If IA is your goal from a smartphone, you probably want reasonably fast text input. A Motorola Droid is significantly better in that regard, since it has a physical keyboard. It’s still not nearly as fast as a full-size keyboard, though. For that, I suggest getting a folding keyboard.
One bit of software I really want, and have considered writing myself, is a text editor that can be used blind with the screen locked. In some contexts, like the subway, it’s easy to take out and use a folding keyboard, but only if the phone is left in a pocket. It would need some clever use of text-to-speech for navigation and typo detection, but the Android OS already provides the hard part of that.
I’ve been using Swype for a while, and was very impressed with it. It did make a big improvement when I got the hang of it.
SwiftKey is also very good when you’re writing a lot of text on your phone. I currently switch between the two of them, depending on what I’m going to be writing.
If IA is your goal from a smartphone, you probably want reasonably fast text input. A Motorola Droid is significantly better in that regard, since it has a physical keyboard. It’s still not nearly as fast as a full-size keyboard, though. For that, I suggest getting a folding keyboard.
One bit of software I really want, and have considered writing myself, is a text editor that can be used blind with the screen locked. In some contexts, like the subway, it’s easy to take out and use a folding keyboard, but only if the phone is left in a pocket. It would need some clever use of text-to-speech for navigation and typo detection, but the Android OS already provides the hard part of that.
Have you tried Swype? I’ve got a physical keyboard on mine, but I find that that method of input is actually even faster.
I haven’t, mainly because the authors refuse to take my money for it. But if it’s that good, then I suppose I ought to seek out a pirated copy.
That would be advisable. It’s been a big hit with at least one other #lesswrong person, so I can now generalize from a set of two.
I’ve been using Swype for a while, and was very impressed with it. It did make a big improvement when I got the hang of it.
SwiftKey is also very good when you’re writing a lot of text on your phone. I currently switch between the two of them, depending on what I’m going to be writing.