this post was submitted on 17 Aug 2023
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cross-posted from: https://lemmy.ca/post/3468141

I have been looking all day for a FOSS keyboard that's under active development. It seems like more of not all of the ones I've seen recommended haven't been updated in over a year some three years. I don't mind if it's a long time between updates but I want to know bugs will be fixed eventually.

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[โ€“] [email protected] 35 points 1 year ago (2 children)

Openboard got a new release from another dev

Please share, maybe someone can help ๐ŸŒž

[โ€“] [email protected] 22 points 1 year ago (1 children)
[โ€“] [email protected] 15 points 1 year ago

now that's proper semantic versioning

[โ€“] [email protected] 4 points 1 year ago

Nice! I just updated mine

[โ€“] [email protected] 30 points 1 year ago (1 children)

FlorisBoard has been a great keyboard. The last proper release was over a year ago but the developer is actively working on a big update which will add word suggestion.

[โ€“] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago

Thanks nice keyboard.

[โ€“] [email protected] 26 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (3 children)

Thumb-key by one of the developers of Lemmy. It takes some getting used to but is my favorite at the moment. Updates seem to be around once a month.

[โ€“] [email protected] 5 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Wait, is this a clone of Messagease? I was hoping to find something like that because I love this type of keyboard but I was worried that it hasn't received updates since 2020.

[โ€“] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago (1 children)

It says it's mainly inspired by MessageEase in the F-droid description. It uses a custom character layout, but you can change to the MessageEase layout in the settings.

[โ€“] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago

Unfortunately, it doesn't support customizing the layout like MessagEase.

[โ€“] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I like it but it's very hard for me to type this lol

you can use this? Like as a primary keyboard? It's cool though!

[โ€“] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Yup! I'm getting an average 70 wpm using it. It's quite fun to use (:

[โ€“] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago

that is crazy lol.

[โ€“] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago (1 children)

This keyboard is wild! I do miss the emoji key :(

[โ€“] [email protected] 4 points 1 year ago

It's perfect for emoticons tho :->

[โ€“] [email protected] 16 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

AnySoftKeyboard has beta releases once a week, although idk how well they work. I've been using the stable version for years and I like it (although the autocorrect can be a bit silly sometimes).

UnexpectedKeyboard is the coolest and lets you easily type (what feels like) every single UTF-8 character imaginable lol. The typing feeling isn't as nice and I don't think there's any autocorrect though so I don't use it.

[โ€“] [email protected] 4 points 1 year ago

UnexpectedKeyboard is amazing. Changed to it after BlackBerry keyboard.

tho there's absolutely zero dictionary and prediction, the fact it has proper modifier keys like ctrl, alt, function keys alone takes the cake, but you can literally map any character to anywhere, and access even more by swiping on the keys.

I don't know how's the developnent, haven't checked for updates for a while, because I modified it a bit for my taste.

It's kinda on my list to fork it and add autocorrect, dictionary and prediction to it, unfortunately I don't have much time :/

[โ€“] [email protected] 9 points 1 year ago (2 children)

FlorisBoard used to be my keyboard, but a couple months ago I found the Unexpected Keyboard. Both keyboards don't have spell suggestion.

FlorisBoard didn't have update for almost a year, but the developer is still working on it. The Unexpected Keyboard had an update last month.

Between those keyboards I prefer the Unexpected Keyboard.

[โ€“] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I tried Floris recently. It looks really promising, but I found the swipe input to be maddeningly frustrating - obscure words chosen over common alternatives etc. That was the reason I most wanted to migrate from Gboard. Alas. There's still nothing out there in this respect which beats the old Swype back in the day for me (though of course it wasn't FOSS).

[โ€“] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago

Oh, I forgot about. I suffered from the same problem. It also happened when I tried swiping long words. I would get a completely different word or nothing at all.

[โ€“] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago

Lol. The unexpected keyboard had a release commit 8h ago :D

[โ€“] [email protected] 9 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I really like AnySoftKeyboard. It has a good features and is very customizable. It also has the best suggestions and autocorrect of any KB I have used.

[โ€“] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago

Agreed. After you get the hang of it, it's amazing. So many special characters and most importantly: Glide Typing!

[โ€“] [email protected] 5 points 1 year ago (1 children)
[โ€“] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago

I like my moonlander if physical keyboards is the question

[โ€“] [email protected] 4 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

For anyone who didn't read the linked cross post: he's looking for FOSS Android on-screen keyboard.

I tried several and settled on the open board fork that has swipe typing.

[โ€“] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Sorry. I eventually edited my post. But edits don't federate well for some reason. How do you get swipe on openboard?

[โ€“] [email protected] 4 points 1 year ago (1 children)
[โ€“] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago

Why isn't this merged in the official version?

[โ€“] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago
[โ€“] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago
[โ€“] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

I was very confused as to why you would need regular updates of, say, a SofleRGB, then I opened your links.

[โ€“] [email protected] -1 points 1 year ago (1 children)
[โ€“] [email protected] 4 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

I still use it to occasionally have access to special keys, but this is enough for me to switch away from it as a daily driver.

[โ€“] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago (1 children)

i mean its a keyboard, why would it need updates if it just works