“While Newton OS’s handwriting recognition engine was impressive from an I’ve-never-seen-anything-like-this perspective, its real-world application was loaded with flaws and miscues, far more than iPhone OS’s autocorrect or Siri’s listening abilities,” Michael Simon writes for Macworld. “As the jokes piled up, the Newton became synonymous with silly errors, and it was never able to fully shake its reputation, no matter how much better it got.”
“By the time Steve Jobs killed the whole project in 1998, Newton OS — by then on version 2.1 — had a very solid handwriting recognition system that read both print and script with remarkable accuracy,” Simon writes. “It wasn’t just useable, it was widely regarded as the best in the industry. But despite its advances (not to mention his fondness for skeuomorphism), Jobs never really explored the possibilities for handwriting recognition, save the underpublicized Ink feature that was announced with OS X Jaguar, and Apple has done even less to promote the technology on its multitouch devices.”
Simon writes. “But it might finally be ready for its closeup.”
Read more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: Newton OS did indeed have rather amazing handwriting recognition by the time Jobs pulled the plug.
iPad Pro with Apple Pencil and Notes seems like a natural fit for Apple to utilize their long-dormant handwriting recognition talents.
SEE ALSO:
Apple Computer’s search for ‘Handwriting Recognition Engineer’ revives ‘Tablet Mac’ rumors – August 24, 2005
Ink or Inkwell? – Apple please pick one already! – November 19, 2002
Five years ago today Jobs axed Newton – February 27, 2003
MacDailyNews Note: Obviously, today is Martin Luther King Day in the U.S. and the markets are closed. As usual on such trading holidays, we will have limited posting today.
Cominbg soon to an i-Pad near you, for the ultimate hurrah and usefulness.
I would really like to see Apple bring something like MyScript-Stack keyboard to the Apple TV. It would provide an obvious and intuitive text entry method on the remote’s touch pad without the added bulk of a keyboard.
There’s a problem…
As far as I know, the cursive (handwriting recognition) in the Newton may have been pieced off and sold off to Microsoft around 1998, shortly after the Newton was discountinued.
So Apple may not own this technology anymore. If that’s the case, forget handwriting recognition unless Apple invests in reinventing it.
I have no idea what you’re talking about.
I could go over the entire 1998 deal that Jobs imposed on Microsoft for stealing QuickTime code. But it’s up on Wikipedia. DIY.
Apple’s Newton handwriting recognition lives on in Ink. It’s accessible on ALL Macs (as of Jaguar, as mentioned in the article) by attaching a pen tablet, such as a Wacom. It will show up in your System Preferences….
Derek:
I know there is Ink in OS X. But isn’t that just for PRINTED text?
I’m talking about CURSIVE recognition.
So if you’re confused, I’ll clarify it. There are TWO different writing recognition engines in the Newton. One for PRINTED text, the other for HANDWRITING.
It is the handwriting that I believe Apple pieced off and was sold off to Microsoft.
“While the ability to write directly into my application sounds cool, I am quite skeptical of its practical use. I am better at typing using my keyboard, as it is definitely much faster than scribbling onto a tablet. Furthermore, the handwriting recognition requires you to print the characters in order to achieve the best result. If you write like a doctor (read: illegibly), Inkwell is going to have a lot of trouble deciphering your handwriting. In my test, it works quite well when I print slowly. Cursive writing is definitely not recommended.”
https://www.safaribooksonline.com/library/view/mac-os-x/0596004605/ch04s13.html
I know there is Ink in OS X. But isn’t that just for PRINTED text?
Hmm. It took awhile for me to comprehend what you mean. From my background, I immediately think of ‘PRINTED’ as something machine printed onto paper on computer printed onto a screen. But I think you mean ‘print’ handwriting as in the style of writing characters versus cursive handwriting.
The last sentence still makes to sense to me as both styles are ‘handwriting’.
Leaving 1998 and Microsoft out of the conversation, as I can’t imagine they’re related…
Here is the best article I’ve found about ‘Inkwell’, or simply ‘Ink’ as Apple calls it. It specifically is the Newton’s handwriting recognition updated for OS X. I’m personally unaware of it being limited to ‘printed’ or cursive handwriting. But I am certainly aware the attempting to use any handwriting recognition at this time using cursive writing is NOT going to be very effective. I’ve never, ever heard of a decent program for recognizing cursive. Please enlighten me if there is or ever has been. Everyone uses ‘printed’ handwriting if they hope for success.
The article:
http://computers.tutsplus.com/tutorials/get-started-with-inks-handwriting-recognition-tool–cms-21636
A similar but slightly less effective article:
http://mac.appstorm.net/reviews/utilities/how-to-use-ink-your-macs-built-in-handwriting-recognition-feature/
Apple literally has NO ‘help’ for Ink that I can find on their website using their awful search engine, DuckDuckGo or Google. WTF is wrong with them? If you use Motion, they have lots of help with Ink. Again, WTF?
Oh and another handwriting recognition app to try on iOS devices is WritePad. That one is, I believe, the oldest. I haven’t tried it in years as the learning curve was annoying way back then. It has since been considerably update. I’d post its URL, but WordPress would kill this post if I did.
Derek:
I’m a Newton guy. I’ve written manuals for them, collect them, and am part of Newtontalk.
The Newton OS had two writing recognition engines. 1. For print writing. 2. Cursive.
The original Newton OS had terrible recognition regardless. SNL even made fun of this. A person I know, Larry Yaeger, came onto the project and developed a better recognition engine for the Newton. It was the CURSIVE recognition engine that took the stage. The improved write recognition shipped on later Newton operating systems. It was incredibly accurate. A person could scribble cursive garbage and it gets recognized fairly accurately.
This cursive recognition is ABSENT from Apple’s inkwell as far as we all know. There has been some talk that it was pieced off and/or sold to Microsoft. We were all well aware of Inkwell and were disappointed that cursive was absent. If I’m correct, Inkwell started with OS Jaguar.
Of note, in System Prefences, the settings for writing recognition are effectively identical to those on the Newton device itself. It’s just a port. But again, CURSIVE is seemingly ABSENT.
If you’ve ever used a Newton MessagePad 2100 you’ll know what I’m talking about. You can go between print writing and cursive and the recognition for both is incredible.
When Palm came out with their first devices, they had their own version of “Ink”. But wasn’t as good because cursive didn’t exist and their print recognition required the user to write letters a certain way (unnatural). Newton recognized your writing completely naturally with no need to follow some set way of drawing letters for words.
I’m sorry to have been a PITA. I’d like to know the details about the cursive code. So far, I’ve been unable to find anything related on the net.
I had a Newton 2100 and frequently used it for taking notes in cursive during meetings. Handwriting recognition was quite good. The advantage over paper notes was that I had searchable text, and could transfer the files to my Mac.
Years later I had a ModBook and used a French handwriting recognition, again with good results. Although I used a keyboard for most writing, it was sometimes very convenient to enter notes in cursive handwriting.
Surface has it and it pretty good!
I hope/expect apple to release something dolid soon.. Specially now that we have the pencil !
Look for MyScript on the App Store. They specialize in handwriting recognition. They make a variety of apps including a keyboard.
There has been an app called ‘Handwriting’ for iOS for several years. It learns your handwriting as you use it. It’s not great but if you put in the time, it’s helpful.
I am a graphic artist specializing in motion graphics, and the iPad Pro might have a spot on my desk for that kind of art.
But…..and I said this over 10 years ago here, I have an even bigger need for handwriting recognition when taking notes in meetings. I cannot type on a touch pad and maintain any kind of concentration on whats being said in a meeting, but with handwriting its a no-brainer, a breeze. It’s also MUCH faster than any kind of typing.
I use MyScript-Stylus Keyboard about 70% of the time for text entry on my iPad Pro with my Apple Pencil. The accuracy is very good. I am most comfortable printing notes, but have found that MyScript seems to work best for me using cursive. With cursive it is nearly flawless, and very fast. When I print technical notes it sometimes has a bit of a hard time differentiating when I switch from letters to numbers. Also, when recognizing spaces between words. I also really like the MyScript-Stack keyboard on my iPhone, using my finger to print. The MyScript calculator very rarely mistakes my handwriting.
I respectfully disagree. I had every Newton and proudly carried that damn video cassette sized brick all the time.
I find cursive or print parsing as a method of text entry to be painfully slow and more error prone than speech-to-text. All the wannabe iDevice copycats proudly trot out their stylii and annotations on screen of their selfies etc. None show the painful process of getting text parsed, replete with scratchouts and re-dos. It makes for a bad user experience.
Nothing, but nothing would trash the unbelieveably good reputation of iPad and iPhone faster than to put in a slow, infrequently used feature whose laughable “damn you autocorrect”-like errors would be fodder for haters and critics.
(please don’t chime in “I would use it, dan” – we know you would for around an hour, then return to speech to text)
There are lots of situations where it is not appropriate or socially acceptable to be talking to your phone or tablet’s speech recognition system. (When taking notes in a meeting, for example. Or sitting in a library. Or sitting in a cafe. Sitting somewhere loud like a subway train or mall food court. Or just sitting in proximity to strangers.) For this reason, speech to text will never completely replace keyboard/stylus/finger input. And a handwriting recognition system for the Apple Pencil would be great for people who want this. For everyone else, it would be optional like the Apple Pencil is, hardly something people would bother making fun of.
I’ve said it here before…
A handwriting translation interface that students can use to take notes in class will be a BIG bonus for the iPad. No other platform has what is needed for this use — yet. Apple has been working on Inkwell under various names since before the first Newton came out and has had a small team working on it virtually continuously since that time.
Just think of the mathematics, scientific and engineering community (students and non students) using an iPad Pro with a Pencil to take notes, work out equations or annotate simulations, etc. Then they can output that to a word processing application for submission to others (teachers, colleagues, journals, etc.).
There at LOTS of scenarios where voice input just does not work. (Ever tried to do tensor analysis by voice? Only someone truly insane or masochistic in the extreme would attempt it. Ever tried to do stress/loads analyses by voice? Again, only a fool would consider doing it.)
I’ve been calling for Apple to bring out an Apple designed, high end stylus (aka Pencil) for the iPad for years and concurrently bring out what is the current state of Inkwell. Once Apple does this a set of people in a whole new market segment literally will be lining up to buy an iPad Pro & Pencil with this new software.
One of my favorite Apple memories was in Boston watching the ultra early adopters sitting on stone bences and columns trying out their new Newtons in the sun. The excitement was so catchy, and the shaking heads growing to overtake it.
I did sell tons of Newtons, and every piece of software and accessories I could get my hands on, from my Reseller store. We had a nearby Newton medical developer. Indeed recognition approached fool proof by the end. The eMate we sold in Apple Ed was a fabulous tool. My kids loved it, and it would last for a week on one charge. Steve had to console the upset Education customers when he killed the Newton OS. He promised a replacement that would be in color. I haven’t decided what it was that fulfilled this promise. I guess iPad.
Yes, I remember. Russian firm Paragraph, established by Stepan Pachikov, provided handwriting recognition. They were then bought by Silicon Graphics. Eventually Pachikov founded Evernote.
My favorite handwriting recognition continues to be ‘Graffiti‘, which came with every Palm device. I don’t know who owns it these days but I’ll guess that it’s HP, and they simply sat on it. Graffiti took some time to learn as it was essentially a handwriting based gesture system. But once learned, it was great.
Lets start with the ability to use the pencil in Pages and Keynote..then move to fancy.