I’m looking for a privacy-respecting open-source android keyboard, and so far I’ve found:

Does anyone have any experience with these (or other alternative keyboards)? Which one would you recommend?

  • @EyesEyesBaby
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    291 year ago

    Imagine asking this question 15 years ago

  • fernandu00
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    211 year ago

    I use openboard but it gets me mad sometimes when I start deleting characters and it removes the space between the last word…sometimes it’s really annoying!

    • Rin
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      1 year ago

      Is it while using Jeroba for Lemmy? I had that problem with that app so I switched to Sync for that reason.

      • fernandu00
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        31 year ago

        No way I didn’t see that! I thought it was while using the English keyboard since it doesn’t happen in message apps and the only place I use English keyboard is in Lemmy (jerboa) … I’ll switch to other app

    • @[email protected]
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      1 year ago

      That’s a Jerboa bug with any keyboard AFAICT. Insane how this hasn’t been fixed yet.

  • @[email protected]
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    181 year ago

    I use FlorisBoard. It’s not perfect, but it has a fully featured clipboard and undo-redo functionality. Missing the swipe tho.

      • @[email protected]
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        11 year ago

        But it’s quite bad, given their care for privacy there’s no way they can compete with google who has all the data.

        I know a bit of machine learning and I’m pretty confident I could hack something together that’s better than what florisboard has right now, but I’d have no idea where to even start integrating it.

        • @[email protected]
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          31 year ago

          Agreed there isn’t any beating google, but everyone operates on different threat models. A bit of inconvenience for a bit of privacy may be worth it for some and not for others. From what little i used of it when i was trying it that yes it had much room for improvement but it was still useable. Once they get predictive text enabled i think the a swipe feature will really shine. But then again that’s just my humble opinion

          • @[email protected]
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            21 year ago

            Google’s swipe typing is pretty damn good, but it isn’t magic. It gets a lot better after using it for a while so I’m sure they use reinforcement learning in addition to the dictionary.

            They’ve had it for quite a while and it’s good, so I doubt they are putting much work into improving it. And since we have phones with TPUs and multimodal LLMs now, I think it’s possible to beat google.

            The LLM would only need 3-10 words of context and the swipe data as input to generate a single word, so it can be very small. I don’t know much about the power of cellphone TPUs, but I think training an LLM with about 10M parameters on the fly should be possible. If that’s the case, we could beat google while doing everything locally on the phone, so no privacy compromises.

            Now that I think about it, it sounds doable. But then again I never did anything like this so I’m probably underestimating it by an order of magnitude or two.

            • @[email protected]
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              31 year ago

              Beating google while being local would be the dream, wouldn’t it? What you say tracks but i’m like you, i’ve not done anything remotely like it so it’s very possible we’re underestimate indeed.

    • @[email protected]
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      11 year ago

      I’ve been using florisboard for a while now, across multiple phones. It’s exactly what I need in a keyboard with no fluff.

  • @[email protected]
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    131 year ago

    I use Gboard but with internet access disabled for it. I haven’t found a comparable open source keyboard yet.

  • @[email protected]
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    121 year ago

    I use thumb-key, made by dessalines. I downloaded it from fdroid

    If you check out screenshots, you’ll see that its a very non traditional type of keyboard that requires time and effort to get the hang of.

    Once you do, you will be able to type roughly as fast as you would with predictive swipe

    • @[email protected]OP
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      61 year ago

      That is really out there!

      Probably not going to use it (since I’m already too used to normal keyboards), but props to the devs for developing something different.

      • @[email protected]
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        41 year ago

        Understandable. I had to take some time to learn it, and I sometimes do stop for a bit when I dont exactly know how to spell something lol

        • @[email protected]OP
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          31 year ago

          I just noticed, that keyboard was created by one of the Lemmy Devs.

          Quite fitting to see it posted here

    • Rouxibeau
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      1 year ago

      I’m using MessagEase, which looks incredibly similar.

      ETA: oh, its a remake. I might need to install and move my layout over.

    • @[email protected]
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      11 year ago

      Any tips on how to actually learn this keyboard? Do I just force myself to use it as much as possible until the movements start to become muscle memory? How long might that take?

  • @[email protected]
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    91 year ago

    Any keyboard with no internet permission should be “privacy-respecting”, as it can’t (as I understand it) send any data back to the developers. I’m personally a big fan of Unexpected Keyboard, though it’s definitely something to get used to.

  • L3ft_F13ld!
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    1 year ago

    Just adding Simple Keyboard here as well. It has no features besides typing. It’s literally just a keyboard. Been using it for a bit and like it, but it won’t be for everyone.

    • @[email protected]
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      31 year ago

      +1. Took some time for me to adapt, but since then it’s been a good experience. Been using since 2022.

  • moosetwin
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    81 year ago

    my dumbass thought you were referring to a physical keyboard

    • @[email protected]
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      1 year ago

      Looks great thanks for the suggestion. Im1. Trying to switch from swiftkey. I tried florisboard but they don’t have numpad.

      edit i take my words back this keeb isnt meant for reg&lar use

  • @[email protected]
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    71 year ago

    All good but Florisboard has an internal clipboard with past entries. If you use its buttons (change in the settings, top row) and not the android ones, the system never gets your clipboard

    • strawberry
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      41 year ago

      @ashtrix shared a link for open board with gestures, this is what I use now

  • LucasWaffyWaf
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    51 year ago

    Right now I’m using SwiftKey, but if I can find an open source keyboard alternative with good customization and keyboard resizing (vertical and horizontal) I’d happily swap away.

    • @frogfroggy
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      21 year ago

      Swiftkey was bought by Micrsoft some eons ago. That was the reason fkr me to change to Simple Keyboard (not from Tibur) and to Openboard, but stayed ultimately with Simple Keyboard. I am a simple man.