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Patrick
Asked: 2011-01-20 10:08:18 +0800 CST

Are there plans for handwriting recognition?

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This is a big feature when it comes to putting Ubuntu onto tablets. Currently, Netbook edition works great for that purpose and the pen digitiser is perfect, but the handwriting would be a real dealmaker (especially for my business - we could actually move to Linux) to compete with the Windows one.

CellWriter exists, but that only handles character and keyboard input (but I don't know about multitouch on the keyboard). It also needs to handle print and cursive, because character mode can be slow and uncomfortable (unless you're writing passwords). Lastly, CellWriter needs to have some default letter shapes rather than having to be trained from the start.

There is a software package called MyScript (by Vision Objects) that handles all four modes (keyboard, character, print, cursive) plus calculator and fullscreen, but it's only free as a trial. Still, it would be nice to see it in the For Purchase section and the trial in the free section of the Software Centre.

The only other ones are for Chinese/Japanese/Korean characters.

What would really make a difference for us is the integration of some formal API with the OS that can automatically activate when running on a tablet to pass ink data to whatever recognition system is installed, and have something available (however rudimentary) to use it.

tablet

1 Answers

  1. Best Answer

    Ubuntu keeps all it's plans in a system on launchpad called blueprints, each feature or plan is carefully laid out and given a time line. Searching this database I can find no release targeted specifications for handwriting. But I did find this user created specification back in Boston-UDS 2007:

    https://blueprints.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+spec/handwriting-recognition

    Perhaps it's time for you and others to pick this up and beat the drum so Mark and the Platform team will take the lack of handwriting recognition as a problem that needs fixing in the next release.

    Now Ubuntu is based on Gnome, and checking Ubuntu functionality at this level wouldn't be complete without looking for gnome solutions. For that I come across this project called CellWriter:

    http://risujin.org/cellwriter/

    Gnome plans are not firm on the matter of hand reorganisation, so it's not likely we'll get leadership in putting the functionality into Gnome by default. My best advice would be to try CellWriter, if it does the job then push for it's inclusion by default by creating or modifying the blueprint and keeping at the issue through the release cycle.

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