The QWERTY keyboard we use on all of our devices today was designed 140 years ago with specifications that met the needs of typewriter users. The placement of the keys helped ensure that the most often-used keys wouldn’t get stuck and interfere with your typing. But modern keyboards don’t need the special placement; we just keep using the layout because it’s convenient and familiar.

Swiss startup icoaching wants to shake up the whole world of typing with its honeycomb-like keyboard layout. They call it WRIO, and it’s supposed to be a whole lot faster for typing on your mobile device than the traditional setup. The larger keys and unique letter placement let your thumbs move around faster than on the typical flat keyboard layout, and the size of the letters makes it harder to fat-finger an unintelligible sentence.

The letters’ positions aren’t really changed too much, but they are arranged on five levels rather than three and situated around two central space keys.The most commonly used special characters are right there on the main layer so you don’t have to push an extra key or two to get to them. The company is developing autocorrect software that is user-guided, so slang words and unusual contexts won’t constantly prompt annoying and inaccurate corrections.

WRIO also includes gestures to make texting and typing even easier. A swipe to the left is like hitting backspace, a swipe to the right adds a space (if you prefer to avoid the two space keys) and an upwards swipe acts as a “shift” key so you don’t have to go looking for it. For all of the wacky keyboard redesigns people have come up with over the years, this seems like one we would actually use and like. The designers say that after a couple of months, WRIO will become like second nature and you’ll never want to go back to a standard keypad.

The post Write-O! Redesigned Keyboard Makes Mobile Typing Simple first appeared on Gajitz.

In addition to an array of other useful features, this futuristic mobility-aiding cane contains a camera and facial recognition software to help the visually impaired pick friendly faces out of the crowd.

The cane is a widely-recognized and frequently-used staple for those who cannot see well or at all, and thus an idea vessel to enhance with GPS and other computer-driven aids. The device is being designed by Waheed Rafiq, Steve Adigbo, and Richard Howlett, researchers at Birmingham City University in the United Kingdom, and still just a prototype at this point.

In terms of face-seeing software: the built-in camera takes continuous images, searches for faces, then scans them against a database tied to your social profiles or other uploaded images (you can also use the cane itself to take new photos for the database). When a match is found, the user is notified via bone-conduction earpiece designed to cut down on auditory distractions.

The long-term vision is a commercial version but that is still a ways off. The goal is also to include only what is necessary in the cane, perhaps primarily hardware, leaving the heavy lifting to modular software components or third-party devices already in hand (like mobile phones). Other smart canes are also in development, some being marketed for as little as $40, but with far fewer features.

The post Smart Cane for the Blind Recognizes Faces From 30 Feet first appeared on Gajitz.

Although Adobe has always been a leader in creative software, their programs often lose out to good old pen and paper when a creative idea strikes. Adobe is taking a first tentative step into the realm of hardware with a pair of tools they call Ink and Slide. The two come as a set and work with iPad apps Sketch and Line, both designed to make the creative process simple and intuitive.

Ink and Slide are a stylus and a slide rule, respectively. The lightweight brushed aluminum tools are minimalist and futuristic in appearance, matching the Apple products they are meant to be used with. They both have white plastic accents and a single button which changes their settings within the associated apps.

Ink has a pressure-sensitive hard plastic tip that lets it move easily across the iPad’s screen. It works as a stylus with any iPad app, not just Adobe’s creative software. Within Sketch and Line, however, the stylus can be used to draw with a variety of in-app brushes and other drawing tools, and add personalized ink colors to your creations.

Slide sits atop the iPad’s glass and helps you draw perfect lines and shapes with the Sketch and Line apps. Inside, three magnets let it interact with the iPad: two at the ends tell the iPad that the Slide is there while a middle magnet makes contact when the Slide’s button is pushed. It’s a ruler, a drawing aid, and a shape stamping tool that switches functions with a few pushes of its button. The duo of Adobe tools comes in a case that is also a charger with an LED ring that glows when the case is charging. Ink and Slide are available for $199.99, and the Sketch and Line apps are free in the app store.

The post Let’s Get Physical: Adobe’s New Set of iPad Sketching Tools first appeared on Gajitz.

In their early days, 3D printers were only used in industrial and specialized business settings such as architectural firms. As they have inched further and further toward the consumer market, they’ve begun to draw attention from individuals who would love to make rapid prototypes and custom objects at home. The problem is that even the smallest and least complex commercially available 3D printers cost upward of $500, with the cost of higher-end models climbing into the thousands. A company called New Matter wants to put 3D printers into every home with a revolutionary $250 machine.

New Matter calls their 3D printer Mod-T, a nod to Ford’s vehicle that finally made it possible for the general population to afford their own cars. With some clever engineering tweaks, the Mod-T’s designers were able to lower the complexity and production price of their machine.

But the company noticed that price wasn’t the only thing holding people back from experimenting with 3D printing. The other hurdles included the need for special skills to operate the machines and the lack of high-quality objects to print. With their revolutionary concept, New Matter would more or less create an app store for 3D printable objects. Designers will be able to upload their designs and Mod-T users can download them with a few taps or clicks.

Unlike current sources of 3D printable objects, there is no special programming, tweaking, or modification to be done before the object is printed. Designers and artists build their printable object files just for the Mod-T so they are already customized to that specific machine and its requirements.

After finding and purchasing an object to print, it truly is just like downloading and app and waiting for your object to be produced. Users do have the option of making small changes like the color of the objects before the file is communicated to the machine via built-in wi-fi. Early adopters can order their own Mod-T through the company’s IndieGoGo campaign for $249.

(via: Wired)

The post Revolutionary $250 3D Printer Makes Object Printing Simple first appeared on Gajitz.

If you’ve ever played a platform video game and thought “I could make a way better game than this,” your day has finally come. Pixel Press is a mobile app that lets you create your own game, then play it from your mobile device. You don’t need to know any kind of coding or even use a computer – just draw what’s in your imagination and the app takes care of the rest.

It all starts with a special piece of graph paper, which you can either print out or have sent to you pre-printed. The app’s instructions give you the basics for creating terrain, traps, obstacles and barriers. The goal is to create five levels which your character will traverse, bottom to top, with each one getting progressively more difficult.

When you’re done drawing your game, you snap a picture of it with your iOS device and the Pixel Press software goes to work digitizing it into a playable game. You get to test it out, add textures and music, and even try out games created by other users. The whole Pixel Press experience has the potential to be educational as well as entertaining. The project is raising funds on Kickstarter, with great donation incentives like early downloads and sketchpads.

The post Draw Your Own Video Game, Then Play it on Your iOS Device first appeared on Gajitz.