FITALY is a
keyboard layout
A keyboard layout is any specific physical, visual, or functional arrangement of the keys, legends, or key-meaning associations (respectively) of a computer keyboard, mobile phone, or other computer-controlled typographic keyboard. Standard keybo ...
specifically optimized for
stylus
A stylus is a writing utensil or tool for scribing or marking into softer materials. Different styluses were used to write in cuneiform by pressing into wet clay, and to scribe or carve into a wax tablet. Very hard styluses are also used to En ...
or
touch-based input. The design places the most common letters closest to the centre to minimize distance travelled while entering a word. The name, FITALY, is derived from the letters occupying the second row in the layout (as QWERTY comes from the first row of standard keyboards).
In the first of several keyboards in the system, lowercase letters are arranged in the following pattern:
There are uppercase, numeric, and symbol keyboards as well, and various strokes (rather than taps) are used for both shifting case and selecting symbols. For details, see the manufacturer's site (below).
Fitaly was invented and patented by
Jean Ichbiah and is commercialised by the company he founded, Textware Solutions.
The aim of the design is to optimise text entry by organising keys to minimise key-to-key finger movement, allowing faster input through one-finger entry (compared to ten digits required to type efficiently on QWERTY layout). As compared to the three-row QWERTY keyboard, FITALY has five rows with at most six letters in a row (as opposed to the ten on QWERTY).
Keys are arranged based on individual frequencies of letters in the English language, and the probability of transitions. The ten letters at the very centre (i, t, a, l, n, e, d, o, r, s) account for 73% of keystrokes in English; adding the four letters at top and bottom of the middle columns (c, h, u, m) brings this number to 84%. The user nearly always finds the next likely letter on a key very close to the one previously tapped.
Currently supported platforms are
Pocket PC
A Pocket PC (P/PC, PPC) is a class of personal digital assistant (PDA) that runs the Windows Mobile operating system, which is based on Windows Embedded Compact, Windows CE/Windows Embedded Compact, and that has some of the abilities of modern ...
/
Windows Mobile
Windows Mobile is a discontinued mobile operating system developed by Microsoft for smartphones and personal digital assistants (PDA). Designed to be the portable equivalent of the Windows desktop OS in the emerging Mobile device, mobile/port ...
, and
Windows Tablet PC. There was a version for the
Palm
Palm most commonly refers to:
* Palm of the hand, the central region of the front of the hand
* Palm plants, of family Arecaceae
** List of Arecaceae genera
**Palm oil
* Several other plants known as "palm"
Palm or Palms may also refer to:
Music ...
. An
Android version is under consideration, but Barry Shaffer had a
DIY Android port. That port is impractical for inserting text anywhere but after the last character of a document.
See also
*
Personal digital assistant
A personal digital assistant (PDA) is a multi-purpose mobile device which functions as a personal information manager. Following a boom in the 1990s and 2000s, PDAs were mostly displaced by the widespread adoption of more highly capable smar ...
*
HexInput
References
External links
Fitaly.com
The-gadgeteer.com
Everything2.com
Keyboard layouts
Latin-script keyboard layouts
Touchscreens
Input methods for handheld devices
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