Hi guys,

I bought the brand new 7135 version of FitalyStamp3 right when it first came out a few weeks ago, but I have been so swamped with holiday activities, etc. that I haven't had the time to write a review about it. So finally, here goes...

Ever since I got my 7135 (almost a year ago), I have been dying to have a stylus keyboard to replace graffiti. And now with "Graffiti2" in the newest version of firmware, I was even more on a mission.

I initially tried MessagEase, but hated the tiny, nearly invisible letters sharing squares and especially disliked all the inaccurate sliding I had to do just to do the most basic letters.

Then FitalyStamp for 7135 came out. Fed up with MessagEase, I gladly bought Fitaly because it had every single letter of the alphabet right in the center of the label, with no sliding involved, the way it should be. As I'm sure you have heard, in Fitaly the letters are situated in an order in which the most used letters are grouped together in the center to minimize hand and stylus movement. This is very practical and once your brain and hand quickly learn the new layout, it really does save time.

As you may have read here on the forum, last week I was on a business trip in Dallas and when I chatted with dwdod via Verichat instant messaging on my 7135, he was amazed at how fast I was "typing". He even asked me if I was using a laptop!

When you order FitalyStamp, you are sent 4 keyboard labels just like this...


I was impressed with how nice they look and amazed at how they fit over the graffiti area's exact dimensions. Once I did the initial set up and digitizing, I was also impressed with its pinpoint accuracy. The labels are very durable and with the strong laminate, I don't think they will ever rub off. There are also several ways to customize the functions.

So what I am saying is that I am completely impressed and happy with this product. It is so liberating to move beyond Graffiti and take advantage of the speed and accuracy of FitalyStamp. I encourage you to check it out.

Read more about FitalyStamp3 here...
http://fitaly.com/fitalystamp/fitalystampdesign.htm


By the way, I should point out that I am in NO way affiliated with Fitaly or Textware Solutions. This is merely my own unbiased opinion.

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~'kito
pdaPhoneHome Moderator

Sorry for the rebuttle...

I'm a big fan of Millikeys. I use the 5 line layout, modify it with some color, print it out and put it under a Strong Screen Protector. Works great for me. I don't have to learn a new keyboard layout...

Price : Freeware

and I too am not affiliated with Millikeys. Just my opinion.

There really isn't that much of a learning curve, but that's cool.

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~'kito
pdaPhoneHome Moderator

I've been hesitant to try any of the "grafitti keyboard" programs after a brief test with Messagease (sp?)...yuck....

I am pretty proficient with grafitti, but after the glowing review...we'll give this a try. Any excuse to spend more money on my little toy...

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My sordid past:

Kyocera 6035, Kyocera 7135, Samsung i700, iPAQ 6315, iPAQ hx4705, Motorola a630, BB 7100t, iPAQ rx3115, JAM 850, BB 8700g, Samsung i320 (just for fun), imate KJAM, TMO SDA, MDA, TMO Wing

Ok Mark... you and Dave have talked me into it! I just placed my order. While I wait I guess I should read up on it some more. I see that they letter layout is very different, and I understand why they are doing it this way. How long did it take you to get used to it? Is anyone using Fitaly Stamp in conjunction with any text entry apps such as WordComplete?

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Please visit my picture site: Robert-O-Rama :)

1. There is a slight learning curve, however it is much easier to learn than was MessagEase. I've had it now for about 5 days and am feeling quite familiar with the layout.

2. I am using FitalyStamp in conjunction with Wordcomplete. They work together swimmingly.

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Dave

I gave the Millikeys 5-line layout a good faith effort. It just wouldn't work well for me. I had a hell of a time getting the top row of characters working properly and that played havoc with most of the special characters. Also, I didn't find a convenient way to get into caps-lock mode.

Maybe it was just me, but I have found FitalyStamp to be a much more solid program and well worth the cost.

Like Markito, I have no financial interest. Just a satisfied customer.

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Dave

Sweet! That's the way I was planning to use it myself, so it's good to know that there are no problems

My order with Fitaly will ship out today, so hopefully I'll get it by Friday so I can play with it this weekend

__________________
Please visit my picture site: Robert-O-Rama :)

I too use it in conjunction with WordComplete and they work just fine together. Glad you got on board Robert K.!

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~'kito
pdaPhoneHome Moderator

And I'm glad to be on board!

One other thing that swayed me to get the FitalyStamp... it's a very nice color scheme... much nicer than Silkyboard ever was :p (I'm joking about that being a deciding factor )

__________________
Please visit my picture site: Robert-O-Rama :)

I have to confess that I really enjoyed the appearance of the MessagEase stamp. It was a real attention getter.

Attached Thumbnails

 

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Dave

No argument here! I liked the look of it too... but looking at it didn't get me too excited about trying to USE it

__________________
Please visit my picture site: Robert-O-Rama :)

Yeah, it looks like one of those kaleidascopes in which you look through the tube, turn the other end and see lots of spinning colors and designs.

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~'kito
pdaPhoneHome Moderator

I tried fitaly on my 6035. What i didn't like was having to slide for the #'s, whcih i use all of the time. The slide area was too small and it never worked well for me.

Now I'm using MessageEase Stamp and it too uses taps and slides. But i don't have trouble with the slides in messageease. And the #'s are all taps.

I haven't seen any reason to drop messageease for fitaly. And if the #'s are still slides, that alone would keep me away from it.

I thought fitaly was a very good program, and tried it with the 7135 before they got around to making an actual 7135 stamp. But i got tired of waiting and found MessageEase. I appreciate Jean designing fitaly for the 7135. I might have stayed with it had it been sooner.

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The more I learn, the less I know.

Kirkk,
The "123" button in the bottom left-hand corner of the FitalyStamp brings up numbers if you don't want to slide.


I find that I do letters far more often than numbers, so it doesn't bother me.

__________________
~'kito
pdaPhoneHome Moderator

I have been using Millikeys for about five months now, and really like it.

The Tap and hold for caps works easier than a caps key. The only issue I have is it doesnt seem to work with graffiti shortcuts.

I see the fitaly stamp has a shortcut button, how well does it work.

I actually live about 1/2 mile from their corporate office and am thinking of giving it a whirl over the holidays.

I put a strong engineering sheild under my Millikeys label that I print on Avery labels. The strong label lets me pull up the Avery without damaging the graffiti area.

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Mark
==========================
Palm Personal > Palm V > Palm Vx > Clie 760 > Kyocera 7135 > Treo 600 >Treo 650 > (Maybe i730??)

Millikeys' tap and hold is great for individual capital letters, but if you need to type continuously in upper case, a caps lock is essential.

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Dave

Yes you can use the shortcut key. Actually, Fitaly lets you use the key either in prefix form like in ‹shortcut›ds or in the more intuitive postfix form ds‹shortcut›

Even better, you can create macros that expand shortcuts and assign such macros to slides. For example, I have a slide of d in the South direction defined as follows:

‹enter›-- ds‹shortcut› --‹enter›

This means that sliding the d letter downwards produces:

-- 03-12-17 --

At least, that's what it does today

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Jean Ichbiah
Textware Solutions
www.fitaly.com

Hi Jean! I'm glad to see that you have been here participating in the discussion! I ordered FitalyStamp yesterday (because of dwdod and Markito's recommendation) and I'm really looking forward to using it

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Please visit my picture site: Robert-O-Rama :)

Welcome to the boards, Jean. It's always nice to see devs post here. I, too, just ordered the product based on the recommendations here.

__________________
My sordid past:

Kyocera 6035, Kyocera 7135, Samsung i700, iPAQ 6315, iPAQ hx4705, Motorola a630, BB 7100t, iPAQ rx3115, JAM 850, BB 8700g, Samsung i320 (just for fun), imate KJAM, TMO SDA, MDA, TMO Wing