keyboard

Those of you who loved Lenovo's classic-style laptop keyboards can wave bye-bye to them.

With the new 2012 T-series ThinkPads, Lenovo has put the final nail in the coffin of the classic keyboard once made popular by IBM.

Lenovo stuck with the classic keyboard for the current T420, T420S, and T520. But the new ThinkPad T430, T430s, and T530 due to launch early next month have been overhauled with the island-style keyboards that seem to be hitting almost every laptop these days.

The company had already switched to the island-style keyboards for all of its other laptops, so the … Read more

An iOS developer is working on a new keyboard that takes some cues from RIM's virtual keyboard in BlackBerry 10.

Dubbed Octopus Keyboard, the solution is designed for owners of jailbroken iPhones who want to get more functionality out of the virtual keyboard built into iOS. According to iDownloadBlog, which first reported on the keyboard, the software should enhance a user's ability to quickly type out a message, and can work with a host of languages.

However, the key feature is a learning function that runs in the background and determines what the user typically types out. Based on that information, words are displayed above a letter. If the user wants to add the word to the message, they can just hold their finger on the word and swipe up to make it happen.… Read more

NEW ORLEANS--You know all that typing on your phone's virtual keyboard? Snapkeys says that so long as you're using a QWERTY layout, you're doing it wrong.

The company believes that there's little logic to the traditional way a keyboard's arranged, and instead offers up an onscreen virtual keyboard that uses only four buttons.

The buttons are organized by letter types: one for letters that touch the bottom of a ruled line once (like T and I); one for letters with two touch points (like K and H); one for letters with straight lines at the … Read more

Logitech's been on a roll with its well-made keyboard accessories for the iPad (the Ultrathin Keyboard Cover is one of my favorites), but there's one big problem with all these accessories: they need their own USB charging cables.

Logitech's just-announced Solar Keyboard Folio adds a clever twist to the crowded iPad keyboard case market by introducing a solar charger. Better yet, the case doesn't look clunky.… Read more

In today's show, we're flowing through apps, fixing our faces and keeping track of the roomie's tab:

At the BlackBerry World conference in Orlando, we learn more details on the BlackBerry 10 operating system. The interface has a multitasking feature called Flow View and the camera has a time-bending feature that can make sure everyone in a photo looks their best.

And though Research in Motion is pushing it's new virtual keyboard, the CEO made it clear today that the company is not abandoning physical keys. After this new all-touchscreen model is released later in the … Read more

In today's show, it's time to get touchy with BlackBerry, bite your nails over courtroom drama, and share your spleen on Facebook:

Research in Motion showcased the new BlackBerry 10 operating system and its new touch-screen keyboard. Senior Editor Brian Bennett called the keyboard 'freakishly smart, and it was as if the device could read his mind.

On Facebook, you can now add organ donor information to your timeline. To add it to your profile, select life event, and find it under health and wellness.

The first phase of the Oracle v. Google trial heads to jury. Google argues it used Java fairly … Read more

commentary A BlackBerry without a keyboard? Sacrilege, I suspect many of the faithful will say.

But Research In Motion has bit the bullet and shed its physical keyboard -- arguably the defining trait of its best phones -- and has opted to go virtual with its BlackBerry 10 operating system (at least for the initial phone). And even though I argued as recently as a few months ago that a physical keyboard should remain intact with the next-generation of BlackBerrys, I find myself warming up to the idea.

If BlackBerry 10 is supposed to represent a wholesale change and jump … Read more

It appears there will be no new BlackBerry phones coming out of Research In Motion's annual smartphone shindig, BlackBerry World, this week, but Google could be looking to pick up some of that slack very soon if a new patent filing is any indication.

The patent application, published late last week, gives top billing to Android chief Andy Rubin and details a design for a smartphone with a slide-out keyboard. A hard keyboard would be a first for Google's trademark line of Nexus phones, if that is what this application actually portends.

Google's manager of global communications and public affairs, Jim Prosser, told CNET in an email that the company files "patent applications on a variety of ideas that our employees come up with. Some of those ideas later mature into real products or services, some don't. Prospective product announcements should not necessarily be inferred from our patent applications."

But there's a few hints that the filing is serious business, namely that Rubin's name is on it and that it went from submission in January to being published this month -- much faster than the typical 18-month turn-around time.… Read more

One little decision can provoke so much.

It seems that, in those days when everyone believed that BlackBerrys were the most extraordinary machines on the planet, Apple was still cogitating over its little iPod-phone thingy.

And apparently one of the options the company considered was to have a physical keyboard. Yes, like the BlackBerry. With real physical buttons.

This revelation came via Tony Fadell, an engineer who was working at Apple at the time.

In an interview with the Verge, Fadell -- who left Apple to create learning thermostat company Nest -- offered that there were three designs being considered … Read more