Chapter 7: The One-Row Keyboard-A Case Study in Mobile Text Input

Overview

Miika Silfverberg

By 1998 the short message service (SMS) had become a real hit in mobile GSM phones. The idea of transmitting 160-character textual messages to mobile terminals, originally meant for sending operator announcements, had taken off by itself-especially among young people. There was also rising interest in full-scale mobile email (electronic mail). Other kinds of text-based mobile services started to emerge as well; mobile phones were not just for talking anymore. These trends obviously increased the amount of text that the average user was entering into mobile terminals. Text entry methods existed, but they all had clear limitations. They were either too slow, too difficult to learn, or simply too large. Physical size is a major factor in mobile products; to be competitive, a product should be as small as possible. It should ideally fit into a user's pocket. A full QWERTY (the first six top left keys) keyboard with tens of keys is familiar to many users, but it takes up a lot of space even when it is scaled down.

A group of designers and researchers were assembled to find new solutions for mobile text input. Their goal was to generate concepts for several new input methods that would be nearly as efficient as a full-size keyboard in significantly less space.



Mobile Usability(c) How Nokia Changed the Face of the Mobile Phone
Mobile Usability: How Nokia Changed the Face of the Mobile Phone
ISBN: 0071385142
EAN: 2147483647
Year: 2005
Pages: 142

flylib.com © 2008-2017.
If you may any questions please contact us: flylib@qtcs.net