iPad Beta: Flashcard fill-in-the-blanks handwriting input problems

[trebotski]

Pleco usage: On an iPad with the Apple Pencil, in both Legacy and Beta, I've been focusing on flashcards "Fill-in-the-blanks" with handwriting, it's been GREAT for improving both character memory AND real life writing speed in a meaningful way!

Problem: My hand touching any part of the handwriting input area constantly fudges with the resulting characters, and often erases the words I've already written.

Legacy solution: In Legacy Pleco, the left-handed UI settings put the writing input box on the left:

It's okay at a table, though the thickness of the iPad makes the elevated writing height a little weird.

But I really enjoy practicing everywhere - with the iPad on my lap, the couch, in bed, etc.

So I changed it to right-handed UI:

BOOM! Problem solved. The grey non-input area is a GREAT place to rest my hand while I write, literally anywhere I sit, even if it looks a little wonky. I've been doing this for months and it's excellent. Seriously, I love this.

Beta problem: The only setting I can find is now a full-screen input area.

Writing with hand off the screen is sometimes okay, but even the slightest brush of my middle/ring finger against the screen is still constantly erasing words.

I've tried just putting my hand on the screen...

But my skin on the screen keeps making marks and erasing words.

Possible Beta solutions(?):
1) Any non-input space on the screen would give space for hand-resting, adjustable for left/right sides, and solve the problem, just like it did in Legacy.
2) A few apps have settings where only the Apple Pencil is allowed to mark the screen, while skin-touch can only activate buttons or certain areas, but this would only solve it specifically for Apple users.

Sorry to sound so nitpicky, but writing from offscreen has been causing some hand strain. Maybe I've foolishly missed something in the settings. I'll keep using Legacy for now!

 

[mikelove]

Sorry about that; this is actually an area we haven't done any iPad-specific UI design yet, we're mostly focused on the 'snap' handwriting input test and for this one at the moment we simply use the iPhone UI (which has good reasons for being translucent and full-screen). I think we should probably just fix this by restoring the old design with the box on the right/left, I don't see any particular reason to change it as we still have the answer buttons on the left/right on landscape iPads.

As an immediate temporary workaround, have you thought about putting your iPad into split screen mode when doing Pleco handwriting tests? It's not really using the whole screen productively anyway.

 

[trebotski]

Thanks very much for the reply. That's a smart workaround, I've just tried it and it seems to kinda work with an unreactive app under my writing hand, though accidental app-changing starts to happen mid-writing.

Restoring an option for the old design, or at least a left-right layout, would be awesome! I'm really looking forward to using more of Beta's options for in-iPad custom fonts like Taiwan Traditional Kaiti, that has been a perfect fit for writing practice.