How does the technology work?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EhPFAVkD9b0
CharaChorder switches detect motion in 3 dimensions giving you access to over 300 unique inputs. What’s far more powerful however is that in addition to character entry, users can type entire words in a single motion by pressing all the letters of a word simultaneously. CharaChorder’s internal processor will automatically arrange the letters in the correct order in real time.
How does CharaChorder differentiate between words with the same letters of another word?
This is determined by your chord library. Each set of letters is mapped to only a single output. For example, “thing” and “night” have the same five letters. However, the default chord for night is n+i+g+h, while the chord for thing is n+i+g+h+t.
Context is taken into account for some combinations, though this is not yet fully customizable. For example, chording 'out' after 'with' will produce without rather than 'with out’.
How was the layout determined?
The layout is designed based on the most common bigrams/trigrams in the English language. The layout also maximizes the number of left versus right hand as well as finger versus thumb alternations—factors known to improve typing speed.
Is the CharaChorder One really faster than a QWERTY keyboard?
Chorded text entry is indeed much faster than typing on a keyboard. This is enabled by skill and the laws of physics. Fewer, shorter movements of the fingers result in larger outputs of words.
Even without chorded entry, CharaChorder is still potentially faster than a QWERTY keyboard for most people. The fingers move far less than in a normal typing experience on the CharaChorder One, and on a layout that is more optimal than a QWERTY keyboard setup. It does require practice and coordination to achieve extremely high speeds with character entry alone. But, being able to interweave chords and character entry allows newer users the benefit of any text input method they are comfortable with, which helps smooth out the learning curve.
Do you have a tutorial available?
We are currently developing games and educational resources for our new users such as in our LaunchPad Learn app. CharaChorder is also compatible with any typing tutorial developed for Windows, Mac, iOS, and Android, such as these popular sites that we also recommend: