Streamline typing with text substitution

One thing Nick missed was one simple tweak that will help a lot:

Right click on the ActiveWords monitor, go to options, go to confirmation options, and then enable the spacebar/spacebar box at the top 1/3 of screen.

This way you don't have to reach for the F8 key, and can just use the space bar to trigger ActiveWords.

Let me know if you have any ideas on how to make ActiveWords better...

Buzz

I like ActiveWords, but stopped using it because it doesn't have autocomplete. I'm now using a combination of MacroExpress (for my text and macros) and SlickRun (to run programs and open folders). I'm a registered user of ActiveWords and I'm disappointed on its lack of development. I can't remember the last time a new version has come out (not including the tablet version).

I would agree with Tim about lack of any updates for quite some time on AW. I do, however, continue to use it and find it handy. Also, it's near impossible to find a "current release version" statement posted on the site (every couple of months when I do a search to see if there have been any updates, it takes me forever to find some obsure forum post for eons ago that says what the last release was)

I often wondered why, when you type ctrl-space to bring up the pop-up window, there is no "history" of previous commands to rotate through. The control even has up/down arrows at the end of the input box, but they are always disabled.

I also wish that you could have confirmation of "invalid" commands instead of an option to beep when you have recognized commands. Seems a bit backwards to me. 95% of the time I'm going to type things in correctly and don't need to be told about it. It's the 5% of "typos" that I type in where there is no feedback/indication of it being wrong that I sit there for a period of time wondering whats taking so long for the action to kick in.

Being a developer, I also wish AW had a more "public" API for adding support into 3rd party apps. Currently, I think you have to go through them in order to get the APIs.

Overall, though, I am an AW fan!

Tim:

The core ActiveWords engine is rock solid, I think that the latest version, 1.98. And one of these days we will re-write and and re-build, maybe post Vista shipping. We could have called it 2.0, but we are trying to come up with something really spectacular by way a breakthrough idea.

We know we need to upgrade the UI look and feel. What you are missing is that we have really focusing on building agents. Look at what we have done with MindManager, MSN Desktop Search, Google, and ClearContext. Let us know which applications you are using, and we will look at building at more content in these areas.

We are also working hard on ActiveWords for Origami, and beginning to look at ActiveWords for WinMobile 5.0 and the Blackberry.

Brian:

See my notes above.

I really have no clue where our current release date is, but will see what our guys think about posting it. Again, once our core technology was built, we have sought to just refine and improve it, instead of re-inventing it. We are looking at a bunch of new tools that would allow us to re-write, re-build and both speed up and shrink the size of it.

As for history of previous commands….good idea, let me see what our guys think about it. The up and down arrows are really about scrolling up and down if you were using the “ActionPad on a massive scale.

As for “invalid commands”, is the fact that they just don’t work not an indicator?

We would be happy to talk to your about our APIs, and everything else we have if you will sign an NDA. Let me know if that is of interest to you. And also, tell me what apps you are thinking of.

Again, our stuff only gets better when we have conversations like this.

Buzz
buzz@activewords.com

Buzz,

Yes, please look into making it easy for users of AW to figure out if they have the latest greatest version. Right now it's near impossible for the average user. Of course, you could always enhance AW someday to check for updates via the UI or automatically. Seems to be the "in" thing to do now that everyone is wired into the internet.

"As for “invalid commands”, is the fact that they just don’t work not an indicator?"

It's not an invalid AW scipt, as in there is something wrong with the scripting... It's that a typo was made while quickly typing in a command or I have forgotten exaxtcly the name of the command.

For example, lets say I launch the Palm Desktop via "pdt". A month later I type in ptd or palmdt instead. Or even worse yet, its a command that does something in the background where there is no visual indication of if it worked or not. If I type that command in 100 times a day, I only want an audible indication of the 1 time I type it in wrong, not the 99 times I get it right. For that reason alone I quickly learned to disable the audible indicator of recognized commands. Another argument is this: lets take "FireFox" for example. On one or two of my systems, it takes a good 10 to 20 seconds before there is even a clue that firefox is "starting up". If there was an indication (beep) that I typed "FireFox" in incorrectly and got an instand "Beep" back from AW, I could quickly retype it in (hopefully correctly) instead of sitting there for 30 seconds wondering if FireFox is slow getting started, is hund in memory, or had I mis-typed the command. Once again, I don't want a "beep" as a reward for typing it in correctly 100 times a day. I do want a slap in the "beep" when I get it wrong. Hope that helps illustrate my request a bit better.


Sorry, no thanks on anything that involves an NDA. I don't think that a carefully written API would need an NDA in order to prevent trade secrets. It sounds like in order to add AW support into a 3rd party product you have to have access to some low level workings of AW. I can't remember the last time our company had to sign an NDA in order to support another 3rd party product or API set. Perhaps when you update for Vista you'll make it a little easier for working with your APIs.

Like I said, I do appreciate your product (or else why would I even mention wanting to maybe someday add support in my products for it), and I look forward to any enhancements you'll be coming out with in the future. AW on an Origami device is going to be killer.

I would like to see ActiveWords written again from the ground up with a priority on keeping it lightweight and fast. It's amazing what SlickRun can do and it's only 177k. I'm not a fan of having four exe's running for one program. I actually spent more time configuring ActiveWords when I was using it, than I did doing work. I also thought the training mode would be cool, but it just annoyed me after awhile.

My major annoyances are as follows:

- No Drag and drop to add shortcuts, folders or text to Active Words
- No Autocomplete
- Hotkeys are not very configurable
- No Autocomplete (I know it's in here twice, but it's very important)
- Better interface for the Active Words (Explorer / Folder type interface that remembers it's size and position)
- Easy macro making development environment like MacroExpress

My suggestion is to take a look at SlickRun for some ideas. I actually use ClearContext and MindManager, but don't see myself using that them with ActiveWords because I can't remember all the ActiveWords. I usually spend more time looking up the ActiveWords then it would take me to just use my mouse.

I really don't like it when companies don't focus on the basic features (like Microsoft) that you use daily that could really improve the product. It's the simple things that count. Ease of use should be your main focus right now, and I don't think it's there ... yet.

I forgot one item. I agree with Brian, ActiveWords should blink in red if the ActiveWword was incorrect (See Slickrun).