Android Support?

[gooddadmike]

I would love to see Android (and maybe iOS) support. Here is a link to a pull request for AnySoftKeyboard which seems to be the leader in the category of alternate-layout friendly Android keyboards. Maybe it would be a good starting point. I know crap about custom iOS layout stuff.

I know you are just one guy but I think with the right exposure Norman could overtake Workman or Colemak. Great job man!

I am an ex-Dvorak user. I switched back to Qwerty for a while thinking I should at least be super fast in Qwerty first before switching to another layout. I'm leaning towards Norman (mainly because of your research and facts on the site). I'm also a keyboardio owner.

[deekayen]

I suppose I could look at this again to help people who hook up to external, bluetooth keyboards, but Norman is definitely not optimized for mobile (two-thumb) use. I posted a mobile Norman layout prototype in #13 (comment), but I've not done any sort of typing metrics on that work.

[gooddadmike]

I would argue that people want the one layout they are using on desktop to be the same as the layout they use on mobile, as a mechanism to learn it more fully and solidify their familiarity. Comng up with a modification for mobile only makes sense if almost nothing changes. The bluetooth keyboard comment is not what I was talking about. If learning norman I would want my Android software keyboard to have norman layout.

On Mon, Oct 15, 2018 at 7:25 AM David Norman ***@***.***> wrote: I suppose I could look at this again to help people who hook up to external, bluetooth keyboards, but Norman is definitely not optimized for mobile (two-thumb) use. I posted a mobile Norman layout prototype in #13 (comment) <#13 (comment)>, but I've not done any sort of typing metrics on that work. — You are receiving this because you authored the thread. Reply to this email directly, view it on GitHub <#18 (comment)>, or mute the thread <https://github.com/notifications/unsubscribe-auth/AAqlXvzGZc_WZzmDpDmTeKdNHXRzbkILks5ulHCugaJpZM4Xbpbc> .

-- - Mike Searcy <http://mikesearcy.com/> | 502.252.3588

[resolritter]

I think the best course of action is to add it as an alternative layout to AnySoftKeyboard, as it already has support for a lot of other features and plugins, while also being open-sourced.

A recent PR adding the Workman layout has just been merged upstream and it has barely 61 lines. It seems like it's just needed to define which keys are in each row through an XML file. Here is the link for reference:

AnySoftKeyboard/AnySoftKeyboard#1449

[deekayen]

I don't object to this. I'm just saying I probably won't do it. Feel free to empower yourself to submit the pull request where you want it.

[deekayen]

@gooddadmike, @reaysawa We may actually be able to get Norman added to Android if we promote Norman from xkeyboard-config extras to the base list of layouts.

https://gitlab.freedesktop.org/xkeyboard-config/xkeyboard-config/merge_requests/24 is a merge request I just opened to promote Norman to a full layout in xkeyboard-config, which would put it as a feature option in Chromebooks and Android. If you would go add helpful promotion links or just a thumbs up, that may help resolve this situation someday when it works it.

[resolritter]

@deekayen I've been able to use Norman as an "add-on" on top of AnySoft Keyboard. It comes with built-in English language dictionary (that's of course overridable through the app's UI link).

For anyone interested in getting it or looking to modify it, there are build instructions in the README. I also thought hosting the APK somewhere for saving people of the trouble of setting up the Android SDK and compiling everything, but didn't find a proper way to do so. @deekayen let me know if you're interested in the idea.

https://github.com/reaysawa/NormanLayoutAnysoftKeyboard

[deekayen]

I am interested.

[resolritter]

@deekayen I've opened a PR in #21