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Ars Technica Reviews Controller Keyboard
phaedo00 writes "Ars Technica has reviewed the AlphaGrip AG-5 handheld keyboard and mouse. From the article: 'After lots of research and five revisions, the perfectionists at AlphaGrip finally decided that they had a product worthy of marketing, and they released the long awaited AG-5. Although the AG-5 looks strange and intimidating, it is a unique and highly innovative product that deserves consideration, particularly by mobile computing enthusiasts. The AG-5 interfaces with computers via a single removable USB cable. It uses a simple chord-like keyboarding model and an integrated trackball to provide complete keyboard and mouse functionality in a unique form factor that looks a bit like a console gaming controller.'"
does it get you banned in WoW? :P
Even from a person who has taught himself how to use dvorak ... that looks like a nightmare.
Now that's a death ray!
While most mobile users would like to have something more compact, is it really necessary to sacrafice teh productivity of a standard keyboard in order to gain a convenient, compact form factor?
I like the promise that the virtual keyboards have (e.g. http://www.virtualdevices.net/ ). While functionly they have some limitations right now (e.g. having to hold your fingers about the infrared keys), over time they are going to get better. At least this solution you could have a full range keyboard without having to lug it around.
-- Jim http://www.runfatboy.net/
This would eliminate the only exercise they get (typing!). Besides, it requires TWO HANDS.
Also, from the article: If we are successful, the AG-5 will turn out to be just a glimpse of the future of desk-free computing. Desk-free? Where am I going to put my coffee cup?
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...Is how is it going to effect people with RSI. Having something which looks relativly heavy and having to hold it up for a longish period at a time isn't going to be good for your wrists (not that a keyboard is much better tbh)
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It seems to me that without wireless support via Bluetooth (not the USB wireless that they promise real soon now), this keyboard/controller's usefulness is decreased quite a bit.
I might be open to switching to an alternate input device, but only if I'll be able to use it with my other devices (PDA, cell phone, etc.)
Also, I fear my vi productivity will decrease dramatically with this device...
A keyboard is letters on buttons...
You're current keyboard also has letters on buttons.....or keys, as someone might call them.
With the first link, the chain is forged.
That thing looks like a beast.
This is Offtopic, but maybe someone here would know...
I've been looking to get a chord keyset similar to the 5-key style that Engelbart created. Picture. I vaguely remember seeing one or two products when i looked a few months back, but nowhere could i find a purchase link.
I guess the question is: does anyone know where i could buy a chord keyset? Maybe some uber-nerdy slashdotter has one laying around i can buy?
"Banking establishments are more dangerous than standing armies." -Thomas Jefferson
I had to learn the Handeykey Twiddler for my foray into the world of wearable computing and it was a PITA to learn. But it at least let me do it one handed and at a somewhat decent rate. This thing looks really awkward to use no matter what you do.
None of these alternative keybards have any real benefits. The twiddler was close as you could type while walking down the street or listening during a class without getting everyone's attention. This thing will get professors glaring at you.
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
Chording keyboards hae been since the invention of the stenotype machine in the late 1800s, enabling those willing to master what the Ars Technica article calls a "steep learning curve" to attain speeds of 225 wpm or about three times the speed of a comparably skilled typist.
They were an integral part of Engelbart's conception--the mouse was intended for use with a five-key chording keyboard.
There is nothing about them that is very difficult or expensive to manufacture. (In fact, common sense says that all things being equal a device with a dozen or so buttons ought to cost less than one with a hundred).
This one must be about the tenth that's made it to the point of being manufactured and sold to the general PC-using public, several marketed at the height of concern about RSI with reasonable evidence that they would be less stressful to use than conventional keyboards.
None of 'em have ever come close to catching on.
Chalk up chording keyboards with leap-week calendars or decimal time or the Single Tax. Ain't gonna happen.
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This just in: The AG-5 is the 'keyboard' of choice for robots, androids, and borg the world over!
Using the headtracking on my Z800 to full effect has been a challenge, since I have been largely stuck using the keyboard for FPS gaming. But this thing could really give me some extra freedom of movement. Just need a long enough USB cable and I should be able to manage the cables well enough to do a few 360 degree turns without getting too tangled.
I tried a wireless programmable controller, but the batteries didn't last very long and their seemed to be some latency. This thing should provide all the keyboard commands you could ever need.
What do you call a device that has numbers and letters on it and its use is primarily for input into a machine.
I call that the telephone.
This guy's the limit!
Except it doesn't really look like a keyboard... more like a gamepad with a zillion buttons + trackball.
/. summary doesn't come right out and say it.
I only point this out because the
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o0t!
Read the first article again. They said it was invented to reduce mechanical failure (no word about typing speed), which is exactly what that article states it was for.
I got one of these controllers. I have played with it a little its definately only for those that can seriously learn to touch type. Since many of the buttons are not at all in sight you really have to learn the keyboard. Over all its comfortable, but I feel that more than one size would have been better. The shipping model is more suitable for the average hand. A smaller hand could problay learn to work with it. My medium-large hands are pretty much at the limit of comfortable use. If you have large hands the buttons are not going to be anyplace near your finger tips.
The keyboard makes extensive use of shift buttons to accomplish things. Get used to some finger acrobatics. I still have not quite got the hang of Control-Alt-Delete on this thing.
The Built in Mouse....
Personally this is the one true downfall in my opinion. The roller ball is WAY to small, and its far far far to slow it takes me far far to many rolls over the ball to get the mouse around even a 1024/768 acreen, never mind the 1280/1024 I typically run at. The performance in games (The reason I originally thought this might be a useful product) is basically worthless at this point. I went so far as to hack the registry to increase the mouse responsiveness to the maximum allowable, a setting you can't even do in the crontrol panel applet. The mouse still isn't acceptably responsive. In fact it seemed barley changed on the AG-5 despite the fact that another mouse on the same machine now zips the cursor accross the machine so fast you have to take a second after the movement to find it again.
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What are you talking about? According an article referenced from your first link:
This indicates that the QWERTY layout is a direct result of the inventor attempting to prevent mechanical jams in the device. The submitter of the article wrote:
The myth to which you are alluding, however, is that Sholes developed the QWERTY layout to decrease the speed of typists (admittedly, to prevent the same jamming of typebars), when, in fact, the QWERTY layout acheived exactly the opposite effect (it allowed typists to type faster because jamming was less likely). The submitter is not claiming that Sholes was trying to slow down the typists (a myth) but that he was trying to reduce typebar jams (the truth).
just a ghost in the machine.
From the website http://www.alphagrips.com/store/shopping.html
"The AlphaGrip may not be ergonomic. The company has not conducted the requisite studies to make that determination."
For some reason it seems to me that using a device other than microphone is too much... why work so hard to go from one handheld device to another? I'm not advocating for brain implants (the ultimate in hands free computing), but voice control is a nice medium. Hands free + surgery free ;) Complex key combos can be shortened to a word or two... no more RSI... plus it frees up both hands............
Chaos is Divine *
The problem with all of these chorded keyboard replacements - including this one - is that they are mostly useless for anyone with fewer than five working fingers [*] on each hand, either accidentally or from birth. And a person with the normal allocation of fingers who temporarily loses use of one, due to an injury for example, would have to revert to the standard keyboard which, happily, is still entirely functional - albeit slower. I would be very interested to see more designs of alternative input devices that can accommodate temporary and permanent disabilities.
[*] Ignoring the thumb-vs-finger debate.
I'm not being sarcastic here -- I'm honestly not sure what group of users is being targetted here. It seems that the only people who might find this useful are people who don't have a flat surface in front of them to rest a keyboard on. That might be laptop users, but if there's nowhere to rest the laptop, you can't use it anyway -- and while it can be argued that typing on the laptop while it's sitting on your lap is uncomfortable, I'm not sure balancing the laptop using only your knees while holding this thing over it is going to be any better. So, if not laptop users, then PDA users -- except this thing is larger than most of the PDAs commonly in use. Tablet users walking around the shop floor? If you're using both hands to hold the controller, what's holding up the tablet?
This is an honest question: who is this thing for?
I really wish that somebody would make a console controller similar to the Xbox 360 controller, with the right analog stick replaced by a trackball. Using an analog stick for moving a pointer or your player's view in a first-person shooter is just terrible. Having a trackball would be much better for such actions. Also, with such a change, the controller would have 3 direction controls: D-pad, analog stick, and trackball. Each have proven themselves to be useful for certain game tasks, so why not make them all available at the same time?
But we already have a solution: the Nintendo Revolution!
The idea is simple: you move the mouse cursor through tilting the device. It requires no extra buttons and is perfectly natural and intuitive, since you're already holding the thing in the air. Basically, it would be a pointing device that you could really point with. Finally, you could mouse around without interrupting your typing! There would be all sorts of ways the device could detect its orientation. I'm not sure which method will be best, though the Nintendo Revolution controller will probably provide us with good clues. So why not build the innards of the Revolution controller inside of this keyboard? Apart from being useful for living room applications, it would just be awesome for games! Consider for example a game like GTA where you turn the car's steering wheel by tilting the controller!
If these guys don't build that in, I hope someone else does. Hell, I'd pay $200 for a wireless tilt-driven one of these (that fits large hands).
I might call it an Alphanumeric Glyph-based Human Interface Peripheral Device. Or an "Anghip" device... if it hadn't already been named, that is.
Or an "Anguhip" for Alphanumeric glyph-based USB human interface peripheral.
Too bad, though. It might sound cooler than "keyboard".
English Alphanumeric Glyph-based Loader Entry (or 'eagle') HID device????
L @ L
Don't quote me on this...