel22]

Is there an app that changes the default qwerty keyboard to azerty? It drives me crazy on my Xperia u since I live in an azerty country.

 

[ktchong]

SwiftKey Flow is now officially released. I installed Flow a couple days, and have been using it since then. (I did not try the beta.) I'd been using Kii for about a month before I installed Flow.

So far, SwiftKey Flow has been far superior than Kii.

Kii has troubles recognizing "apps", "business", and words with two successive repeated letters. I emailed the Kii developer and reported the problem almost a month ago, and they still have not fixed that one basic problem. I have not had that problem with SwiftKey Flow. (Kii has a few other problems with gesture/swype recognition, which I can't remember at the moment.)

Kii is still pretty good, but just not as good as SwiftKey Flow. Flow is not just a little better than Kii, but a lot better. I think Kii's advantage is it has a lot more customization options. I prefer a gesture/swype keyboard that has excellent recognition, not one with dozens of customization settings but keep making mistakes in recognizing basic words like apps and business.

Switching over to Kii to add this part: Kii mistakes "apps" as spots or APS, "business" as business's.

Also, if SwiftKey made a mistake in recognition, and I corrected the mistake by selecting the correct word, then Swiftkey would remember the correction and would not make the mistake again. I have corrected "apps" and "business" with Kii over and over again, but Kii still make the same mistakes every time.

 

[UncleMike]

Kii is still pretty good, but just not as good as SwiftKey Flow. Flow is not just a little better than Kii, but a lot better.

I couldn't disagree more. I can tweak Kii to deal with its trouble recognizing certain words, but SwiftKey's next word prediction bugs the crap out of me because I prefer to be presented with possible corrections to the previous word instead, and there's no way to change this behavior in SwiftKey.

I like Kii so much in fact that I bought it during the beta period even though I already paid for SwiftKey. I would pay $10 for Kii before I would use SwiftKey for free.

 

[ktchong]

Yesterday Samsung pushed the 4.1.2 Jellybean update onto my Galaxy S3. The Jellybean update includes a new version of Swype. (Previously the phone did not have Swype.) So I've been using Swype since the update.

I like it. So far, it's better than SwiftKey Flow and Kii. It has excellent swyping recognition and, more impressively, very high tolerance for typos (...or rather,"swypos".)

So my current rankings for gesture keyboards are:

Swype > SwiftKey Flow >>> Kii.

Kii has the weakest recognition and weakest tolerance. Kii still has serious troubles recognizing words with repeating letters like "app" and "business", e.g., Kii still mistakes "business" as "business's". Any good swyping keyboard should be able to correctly recognize words with repeating letters. Why can't Kii get them right?!?

I find that kind of recognition mistakes more and more unacceptable since I've been using the new Swype and SwiftKey Flow, both which have superb recognition. What is even more unacceptable is that, whenever Kii made the mistakes, I corrected the mistakes and put in the correct words a few times. Yet Kii continued to make the same mistakes, over and over again. When I corrected mistakes in Swype and SwiftKey, those keyboards would remember my corrections and would not the same mistakes again. That is a very basic function of an "intelligent" keyboard. Kii can't even do that.

I like Kii so much in fact that I bought it during the beta period even though I already paid for SwiftKey. I would pay $10 for Kii before I would use SwiftKey for free.

That's your pejorative. I paid for Swiftkey and SlideIt (which has fallen behind the new competitions,) but I would NOT pay for Kii until it can correctly recognizes "app", "business", and other words with repeating letters, or until it gets smarter and stops repeating the same mistake again and again. Those words are very basic recognitions that Kii or any good swyping keybord should be able to get right. Swype and SwiftKey Flow recognize commonly used words like app and business. Why can't Kii?? Why can't Kii recognize and correct the mistakes after I corrected Kii's mistakes??

 

[leeanne172]

I was using Kii until they went paid but have gone back to Swiftkey (paid) which is most likely what I'll keep using for now.

 

[ktchong]

Kii finally fixed the "app" and "business".

 

[UncleMike]

That's your pejorative. I paid for Swiftkey and SlideIt (which has fallen behind the new competitions,) but I would NOT pay for Kii until it can correctly recognizes "app", "business", and other words with repeating letters, or until it gets smarter and stops repeating the same mistake again and again. Those words are very basic recognitions that Kii or any good swyping keybord should be able to get right. Swype and SwiftKey Flow recognize commonly used words like app and business. Why can't Kii?? Why can't Kii recognize and correct the mistakes after I corrected Kii's mistakes??

Prerogative? You must have "flowed" that.

Seriously though - choice is good, and your choice may not be the same as mine, today. But as we all know, software updates introduce new bugs as well as new features, and as such, our choices can change. I'll continue to use Kii until I find something I like better.

 

[Stuntman]

Back in January, I switched to the Kii keyboard from Thumb Keyboard. I like the various layouts and use the landscape split layout most of the time.

A couple of weeks ago, I tried the latest version of Swiftkey. I saw a video that convinced me to try it. I tried it a long time ago, but did not like it for various reasons. This time, I spent more time and actually tried to use the text prediction. I am currently sold on SwiftKey due to the text prediction.

The great thing about SwiftKey is that it does a very good job at predicting what I want to type. Also, unlike other keyboards, SwiftKey only presents me with 3 choices for what word it thinks I intend to type. The most likely choice is always at the centre above the keyboard (with the other two flanking it on either side). This presentation allows me to only look at one spot when I finish typing a word. Other keyboards present many predicted words and I find that with those keyboards, I spend too much time scanning the list of predicted words which slows me down. After using Swiftkey, I find that I am typing more accurately and faster than ever before on a phone.

Just a bit of background on me. I have always preferred phones with a physical, landscape slider keyboard over touch screens. I got an SGS3 last July. For a long time, I dreaded typing on this phone with various keyboard. After getting SwiftKey, I must concede that SwiftKey on my SGS3 touch screen gives a better typing experience than with any physical keyboard phone I have ever used.

I mostly type with 2 thumbs in landscape. Occasionally, I would type one handed. I do this if I am lying down with auto rotate turned off. When I type one handed, I would use the Flow feature. I find that Swiftkey Flow does a good job of predicting my words and most of the time will find the right word.

Ever since I started using Swiftkey, I really enjoy typing on my phone again. Before, I would minimise the typing on my phone. Now, I do more typing in a week on my phone than I did in a month before. I would say the downside is that I like typing so much that it is draining my battery more than ever. Kii was impressive when I was using it, but SwiftKey just blew it away. Not even close.

 

[Methos1979]

I decided to go back and give SwiftKey Flow a good, long, fair try. So I bought the paid version and loaded it up. SKF is no doubt a great program. The predictive text is really good and there were occasional texts where I could just choose all the words from the suggested bar. It didn't happen often, but occasionally and it's a neat feature for sure.

But after three solid days I had to go back to Kii for the following reasons:

I don't use predictive words that often anyway, mostly I suppose because I'm not used to it. Maybe if I tried it longer but it seemed kinda almost gimmicky.

Another biggie for me is that once the last word typed in SKF is there - to go back and get rid of it I had to manually backspace over the entire word. On Kii, if you want to kill the last word typed a simple backspace deletes the whole word. Or you can arrow back to do individual letters.

Dedicated number row.

The ability to use aftermarket themes. The SKF ones are not bad, but nearly as good as the one I'm currently using that I love. (go back to first page of posts to see some great examples)

The ability to add custom phrases. I have a ton in there that really help with my 'shorthand' texting.

I found my texting wasn't nearly as accurate with SKF over Kii most likely due to the ability to customize my keyboard's size and padding left to right, up and down. It took a little while but I definitely found the perfect settings for me. Wit hSKF I could only adjust between large and small size.

If SKF has some of these features I couldn't find them from the menu in SKF. Anyway, I have both paid versions now and I'm sure I'll go back on occasion to check out any SKF updates, but for me at least, Kii is hands down a better keyboard.

 

[walpow]

I've been going back and forth between Swiftkey Flow and Kii. I like the next-word prediction in SK - it's a little rush every time I can type a bunch of words in a row by just choosing its predictions. But how often does that really happen? Not that often, with the type of typing I do on my phone and tablet.

One thing that truly bugs me about SK (and other keyboards) is that when you complete a word and a space has been inserted, if you then indicate the field is complete, the space remains. So whenever I do a task list entry, for instance, it ends with a space. Perhaps not so big a deal. But where it really drives me crazy is when, say, renaming an app link or folder. Let's call this Astronomy, I say, and partway through SK figures it out, and gives the suggestion, and I hit it, and I get Astronomy_. So I have to backspace before saying OK.

Kii, on the other hand, when it predicts Astronomy, is kind enough not to append the space when I say OK.

I know. Most people don't care about the extra space. But most people aren't as OCD as I am.

 

[bruce73]

I am, lol. And I agree with every thing you say, especially about the automatic spacing (it's really annoying when you're trying to write the name of a file with its extension) .

Because neither keyboard is all that forgiving with sloppy swiping (not like Swype) I do like SKF's predictive ability and the fact that it learns much more quickly than Kii. Most of the time I don't know how Kii is coming up with its predictions and it doesn't get better at it. Maybe I don't use it enough because, like you, I'm constantly switching back and forth. I like the customizations available with Kii, but bottom line I will use the one where I have to make the fewest corrections.

 

[tcat007]

I too keep switching between SKF and Kii. I like the look of Kii (because you can make it look anyway you want), but I like "feel" of SKF a little better. I also see that Kii builds up a large running memory, where SKF stays relatively low. Using SKF at the moment.

 

[Stuntman]

I decided to go back and give SwiftKey Flow a good, long, fair try. So I bought the paid version and loaded it up. SKF is no doubt a great program. The predictive text is really good and there were occasional texts where I could just choose all the words from the suggested bar. It didn't happen often, but occasionally and it's a neat feature for sure.

I don't use predictive words that often anyway, mostly I suppose because I'm not used to it. Maybe if I tried it longer but it seemed kinda almost gimmicky.

The value of the text prediction lies more in after you typed a word (or most of the word). I find that I often make mistakes and the predictive text can identify which word I meant to type. I basically just type the word and then look at the centre word that SKF predicted. If it is the word that I want, I just select it (instead of pressing the space bar).

I only use the next word prediction a bit if using Flow typing one handed.

Another biggie for me is that once the last word typed in SKF is there - to go back and get rid of it I had to manually backspace over the entire word. On Kii, if you want to kill the last word typed a simple backspace deletes the whole word. Or you can arrow back to do individual letters.

In SKF, hold down the backspace key to delete the entire word. If you only want to delete a few letters, then backspace allows you to do that.

I found my texting wasn't nearly as accurate with SKF over Kii most likely due to the ability to customize my keyboard's size and padding left to right, up and down. It took a little while but I definitely found the perfect settings for me. Wit hSKF I could only adjust between large and small size.

I would like more options to customise the SKF layout as well. There are a limited number of layouts and you can only choose from 3 different keyboard heights with each. I like the Kii layout for the most. I wish I had that layout on SKF. Overall, I rely on the text prediction to correct my sloppy typing. The text prediction I find is much easier to use on SKF than on Kii.

One thing that truly bugs me about SK (and other keyboards) is that when you complete a word and a space has been inserted, if you then indicate the field is complete, the space remains. So whenever I do a task list entry, for instance, it ends with a space. Perhaps not so big a deal. But where it really drives me crazy is when, say, renaming an app link or folder. Let's call this Astronomy, I say, and partway through SK figures it out, and gives the suggestion, and I hit it, and I get Astronomy_. So I have to backspace before saying OK.

Kii, on the other hand, when it predicts Astronomy, is kind enough not to append the space when I say OK.

I know. Most people don't care about the extra space. But most people aren't as OCD as I am.

The reason I originally did not like SwiftKey when I first tried late last year is the auto spacing. There was simply no way to turn it off and I found the auto spacing was rather inconsistent. I got fed up with an auto space that sometimes appeared and end up having to delete extra spaces that I didn't bother using it and switch to Thumb and then Kii later.

When I tried the latest version of SKF, I got used to the extra space. If I really cared, I would just backspace over it. There are also some quirks with regard to the auto spacing. If I select the word in the prediction row, it adds a space. If I then want to add some punctuation mark, it replaces the space with the punctuation mark and then auto spaces.

Since the text prediction is so good and how it presents the text prediction is handy to quickly look and pick, I have gotten used to the various quirks when using SKF. Overall, it only took me a few days to get used to them and I find the end result of my typing is faster and much less proned to errors compared to any other keyboard I have used.