Minuum - universal one-dimensional keyboard

    On March 18th, a very interesting keyboard concept for Minuum touchscreens appeared on IndieGoGo . Typing on a smartphone or tablet is inconvenient not only because of the lack of tactile feedback, but also because the keyboard closes the half-screen. The creators of Minuum solve this problem like this: they take a regular QWERTY keyboard and “flatten” it vertically, lining up almost in one row: Q a Z W s X E d C. With this arrangement, the usual position of the letters will be preserved, and the lack of information about the vertical arrangement of the letters and the inevitable inaccuracies are quite easy to compensate with the help of dictionaries and recognition algorithms that have become almost standard applications on any smartphone. If you need an exact set, for example, in the case of passwords and URLs, then the desired letter or number can be selected in the enlarged fragment that instantly appears when you touch it.



    The fact that Minuum uses just one dimension to work, turning a traditional keyboard in the form of a two-dimensional table into a ribbon, opens up great opportunities. The same principle of organizing the keyboard can be applied not only on touchscreens, but also in devices with any sensors capable of recognizing hand movement along a straight line (or curve) —Kinect, Leap Motion, Wii, accelerometer with gyroscope, video camera, or even a strip of paper with a simple pencil drawn graphite path. This will allow you to type text on the device with almost any miniature form factor - glasses, watches, rings, etc.



    The alpha version of the Android application is already ready, the crowdfunding campaign has successfully reached its goal as soon as it starts, the release of the beta version for backers is scheduled for July. A public release, including a library for iOS application developers and a universal SDK for different types of devices, is due to take place in early 2014.


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