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ShapeWriter?

A

adding2n2is5

Newbie
I just came across this cool app loaded it and using it today. Love it. In reading more there seems to be some conflicting info. Is the app a free trial or free free?
 
I came across it today too, after reading about it in these forums.

I un-installed it after 10mins.

Absolutely pointless - its far easier to type than draw squiggles, and as for writing words that have doubled letters, its a nightmare. Takes twice as long to write a message using this app, and I wasnt even prepared to give it the benefit of the doubt. Awful...
 
Using this app is awesome. I'm using it right now. Did you read instructions our watch tutorials? If you need to do a word with double letters you do it as if it is a single letter. The program figures out the word you wanted. So to type the word cool you just trace from c to o to l
 
Yes I read instructions and watched tutorials.

Its pointless.

Ok you get a choice of words to select should there be a doubled letter. On the default keyboard, it automatically corrects any spelling mistakes AND inserts any apostrophes.

Hey, it might look nice, but its pointless.
 
As with any program some people will like it some not
This app just like the default will auto put apostrophes and is very accurate at predicting the word you want... yeah sometimes you need to select a different word from list but you do that on the default sometimes to.

.
 
Pointless for some people granted, but you cant apply that to everyone. I love it, but its taking some getting used to. Probably because its just so different. So I'm gonna use it for a while before passing judgement.
 
Admittedly, especially in the case of those users who have never used a touchscreen phone before and prefer to use one finger typing, it could prove to be a useful app.

But...

lekky said:
I love it, but its taking some getting used to. Probably because its just so different.
Click to expand...

...if you can type proficiently, getting used to this app would be akin to trying to walk with both legs tied together... ...because its so different.
 
Just dl the trial, the full version was supposed to be pulled (and majorly fubared my phone the other night).

The trial works for 30 days, by which time, hopefully, they'll have the full (paid) version back up.
 
I can't find the posting now, but I'm sure I saw somewhere that the unlimited version of ShapeWriter is free for Android through the end of January. I'm not sure whether it's because I have it installed on my device, but I was able to search for and find ShapeWriter in the market app with no problem.
 
Auto-reply email received Saturday morning:

Please note: ShapeWriter Android full/paid version is temporarily
unpublished due to a glitch we ran into with Android Market set-up. We
are waiting for tech help from Google. Please be patient with us, we
will fix it one way or another and bring it back to the Market.
Meanwhile you may use the trial version if it has not expired for your
device.
Click to expand...

That's all I know. :)
 
I was able to find this on the Markeplace and download it last night. Been using it for Twitter and Texts, but think I'm going to ditch it. Can get on well enough with the normal keyboard, and using shapewriter take too long, and too many attempts needed to write a few lwords. No doubt I would get bettere with practice, but it hardly takes me an age to write a text anyway!
 
I've been using Shaprewriter for several months now and love it. I can complete messages far faster with this than I can even with G1's keyboard.

Maybe 1 word in 50 isn't found and then you just tap the "add word" option and you don't have to worry about it anymore.

The full version was, originally, a paid item but I noticed that they were running a special free upgrade to full during the end of December and in January. Probably to compete with a couple other slide-style keyboards coming out.

The developers are very responsive and there have been several nice updates recently.

I understand how this style of writing is not for everyone but I find that it's the easiest and fastest way to type on my G1.
 
Thanks for the heads up...downloaded the full version and uninstalled the trial.


Huntsman said:
I've been using Shaprewriter for several months now and love it. I can complete messages far faster with this than I can even with G1's keyboard.

Maybe 1 word in 50 isn't found and then you just tap the "add word" option and you don't have to worry about it anymore.

The full version was, originally, a paid item but I noticed that they were running a special free upgrade to full during the end of December and in January. Probably to compete with a couple other slide-style keyboards coming out.

The developers are very responsive and there have been several nice updates recently.

I understand how this style of writing is not for everyone but I find that it's the easiest and fastest way to type on my G1.
Click to expand...
 
you guys just wait until swype is actually out for the android. similar to shapewriter, but the accuracy of the predictive text is amazing. on swype, your drawings don't have to be as accurate as shape writer and was 95%+ accurate for me. you can 'draw' capital letters as well as double letters.

i used swype for my retired winmo phone, and not even berry's could not compete with how fast i was on swype. although you can not use two fingers to type, the keyboard on the swype is smaller and can transverse the area faster then 'pressing' individual buttons.

i can't believe i'm saying that i miss my WinMo phone... haha
 
I had the moto droid and installed swype...LOVED it! Got the eris and found out it won't work :( Finally found shapewriter on the market, but so far I am disappointed. It's not nearly as accurate in its word prediction as swype or the stock sense keyboard for that matter. I went to write "cat chow" and it chose "cat cum" instead!!! lol Glad I caught that one! I actually switched back to the stock keyboard. I hope that swype is available soon. Or maybe slideit?? Would like to give that one a try.
 
this is a good app. It does take some time to get used to but once you have had a go at it for a few days then typing a long email is much easier.

One problem I have with this, and I have emailed them about it, is how you change to capitals.???

On the earlier version you had to type your word, press case and it changed, either the first letter in the word, or the whole word. Try typing a password that way which has a mixture of CaSe like we are supposed to use nowadays.?!?!?!?!?

The new version I cannot even find the case button. I have returned to the stock keyboard. This really is a fundamental thing to get right. They have tried to be different, but in doing o they have gone too far. It should simply be, press shift, change case continue typing.
 
mylinuxbox said:
One problem I have with this, and I have emailed them about it, is how you change to capitals.???

On the earlier version you had to type your word, press case and it changed, either the first letter in the word, or the whole word. Try typing a password that way which has a mixture of CaSe like we are supposed to use nowadays.?!?!?!?!?

The new version I cannot even find the case button. I have returned to the stock keyboard. This really is a fundamental thing to get right. They have tried to be different, but in doing o they have gone too far. It should simply be, press shift, change case continue typing.
Click to expand...

There has been some discussion about this in the forum on the shapewriter.com site. I suggested that in literal mode the "change case" button should apply to characters rather than words, and their initial reaction was that that was a good idea. Whether they will actually do that in a future release is another question.

In the current version you can change individual letters in a word by moving the cursor immediately following the letter to be changed and hitting "change case" -- if the cursor is not at the end of a word, it just affects one character, not the whole word. That's cumbersome but it can be made to work. For your "CaSe" password, for instance, I would type "case", hit the "change case" button once to change it to "Case", then move the cursor between the "s" and the "e" and hit "change case" again, resulting in "CaSe". Voila!

(BTW, the reason they changed the "case" button to the "chasing arrows" graphic was for international non-English-speaking audiences. That lost a few English-speaking people along the way, though. Icons are nice, unless you can't figure out what the picture is supposed to represent...)
 
karib said:
Finally found shapewriter on the market, but so far I am disappointed. It's not nearly as accurate in its word prediction as swype...
Click to expand...

I haven't used Swype -- as a software developer I'm kind of sensitive to IP issues, and they've indicated that the current Android version that's floating around was leaked illegally and against their wishes, so I'm waiting for an official release before installing it on my phone -- but I agree that the current version of ShapeWriter has accuracy issues. If you're very precise in your strokes, it's quite good, but that's stressful and slows you down. I find that it mainly affects short words, though; with long words you can usually be pretty sloppy and it will still guess right, because there are fewer possibilities that match the long, intricate shape.

They have a non-QWERTY keyboard arrangement called "ATOMIK" on some of their versions that moves frequently-occurring pairs of letters close together. That should increase both speed and accuracy -- it's easier to be precise with short strokes than with long ones -- and that was enthusiastically confirmed by at least one person on the shapewriter.com forum who uses ATOMIK. Unfortunately, it's not available in the Android version, but several of us have asked for it and they seem to be considering adding it in a future version.
 
i just downloaded it and i find the keyboard its self is better than the stock one, even if your not using the word slide use for it. when i 1st got it i thought it was just a keyboard. then i see you slide your finger to make words and such. iv been using it for a few hours and i LOVE IT.
 
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