On-Screen Keyboards

On-screen keyboards are useful to those who access computers by means of a mouse, joystick, touchscreen, headmouse, or eyegaze and do not use a physical keyboard. Letters and characters can be selected by highlighting the chosen location, and either dwelling on it (eyegaze) or pressing an external switch.

On-screen keyboards, which are switch accessible, allow the user to type text using a keyboard on screen which is controlled via a switch connected to the computer via a serial or USB port. When the user hits their switch, each row of the on-screen keyboard is successively highlighted; the user then hits the switch again when the target row is highlighted, and again, when the target letter/word/keyboard function is highlighted. There is a wide range of scanning options to choose from in most switch accessible packages.

Many on-screen keyboards also allow the user to control the mouse functions via the switch. This means that the user can have full access to, and control of, the computer via a single switch. Some users will use more than one switch to control the PC. The number of switches used depends upon the number of switches the user can easily access. In combination with support software such as word prediction, the rate of input for a user can be increased significantly.

Microsoft Windows 7 now comes with a free scanning on-screen keyboard with word prediction as part of the operating system.