Digital pen or ultrasonic sonar in your pocket

    I have a friend, he is Spaniard. Rather, the indigenous Catalan. And already at the age of over 50. And in the summer he began to study the Russian language. We often communicate on WhatsApp, and once he sent me a photo, as he writes the Russian alphabet by hand. He says it’s easier to remember letters, as horses look and pronounce. At that moment, I remembered reading an article about the benefits of writing by hand and told him about it. And he thought how much writing is appreciated by hand in the modern world? We are increasingly in contact with the keyboard, whether it be a physical computer keyboard or on-screen tablet or phone. And it’s interesting whether they are currently writing lectures at the institute by hand, or are they increasingly using laptops and typing immediately in Word? I think that technology is increasingly gaining space and more often provide reasons to use new, simpler methods, and not always easier means more useful.




    Speaking of the benefits of writing by hand. I do not know from which authoritative source to look at information about the benefits of writing by hand, but many sources mentioning this benefit write about the following. There are at least 6 reasons to write by hand:
    • 1. Aesthetic pleasure.
    • 2. The assimilation of information.
    • 3. The formulation of thought.
    • 4. Concentration.
    • 5. Benefits for the hands.
    • 6. Comprehensive development.

    I will not describe these points in detail, but the benefit of writing by hand is obvious. And now let's go to one of the most technologically advanced countries in the world - Japan. It is in Japan that many advanced technologies are born, and the share of gadgets per capita there probably goes off scale according to all the statistics in the world. It was from there from Japan that the technology used in the Digital Pen of the Dadget came. I did some research and found a relative of the pen I reviewed - Pentel's airpen Pocket. True, it’s not difficult to find it on sale, I would even say it’s almost impossible. Usually if something cannot be bought from us, I go to E-bay. And what? there is only one such lot. There are 3 colors to choose from - blue, green and gray. And green is a version in conjunction with Evernote. But here is the price ... The price with delivery of about 15000r. However a little expensive although there are some additional advantages compared to the Dadget pen - the presence of Bluetooth and software for the smartphone. But for a twofold increase in the price, I don’t intend to supplement the pen with a blue-tooth :) Communication with the computer is enough.



    So what do we have in a nice box?



    Inside the package there is a blister with a handle, a memory receiver, a spare rod and a rod extraction device. The rod is not removed here like all ordinary pens, but simply pulled forward by the protruding part with a kind of tweezers. The core itself reminds me of a Victorinox-like knife, though it seems to be a little shorter there.
    The box also contains instructions, a soft velvet pouch, miniUSB cord, and a pair of program discs.



    The pen itself, by the way, at first glance looks simple, but taking advantage of it a little, you are imbued with design and tactile sensations, you begin to find pleasant moments. The triangular cross-section of the handle with rounded edges fits comfortably in the hand, and a slightly heavier weight compared to conventional handles (due to the electronics and battery) gives it a certain solidity.



    The cap is removed tightly, he sits tight. But on the back of the pen he does not dress, he will have to put it either in a bag or somewhere else. So you can lose it inadvertently, you need to be careful.



    On the reverse side, the pen has the same miniUSB connector for recharging it. And at the opposite end, closer to the rod there are ultrasonic emitters + IR LED. I believe that the pen is initiated through the IR channel when we remove the cap, and then ultrasonic emitters begin to respond for positioning. In general, the method is interesting. Before that, I only used pens on tablets. There, the size of the drawing / writing field is limited, but the degree of depression and, in some cases, the angle of inclination are transmitted. But ... there is no mobility all within the cord from the computer. And here everything can work without a computer at all, autonomously.



    Ok, install the software.


    Windows



    Windows has no problems with digital pens. Even without software, the pen is recognized as a handwriting input device and the built-in writing panel leaves. Depending on the selected keyboard layout, handwriting is recognized in a particular language. It’s a pity it’s not automatic, otherwise I hit it a couple of times :) I remember how this moving panel infuriated me on the small resistive UMPC screen, but on the contrary, it helps. Although this is not a very convenient solution. You can’t stretch the handwriting input window to the full screen, you can write in only one line, which is convenient on paper itself.

    We pass to applications on a disk.

    The first is the Note Manager.



    This is, as it were, the main application for taking notes from a storage device with subsequent recognition of the text. True ... When installing the application, I did not see the Russian language, well, ok, I like English programs more. But there is a certain insidiousness in this, recognition goes the same in English :( I have not tried other languages, I decided to move on.



    There is another program: MyScript Notes Lite



    Everything is more serious here. The license key is indicated on the disk, the installation takes longer, and the program itself is already able to do more.



    Don’t look at what it recognized with errors, it’s like my handwriting, and the fact that the labels are at an angle, it’s just that I fixed the receiver a little crookedly :) I’m still having slightly different goals associated with this pen is not just writing and the drawings, and there the angles are not important, the main result :)



    In general, with MyScript everything is recognized perfectly, and if you also write a little more clearly, then everything will be fine.



    For the sake of interest, I decided to check the eminent Fine Reader so many times that he helped me out on working with texts and the latest versions recognize everyone very worthily. I try to feed him the files exported from Note Manager, Fine Reader tries to recognize ... But in the end, it either gives out a complete nonsense or refers to the second correction, oh, for the low resolution of the file.



    We approach the most interesting. Everything is more or less clear with the text. If you write a little more accurately than I do, then in principle everything is recognized well and graphics can be marked in separate blocks and they will be saved as pictures.



    Well, what about the full-fledged drawings. I quickly “threw” the sketch with a pencil, and then circled it more clearly with a pen. The process was monitored from beginning to end by the receiver and carefully memorized everything.



    Here I will allow a slight digression. I often have to make simple illustrations for newspapers and magazines, sometimes for advertising purposes, and usually the process looks like this. I either find the right pictures and, after modifying and compiling + some additional sketches, I circle it all in a vector in the illustrator and then apply the necessary style to the lines, or I just draw with a pencil and simply circle the black gel pen to get a scan that I process in Photoshop to get more or less clean lines. And here it is as if you can pass many stages and get a picture right away, and you don’t need to clean it from a pencil and you don’t have to pick up a white clean surface. Sheets can be in a cell, a dot, a circle, and generally any color.

    In general, here is the result of the scan / photo:



    And this is the result taken from the receiver:



    There are some inaccuracies, but again, I like to grind it up and I had to take a larger sheet, for example, A4 is not A5 notebook, but not bad.
    Here either leave it as if an interesting style has been added (there are some hooked moments), or a little bit in Photoshop and then remove the gray tones, then everything will be smoothed out.

    Aplle OS X

    Now we’ll try the functionality on macBook, I basically use it more often, see what can be done with the digital pen on it. On the disk it is proudly written that it supports Windows and MAC OS, check.



    Everything is installed simply and quickly, and after installation a new program appears, which is responsible for ... tuning the receiving unit.
    Rather, where will the files from it be saved when connected and whether to delete them after downloading or not.



    We check. We write with a pen, connect the unit to the laptop and ... a Tiff file arrives in the specified folder. But for some reason, it is not erased from the device. I try again. The result is the same. Files remain on the device. How to wash them? Well, let's figure it out. I wonder what kind of file.
    When you click on it, the standard OS X viewer opens and you can see that the file is paginated. All data is in the form of drawings. Well, Tiff, that's right. For the sake of interest, I open it in PhotoShop and, strangely, I can not find any layers or additional channels. A tricky file of some kind.

    Well, we got the files, but how do I translate them into text? Here, Apple does not offer anything on the move. Google handwriting recognition. They write that it seems to be included in new versions of OS X, but where and how to look, I don’t understand something. And here is another mention that Ewernote can recognize handwriting. I try for the sake of his interest - no result. The pen can be used in mouse mode if you connect the receiver to the laptop and pressing the left button will be emulated by pressing the rod or the button on the pen itself. But I didn’t find handwriting recognition right away. Well, fortunately there is an old laptop on Windows or, in extreme cases, Parallels, although I have enough standard functionality for drawings.

    Eventually


    There are some flaws with the software part, but not critical. I have not tried another program that is just designed for drawing with this pen. But when I opened it and saw the style a la 4th iPhone in full screen, I decided not to try it, all the more I already knew that the drawings were saved quite well. Therefore, with 50/50 programs, it turns out half suitable for half controversial and mainly for Windows, for Apple you need to either select something specific and look for it yourself, or simply save images from the receiver and erase by pressing the Reset button. The pen itself is gorgeous and will surely attract attention, especially after you take out the receiver and attach it to the top edge of the sheet. By the way, you can mount it not only strictly upwards in the center, but also from the edges of the sheet.

    The bottom line is a device worthy of any geek, almost no competitors at a very normal price, and by the way you can buy it here .

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