Graffiti:
Handwriting Recognition for PDA's

November 1994

We’re writing differently on our Apple Newton these days and, as a result, we’re trying it out again. It had been living in the virtual bottom drawer, together with other technological experiments we tried, but didn’t like enough to actually keep using. Baby Newie’s problem was it never understood my writing. Since I bought it to write things down (generally while standing up), this wasn’t a good deal.

Enter Palm Computing, Inc. of Los Altos, California. It has invented a notational language, Graffiti, which is almost like hand printing. Enough like the alphabet that you can learn it in less than five minutes. (An A looks like an upside down V; the idea is to simplify things so the computer won’t make mistakes.)

Graffiti is nearly foolproof; I almost never make a mistake with it. It is not handwriting recognition, which I’d rather have. But I’d rather have perfectly recognized Graffiti than pitch my Newton in the drawer in utter frustration. And it’s much better than using the typewriter keyboard with a pen interface.

Until something better comes along, Graffiti, at $79.95 (and also available for Sharp, Radio Shack, and others coming) looks like the best game in town. And to think only a year ago its CEO Jeff Hawkins stood up in front of a roomful of PC industry insiders and said handwriting recognition couldn’t be done. He thought about it and came up with a reasonable substitute given the constraint of what the technology can do in the palm of your hand. Thanks, Jeff.

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