This is absolutely  the first time I’ve used any software from Sunnysoft, and the only title in their library, that I knew of was their contact manager. Having never experienced it, my interest was piqued when I heard the had a SIP available, I had to have a look of course. the evolution of Windows Mobile SIP’s has been greatly accelerated by the iPhone, finger friendly being the major theme.

Sunnysoft’s offering includes a full screen keyboard as well as a more traditional keyboard, and although it is probably the most set up intensive SIP I have tried it does offer some nice surprises.

One thing I would note here, is that the hardware keyboard has taken over for most, and as Doug pointed out, the SIP, software keyboard is becoming a bit of a niche market. Is this an application that will overcome that?

In general it is a standard SIP that offers a diversity of keyboard layouts and skins, not a lot different there. It is though, the most configurable keyboard I have ever looked at and that in some cases is a good thing, but for your average WinMo user is overkill, so it’s great that it works right out of the box [read on installation]. It is also skinable, which means you don’t have to live with an outdated look, one that resembles the native SIP, like the one pictured above.

There are some much more visually  pleasing skins included, that take the DOS look out of the keyboard.

In the food industry we say that  90% of the taste is in the eye,  meaning that how it looks actually influences the other senses, and I think that applies to any UI. The prettier and smoother it looks, the more likely I am enticed, and will  continue using it.

Interwrite, didn’t really deliver for me on this front, although under the hood they have included enough customisation to alleviate the anxiety of the most demanding SIP user.

At this point I should say, I’m not writing a user manual for this application, as much a reminder for you as for myself. As for you, what I really want to do is give you a users feel for the app and my impressions of it.

As I said earlier, this is the most configurable SIP, I’ve tried, but some of the config settings are common to many of the programs out there.

Most of these settings are native to windows mobile, so if you’ve spent any time setting up the default SIP in windows mobile, InterWrite Pro by default, assumes these settings on installation. Interwrite also includes customisable gestures, which has also become a standard for third party SIP’s.

The options for the full screen keyboard are nothing to talk about, and I was quite disappointed that the full screen keyboard resembled the SPB full screen keyboard so exactly,

Above is SPB full screen keyboard, and below is Sunnysoft’s offering, the fact that I’ve had the SPB app for quite a while, and that Sunnysoft’s offering looks so similair, is a coincidence I hope.

So What’s New?

There is one part of this SIP that really enervated me, SunnySoft have built a function into this keyboard, that actually offers you an alternative user interface, directly from the software keyboard.  It revolves around the function key actually, on any of the keyboard interfaces in this app you hit the Function key on the SIP you are transported to a new UI that is infinitely better than going back to the today screen in WinMo.

What’s happened here is that SunnySoft have added an interface that is able to be manipulated, and gives you a direct channel to your most used programs from the SIP in any application you are using, as long as it utilizes the SIP.

What Do I Really Think?

One of the things that came up for me with this SIP, was the fact that most apps are usable out of the box, and this app had a lot of extras. The full screen keyboard, was not an acceptable thumb keyboard on the Axim, the smaller layouts, took a lot of finesse to configure for finger use, and the best thing was the ability to jump to application menus directly from  the SIP.

The thought that strikes me here though is simplicity, the more you add to what should be a simple, functional, and by that I mean, serves a purpose, application, probably the less user friendly it becomes.

SunnySoft have included a lot of stuff in this SIP, probably thinking it’s what sells, but the hardware keyboard, and the iPhone have really turned the SIP market into a swamp.

Don’t get me wrong, this is a great app, it works really well, and has a few great surprises, but I just feel it’s been  over engineered, thought out too much. If the average user could configure this SIP, even if they new how to get to the options menu, they would be an advanced WinMo user.

InterWrite Keyboard  version 9.5 is not available yet ,but should set you back about $19.95 from the Sunnysoft web site.

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Related posts:

1. Review: SPB Keyboard 4
2. SPB Keyboard Update 4.1.1 released
3. Review: SunnySoft Contacts 2.0
4. Review: Resco Keyboard 5.0
5. Review: SPB Full Screen Keyboard — The Search for the Perfect Input Method.