Swype

Swype

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Developer(s)	Nuance
Initial release	Android April 24, 2013
Stable release	Android 1.6.20 (November 19, 2014 (2014-11-19)) [±]
Development status	Active
Operating system	Android (2.2 and later) Bada MeeGo Symbian Windows 7 Windows Mobile iOS (version 8.0 and later)
Type	Virtual keyboard, Speech recognition software
License	Proprietary
Website	Swype.com

Swype is a virtual keyboard for touchscreen smartphones and tablets originally developed by Swype Inc. where the user enters words by sliding a finger or stylus from the first letter of a word to its last letter, lifting only between words. It uses error-correction algorithms and a language model to guess the intended word. It also includes a predictive text system, handwriting and speech recognition support. Swype was first commercially available on the Samsung Omnia II running Windows Mobile, and was originally pre-loaded on specific devices.

In October 2011, Swype Inc. was acquired by Nuance Communications where the company continued its development and implemented its speech recognition algorithm, Dragon Dictation.

Software

Swype consists of three major components that contribute to its accuracy and speed: an input path analyzer, word search engine with corresponding database, and a manufacturer customizable interface.

The creators of Swype predict that users will achieve over 50 words per minute, with the chief technical officer (CTO) and founder Cliff Kushler claiming to have reached 55 words per minute. On 22 March 2010, a Swype employee by the name of Franklin Page achieved a new Guinness World Record of 35.54 seconds for the fastest text message on a touchscreen mobile phone using Swype on the Samsung Omnia II, and reportedly improved on 22 August of the same year to 25.94 using a Samsung Galaxy S. The Guinness world record text message consists of 160 characters in 25 words and was at that time typed in 25.94 seconds, which corresponds to a speed of nearly 58 words per minute, or 370 characters per minute but has since been bettered by the Fleksy app on an Android phone to 18.19 seconds in 2014.

As of April 2013, Swype supports the following languages:

	Keyboard	Handwriting	Dragon Dictation
Albanian	Y	N	N
Arabic	Y	Y	Y
Armenian	Y	N	N
Azerbaijani	Y	N	N
Basque	Y	Y	N
Bosnian	Y	N	N
Bulgarian	Y	Y	N
Catalan	Y	Y	Y
Chinese (CN, TW, HK)	Y	Y	Y
Croatian	Y	Y	Y
Czech	Y	Y	Y
Danish	Y	Y	Y
Dutch	Y	Y	Y
English	Y	Y	Y
English (US)	Y	Y	Y
Estonian	Y	Y	N
Farsi	Y	Y	N
Finnish	Y	Y	Y
French (FR, CA)	Y	Y	Y
Galician	Y	Y	N
Georgian	Y	Y	N
German	Y	Y	Y
Greek	Y	Y	Y
Hebrew	Y	Y	Y
Hindi	Y	N	N
Hinglish	Y	N	N
Hungarian	Y	Y	Y
Icelandic	Y	Y	N
Indonesian	Y	Y	Y
Italian	Y	Y	Y
Japanese	Y	Y	Y
Kazakh	Y	N	N
Korean	Y	Y	Y
Latvian	Y	Y	N
Lithuanian	Y	Y	N
Malay	Y	Y	Y
Norwegian	Y	Y	Y
Polish	Y	Y	Y
Portuguese (BR, PT)	Y	Y	Y
Romanian	Y	Y	Y
Russian	Y	Y	Y
Serbian	Y	Y	N
Slovak	Y	Y	Y
Slovenian	Y	Y	N
Spanish	Y	Y	Y
Swedish	Y	Y	Y
Tagalog	Y	Y	N
Tamil	Y	N	N
Thai	Y	Y	Y
Turkish	Y	Y	Y
Ukrainian	Y	Y	Y
Urdu	Y	Y	N
Vietnamese	Y	N	Y

Swype was listed among Time (magazine)'s 50 Best Android Applications for 2013.

Availability

Swype currently ships on the Samsung Omnia II, Nokia N9, Nokia N950, Samsung wave s8500, Motorola CLIQ, Motorola CLIQ XT, Motorola DEFY, Motorola Atrix 4G, HTC HD2 (T-Mobile USA version,) T-Mobile G2, T-Mobile MyTouch 3G 3.5 mm Jack and myTouch Slide 3G (the latter both by T-Mobile USA). The most recent additions include the Samsung Galaxy S GT-i9000 and Nokia C7, as well as the Samsung Droid Charge and the Samsung Stratosphere. Swype has also recently become available for Windows 7 based tablets from certain manufacturers, including HP and ViewSonic.

The software's developer, Swype, Inc. is planning to market the software to other mobile device makers and expects a widespread adoption of the software among touch-based mobile devices.

On June 16, 2010, Swype opened a public beta for the Android operating system. The Samsung Galaxy S, Samsung Galaxy S II, Samsung Galaxy Note, Motorola Droid X, Motorola i1, and Motorola Droid 2 Android-based smartphones come with Swype pre-installed.

Virgin Mobile USA introduced Swype on the LG Optimus V, which runs the Android OS.

Swype is available for the Symbian platform S60 5th edition devices e.g. the Nokia 5800 Xpressmusic, Nokia 5230, Nokia N97 original and mini, Nokia C6-00, and the Nokia X6. Swype was released for Symbian^3 on October 16, 2010. It is available on the Ovi store.

In December 2010, an update including Swype was pushed to Sprint's HTC Evo 4G users. By the end of 2011, Swype expected to be preloaded on over 100 million devices.

On November 27, 2012, the Symbian versions of Swype beta v2 stopped working due to a software error. A fix was implemented on January 11, 2013. The Swype v1 for Symbian was not affected by the error.

Swype exited beta in 2013 and became available for download via Google Play on April 24, 2013. On June 2, 2014 Swype confirmed that they would be making a version of their keyboard for iOS 8, as it now supports third party keyboards.

Competitors

Swype is similar in concept to SwiftKey Flow, Fleksy, SwipeIt, SlideIT, TouchPal, Adaptxt, ShapeWriter, Multiling O Keyboard, Sony Gesture Input, and Android 4.2 Gesture typing, all of which also involve tracing a path over letters on a virtual keyboard. A somewhat different approach, though similar in concept, is found in MessagEase and Minuum.

Keyboards with optional tracing mode include HTC Touch Input, and Ultra Keyboard for Android.

See also

• Dasher (software)
• Shorthand
• Keyboard (computing)
• T9 (predictive text)
• Multi-touch

External links

• Official website
• United States Patent 7,098,896. C. Kushler, R. Marsden, "System and method for continuous stroke word-based text input"
• United States Patent 7,250,938. D. Kirkland, D. Kumhyr, E. Ratliff, K. Smith, "System and method for improved user input on personal computing devices"