01-02-2004, 07:00 PM
|
|
Ponderer
Join Date: Aug 2006
Posts: 108
|
|
Review of PhatPad v1.1
I have a guilty secret to confess. Sometimes I write things down on paper. You know, a quick reminder, a few things I need to buy, to do, to remember. I have a pocket computer costing hundreds of pounds that's capable of storing a vast quantity of information in a variety of structured formats, but the simple truth is that sometimes I just find it quicker and easier to scribble short snippets of information down on paper. To cap it all, I usually then re-enter these scribblings into the Pocket PC, sometimes only a few minutes later. What I need is a Pocket PC application that, well, acts like a piece of paper. Nothing has yet come close enough to totally stop me reaching for the pen, but PhatPad, the latest contender, looks like it might be in with a chance.
PhatPad from PhatWare Corporation is on the face of it a simple note taking tool along the lines of the built-in Notes application. However, on closer examination it has enough additional features and usability enhancements to make it a far more useful application. I looked at version 1.1.
Note Files and Formats
PhatPad notes are stored in files using its own proprietary file format. Each note can consist of up to 1,000 virtual 'pages' of handwriting, and the number of notes you can have is only limited by your storage memory. If you're launching PhatPad for the first time, or after manually shutting it down (there's no Exit option), then you're presented with a new note automatically. Otherwise you get the file browser.
Figure 1: The file browser; PhatPad notes can be stored anywhere.
PhatPad allows you to create notes with a variety of resolutions ranging from the actual screen size up to 1024 by 1024, and comes with enough zoom options to make the most of them. There's no wordwrap though as you zoom in and out.
Figure 2: The different zoom levels.
Handwriting
The key to PhatPad is its so-called digital ink technology, which makes handwriting on the screen very smooth. There's no jerkiness and no delay between moving the stylus and something appearing on screen, which is a marked improvement over Pocket PC's built-in Notes app. It does almost feel like writing on paper as you can scribble things down very quickly indeed.
Figure 3: Your handwriting with PhatPad will only be as good - or bad - as your writing with paper.
You can also choose to write in a variety of colours and line thicknesses to simulate your favourite pen.
Figure 4: Ink settings.
Editing
You can switch to 'Erase' mode and every line you touch with the stylus is magically deleted. This works in a fairly intelligent fashion, to the extent that you can delete most words with a single swipe.
Figure 5: Rubbing out a word in erase mode.
There's also a 'Select' mode, with the usual Cut, Copy and Paste options, but you can only copy and paste from one page to another; there's no way to re-position the 'cursor' elsewhere on the same page. Similarly you can't drag and drop the selection. Other editing features include Undo and Redo and the ability to Clear or Delete the current page.
Text Note
Each PhatPad note can also optionally include an additional single text note, which consists of text either typed using the soft input panel (SIP) or recognised from your handwriting - more on this later.
Figure 6: The text note; the divider can be moved up or down.
You can choose whether to show or hide the text note.
Handwriting Recognition
If you have Calligrapher, not surprisingly also produced by PhatWare, then you can get PhatPad to attempt to recognise your handwritten scribbles (note that you can't use Transcriber for this, you do need Calligrapher).
Figure 7: Selecting how the recognition should work...
Figure 8: ...and the finished result.
I tested the recognition with the new Calligrapher 7, and it works pretty much as you'd expect if you've used Calligrapher or Transcriber before - that's to say, generally fairly accurate depending how good your writing is. One key difference however is that the recognition in PhatPad is done as a batch operation rather than the real-time approach employed when using Calligrapher as the SIP. This means you also make corrections in batch at the end, rather than as you are writing. I found this way of working preferable as it makes the actual writing part more flowing and continuous, although to be honest the recognition aspect isn't a critical feature for me, as I'd envisage mainly using PhatPad for quick handwritten notes that I don't intend to convert to text.
Text Searching
Cleverly, PhatPad can also search your handwritten text, but this is very slow as it inevitably has to recognise it on the fly (and hence you need Calligrapher for this feature to work as well). However, this operates across notes so it's a very powerful feature if you have hundreds of notes and can't remember which one contains some specific text you're after.
Figure 9: Searching for handwritten text.
Diagrams
Now writing is all well and good, but sometimes you also need to do quick sketches, maps, diagrams, etc., and PhatPad supports this by default, as you'd expect in a free-form notes application.
Figure 10: A diagram, with rather wobbly lines.
However what you might not expect is that PhatPad can also recognise and correct some simple shapes, namely rectangles, circles and triangles, as you draw them. This works reasonably well, but your hand-drawn shapes need to be pretty close to the real thing for the recognition to work, and you can't use it whilst writing as it will try to convert your letters into shapes. Also I did experience a couple of lock-ups with this feature turned on, requiring a soft reset.
Figure 11: Shapes, most of which have been corrected for me.
The variety of colours and line thicknesses available also enables you to draw simple pictures.
Figure 12: Yes but is it art?
Reminders
As a bonus PhatPad also allows you to create reminders which display specific text at the appointed time.
Figure 13: Setting up a reminder, using Calligrapher to enter the text.
Export Options
Notes can be saved as bitmaps/jpegs, emailed as an attachment or beamed via IR to another Pocket PC.
Figure 14: Export options.
Gotchas- The shape recognition mode can hang the Pocket PC and can't be used whilst writing.
- It can be laborious to switch between Draw and Erase modes via the menu options; I'd prefer to see dedicated toolbar buttons for this.
- There's no way to move text around within a note page.
- If you create a new note but don't close or save it, and let the PPC power off, then on powering back on and closing the note it doesn't appear in the file list - you have to manually refresh it.
- PhatPad should prompt you for a filename on closing a new note, instead of forcing you to accept the default name and then manually rename it later.
- I'd like the option to always start a new note when I switch to the app.
- There's no voice recording facility.
Where To Buy
The software can be downloaded from Handango and purchased for $14.95 (affiliate link), or half this if you buy Calligrapher at the same time. A trial version is also available.
Specifications
This program will run on Pocket PC 2000 or later and takes up about 300 Kb of space.
Conclusions
PhatPad makes handwriting noticeably smoother than the built in Notes application, and has a good choice of line colours and thicknesses, note sizes and zoom options, and the multi-page format allows you an almost unlimited amount of writing per note.
In addition, PhatPad provides some powerful add-on features such as handwriting recognition and searching, shape recognition and reminders, although some of these require the use of an external tool, and the shape recognition is flawed.
Overall I found PhatPad very useful for jotting down quick notes when I didn't want to fire up a full-blown text-based application such as a word processor or list manager. Ultimately for me PhatPad does the job - I just need to think twice before reaching for a pen.
|
| |
|
|
|
01-02-2004, 07:24 PM
|
|
Ponderer
Join Date: Feb 2002
Posts: 76
|
|
phat pad
I've been using this software for several months now. It works. I like the way you can scroll a big "piece of paper" if need be. When speed, focus on the conversation, and the ability to draw are upmost important - this is my go to Ap.
__________________
ipaq 3670*OS 2002
|
| |
|
|
|
01-02-2004, 07:30 PM
|
|
Theorist
Join Date: Aug 2006
Posts: 298
|
|
The thing that bothers me about this is that the basic note pad features, very nice ones, I agree, have historically been an integral part of Calligrapher, up to version 6.52. Now, they have been removed in the latest version of Calligrapher, 7.0. Obviously, that is to promote sales of PhatPad as a separate app, and Phatware has every right to do that I guess, but it is very disappointing to a longtime Calligrapher user. It is a real disincentive to upgrade Calligrapher, in fact.
|
| |
|
|
|
01-02-2004, 07:43 PM
|
|
Contributing Editor Emeritus
Join Date: Aug 2006
Posts: 8,228
|
|
I too really dislike the bundling effect of Phatware's software. Not only is it costly, it takes up so much space.
1. I messed up and purchased PhatPad before I realized it didn't do what I wanted. I had tried it earlier and uninstalled it but it left something on my machine because when I reinstalled it months later, it said the trial had expired. I just forked over $10. My mistake. I uninstalled it within 20 minutes of getting my reg key. I wanted something that I could take notes with using FITALY. I hate HWR mainly because FITALY is faster and my HW is pathetic. Even so, transcriber does a good job for me, but give FITALY is faster, I just don't do HWR much.
2. It requires Calligrapher to work completely. This makes PhatPad a $45 app. 8O
3. Calligrapher 6.5 doesn't work with the iPAQ 2215. Well documented bugs in device power on issues - just like the Stowaway 1.x driver. So, if you purchesed both and got a 2215, you either dealt with the issues or uninstalled Calligrapher 6.x, meaing PhatPad is cripled. :evil: Presumably this was fixed with Calligrapher 7, but that came 4-6 months after the 2215 was launched.
I just want a basic note taking app that allows scribbles, drawings and SIP/keyboard based text with some of the features of Phatpad and without relying on other input methods.
|
| |
|
|
|
01-02-2004, 07:47 PM
|
|
Philosopher
Join Date: Jun 2002
Posts: 498
|
|
Quote:
|
Originally Posted by Ed Hansberry
I too really dislike the bundling effect of Phatware's software. Not only is it costly, it takes up so much space.
1. I messed up and purchased PhatPad before I realized it didn't do what I wanted. I had tried it earlier and uninstalled it but it left something on my machine because when I reinstalled it months later, it said the trial had expired. I just forked over $10. My mistake. I uninstalled it within 20 minutes of getting my reg key. I wanted something that I could take notes with using FITALY. I hate HWR mainly because FITALY is faster and my HW is pathetic. Even so, transcriber does a good job for me, but give FITALY is faster, I just don't do HWR much.
2. It requires Calligrapher to work completely. This makes PhatPad a $45 app. 8O
3. Calligrapher 6.5 doesn't work with the iPAQ 2215. Well documented bugs in device power on issues - just like the Stowaway 1.x driver. So, if you purchesed both and got a 2215, you either dealt with the issues or uninstalled Calligrapher 6.x, meaing PhatPad is cripled. :evil: Presumably this was fixed with Calligrapher 7, but that came 4-6 months after the 2215 was launched.
I just want a basic note taking app that allows scribbles, drawings and SIP/keyboard based text with some of the features of Phatpad and without relying on other input methods.
|
I can't agree any more. 
HPC notes need the calli***** for the ink function too. I just can't understand, even some free note software can implement the ink function without any calli****(such as stoptime 2.0), why can't they? They want to bundle and sell. I don't want to add 3mb into my precious RAM, esp when I think about that I have a transcriber in ROM which has been disabled by calli***.
|
| |
|
|
|
01-02-2004, 08:54 PM
|
|
Intellectual
Join Date: Feb 2002
Posts: 226
|
|
I love Transcriber (never forked the cash for Calligrapher), but the one thing that keeps it from perfection is that post-recognition, it does often require some editing. Granted, I can do the editing quickly, but when you are taking notes in a meeting, even a few seconds can be significant. What I have wished I could find for several months now is an application that would allow me to write at length without recognition. Then, at my leisure, I could return to the desktop and activate the recognition software to translate my handwriting into text. But, the key is that it would have to preserve the handwriting itself, because I would need to figure out the recognition errors without the immediate context of what was being said - that way I could do the obvious corrections myself, but still look up the handwritten version in case I got a word so badly mangled that the context didn't make it clear.
All that to say: does anyone know if this application will keep a copy of your handwritten notes after you use the recognize feature? :mrgreen:
|
| |
|
|
|
01-02-2004, 09:02 PM
|
|
Ponderer
Join Date: Aug 2006
Posts: 108
|
|
Quote:
|
Originally Posted by QYV
All that to say: does anyone know if this application will keep a copy of your handwritten notes after you use the recognize feature? :mrgreen:
|
Yes, PhatPad does do that, as the recognized text is added to the 'text note' without affecting your original handwriting.
|
| |
|
|
|
01-02-2004, 10:36 PM
|
|
Thinker
Join Date: Sep 2002
Posts: 405
|
|
OT-Tim Allen? Is this a joke? Why is there a Tim Allen posting on PPCT?
LOL!
Oh yeah-um, interesting app. 
|
| |
|
|
|
01-03-2004, 12:35 AM
|
|
Intellectual
Join Date: Apr 2004
Posts: 129
|
|
Quote:
|
Originally Posted by Ed Hansberry
I just want a basic note taking app that allows scribbles, drawings and SIP/keyboard based text with some of the features of Phatpad and without relying on other input methods.
|
Doesn't built-in Notes application meet your needs? You can write, draw, type (with any SIP tool), record voice notes, move drawings around, scroll (incl. autoscroll) and - what is very important to me - synchronize with Notes module of desktop Outlook.
I honestly do not see any compelling reason to replace Notes with PhatPad....
Cheers,
|
| |
|
|
|
01-03-2004, 02:50 AM
|
|
Moderator
Join Date: Aug 2006
Posts: 6,878
|
|
Quote:
|
Originally Posted by Fzara
Tim Allen? Is this a joke? Why is there a Tim Allen posting on PPCT?
|
Maybe because that's his name and he is a member of the Review Team???
Steve
__________________
"My eyes are rolling back in my head so far I can see my grey matter bubbling and frothing from reading this thread....bleh." JD
|
| |
|
|
|
|
|
Linear Mode
