[HN Gopher] Fingerjigger
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Fingerjigger
Author : bookofjoe
Score : 66 points
Date : 2025-08-09 16:36 UTC (4 days ago)
(HTM) web link (fingerjigger.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (fingerjigger.com)
| elric wrote:
| No way to change keyboard layouts?
| benchly wrote:
| Nevermind layouts, what about size? I'm already terrible at
| typing on a touchscreen and trying to do so with a
| distractingly colorful and animated keyboard that is half the
| size of my native mobile keyboard makes for a not-very-fun
| game.
| ethan_smith wrote:
| Alternative keyboard layouts like Dvorak/Colemak support would
| significantly improve accessibility for a non-trivial segment
| of typists.
| Azkron wrote:
| It would be nice if it had the option to indicate you which
| finger you should be using to press the key ideally. Like the
| mechanigraphy games.
| AndrewOMartin wrote:
| Dollars to doughnuts this is collecting keypress-cadence data for
| fooling anti-automation algorithms with natural typing speeds.
| JoshuaDavid wrote:
| Mm, doughnuts. I'll take the flip side of that bet, since I
| don't think capturing the typing cadence for individual words
| would be all that helpful. I'd bet the typing cadences here are
| distinguishable from the cadence of normal English text (as
| might be collected by a malicious browser extension which
| vacuums up keystroke data on popular UGC sites).
| Sebastian_09 wrote:
| If you think about it as a game and not a typing exercice it's
| quite good, feels a bit like a typing guitar hero, and the
| animations are fun. Also learned some words. It lacks an
| accessible about page, you only reach it once going through a
| complete round.
| mackopes wrote:
| It's weird to see only one word at the time. I don't think this
| reflects my true typing speed as I have a tiny pause to read the
| word once it shows on the screen. On the other hand, I'm able to
| read multiple words ahead as long as I can see them and naturally
| remove the pause.
| gwd wrote:
| Yeah, every new word flushes the entire pipeline. I end up
| typing long words that I happen to know (prestidigitation)
| faster than short words, because I can "fill up the pipeline".
|
| Not clear if there's any intelligence selecting the words, but
| on the whole I still find https://typeracer.com more fun.
| Tepix wrote:
| Yes, i get half of my normal WPM here because i can't look
| ahead.
|
| I recommend using https://typing-speed-test.aoeu.eu/ instead.
| v4rp1ng wrote:
| absolutly agree. I find https://10fastfingers.com much better.
| keyle wrote:
| The animations is also quite confusing, _the bubble explosion_
| irobeth wrote:
| I also find some difficulty in reading the next word because of
| the animation obscuring it; this has my net wpm at 61, but my
| monkeytype average wpm is ~120
| gorgonical wrote:
| I like it, but the fact that you don't have to input the whole
| _word_ correctly and only each individual letter really conflicts
| with my muscle-memory to correct mistakes. I also think the
| animations and effects are a little over the top and they
| distract me from typing.
| croes wrote:
| Black text on a purple key is hardly unreadable for me.
| ramon156 wrote:
| had to disable vimium because it doesn't work well with this
| site. I don't know enough about the extension to know whether
| that's the site's fault, but I'm assuming it's not a blacklist
| type of thing. Improving accessibility might solve it
| OJFord wrote:
| Because you don't have an input text area focussed, vimium will
| assume by 'j' you want to scroll down for example, because
| that's the point of it. Iirc you can manually enter insert mode
| and then it should work fine.
| redeyedtreefrog wrote:
| I like the animations and general appearance, and how snappy it
| feels. Would prefer if mistakes required a backspace though, and
| also more than one word at a time. Also unclear if the timer
| starts when the word is shown or when you start typing.
| paufernandez wrote:
| Very snappy, I like the animations very much (they keep changing,
| you had fun!). I tried signing in with Google and it didn't work
| (blank screen). But I've played a lot with these games and I've
| made my own, and yours is very addictive because feels quick and
| the feedback is clear. Also I found the jump from the first wave
| (short words) to the second (very long words), a little too big.
| I would put an intermediate one in between.
| LoganDark wrote:
| super annoying that for me, backspace just inserts an unknown
| character instead of working? I correct mistakes with backspace
| all the time, I don't always type everything perfectly the first
| time.
| QuantumNomad_ wrote:
| The custom keyboard that they have on the web page is pretty
| small compared to the OS keyboard on iOS, when I use the page on
| an iPhone.
|
| If I could use the iOS keyboard I think I would get a much better
| speed. I usually type with fingers from both hands on iOS. With
| the custom keyboard that they have on the page I can only use one
| finger from one hand to type.
| bookofjoe wrote:
| Just the opposite here: 1 finger on iOS v 10 on MacOS
| jeffhuys wrote:
| You use 1 finger, always, on iOS? Or am I misunderstanding?
| If not, how would you not go crazy? Or are you using swipe-
| style typing?
| bookofjoe wrote:
| >You use 1 finger, always, on iOS?
|
| Yes. My left index finger. NO SWIPING. I've been doing it
| since my first iPhone back in the day and I haven't gone
| crazy yet!
|
| Full disclosure: I'm 77 years old. Perhaps it's a geezer
| thing....
| jeffhuys wrote:
| Haha, well, color me impressed. Because I'm curious: do
| you type a lot on your phone, or mostly on a computer or
| similar?
|
| And sorry to say but my dad (71) also does this, so it
| indeed might be a geezer thing... you're a cool one
| though, you're on hacker news! ;-)
|
| (All this typed with a big smile on my face, you made my
| day)
| bookofjoe wrote:
| >do you type a lot on your phone, or mostly on a computer
| or similar?
|
| You know, I've never really thought about the comparison
| until you asked. I estimate 99% on MacBook Pro/1% on
| iPhone w these 2 phone use cases:
|
| 1) Captions for my YouTube videos
| https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCd6EjvCDRRWlkHjEYvSfOkA)
|
| 2) Replies to emails/texts
|
| Thanks for the kudos!
|
| I'm glad I brought some joy to someone today!
| kinnth wrote:
| I think this is a nice challenge. Touch typing was something i
| was never taught. I definitely have incorrect finger placement
| for instance.
|
| However I know my overall typing speed is good from the 20 years
| i've spent behind a keyboard! I actually think the UI is good,
| with some interesting elements that are not so distracting.
| meowface wrote:
| IMO, finger placement is a total red herring. I can type around
| 170 WPM (if exerting myself - and assuming typeracer.com has
| accurate WPM scores) without looking at the keyboard and I've
| never once used anything close to the prescribed "touch typing"
| finger placement taught in schools. Whatever works works.
| going_north wrote:
| Typing speed tests are always fun. I enjoy
| https://monkeytype.com/
| krammer wrote:
| It's quite interesting how we are used to our mobile phone
| keyboards "AI" helping us to type better. Would love to learn
| more about how that prediction works. I remember my old 2010 HTC
| phone to be really hard, meanwhile in 2025 it feels like i can
| type anything without thinking.
| stevage wrote:
| As a Dvorak user on a laptop it was confusing seeing a QWERTY
| keyboard on the screen that didn't seem to have anything to do
| with anything.
|
| The wpm score is also a bit meaningless when you're typing
| individual words at a time. My normal typing score is around
| 120wpm and this was scoring me at 64wpm. It's more about reflexes
| than about typing speed per se.
| pitched wrote:
| That keyboard is how to play the game on mobile. Is it not
| possible to have the system keyboard pop in without an input
| field on mobile Safari?
| fkyoureadthedoc wrote:
| I'm finding that not typing a space between words _really_ messes
| me up
| monster_truck wrote:
| Visually breaks if you try to make the font a reasonable reading
| size. Why does it disable backspace?
|
| E: It also seems to be registering inputs incorrectly if you type
| fast enough. On a bad day I clear 140 on monkeytype, can do
| minutes long tests without any errors.
| braum wrote:
| this is fun but you are killing speed by not showing the next 2-4
| words. I'm not even that fast really 85wpm but having to wait for
| the next word it is leaving a lot of speed on the table for no
| reason.
| siva7 wrote:
| Hah, i got 45 wpm and i can't even touch type but just stare at
| my keyboard pointing two fingers somewhere. Anyway i don't need
| this skill anymore, god thanks, i can now just use ai to command
| this machine over voice, faster than touch typists.
| btdmaster wrote:
| To anyone who does keyboard handling, please don't use
| KeyboardEvent.code like this site does unless you have a reason
| to ignore all users that use a different keyboard layout:
| https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/API/KeyboardEve...
|
| > Warning: This ignores the user's keyboard layout
| patrickhogan1 wrote:
| Keyboard small. Fingers big.
| butlike wrote:
| Fun game. I feel like with all the mobile keyboard tapping and
| LLM-prompting this is going to be a dead skill in a few
| generations
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(page generated 2025-08-13 23:02 UTC)