[will308]

I agree with you all the way slag +++++++

[BB30000]

And the worst thing is that NONE is giving reasons why those few millimeters are helping...

People ask for change, and then don't want it. Have you ever used a BlackBerry Passport? I think not.

Via The BlackBerry Z10 Experience.

[knighty2112]

All I'm hearing is:

Bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla.

Wait until the device is out and try it for yourself before you judge / whinge / complain / demand answers from BlackBerry.

Hey, CrackBerry exists because we all go bla, bla, bla, bla here at some point right? ; )

Careful! Z10....er..... BlackDroid in action!

[Thunderbuck]

I don't know for sure, but a lot of companies make decisions based on things like internal politics and cost cutting rather than what is best for consumers. I hope that I'm wrong on this one!

I think the Passport represents to BlackBerry what the Avanti represented to Studebaker: a design and performance statement. I think they've poured their hearts and souls into it.

Posted from CB10 running on my awesome Z30 2B6927F7

[dejanh]

I'm really taking a wait and see approach. This appears so radically different from the traditional keyboard and even virtual keyboard that I really can't say how it will do until I try it. One thing remains though, blackberry can't afford mistakes so whatever they did with this keyboard will work. Whether it will be everyone's cup of tea is definitely up for debate.
As a side note I have a feeling that you will never have to resort to the virtual keyboard and that virtual mapping of keys to the alpha physical keys will play a big part.

Posted via CrackBerry App

[MrGlenn]

Or maybe their new philosophy is: modern people on the Internet just do not need punctuation marks anymore (aside from hashtags and the @ symbol) for communicating.

With all the information we have seen so far, my best guess about how the typing experience will be now depends on one thing only:
Maybe the "Contextual Row" of symbols responds only to touches on the screen (slow), or maybe they also respond to some sort of gesture on the keypad (fast). Because symbols like . ,? and ! are just too common not to have quick access to.
As far as my other complaints go, the latest screen shots have, in my opinion, clearly shown the symbols list works similar enough to the Q-devices to be useful.

One additional worry then (cannot be too positive here after all!): the currency symbol. If they still have not made that change with regional settings I will be furious. That we cannot change the default currency symbol has driven me crazy since early 10.0.

BlackBerry 10 signed.

[slagman5]

Good news:

Attachment 280597



Posted via CB10

Only a swipe away! Such an improvement over just always seeing it without needing to swipe or anything...

?Posted without the aid of AutoCorrect with my physical keyboard via CB10?

[RodolfoAP]

I will be getting the Passport on launch day but I couldn't agree more with you slagman5

Posted via CB10

[MrGlenn]

Symbols on old situation: Physical Alt/Symbol key + keypress; 2 touches, 1 symbol.
New situation:
Virtual context row: 1 touch 1 symbol, or
virtual alt/symbol key + keypress: 2 touches, 1 symbol.
You keep going on about speed, but this should show you "speed" should be at least similar. If you ask me the point is not speed, but accuracy. If that contextual row is not somewhat fixed/predictable typing those basic symbols will become a bottleneck.

Only a swipe away! Such an improvement over just always seeing it without needing to swipe or anything...

BlackBerry 10 signed.

[Aljean Thein]

I dont see how this can make you type any faster. Your fingers will be position where the keyboards are, and then when you need to type in some numbers in your message, you'll have to move up to the screen and type it from there?? Instead of just typing them on the keyboard where you fingers are already position at. It sounds like more movement than it really need to be.

[Mirk]

I dont see how this can make you type any faster. Your fingers will be position where the keyboards are, and then when you need to type in some numbers in your message, you'll have to move up to the screen and type it from there?? Instead of just typing them on the keyboard where you fingers are already position at. It sounds like more movement than it really need to be.

It appears you can still use the physical keyboard as the top three rows of keys displayed on the screen mimic it. Notice the space bar in the center. You might not need to touch the screen to type actually. I'm just, you know, hypothesizing.

Ok, here is me 2 cents... it's a quasi Z10 Q10 hybrid. It seems if the keyboard has the same swipe up word prediction as the Z10/Z30 there could be a lot less typing and a lot more swiping. Combine that with a contextually changing row of keys and that alt button might be used a lot less. I dunno, but it could make for an even faster typing experience. I do know that I've seen a lot of Z10/Z30 users on here say they love to swipe up and often do nothing but. As many of you know it's a simple and fast typing experience and you often find yourself swiping up instead of typing. That 4th row of keys might become more or less unnecessary and has essentially been replaced by a virtual row of keys.

It's a whole new thing, a whole new typing experience... and the more I think about it... its conceptually magnificent.

[cfoxx]

I'm with the OP - even with a 3-row keyboard, they could have squeezed in an ALT and SHIFT key.

Cluttering up the limited screen space with more rows of keys, and making people use additional touch screen context keyboards is a ridiculously inefficient "solution", compared with having an ALT key for punctuation.

[MrGlenn]

Did you see the new screen shots showing how "big" the symbols overlay is? The readable screen is still massive even with that visible.
And with just the contextual row it is just enormous (running out of size-words).

BlackBerry 10 signed.

[BCITMike]

Maybe they will revolutionize the internet by automatically detecting apostrophes, commas, periods, new paragraphs, etc. All these TL;DR posts might get formatted in a readable fashion!

[slagman5]

Symbols on old situation: Physical Alt/Symbol key + keypress; 2 touches, 1 symbol.
New situation:
Virtual context row: 1 touch 1 symbol, or
virtual alt/symbol key + keypress: 2 touches, 1 symbol.
You keep going on about speed, but this should show you "speed" should be at least similar. If you ask me the point is not speed, but accuracy. If that contextual row is not somewhat fixed/predictable typing those basic symbols will become a bottleneck.


BlackBerry 10 signed.

I reach for the alt key as I'm typing the last normal letter before my desired symbol, so it doesn't take any more time over just pressing one key. And if you think reaching up from the keyboard to touch the screen then moving your thumb back down to the keyboard to continue typing is faster than just typing another letter on the keyboard your thumbs are already over then I guess that's your opinion and I'll just leave it at that...

?Posted without the aid of AutoCorrect with my physical keyboard via CB10?

[slagman5]

I dont see how this can make you type any faster. Your fingers will be position where the keyboards are, and then when you need to type in some numbers in your message, you'll have to move up to the screen and type it from there?? Instead of just typing them on the keyboard where you fingers are already position at. It sounds like more movement than it really need to be.

You're obviously using too much of your brain, stop it. This is "new" so it has to be better, duh!! Simple as that. ;-)

?Posted without the aid of AutoCorrect with my physical keyboard via CB10?

[slagman5]

Did you see the new screen shots showing how "big" the symbols overlay is? The readable screen is still massive even with that visible.
And with just the contextual row it is just enormous (running out of size-words).

BlackBerry 10 signed.

But the point is, wouldn't the usable screen be even bigger if it didn't require that contextual row?? I'm still waiting on how thise new system would benefit over having the symbols on the keyboard and an alt key to get to them. So far all I've heard are ways they can "alleviate" it or make it "just as good, maybe." Still waiting for how this is actually "better."

?Posted without the aid of AutoCorrect with my physical keyboard via CB10?

[MrGlenn]

If that ever happens, illiteracy will become the new cool.

Maybe they will revolutionise the internet by automatically detecting apostrophes, commas, periods, new paragraphs, etc. All these TL;DR posts might get formatted in a readable fashion!

BlackBerry 10 signed.

[MrGlenn]

"I reach for the alt key as I'm typing the last normal letter before my desired symbol, so it doesn't take any more time over just pressing one key."
Equals:
"I reach for the symbol (virtual) key as I'm typing the last normal letter before my desired symbol, so it doesn't take any more time over just pressing one key."
Sure it still takes up a bit of the screen space, but not that much (judging from the screen shots).
That is why I am assuming it will not be any 'worse' than the current BB10 devices.

And to address the other part: the typing does not need to be "better". As long as it is equally usable, but with the added gestures, it is still an improvement over what we have now.

BlackBerry 10 signed.

[slagman5]

"I reach for the alt key as I'm typing the last normal letter before my desired symbol, so it doesn't take any more time over just pressing one key."
Equals:
"I reach for the symbol (virtual) key as I'm typing the last normal letter before my desired symbol, so it doesn't take any more time over just pressing one key."
Sure it still takes up a bit of the screen space, but not that much (judging from the screen shots).
That is why I am assuming it will not be any 'worse' than the current BB10 devices.

And to address the other part: the typing does not need to be "better". As long as it is equally usable, but with the added gestures, it is still an improvement over what we have now.

BlackBerry 10 signed.

Again, so much of "it won't be worse" arguments. So basically, we have to adapt to a new keyboard, learn new ways to get things we already knew how to get before much simpler, just so we can get a "not worse" experience?

That's great. So you're basically admitting that had they kept the standard keyboard, and ADDED the capacitive touch features to it, we would have ended up with a phone exactly like the Passport, but without the need of the contextual bar ever taking up space on the screen, however small you claim it is to you, now it wouldn't be there at all, and the only difference is the device is like 4mm taller? Sounds like that actually would have been more ideal...

Unless someone, anyone, can do more than find a reason it is "not much worse" and actually better to justify the removal of the features from the physical keyboard. Compromise is only a compromise if you're actually getting something back...

And you can't use the added gestures as the benefit because I'm proposing to add all of those gestures and capacitive features ON TOP of the standard keyboard... So imagine a standard keyboard WITH those features.

?Posted without the aid of AutoCorrect with my physical keyboard via CB10?

[cfoxx]

Either of these, to me, would be infinitely better.

[cfoxx]

"I reach for the symbol (virtual) key...."

That is why I am assuming it will not be any 'worse' than the current BB10 devices.

That's exactly why it WILL be worse. Right now I can bash out emails with my eyes closed, putting in punctuation without a second thought.

Now I'll have to use touch-screen keys and can no longer touch type.

[II ARROWS]

Some users don;t know press and hold cysles through small-cap-symb, some don;t know double tap space gives you period space, some don't know you don;t need to the the spaces for web addresses, etc .,

Then you should teach them, it's easier, cheaper and more effective for both.

You acted exactly like steve jobs: your keyboard may have only 3 rows, but you still have SHIFT, CONTROL and ALT keys.
Don't ignore the obvious point that defile your thesis. Doesn't make it better.

[II ARROWS]

Symbols on old situation: Physical Alt/Symbol key + keypress; 2 touches, 1 symbol.
New situation:
Virtual context row: 1 touch 1 symbol, or
virtual alt/symbol key + keypress: 2 touches, 1 symbol.
You keep going on about speed, but this should show you "speed" should be at least similar. If you ask me the point is not speed, but accuracy. If that contextual row is not somewhat fixed/predictable typing those basic symbols will become a bottleneck.

You seem to forget that with physical keybard you press the alt key with one finger and the symbol with the other.
Those 2 keypress are very close. And can be made while blind typing on the go.

[MrGlenn]

Whether or not the Alt button is close to the symbol depends a lot on the symbol. Anything on the right half of the keypad would technically be closer to that virtual key right? For numbers you definitely have a point though, that is such a force of habit now: left thumb Alt, right thumb numbers would become right thumb virtual key, left thumb numbers.

Well like you said, everyone is entitled to their own opinions/assumptions. I would not consider a single virtual row to be worse if it is implemented right. It will just take some time to get used to.

And who knows what kind of gestures we might get to make the symbols easier. Another good thing (I think) about a partially virtual/touch sensitive keyboard is that they can improve on it with updates.

BlackBerry 10 signed.