Because the QVGA display of my ipaq 114 is not very clear I wanted to buy a new decice. I looked for something with a big display. The ipaq has 3.5" and I cannot imagine to use a smaller one. The Xperia X1 and also the new Touch Diamond 2 have 3.2" displays. I thought for well using pleco they are a little to small.
Anyway the only new WM device with a big display seems to be the HTC Touch HD. I studied the blogs and forums and thought it should be possible to get everything to work and bought a cheap one with 2 years warranty via ebay.
The result is I got a device that is neither meat nor fish. The display is made for finger use. But many things on WM specially inside Pleco are not usable with finger. thats why you need a stylus. Using a stylus is no problem for me. I use it since my first Palm in 1998. But working with the stylus on the Touch HD is like a pain. The stylus is so short and thin that my arm and hand hurt when using it. Also the display is not very sensible for stylus action. I have to press with much power.
Working with stylus on my iPaq makes fun. On the Touch HD it is annoying.
Many things using Pleco are problematic. IA does not work in all applications. Selecting a part of the dictionary on pages with scroll bar just works when the keyboard is open. This is because when keyboard is closed the page is finger scrollable like the iPhone. Sliding the finger up and down. But it prevents me to select and highlight one sentence that I want to copy via copy&paste. When I activate the keyboard the page is no longer scrollable with finger. Then it is possible to select text.
The same effect is in "Manage Flashcards": In left drop down I select category and in the right drop down I want to scroll down to find my category. This is just possible when the keyboard is opened because otherwise I scroll the main page (including the category content)
Some buttons of Pleco are good usable with fingers but many are to small. And because the touch display of the Touch HD is designed for finger use it does not work well with stylus. For example In flascard session - Free answer mode the Pinyin keyboard is like a pain with stylus because I have to give so much pressure to get a reaction.
This leads me to the question of the future of Pleco. For myself I don't need cool graphic effects. I just wanted to buy a device with big display (including a good phone) using via stylus. But I guess WM and the devices will change dramatically. In future more and more things must be usable without a stylus. And I am afraid there are less people that are willing to use a stylus. For the display sensitivity I guess it makes a big difference. A stylus gives pressure on a small point. A finger gives its pressure to a bigger area. But the finger could give easily more short and strong pressure like (short but forceful) pressing a real keyboard than writing with a stylus. When hand writing with a stylus I don't want to give much pressure. It should be a little pressure and than flowing. I think the touch display of new devices will change in respect to this requirement.
It is difficult to explain for me in English but I mean the contruction of a display for finger use is maybe not the same than for stylus use. On the Touch HD it seems to be true. The stylus sensitivity is worse than every other PDA I ever had.
When I have a look how the devices changed during the last 6 monts I am afraid next year the whole WM world (6.5 and 7.0) are no longer well usable with stylus as compfortable as today. We can see the beginning right now: The Toudh HD as I talked above, the Samsung Omnia has a stylus but no place for keeping it inside because Samsung maybe think you do not need it (I don't know how big the stylus is). Maybe soon the first WM device will be sold that has no stylus at all.
I think even if writing without a stylus will be compfortable, I nevertheless often want to use select and copy some text. Maybe a word, maybe a part of a sentence, maybe some characters. How can this be done just with my fingers? How can I write without a stylus inside the sketchbox?
Where goes Pleco user interface in the future? How can Pleco give an answer to this trend?
Anyway the only new WM device with a big display seems to be the HTC Touch HD. I studied the blogs and forums and thought it should be possible to get everything to work and bought a cheap one with 2 years warranty via ebay.
The result is I got a device that is neither meat nor fish. The display is made for finger use. But many things on WM specially inside Pleco are not usable with finger. thats why you need a stylus. Using a stylus is no problem for me. I use it since my first Palm in 1998. But working with the stylus on the Touch HD is like a pain. The stylus is so short and thin that my arm and hand hurt when using it. Also the display is not very sensible for stylus action. I have to press with much power.
Working with stylus on my iPaq makes fun. On the Touch HD it is annoying.
Many things using Pleco are problematic. IA does not work in all applications. Selecting a part of the dictionary on pages with scroll bar just works when the keyboard is open. This is because when keyboard is closed the page is finger scrollable like the iPhone. Sliding the finger up and down. But it prevents me to select and highlight one sentence that I want to copy via copy&paste. When I activate the keyboard the page is no longer scrollable with finger. Then it is possible to select text.
The same effect is in "Manage Flashcards": In left drop down I select category and in the right drop down I want to scroll down to find my category. This is just possible when the keyboard is opened because otherwise I scroll the main page (including the category content)
Some buttons of Pleco are good usable with fingers but many are to small. And because the touch display of the Touch HD is designed for finger use it does not work well with stylus. For example In flascard session - Free answer mode the Pinyin keyboard is like a pain with stylus because I have to give so much pressure to get a reaction.
This leads me to the question of the future of Pleco. For myself I don't need cool graphic effects. I just wanted to buy a device with big display (including a good phone) using via stylus. But I guess WM and the devices will change dramatically. In future more and more things must be usable without a stylus. And I am afraid there are less people that are willing to use a stylus. For the display sensitivity I guess it makes a big difference. A stylus gives pressure on a small point. A finger gives its pressure to a bigger area. But the finger could give easily more short and strong pressure like (short but forceful) pressing a real keyboard than writing with a stylus. When hand writing with a stylus I don't want to give much pressure. It should be a little pressure and than flowing. I think the touch display of new devices will change in respect to this requirement.
It is difficult to explain for me in English but I mean the contruction of a display for finger use is maybe not the same than for stylus use. On the Touch HD it seems to be true. The stylus sensitivity is worse than every other PDA I ever had.
When I have a look how the devices changed during the last 6 monts I am afraid next year the whole WM world (6.5 and 7.0) are no longer well usable with stylus as compfortable as today. We can see the beginning right now: The Toudh HD as I talked above, the Samsung Omnia has a stylus but no place for keeping it inside because Samsung maybe think you do not need it (I don't know how big the stylus is). Maybe soon the first WM device will be sold that has no stylus at all.
I think even if writing without a stylus will be compfortable, I nevertheless often want to use select and copy some text. Maybe a word, maybe a part of a sentence, maybe some characters. How can this be done just with my fingers? How can I write without a stylus inside the sketchbox?
Where goes Pleco user interface in the future? How can Pleco give an answer to this trend?
