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Swype keyboard is one of the most famous and widely used touch-screen keyboards, especially for Android. Swype is popular because it allows a user to enter text by swiping over the letters in the word or phrase you want to type. Though for some users Swype may be more of a hassle than a useful tool, many users have found it to be an essential feature for their device.
Nuance Communications acquired Swype in a $102 million deal last year. This new update is marked to be the first major update to Swype after it was acquired by Nuance. (As a side note, it might be interesting to note the man who invented T9, which is probably the most famous mobile text prediction tool for feature phones, founded Swype; and T9 was also bought by Nuance.
The update to Swype brings fresh features to the custom keyboard utility. The two major features are speed recognition and better word prediction. Nuance is well-known for its speech recognition product, Dragon Speech Recognition, so it isn’t a surprise Swype now includes Speech Support. The other major new feature, Next Word Prediction, is reportedly somewhat similar to the FlexT9 keyboard, which is another product of Nuance.
Other changes made to Swype are:
- A redesigned look
- Swype’s ability to “learn” how you type
- Users now have the ability to suppress words in Swype’s default dictionary
- Handwriting recognition
Android users can install Swype keyboard from the link below; you need to register with Swype before you can download it and you must sideload it onto your Android device. Do note, however, Swype is in Beta right now; if you already have Swype installed on your Android device this Beta version will work side-by-side with your already-installed version.
[via Ars Technica]
