Oska on-screen keyboard

Posted by Robert Stewart on the 1st October, 2009

Another interesting application demonstrated at Communication Matters, Oska is designed to offer a variety of alternative input methods to custom designed keyboards.

The software basicaly allows you to design your own keyboards and attach an input method (such as a switch) to control that custom keyboard. Thus, users are able to operate a PC in a way that suits them. Methods of input range from mouse, keyboard and switch to head and mouth stick. Since the keyboards are custom designed you can have any key perform almost any action; open and close a program such as Microsoft Word or open another custom keyboard specifically designed for an application or game. You can even move the keyboard around the screen if it's in the way. Some great features can be designed into the keyboards and the editor is surprisingly easy to get to grips with. Although, that is from a 'techy' point of view!

The package is free to developers but clients wishing to use the keyboards have to purchase the Oska suite for £159 from Claro Software.

I shall describe 2 methods demonstrated at Communication Matters:

Scroll Wheel Scanning

Using a standard UK on-screen keyboard you can use the scroll wheel on a mouse to operate a switch/scanning system. You scroll (as fast or slow as you wish) the column or row back and forth and click the scroll wheel to select. i.e.

• scroll to the desired column using the scroll button;
• click to select the column and then scroll to the desired row;
• click to select the key you require;
• repeat the process.

TenKey Mouse

Using the numeric keypad at the right of a computer keyboard or a keypad such as the Kensington Pocket Keypad. The keyboard is separated into  9 sectors of 9 keys (9 x 9) and you press 1 - 9 on the keypad to select a sector and then 1 - 9 to select a key.

The advantage of this method is that the user could eventually memorise the key presses for every key and no longer need to look at the keyboard to type.