New Minuum Keyboard Layout Saves Valuable Screen Space [Video]

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Posted March 18, 2013 at 8:09pm by iClarified

Minuum is a new keyboard layout designed by Whirlscape that aims to revolutionize how we type on modern devices.

Minuum is a tiny, one-dimensional keyboard that frees up screen space while allowing fast, accurate typing. Current technology assumes that sticking a full typewriter into a touchscreen device is the best way to enter text, giving us keyboards that are error-prone and cover up half the usable screen space (or more) on most smartphones and tablets.

Minuum, on the other hand, eliminates the visual clutter of archaic mobile keyboards by adapting the keyboard to a single dimension. What enables this minimalism is our specialized auto-correction algorithm that allows highly imprecise typing. This algorithm interprets in real time the difference between what you type and what you mean, getting it right even if you miss every single letter.

New Minuum Keyboard Layout Saves Valuable Screen Space [Video]

Features:
● More Screen Space: Recover more than half of the usable touchscreen space you lose when typing on traditional virtual keyboards

● Fast Sloppy Typing: Type fast without worrying about being precise, thanks to smart
auto-correction

● Large-Finger Friendly: Easy letter magnification for precise typing—especially useful if you have large fingers

● QWERTY Keyboard: You already know how to type with Minuum—it’s just the QWERTY layout, minimized

● Full Functionality: Convenient access to everything you’d expect in a keyboard (such as, punctuation, space, backspace, and enter) without stealing your screen space

● Type Anywhere: Move the keyboard around on your touch screen, and stretch or shrink it to suit your needs

Whirlscape is seeking funding on Indiegogo for their Minuum keyboard. So far over $3000 of their $10000 goal has been raised with 30 days left. The keyboard will first be released on Android via the Google Play Store. A SDK for iOS will also be released to allow developers to add Minuum keyboards to their apps.

Check out the video below for more details...

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Jigar Rajpura - March 19, 2013 at 2:54am

You guys need to dumb down the music in the background so that one can hear the presenter speak. Innovative idea BTW.

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Tim Cook - March 19, 2013 at 2:45am

Hmm neat idea... If you are a nerd and technology enthusiast - you should always be open to new ideas and concepts. If you don't well you will be left in the dust like BlackBerry. Good luck guys.

pkmaximum - March 18, 2013 at 11:37pm

The computer geek inside of me does not want to welcome this old-refreshed T9 keyboard. However, it is undoubtedly useful in the way it frees up precious screen real estate which the iPhone desperately needs in landscape keyboard mode. Perhaps this could be disabled for certain apps where precision typing is more of a "must." For texting though, this would perform adequately.

DarkKent - March 18, 2013 at 10:31pm

It does look promising as far as with other applications

matrixmaniac - March 18, 2013 at 8:58pm

That's not sooo new: on the old mobile phone numeric keyboards you could achieve a very similar thing with the T9 auto complete. It worked pretty well on old Nokias. With a somewhat advanced keyboard layout and better software it's no wonder this can work. Just a wonder that nobody else got the idea (especially not Nokia or Samsuck or I at least).

Mark Thompson - March 18, 2013 at 11:48pm

Hi, Minuum marketing guy, here. Without giving too much away I will say that our keyboard makes use of a very nice disambiguation algorithm. As our Indiegogo campaign unflods, we'll write a blog post about it. There's actually some very new stuff going on. Watch for it.--Mark Thompson

NoGoodNick - March 18, 2013 at 8:52pm

Yeah, it's a QWERTY keyboard for all those noobs who've never learned to type, and who only know how to hunt and peck with one finger. I can't see it being very useful for REAL text entry.

Mark Thompson - March 18, 2013 at 11:56pm

Hi: Thanks for your input. As more and more devices, such as laptops, become touchsceens we'll find out soon enough if the Minuum keyboard works for "real" typing. (I'm guessing "yes.") --Mark Thompson

Ken7.01 - March 18, 2013 at 8:50pm

Call me when it's ready. Ill take one.

Hash - March 18, 2013 at 8:18pm

This looks very promising...