If you regularly type on your iPhone with a non-supported language such as Danish, Dutch, Finnish or Portuguese, you'll be pleased to learn about iPhoneDict, a repository of free keyboard dictionaries. The solution is a bit of a hack. After downloading, you have to add the dictionary into the English (UK) slot. This may be a problem if you're actually a British iPhone user. Once downloaded, you activate the keyboard and its dictionary from Settings > International > Keybaords. You can learn more and find step-by-step instructions on the iPhoneDict website.
Today Apple released a keyboard update for both the MacBook and the MacBook Pro notebooks. In regular Apple style, their release notes are not extremely profuse, "This MacBook and MacBook Pro firmware update addresses an issue where the first key press may be ignored if the computer has been sitting idle. It also addresses some other issues."
Please note, this is a firmware upgrade that will install an application in the utilities folder that you will then, in turn, need to open and follow the on-screen instructions. For a list of MacBooks that may need the update, you can look at the Apple support note.
If you computer has been affect by these issues, or if you are just inclined to installing all Apple updates, you can get this update by opening Software Update (Apple Menu > Software Update) or by downloading the installer package from the Apple Support downloads site.
The LowKey Stand looks like a very cool concept, judging from the rendering above. It is a stand that you can perch your iMac or Cinema Display on, and slide your new Apple Keyboard underneath. It doesn't stop there, dear reader! The stand also sports an integrated 4 port USB 2.0 hub so you don't have to go fishing around on the back of your Mac for a port.
The LowKey Stand ships on February 15th, and will cost you $59.99.
According to Apple Insider, Apple has filed a patent for a dynamic, OLED-based keyboard that will allow on-the-fly keyboard layouts via software. Each key would have a matrix of OLEDs (organic light emitting diodes) that display that key's currently configured character.
Not only would this dynamic keyboard design be able to show you the effects of meta keys on standard keys, it would also allow for swappable language configurations. As a user with a bizarre keyboard fetish, I would personally jump all over this, even if it didn't have the Matias Mechanical Keyswitch.
I have a confession: I hate the caps lock key! I mean it's a crazy holdover from typewriter days and for me at least it's always much more of an annoyance than a help. Fortunately, as we covered in an earlier Mac 101, Apple makes it easy to turn the caps lock key off altogether in the Keyboard tab of the Keyboard & Mouse Preference Pane. It looks like they've gone even farther with the new Apple Keyboard.
"Wolf" Rentzsch has discovered an undocumented anti-caps lock function whereby the keyboard will not register a very quick press of the caps lock as sometimes happens by accident when reaching for the left shift key. You can still activate it by pressing and holding the key. Rentzsch notes that if caps lock is already active a quick press will disable it, confirming that this is an intentional feature. He posts a little video to demonstrate.
This is vintage Apple: thinking about and implementing the little things that make your computing life just a little better.
You may recall that one of Apple's slogans when the Mac mini was released was BYOKM-bring your own keyboard and mouse. Well a lot of those keyboards will of course be Windows keyboards, and while they work fine on a Mac, there's one particularly annoying thing. For some reason the keyboard Windows key is mapped to the Mac Command key and the keyboard Alt key is mapped to the Mac Alt or option key. The reason this is a problem is that on a Windows keyboard the Alt key is right next to the spacebar (where the Command key is on a Mac keyboard). So if, like me, your keyboard shortcut muscle memory is to the key next to the spacebar then all your shortcuts get messed up on a Windows keyboard. Fortunately, there's a simple solution to this problem in the Keyboard tab of the Keyboard & Mouse Preference Pane. There if you click on the "Modifier Keys..." button you'll be taken to a dialog where you can easily remap the keys. So to make a Windows keyboard work like a Mac keyboard just change the option key to the command key and the command key to the option key as follows:
When I saw the new Apple keyboards I knew one had to be mine. I'm a huge fan of my MacBook's keyboard, and the new Apple keyboard is a MacBook keyboard you can attach to any number of Macs, what could go wrong?
Once I got my new keyboard in the mail I set it up on my iMac. I downloaded the Keyboard Software Update, restarted the iMac, and plugged in the keyboard. All the special keys worked as they should, with the exception of the Exposé key and the Dashboard key (F3 and F4). Press as much as I would, these keys did nothing. I thought that it might be the iMac, so I repeated the steps on a MacBook Pro and a MacBook with the same results (I also tried using different accounts on those machines, to no avail). Luckily, this isn't a hardware issue since the buttons actually work (I assigned some shortcuts to the F3 and F4 keys to make sure they were actually working) so it would seem the devil is in the software.
TUAW reader shak forwarded a link to this Apple Support Discussion in which several other people are encountering the same problem. Do not be fooled by this discussion's 'Solved' status, as reading through the discussion makes it clear that this problem is being encountered by many folks.
TUAW readers, is anyone else out there seeing this behavior? As I wait for Apple to fix this issue I'll be reading the comments here hoping someone has a solution.
I don't know if you were on the TUAW Talkcast Aftershow with us last Thursday, but if you were, you would have heard a member of the TUAW staff (who shall remain nameless) saying something very forceful about the iPhone keyboard: "Let's face it-- it sucks."
Yes, for all the "oh, it gets better when you learn it" and "you just have to trust it" comments, it seems that the naughty secret lying in the heart of every iPhone owner out there is that iPhone keyboard is not the easiest to type on. And now Science has confirmed it: a new study says the iPhone's keyboard is two times slower than phones with QWERTY keyboards on them. The study examined people (who didn't own iPhones-- more on that in a second) sending fixed length text messages both on their own phones (half QWERTY and half numeric) and on the iPhone, and QWERTY was the fastest. The iPhone keyboard took twice as long (the numeric keypad took about the same time as the iPhone), and participants had more errors on the iPhone than their own phones.
But iPhone stalwarts, worry not, because that "it gets better when you learn it" excuse still holds true-- none of these people were actually "used" to an iPhone. If we really wanted a completely objective idea of iPhone speed vs. QWERTY (or numeric) speed, we'd have to get an iPhone owner to match up against another owner, both experienced with using their phones. How would that pan out?
Oh, and I should put the TUAW staff member's comment in context-- we were talking about the fact that the iPhone doesn't support using an actual Bluetooth keyboard. Compared to the no-button keyboard on the iPhone, it seems our staffer would rather have a full sized QWERTY keyboard hooked up via Bluetooth any day.
Thomas from the German site Rettet die sent us this English version of his petition to save the Open Apple key-- that little Apple icon on the Command key that's missing from the new Apple Keyboards. Already, he's received 1600 German comments in favor of keeping the Apple key, and he asked us to bring the petition to America and join the fight to save the Apple key.
But is it a fight we want to join or not? Sure, the Open Apple key is a tradition by now-- ever since I was a kid, I've learned to use the Open Apple key instead of the Ctrl key on Windows keyboards, and even when Microsoft trotted out their "Windows key" in Windows 95, it was just a copy of the classic-- their flag didn't come close to the icon design of the bitten apple.
But Apple has to have a good reason for taking the key off, don't they? So far, all I've heard is that they did it from a design standpoint-- they didn't want Apple logos all over the place, and the Command key is (and works) exactly the same anyway.
For me, that's not a good enough reason. Having a logo on the Command key is a uniquely Apple standard, and no one said that it cluttered up the keyboard before now. Of course, Apple is Apple, and they'll do what they want-- even 16,000 petition signatures probably won't get them to change their product. But that doesn't change the fact that they're wrong to kill the Open Apple.
Yesterday I took a little trip down to my local Apple Store (the Michigan Ave. store here in Chicago) to check out the Keyboard. That's what Apple is calling their latest engineering marvel-- not the iBoard or the MacBoard, just Keyboard. I got a chance to check out the new iMac, and play with the new iLife apps for a bit, then I cracked open TextEdit and started typing.
So what did I think? I wasn't kidding when I called it an engineering marvel-- the Keyboard is unlike any other keyboard I've seen. It is extremely, almost dangerously thin-- Apple is already making stuff the width of cardboard, and pretty soon they'll move on to paper-thin. It's not actually flexible, but I got the feeling that if I really tried (or just landed a heavy phonebook on it), I could break it in two. Probably not true, but I still felt that way.
But you don't buy a keyboard for its durability-- you buy it to type on, and that's where I ran into problems.
When we first wrote about the then rumored new Apple keyboard old time Mac users discounted it as a fake because of one little detail: no Open Apple on the Command key. That's the Apple logo that which, until today, appeared on the Command key.
Sadly, it is true that the Apple logo has been banished from the keyboard, replaced with the much more useful label 'command.' At least this will help Mac support folks educate their users ('You want me to look for an Apple key?! That doesn't even make sense. Remind me again why I called the Help Desk!'), but I'll miss that little Apple logo. Call me old fashioned if you like, but Open Apple will always have a fond place in my heart and I'm not afraid to admit it.
Today at a special event Apple, Inc. honcho Steve Jobs announced a whole slew of new products including a revamped iLife '08 suite, enhancements to the .Mac service and something which makes me particularly happy: redesigned and enhanced iMacs. These new computers sport cool new enclosures made of glass and sleek plastic as well as a host of internal refinements to processor, memory and video.
And what goes better with a cool new iMac than brand new input devices? Yes, in addition to the re-designed iMac, Jobs also announced two versions of a slick new anodized aluminum keyboard to go with them or to purchase separately. The new keyboards have been completely redesigned and seriously put previous Apple keyboards to shame -- at least in terms of looks.
The new keyboard comes in two different versions, one is USB 2.0 and sports the full complement of keys including document navigation controls, a numeric keypad and special function keys for Mac features such as brightness, volume, eject, play/pause, Exposé, and more. The second keyboard option is smaller, more compact and is wireless via Bluetooth.
It features the same low-profile keys as the wired version as well as the same access to Mac features as its larger sibling. However, it does not have the numeric keypad like the larger version. It also features what Apple calls "intelligent power management" which conserves battery life by powering down the keyboard when not in use and then bringing it back to life the moment you start typing again.
Yes, the new keyboards look super cool. After all, they do come from Apple, which excels at making things that look great. However, I'm a stickler for a good keyboard, so I really hope these work and feel as good as they look. When I get my hands on one, I'll report back. Until then, if any of you get one first, let us know how it is.
People like to sue each other (Americans at least), and they love to sue Apple.
Supposedly, the iPhone's keyboard infringes upon a patent awarded to Florida's SP Technologies LLC in 2004. They're seeking compensation for iPhones sold, as well as an injunction against the continued "...willful and deliberate" use of their intellectual property.
We'll see where this goes. In the meantime, we'll say it again: People love to sue Apple.
Our friends at Engadget have posted several photos of what may be the rumored super-slim, aluminum keyboard that will accompany the new iMac. It's very thin indeed, and the keys look like those of a MacBook. I imagine typing on such a thin keyboard would be annoying, but I've never tried it, of course, so who knows.
The strangest feature is the Command key with no Apple logo! What's going on here?
We can't confirm that this is the real deal, so viewer beware.
Today Apple released a keyboard update for both the MacBook and the MacBook Pro notebooks. In regular Apple style, their release notes are not extremely profuse, "This MacBook and MacBook Pro firmware update addresses an issue where the first key press may be ignored if the computer has been sitting idle. It also addresses some other issues."
According to 
I have a confession: I hate the caps lock key! I mean it's a crazy holdover from typewriter days and for me at least it's always much more of an annoyance than a help. Fortunately, as we covered in an 
I don't know if you were on 
Thomas from the German site Rettet die sent us 
I think this past week represents the most we've ever written about a keyboard.
People like to sue each other (Americans at least), and they love to sue Apple.
Our friends at Engadget 
