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LiquidKeyboard: An Ergonomic, Adaptive QWERTY Keyboard for Touchscreens and Surfaces

Authors:
Christian Sax
Hannes Lau
Elaine Lawrence

Keywords: Keyboard; touchscreen; touch surface; adaptive; touch-type; QWERTY

Abstract:
Virtual touchscreen keyboards provide poor text input performance in comparison to physical keyboards, a fact, which can partly be attributed to the weaker tactile feedback, they offer. Users are unable to feel the keys on which their fingers are resting, and usually hover their hands over the keyboard, hitting each key individually. Consequently, users cannot use all ten fingers for typing, which decreases their input speed and causes hand fatigue. We present a keyboard prototype called LiquidKeyboard, which adapts to the user’s natural finger positions on a touchscreen and discuss options to allow for the fingers to rest on the screen while typing. When invoked, the keyboard appears directly under the user’s fingertips and is able to follow finger movements. As the positions of the surrounding keys are fixed in relation to each finger, users can find and touch the keys without tactile feedback. Additionally the user controlled positioning of the keys allows the keyboard to adapt to the physical specification of the user’s hand, such as the size of each finger.

Pages: 117 to 122

Copyright: Copyright (c) IARIA, 2011

Publication date: February 23, 2011

Published in: conference

ISSN: 2308-3956

ISBN: 978-1-61208-116-8

Location: Gosier, Guadeloupe, France

Dates: from February 23, 2011 to February 28, 2011