The Daily App: Graffiti For Android

If there's one thing we miss about the Palm handheld platform it would be the fast input that it afforded by use of the stylus. Once you took the time to learn Palm's Graffiti alphabet and handwriting recognition system, notes could be captured as fast as writing by hand. Not so with the tiny keyboards of today's smartphones, although younger generations seem to have evolved faster thumbs than we old timers.

We're happy to report that there's a Graffiti for Android that works as an optional replacement for its default keyboard. It supports toggling to the Android keyboard, and an option disables it when a hardware keyboard is plugged in.

Like Android's own keyboard, Graffiti features auto-capitalization, word suggestion and word learning. Like the Palm version, Graffiti puts a dual-region input box on the screen where numbers and letters are input. We found the Graffiti interface most useful as a keyboard replacement on our Nexus S smart phone, since the larger keyboard on the Galaxy Tab is quite comfortable for typing. It accepts finger or stylus input (if you happen to have an Android-compatible stylus). If you're not familiar, take a quick video tour of Graffiti. Graffiti is free and developed by Access; there's also a Pro version.