Gallery: The Real Symbian^3 Portrait QWERTY keyboard demoed on the Nokia N8

| October 31, 2010 | 72 Replies

As promised alex68  has updated us on tips@mynokiablog.com about the portrait QWERTY of the Nokia N8. This is the real one (mid development perhaps) and NOT the 3rd party QWERTY keyboard that we saw the other day.

Here’s the standard T9. Note how the text field is no longer separate. You can see exactly the app you’re typing in without being whisked away  into a separate text box.

The T9 on a touch screen has often been criticised as being outdated – but I think T9 is a great option to have. Folks can still type with one hand very easily like their own candybar T9 handsets. It helps if you have big hands. Some folk just prefer typing with T9. It’s good to have the option there – but even better were the QWERTY portait given also as an immediate option.

Well let’s quickly pop into settings: See QWERTY keyboard. Not bad – immediately visible without having to dig around the menu.

And Voila. The portrait QWERTY for Symbian^3.  Typing very responsive. Not sure about multitouch support. Not such a requirement when in portrait as you’ll be one handed.

The portrait QWERTY should mean future portrait QWERTY for Swype – for me, that’s what swype is made for. One handed thumb swyping. Portrait is ok but possibly not as convenient as a single thumb drag.

Note: This is NOT an English QWERTY keyboard. I don’t know how the button placements would appear were there to be fewer letters. Perhaps they would be not directly aligned and offset like a proper qwerty?

Numbers Button:

What do you think? What do you like about it? What could be improved?

 

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Category: Nokia, Nseries

About the Author ()

Hey, thanks for reading my post. My name is Jay and I'm a medical student at the University of Manchester. When I can, I blog here at mynokiablog.com and tweet now and again @jaymontano. We also have a twitter and facebook accounts @mynokiablog and facebook.com/MyNokiaBlog. Contact us at tips(@)mynokiablog.com or email me directly on jay[at]mynokiablog.com

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  1. Cocco Bill says:

    Alex :
    and what about the screws on each side of the phone? they went from white to black just in a few days … i hope they will not get rust stains. (anodized aluminum casing and still they go cheap on the screws? can’t believe it!)

    Maybe the screws are silver. ;)

  2. zak says:

    i want the potrait qwerty keyboard really bad, but this layout is ugly =/ keys look cramped as hell grr come on nokia! Step it up. Nobody wants half assed job. It looks like who ever designing it just flipped the landscape qwerty to this one. Looks way uncomfortable n don’t like the layout!! Hope they improve it!

  3. eze says:

    button tooooo narrow!!!

  4. alex68 says:

    If you installed some third party apps or games that have not been tested well enough for Symbian 3, I am not surprised to hear this. This is usually the most of the sources of problems like this.

  5. alex68 says:

    I see. Try to contact Nokia Romania if they can do you a favor to flush the right language pack for your firmware.

    If not, I can ask if I can get the software for you.

  6. Alex says:

    i’ll try to contact them but… it’s hard to get in touch. i guess i ow you if you can do this favor for me. all of my friends and i we couldn’t wait for nokia’s lazy ass bring the n8 to romania and we went online and bought the handset from india. so it’s no guarantee applied or stuff like technical support for us :(

  7. alex68 says:

    ok, I see. Tomorrow I will call my friend and see if I can get the lang pack for you. After I receive it, I will upload it somewhere you can download.

    BTW, N8 is in short of supply. It is not about lazy ass thing to delay the release to your country. One of my friends working for N8 even doesn’t have an N8. It has been ordered.

    • Alex says:

      thanks man i appreciate your effort.

      • alex68 says:

        No problem. I still think you should receive
        service and guarantee which should be global wide applicable, regardless of where you buy. I know many Chinese go to Hongkong and Macau (for color or for cheaper price) to buy N8 and they DO have the support and guarantee in mainland.

        The guarantee is 2 years and very important if something is wrong in your N8. You should contact Nokia Romania to get this clear.

        • Alex says:

          i’ll try to get in contact with them tomorrow to see if i can get a guarantee certificate. and again thanks 4 the advice. keep in touch with the lang. pack

          • alex68 says:

            I replied to you in the browser post. Too confused everyday due to not enough sleep :( .

            In my reply I gave you the links where you can find product code for your language.

            Nokia staff internally handle language things differently than we end users. Even my friend who is a developer doesn’t know the external language product code and has to check and learn it as well.

    • Alex says:

      any news? :-S

  8. JTHC75 says:

    Terrible layout. Why are the alternate vowels shown by default? They should make it so that a long-press on a vowel gives you a mini-popup choice. This just makes it extremely cramped–3.5″ is already about as small as you can go and I don’t think Nokia’s screen is as touch accurate as the iPhone’s.

  9. Mogens Damsbo says:

    Glad to se the the T9 will still be an option.
    I need for one-hand-hold-and-thumb-typing.
    Looking forward to trying Swype though :-)

  10. q8phantom says:

    I need swype, I already saw this one on the post on a video on youtube but it has been deleted!! But we need portrait swype!

  11. q8phantom says:

    Here is the video am talkin about

  12. Bayram says:

    When I asked about vertical keybord . nokia staff answerd me that I should have small fingers to use such a keyboard on that phone. It means that all Iphone and Samsung Galaxy S users are having small fingers.

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