buttonless pda

[Aerestis]

I would really like a handheld without buttons on the front face, but rather smaller and on the sides. I want a front face that is 100% screen (Or 90%, but a very large amount of screen anyhow). I am sick of paying for looking at button; I'm not too stupid that I couldn't find them if I wasn't staring at them all of the time. Actually, I hardly ever use buttons. I'm talking about those shortcut buttons. What in the world? Now I'm mad.

[Zack Mahdavi]

I agree... I hardly ever use those buttons at all as well. It would be awesome to have a handheld with a centered display and absolutely no buttons (well, except for the power button of course). :)

In the past, there were some CLIEs that made the buttons very, very small, so it gave the handheld the appearance that it was buttonless. They looked very cool, but they haven't gone as far I'd like.

The only button I use is the D-pad. but if they can make a Sony Ericsson style joystick on the side, or maybe just a jog dial, I'd be a happy camper. 8O

[Kowalski]

i disagree! i use the hardware buttons alot, they make my life easier.
just like the desktop environment. i dont like using the mouse eighter

[dean_shan]

Hardware buttons all the way. I like to be able to press a button and get right into an important app.

[Zack Mahdavi]

Haha okay.. I guess I'm in the minority.. :)

[Jacob]

I wouldn't mind one of these myself.

The ONLY thing I use the buttons for is the occasional playing of games - and even then that's quite rare.

I could certainly do without them.

[Aerestis]

You could still play games without them being on the front face, and there still would be hardware buttons you guys, they would just be smaller and out of the way. On the top or on the sides.

I'll post a link to a 3d rendering of it soon. I've been working on it since I posted this thread, I'm a little stuck on where the buttons should go. I'll work it out, it will be good.

[Dave Potter]

I vote for the buttonless face. 90-95% screen sound great to me. I never use the damn things and only occasionally use the D-pad. In fact, a jog dial installed on the side would serve me much better than the D-pad does.

[Chingyul]

I wonder how hard it would be to play games using your index figures on the back. Same grip, just moving the buttons to the back.
Intriguing??

[senfeng]

I guess I'm in the minority as well. I can't stand the hardware buttons. I use them for games if I have to, but I've got "ogre" fingers and they're just too hard for me to push.

I wish that there was an attachment that I could use with controller style buttons. I just got back from GDC in San Jose, CA and I saw a sony ericsson phone adapter with larger buttons. You just pop the phone into the middle of this "controller" and your good to go. I wish there was something like this for my 2215.

[Aerestis]

hmm, you might be on to something. That's very intriguing... I like that idea as well as a sort of hidden jog dial.

edit: Yeah, a slide on controller deal is a nice idea that I've seen around. If you want buttons, then go ahead and keep them with you. If you don't, leave them at home or don't buy them, so on so forth. The problem is, I'm thinking there could be a bigger screen here, and then the button pad would make this a very large pocket device. Still, usually gamers will gladly spend comfort on fun, hehe. And the point is, this device is more for watching movies, viewing pictures, maybe edging towards drawing or story boarding for 3d animators, and other larger-screen friendly things. I know I would LOVE a nice sketching/vector program, a good image and movie viewer, web browser, and definitely the normal pim stuff with a word editor/spread sheet/so on. The extra screen space is badly needed for a lot of stuff, and those buttons are just silly usually.

I wish I could take scissors and cut off the bottom of my device, leaving just the screen :)

[senfeng]

I've seen some "joystick" devices for Palm, but just slipped over the existing d-pad and buttons. What I saw at the show was something that plugged into the ericsson and made my mouth water.

[Aerestis]

Palm bugs me. My writing pad is such a disgustingly huge waste of space. I didn't pay so my screen could be small, so I would appreciate it if palm would give me a refund and pretend it never happened.

[Trimac20]

Maybe they should design a PDA with a slidable button interface? Personally I think most PDAs have too FEW buttons, ie. buttons for gaming.etc. I don't know if many games utilise the shortcut buttons, but this would be the main reason, in my opinion to keep the hardware buttons. Since it easy enough to access apps in WM2003 (although much more convenient to use the shortcuts).

[JustinGTP]

The buttons should be able to slide in and out of the PDA. I use the hardware buttons now because I have PI 5.0.1 now :D

[Jacob]

Well, if they could make the screen bigger by getting rid of the buttons then I'd be all for it.

The only problem I have with the Toshiba is its size really. Get rid of the buttons and the size isn't as bad.

[Jon Westfall]

Buttons all the way, but they'd be tons more useful if programs like DoubleLauncher and Vito Buttonmapper were included in the OS. Without those, hardware buttons can be a bit of a nusiance. Try using a device with only 2 buttons (i.e. the XDA) - you'll see how often you use them when you only have 2.

[Aerestis]

Sliding buttons are a cool idea too. Can someone elaborate on how exactly that might work? I have a few ideas, but nothing really... comfortable seeming or even attractive. The benefit of sliding buttons is how slim the sliding panel can be; it can also be flexible as well, I would imagine.

[Stephen Beesley]

I came to the Pocket PC from a PDA without Hardware buttons (the Newton) and have to say that I would find it hard to go back. I particularly rely on my Jornada's side mounted rocker switch when reading ebooks and the dpad for gaming. But I also have Gigatask mapped to my home key which is pretty handy for me.

[Aerestis]

I named this thread badly.

What I meant was no buttons on the front face. There would still be short cut buttons, sorry about that. So how would any of you feel about buttons along the side? I would use them as much as I would the front face buttons, and I think I would be just as comfortable too.

[Stephen Beesley]

I named this thread badly.

What I meant was no buttons on the front face. There would still be short cut buttons, sorry about that. So how would any of you feel about buttons along the side? I would use them as much as I would the front face buttons, and I think I would be just as comfortable too.

Sounds okay - but I do play alot of games on my Jornada (Hey you have to do something during those long boring moments at work :D) so for me I think I would like to see at least a dpad on the front and, given how much room that would take up you might as wll put the other buttons there as well....

[Aerestis]

I think that in the end, it is probably fifty fifty. I know a number of people who won't buy a pda simply because it has those buttons. I'm working on the model though, it should be cool when it's done. Just something to look at