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A slightly unfinished but perfectly usable version of Google’s new gesture-based Android 4.2 keyboard has been made available online, which should work for just about anyone using a phone or tablet running Google’s Android 4.0 code or higher.
The updated keyboard, which is one of the big selling points of Google’s forthcoming Android 4.2 release, offers similar functionality to that of the popular Swype app, letting users type by drawing a line between the letters of a word. There’s also a predictive element in it as well, copying the excellent SwiftKey alternate keyboard, so it’s well worth trying, even if the design of this leaked build (with the bizarre blue pop-up words) is slightly rougher than that of the finished code.
Android Police, which originally distributed the ripped out keyboard APK, has been asked to remove the file by Google after the software giant requested it stops distributing unfinished code, but you can still find it online if you look hard enough (like, say here). [Android Police]
It’s not perfect as it’s an early build. You can also grab a slightly buggy version of the new camera and gallery apps too. or just wait a couple of weeks.
I grabbed this earlier – it’s not quite up to par with Swype, but it’s not half bad considering it’s an early build, as stated by Darrell. Some of the word prediction is a little off at present. It’s a lot nicer to use than Swype though – mainly due to the voice recording button not being next to the full stop.
Works okay, might keep it. Good work Google
Doesn’t Swype have a patent on this?
works really well on my gs2, no faults so far
OK. Ok I’m confused again. My Prime recently updated to 4.1 and it’s doing this already. Am I missing something?
And I actually find this feature quite annoying too.
What phone, some of them came with swype preinstalled if I remember correctly.
Asus Transformer Prime Tablet. Actually, I just checked and the default is the ASUS Keyboard so that’s probably why.