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Don't keyboards look primitive?

Hummer

Hummer

macrumors 65816
Original poster
Feb 3, 2006
1,012
0
Queens, New York NY-5
I was just sitting around doing nothing and I looked at my keyboard and I had this vision of some museum curator explaining that a keyboard was used as an input device during the 21st century. So now I'm looking at my keyboard and I'm just like man this thing really looks like something from the 80s. We should be ahead of this already.

What happened with speech recognition? I had tried Naturally speaking dragon when it first came out and then again late last year and it wasn't any better than when it first came out.
 
honestly, the mouse is almost a bit clunkier than the keyboard. i man the keyboard can have so much more power than a mouse really. and faster too. but it takes a lot more effort in the beginning and a bit more learning to get all the shortcuts down. but the keyboard is a powerful too.

voice recognition has come a long way, but i think speech is just too varied in terms of accents and individual 'lingo' that it just won't ever work perfectly.
 
Hummer said:
I was just sitting around doing nothing and I looked at my keyboard and I had this vision of some museum curator explaining that a keyboard was used as an input device during the 21st century. So now I'm looking at my keyboard and I'm just like man this thing really looks like something from the 80s. We should be ahead of this already.

What happened with speech recognition? I had tried Naturally speaking dragon when it first came out and then again late last year and it wasn't any better than when it first came out.
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why dont you freeze yourself at http://www.alcor.org/index.html this place and be reborn in the future to find out if keyboards is a primitive tool.
 
Cassie said:
No.
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Couldn't agree more.


Keyboards rock....much better then mice IMO.


I guess if you really want to look like your from the future get this
 

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zap2 said:
Couldn't agree more.


Keyboards rock....much better then mice IMO.


I guess if you really want to look like your from the future get this
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i can't imagine tring to type with that.. no feedback at all from the keyboard would be very wierd... although one might get used to it... and if it was something to use while on the run and only then... maybe i'd consider it...
 
Its hard to update something that people are so used to. Plus people like feed back feeling, so thats what makes a keyboard ideal. You have too much time on your hands.
 
Electro Funk said:
i can't imagine tring to type with that.. no feedback at all from the keyboard would be very wierd... although one might get used to it... and if it was something to use while on the run and only then... maybe i'd consider it...
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I've looked into buying them, but they cost like 150(if I remember corretly) and its wasn't worth it. Like my Apple keyboard...so there wasn't a need for me to go rish 150USD to see if I like it.
 
QWERTY keyboards are so widely used. They have been around for over 100 years. I'm sure if anything new came out, the transition would take over 20 years at least.
 
The keyboard will never go out of style, voice recognition will never work in an office type environment, Can you imagine 100 people all talking to their computers at once.:p
 
MacNut said:
The keyboard will never go out of style, voice recognition will never work in an office type environment, Can you imagine 100 people all talking to their computers at once.:p
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That doesn't even bear thinking about :eek:
I think keyboards are here to stay for a very long time.

FJ
 
Father Jack said:
That's one cool keyboard :cool:
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It is cool but when a keyboard could be an entire multi-touch screen that could change into volume sliders or a music keyboard, etc. it just doesn't offer the same flexibility and is probably dearer than a touch screen.

Had this come out five years ago it would have rocked, but it has missed its window.
 
Hummer said:
So now I'm looking at my keyboard and I'm just like man this thing really looks like something from the 80s.
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If you mean the 1880's, you're right. The QWERTY keyboard was patented in 1860 and in use by 1873.

There's a reason it's been around so long - it works. Now, the Dvorak (not John!) keyboard is said to have a significantly more typist-friendly layout, as the QWERTY is intentionally awkward to slow you down. (Betcha can't guess why! ;) )

Don't expect a sudden or seismic shift in input technology. While the physical form may change, I think the fundamental concept is here for the forseeable future.
 
JohnNotBeatle said:
...the QWERTY is intentionally awkward to slow you down. (Betcha can't guess why! ;) )
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<raises hand>

In the olden days they soon found out that keyboards where the keys were laid out alphabetically presented a problem when people were typing at speed – the rods that the letters were placed on became entangled together, meaning the typist had to stop and unjam them manually. The qwerty keyboard places the keys for letters commonly used together away from one another, slowing the typist down and making a jam less likely.

Of course, this mechanical limitation is unnecessary with computer keyboards, but the qwerty standard has stuck for the simple reason that it's the layout the vast majority of people are familiar with and have learned to type on.

Do I win a prize then? :D
 
Jaffa Cake said:
Of course, this mechanical limitation is unnecessary with computer keyboards, but the qwerty standard has stuck for the simple reason that it's the layout the vast majority of people are familiar with and have learned to type on.
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Back in the day I could and often did over type a 1200 baud modem. I would have to pause every couple of words to let the buffer flush otherwise I would end up loosing letters. In boggy java chat apps and the like i still occasionally run into issues but since I am not typing as regularly as I did back in High School my speed has significantly decreased. Back in HS I had illusions of becoming a writer. I forced my way through writing a novel. I then made the mistake of reading and realized that it was irredeemably crappy and that the struggle was in no way worth the results. Yes dvorak is much better for typists. Once you get past the learning curve you actually move faster. The current WPM record for typists is 212 on Dvorak keyboard

NO CARRIER
 
Electro Funk said:
i can't imagine tring to type with that.. no feedback at all from the keyboard would be very wierd... although one might get used to it... and if it was something to use while on the run and only then... maybe i'd consider it...
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I've used it...not too bad really...one more thing to charge really though

Jaffa Cake said:
Do I win a prize then? :D
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Kinda....they wanted to keep some reminiscence of the alphabetic layout, and had some other tricks: for example all the letters of the word 'typewriter' are on the top row so that salesmen could easily demonstrate the brilliance of this layout with a quick and easy-looking showing...
 
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