So for the longest time, I've wanted a new keyboard layout specifically designed for swiping. In the same way that Dvorak was optimized for ergonomically typing English words, I want a keyboard layout designed to minimize word overlap/ambiguity when swiping.
It doesn't even necessarily have to have 26 keys, e.g. maybe there could be one key overloaded for v/w/x/z (and you long-press it if you ever want to type a single letter). On the other hand, maybe there need to be separate keys for 'e' and 'ee', or a special key for "double the previous letter".
Because I love swiping, but all my problems with it come from the fact that the QWERTY layout is far from ideal for it. I am 100% willing to learn a new layout if anyone will develop an optimal one for English so that swiping has a 99.9% accuracy rate instead of what currently feels more like 90% or 95%.
Nice to see the hour of swiping I did adding to their dataset actually helped. I'm using it now and it feels as good as the Google keyboard.
Edit: It is sending me a little that it keeps swiping "whats" instead of "what's" though, hopefully they fix that later.
There are a few issues, like it randomly capitalizes words in the middle of sentences. Also, it doesn't seem to take context into account when suggesting words, so words that clearly wouldn't follow the last word will often show up.
It's not as good as gboard yet, but close enough that I'm going to stick with it.
Note that if you have a more powerful device, you can get larger models for voice and larger dictionaries from their site. They make a noticeable difference.
The only fundamental issue I have with it, they seem to be ideologically opposed to adding a GIF search, which I miss occasionally. https://github.com/futo-org/android-keyboard/issues/293#issu...
- https://gitlab.futo.org/keyboard/swipe-library/-/blob/master...
- https://github.com/futo-org/android-keyboard/blob/master/LIC...
https://huggingface.co/futo-org/futo-swipe/blob/main/LICENSE...
Is it this part?
you may not remove or obscure any functionality in the software related to payment to the Licensor in any copy you distribute to others.
As an aside, Eron Wolf, the billionaire behind FUTO, has some rather... out of touch views[0] on the meaning of open source, and seems very committed to diluting the term to mean something closer source-available by removing the most of the rights granted (as defined by FSF, OSI, DFSG and others).
[0]: https://gitlab.futo.org/eron/public/-/wikis/Thoughts-on-Open... - please keep in mind that the RMS quote at the top is taken out of context; he is arguing for more freedom, not less
It's just a commercial license with very mild terms.
The source code is fully available, none of the features are paywalled. They only prohibit you from taking their code and reselling it.
If you take a look at the Play Store, there are thousands of instances where open source projects are lazily renamed and sold for $5 or $10. It's the definition of scummy, pathetic, worthless behavior, and I'm glad the license prevents those kinds of leeches from succeeding.
I know this isn't the only case, but it's the majority of cases. So I have no problem with their license at all.
So no, the license doesn't matter.
It might be not a foolproof solution, but I think the license is better than nothing. Then you have a legal precedent that you can cite when you file a lawsuit against these rats.
Most of these people doing this probably aren't in the same country. But whatever. It's better than nothing.
Integrated speak to text, good autocorrect typing, good autocorrect swiping.
This is such a massive deal. This is, as far as I can tell, the first useful free and open Swipe model. This paves the way for things like swipe typing on platforms other than iOS and Android, a major pain point to newcomer OSes.
It’s unfortunate that the Bing team at Microsoft has so much power. They destroy products for the glory of Bing, and some money. Perhaps it’s about the money. But I feel like Microsoft doesn’t have to make a lot of money on everything they do.
I wasn getting a constant panel from them regarding using the backup feature, that will just keep re appearing.
It was so bad I even moved to GBoard. Not the same, but I'm getting used to.
Their local voice transcription is top notch and proper swipe gestures would be icing on the cake.
Now to fix that issue there tapping "Tuesd" sometimes suggests "Thursday"
The keyboard on the other hand I never really liked for some reason which I can't even explain clearly. So for the keyboard I've been using https://github.com/HeliBorg/HeliBoard for ever, but it does not have sviping.
I might try FUTO Swipe just to test it.
It's notoriously not on f-droid. The way FUTO licenses and/or builds its thing is made deliberately incompatible with f-droid's main repository.
You can add the futo repository to the f-droid client, but when people talk about f-droid they really mean the main repository, not the extra hoops to add less trusted third parties.
In particular, if you end up using the voice input mode of it and have trouble with accuracy, I would giving a try to the biggest model that it supports. It's slower (although really not bad at all on my Galaxy Fold), but it's so nice to have it actually be as accurate as it is.
Or, SwiftKey will allow you to change a typed word's case by pressing shift, but FUTO just does nothing in that case.
I really hope these get fixed, or I can just issue PRs myself for them.
FUTO improved a lot (I had tried it a year earlier also) but SwiftKey's suggestions are still a lot better in my opinion. With SwiftKey I can just type roughly in the right spot without looking and the correct words will come out most of the time. FUTO still suggests a lot of nonsensical next words that just do not follow after the previous in English.
I hope it improves further so I can switch.
The voice models are great though, and they can be used as part of the keyboard or standalone.
SwiftKey got annoying with pushing Ai image Gen and sometimes pop-ups.
I really liked using Fleksy which let you swipe up and down on the keyboard to change autocorrect results, including adding words to your dictionary. I'm still not sure if FUTO even has that option.
Still going strong with Fleksy even though you can't even download it anymore.
That said, it also depends on screen size. Back when Swype first became popular, Android screen sizes ranged from 3-5". That was another factor driving it's popularity back in the day.
Definitely not for everyone or in every situation though
One notable advantage of swiping is that you can be quite loose with each single swipe gesture whereas you have to hit the right key many times for each word. That swipe is also usually much quicker than finding multiple keys for most people.
You preferences may reflect youth, eyesight, finger size, co-ordination, phone case usage or other advantages most people don't have.