SlideWriter Hopes To Highlight Ease Of Text Editing On The iPad
May 7, 2012
It seems that concept videos for better iPad text editing methods are all the rage nowadays. Only three days ago, one such video made by YouTube user danielchasehooper started making the rounds. Then, just a day later, danielchasehooper's proposed improvements were quickly developed into a jailbreak tweak called SwipeSelection. And now? A similar concept video has been posted by the team behind an app in progress called SlideWriter.
The team provides the following description of SlideWriter:
SlideWriter for iOS lets you quickly move the cursor or select text by sliding your finger above the keyboard. It makes editing text faster and much easier than tapping and holding for every edit.If you're as averse to jailbreaking as I am, then SlideWriter would be right up your alley. SlideWriter and the jailbreak-only SwipeSelection aim for the same idea of improving the experience of text editing on the iPad, but they have markedly different executions. Whereas the latter requires a finger or two to be dragged across the keyboard to move the cursor, the former entails the sliding of one or two fingers just above the keyboard to perform the same function. The videos for both concepts are embedded below for your consideration. If you can't see the videos embedded above, please click here and here. Between the two, SlideWriter takes my vote simply because SwipeSelection's system of dragging fingers over the keyboard itself would, as pointed out by my colleague Andy, call for some conflict and counterintuitivity resolution. For now, though, I'm quite happy with iA Writer, which has an extra set of keys that make cursor movement more convenient. Which iPad text editing concept do you prefer? If you want to see either come to fruition on your non-jailbroken device, you can file a ticket to Apple for it to integrate danielchasehooper's in a future version of iOS or tweet your support to the SlideWriter team for it to develop SlideWriter into a full-fledged iOS app.
It does not require a jailbreak, all functions of the built-in keyboard stay intact including splitting the keyboard.
