Designed with older adults to support better error correction in smartphone text entry : the MaxieKeyboard

Through our participatory design with older adults a need for improved error support for texting on smartphones emerged. Here we present the MaxieKeyboard based on the outcomes from this process. The keyboard highlights errors, auto-corrections and suggestion bar usage in the composition area and gives feedback on the keyboard on typing correctness. Our older adult groups have shown strong support for the keyboard

Towards high quality text entry on smartwatches

Smartwatches now provide users with access to many applications on smartphones direct from their wrists, without the need to touch their smartphone. While applications such as email, messaging, calendar and social networking provide views on the watch, there is normally no text entry method so users cannot reply on the same device. Here we introduce requirements for smartwatch text entry, an optimised alphabetic layout and present a prototype implementation together with preliminary user feedback. While raising some problems, the feedback gives indicates that reasonable quality and speed is achievable on a smartwatch and encourages our future work

Factor Analysis of Perceived Mobile Applications Use

Individual evaluation toward technology may influence adoption or usage of a new technology particularly instant messaging applications on smartphones. Davis (1989) introduced two main concepts that explain people’s usage and rejection of a technology; perceived ease of use and perceived usefulness. Perceived is an important factor to develop intention to use, to motivate, to affect, to predict, to explain, and to increase technology acceptance. As a concept, perceived also grows based on various contexts such as perceived usability, perceived enjoyment, perceived quality, perceived aesthetic, and perceived expressiveness. Those concepts were used to analyze information and communication technology acceptance particularly electronic mail (e-mail), mobile social games, social networking sites, and mobile apps. This article discusses elaboration of perceived mobile apps use as a main concept to explain instant messaging applications use. By applying a quasi-experiment, this article analyzes the confirmation factors of perceived instant messaging application use. This article reveals that perceived could be elaborate into main concepts of mobile applications use from psychological motives.     Keywords: perceived, instant messaging, applications, factor analysis, quasi experimen

Shortlinks and tiny keyboards: a systematic exploration of design trade-offs in link shortening services

Link-shortening services save space and make the manual entry of URLs less onerous. Short links are often included on printed materials so that people using mobile devices can quickly enter URLs. Although mobile transcription is a common use-case, link-shortening services generate output that is poorly suited to entry on mobile devices: links often contain numbers and capital letters that require time consuming mode switches on touch screen keyboards. With the aid of computational modeling, we identified problems with the output of a link-shortening service, bit.ly. Based on the results of this modeling, we hypothesized that longer links that are optimized for input on mobile keyboards would improve link entry speeds compared to shorter links that required keyboard mode switches. We conducted a human performance study that confirmed this hypothesis. Finally, we applied our method to a selection of different non-word mobile data-entry tasks. This work illustrates the need for service design to fit the constraints of the devices people use to consume services

QWERTY, QuickType ja Swype virtuaalinäppäimistöjen kokeellinen vertailu taulutietokoneen tekstinsyöttömenetelminä

Taulutietokoneet ovat suhteellisen uusia laitteita, joiden tekstinsyöttöä ei ole tutkittu vielä kovin paljon. Kosketusnäytöllä esitettävät virtuaalinäppäimistöt ovat yleinen tapa syöttää tekstiä taulutietokoneilla. Tässä tutkimuksessa verrataan QWERTY, QuickType ja Swype virtuaalinäppäimistöjä Applen iPadillä sekä kädessä että pöydällä kirjoitettaessa. Tutkimuksen tarkoituksena oli selvittää, mikä näistä kolmesta näppäimistöstä on nopein ja vähiten virheitä aiheuttava. Tutkimukseen osallistui 13 aloittelijatason osallistujaa. Testilauseiden kirjoitus ja tulosten laskenta suoritettiin tätä tutkimusta varten kehitetyllä internet-sivulla. Jokainen osallistuja kirjoitti jokaisella näppäimistöllä 20 testilausetta, joista puolet kirjoitettiin niin, että laite oli pöydällä ja toinen puoli niin, että laitetta pidettiin käsissä. Tuloksista kävi ilmi, että aloittelevat käyttäjät kirjoittivat nopeimmin ja virheettömimmin QWERTY-näppäimistöllä. Osallistujat kuitenkin kokivat vaihtoehtoiset tekstinsyöttötavat tehokkaimmiksi. Pöydällä kirjoittaminen oli merkitsevästi nopeampaa ainoastaan QWERTY-näppäimistöllä

Thumb + Pen Interaction on Tablets

ABSTRACT Modern tablets support simultaneous pen and touch input, but it remains unclear how to best leverage this capability for bimanual input when the nonpreferred hand holds the tablet. We explore Thumb + Pen interactions that support simultaneous pen and touch interaction, with both hands, in such situations. Our approach engages the thumb of the device-holding hand, such that the thumb interacts with the touch screen in an indirect manner, thereby complementing the direct input provided by the preferred hand. For instance, the thumb can determine how pen actions (articulated with the opposite hand) are interpreted. Alternatively, the pen can point at an object, while the thumb manipulates one or more of its parameters through indirect touch. Our techniques integrate concepts in a novel way that derive from marking menus, spring-loaded modes, indirect input, and multi-touch conventions. Our overall approach takes the form of a set of probes, each representing a meaningfully distinct class of application. They serve as an initial exploration of the design space at a level which will help determine the feasibility of supporting bimanual interaction in such contexts, and the viability of the Thumb + Pen techniques in so doing

DoubleType: A wearable double bracelet concept for text entry

Wearable devices are used for text entry on a daily basis. Nowadays, people use their fingers to type text on touchscreens. Unfortunately, the screen size is too small to be able to type text for a longer period of time comfortably compared to quick tasks, such as checking social media posts or email. I present DoubleType, a wearable solution where two bracelets are used together to type text. When used together, the combined display area offers the user more screen estate for a larger software keyboard with larger keys to type and more area for the text being edited to look at. Three concepts were created and a paper prototype for each concept was produced. A video prototype was created to illustrate how the user interacts with the bracelets when entering text to the system. An online questionnaire was published and it contained images of the paper prototypes and a link to a video of the prototypes in use. 34 volunteers participated. Five background questions were asked and then five questions about the prototypes. In general, participants did not see DoubleType as a comfortable system to use for typing text. Also, majority of participants did not think DoubleType will help avoid getting neck and shoulder pains from typing text. And, most participants would not use DoubleType to type in a standing position for some parts of one's days to avoid sitting long periods of time. Of the three concepts, participants favored the most concept C, where the concept is put on a table. From the open-ended questions it was revealed participants disliked the size of the bracelets. There could be use of the prototype in a factory for technicians who need to make notes of the procedures they have done. Future research with working prototypes is needed to find out how ergonomic and efficient DoubleType is for text entry

Short links and tiny keyboards::A systematic exploration of design trade-offs in link shortening services

AbstractLink-shortening services save space and make the manual entry of URLs less onerous. Short links are often included on printed materials so that people using mobile devices can quickly enter URLs. Although mobile transcription is a common use-case, link-shortening services generate output that is poorly suited to entry on mobile devices: links often contain numbers and capital letters that require time consuming mode switches on touch screen keyboards. With the aid of computational modeling, we identified problems with the output of a link-shortening service, bit.ly. Based on the results of this modeling, we hypothesized that longer links that are optimized for input on mobile keyboards would improve link entry speeds compared to shorter links that required keyboard mode switches. We conducted a human performance study that confirmed this hypothesis. Finally, we applied our method to a selection of different non-word mobile data-entry tasks. This work illustrates the need for service design to fit the constraints of the devices people use to consume services

Making Spatial Information Accessible on Touchscreens for Users who are Blind and Visually Impaired

Touchscreens have become a de facto standard of input for mobile devices as they most optimally use the limited input and output space that is imposed by their form factor. In recent years, people who are blind and visually impaired have been increasing their usage of smartphones and touchscreens. Although basic access is available, there are still many accessibility issues left to deal with in order to bring full inclusion to this population. One of the important challenges lies in accessing and creating of spatial information on touchscreens. The work presented here provides three new techniques, using three different modalities, for accessing spatial information on touchscreens. The first system makes geometry and diagram creation accessible on a touchscreen through the use of text-to-speech and gestural input. This first study is informed by a qualitative study of how people who are blind and visually impaired currently access and create graphs and diagrams. The second system makes directions through maps accessible using multiple vibration sensors without any sound or visual output. The third system investigates the use of binaural sound on a touchscreen to make various types of applications accessible such as physics simulations, astronomy, and video games