On the subject of autocomplete, I agree that the feature increases my accuracy on 80% of the words I use. My problem is with the other 20% of the words – the ones not in the iPhone’s dictionary.

To compensate for the poor usability of the virtual keyboard, Apple has to offer an aggressive autocomplete feature. Yet that feature mangles proper nouns, abbreviations, technical terms and profanity. By solving one problem, they’ve created another.

The result is a keyboard in which you must constantly monitor your output to make sure what you mean to say ends up on the screen. If that means that I’m fighting the feature, well yes, I am and will continue to do so.

It’s a typical Apple fanboy perspective to say that I should simply type the way the iPhone’s autocomplete wants me to. Steve Jobs apparently doesn’t want me to swear. He apparently doesn’t want me to use text-message speak in, well, text messages. And apparently he thinks that when I type “Z” as an abbreviation for my boyfriend’s name, I actually mean to type “A.” It’s heartening to know that the folks in Cupertino know more about my personal life than I do.

If the iPhone autocomplete were more capable of learning from my interactions with it, then I’d have no problem. But having to fight it every step of the way renders the iPhone the most frustrating user-input device I interact with in a typical day.

I would respond to your other points, but (a) other people already have, and (b) it’s obvious that you’re the ideal consumer for which the iPhone was designed: One who is happy to change his own habits and adjust his own expectations to suit the device, rather than the other way around.

http://tpgblog.com/2008/09/05/the-product-guys-weekend-reading-september-5-2008/

Jeremy Horn
The Product Guy
http://tpgblog.com

Autocorrect is terrible. I can’t even type my name without it screwing it up. An off button there would have been enough to keep my from replacing my iPhone with a blackberry after week 1.

Mobile stylesheets are absolutely necessary for serious people. Most websites are 75% crap, 25% content. Why not let the iPhone display just the content, if the webmaster has been kind enough to allow it?

Saved passwords are not a big deal on a mobile device — that’s why other devices allow them. Only an idiot would save their bank password on their phone (unless the phone had a decent locking mechanism, which the iPhone lacks), but there are about 30 other passwords I use that really aren’t important enough to hide from the world. The OPTION should be there.

I think it’s mainly aimed for web surfing on the go… but why do people need the net so badly when on the move?? I’ll stick to making calls and text messages

oh well!

- Autocorrect makes the keyboard useful. It’s almost always correct – sometimes spookily so. If you’re typing l88t speak then no, it’s not going to get it right but if you’re typing actual words, then it’s usually excellent. Without autocorrect my typing speed would decrease dramatically. If you’re having that much trouble with it then you’re probably fighting the feature instead of leaning on it.
- Saved passwords are a problem on a mobile device. If you save the password to your banking site and someone steals the phone they’ve got access to your account. That’s why 1Password throws up a pin screen when you go to use the saved password.
- Mobile stylesheets? God no. It’s not a fake browser, it can display the web the way it’s supposed to be. Who wants the ugly, useless WAP-style pages?
- No default keypad? Most people are more likely to turn the speaker phone on/off, mute the call, or put it on hold then need to dial through a voicemail menu.
- Remember wifi? I agree with you here – in addition I’d like to be able to remember to attach/not attach by mac address. There are some ‘linksys’ networks I’d like to attach to and most that I wouldn’t.