Palm Graffiti

HandHeld computers running PalmOs (e.g. PalmPilot) do not have a keyboard. Instead they use an area of the touch-sensitive screen as an input device. Strokes made by a stylus are analysed and interpreted as characters, which are then sent to the active process.

• Uppercase-L produces an 'l'
• Back-to-front uppercase-L produces a 'j'
• Upside-down uppercase-V produces an 'a'
• A big circle produces an 'o'

They do have an on-screen keyboard.

How do you produce an Uppercase-L? (First shift, which is an upward stroke, then L.)

There are also various shift-strokes which behave like control and caps lock on keyboards, giving access to special characters.

To put the PalmOs into upper-case mode, you stroke once upwards. To put it into Caps Lock, you stroke twice. Third time puts it back into lower case. The current mode is shown by a small graphic on the edge of the screen. To enter punctuation, you simply tap once, followed by the stroke for the punctuation symbol.

Letters are written in the left half of the recognition area, and numbers in the right half. Presumably this greatly simplifies recognition.

Some undocumented strokes have been discovered and are in wide use:

• You get a more reliable 'v' if you stroke it backwards (right to left)
• You can stroke 'x' in one move, as a backwards 'k'.
• You get a more reliable 'd' if you draw a triangle, starting at the lower left, moving up, down and then back (like a greek delta). When I try a normal 'D' I often end up with a 'p', so the greek delta stroke works great for me.

Less essential are:

• A "3" in the letter area is a "b".
• A "6" in the letter area is a "g".
• A sideways Graffiti "K" is a "Y".
• A backwards Graffiti shortcut symbol is a "D". (Actually, a circle clockwise, started at the bottom does it too)
• A "C" in the number area is a "4".
• A "S" in the number area is a "5". (You may leave out the upper sidestroke too)
• A "h" in the number area is a "9".
• A dot, then "T" is a "?".
• A "L" is more easily recognized if you begin like a backslash.
• You can skip the initial downstroke on the "P" and the "R".

"All these descriptions of characters are much less useful for learning Graffiti than looking at the diagrams below. Sometimes a picture is worth 1K words." ~SeanOleary

You can try Graffiti out with your mouse (which is, admittedly, nowhere near as natural as with a touch pen) at http://www.palmone.com/us/products/input/.

You can, with additional software, write your Graffiti characters outside of the Graffiti area. Given how scratched-up the Graffiti area looks like after lots of use, though, some would recommend against it.

Alternatives:

• QuikWriting
• OneFingerKeyboard (also available on other PDA platforms)
• HalfKeyboard (also available on other PDA platforms)
• MicroSoft PocketPc has true HandwritingRecognition
• TealScript

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Update (March 2003) Xerox filed suit in 2002 against PalmSource for patent infringement. Palm has agreed to rework PalmGraffiti 1.0 into version 2.0 that will no longer support single stroke letters. Expect to see PalmGraffiti 2.0 in PalmOs 5.1 and latter. First units may be out in mid to late 2003. -ScottElliott

What does "no longer support single stroke letters" mean? For example, how would one enter a "c" or an "o" with more than one stroke?

'f', 'i', 'k', 't', and 'x' require multiple strokes in Graffiti 2.0. Other letters do not.

Graffiti 2.0 disappointment In addition to making simple things awkward, G2 adds another "feature" that makes me nuts: a long (like a second or more) lag after the final stroke of certain multi-stroke characters, so that the gadget can tell you're not going to add another stroke, before it will render the character in question. Man, that sucks! I'm going over to TealScript. -- GarryHamilton

Thanks GarryHamilton. I am suffering from G2 too. Now I have a better choice! -- Siu@Hongkong

You can also replace a file on your palm device (on most palm devices, anyways) to restore the original graffiti version 1 character strokes. There's a description of how to do it on the palminfocenter.com site. http://www.palminfocenter.com/view_story.asp?ID=5830 I swapped out graffiti 2 for graffiti 1 on my Zire71 a few years ago and it works fine. - GaryKlaus

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CategoryHandheld