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October 2, 2010

Google Acquires BlindType to Improve Android's Virtual Keyboard

Google bought BlindType, a service that allows you to type faster and more accurately on a virtual keyboard. "With BlindType, users can type on the touch screen the way they are used to, but without the traditional need to constantly focus on the keyboard. Although this would typically lead to countless spelling mistakes that would be impossible to autocorrect, BlindType predicts what the user intended to write with a success rate not previously seen on any other system."

Singularity Hub found that BlindType's application "knows what you meant to type, even if you make mistakes. Lots of them. In fact, you can type without looking at the screen at all."

Unfortunately, the application is not available in the Android Market or the iTunes App Store, but it will certainly be used to improve Android's virtual keyboard.



{ via Mashable }

12 comments:

  1. BlindType seems like a toy. Swype/SlideIt are a much better solution.

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  2. :-/
    My hopes of seeing BlindType on the iPhone are dwindling.

    Also, I'm guessing that the only way to do a system-wide replacement of the keyboard on the iPhone would require jailbreaking.

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  3. @Brian where do you buy your drugs?
    @Caspy7 Android is better anyway. I felt the same way when I heard Apple acquired Siri.

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  4. Cool.. but I'm afraid that this system also relies on a dictionary. Making it useless for those that type in multiple languages (anyone that doesn't speak English only), or simply for every day typing where text gets a lot more creative than in those clean cut demo texts.

    We need more tech that supports multiple languages.. mixed in the same context.

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  5. It works for other languages than English, too.

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  6. Hopefully Google will only let BlindType be Android-only keyboard and let iphone users jealous.

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  7. @Kakynologyst

    No don't let Google do what Apple does to others !!! No Evil

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  8. Being a touch typist, I can tell you that this is exactly what we need. You remember the relative placement of the keys, but you can't feel them on a touch screen unlike a physical keyboard, so you have to constantly look at the screen to get each letter right.

    With this you won't have to look at the keyboard. Heck, you won't even need the onscreen keyboard.

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  9. WHERE IS BLIND TYPEEEEEE

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  10. I would like to see the keyboard handle non-english unicode based Indic languages like Telugu and Tamil. Android should provide a dynamic keybaorad to map the Upper/lower case keys for any language unicodes. Also Android should support OTC fonts and be able to change the Keyboard layout from English to Non-English on the fly.
    Madhu (mkreddy1@yahoo.com)
    Anyone has answers please reply me.

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  11. @Brian "BlindType seems like a toy. Swype/SlideIt are a much better solution."

    Since you didn't say 'why' you regard it to be a toy, an assertion which isn't obvious to me, your post is pointless. BlindType is a keyboard with advanced error correction functionality - why does it seem like a toy to you?

    Alvin

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  12. So a google backed version of swiftkey. Thats great. :-)

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