HeliBoard, a privacy-conscious open-source Android keyboard based on AOSP/now-unmaintained OpenBoard, is now available on F-Droid

ForgottenFlux@lemmy.world to Android@lemmy.world – 528 points – HeliBoard | F-Droid - Free and Open Source Android App Repository
f-droid.org

HeliBoard keyboard is an improved fork of the now-unmaintained OpenBoard keyboard. It does not require internet permission, allowing it to be used 100% offline.

Features

  • Add dictionaries for suggestions and spell check

    • Build your own, or access them here, or in the experimental section (quality may vary)
    • Additional dictionaries for emojis or scientific symbols can be used to provide suggestions (similar to "emoji search")
    • Note that for Korean layouts, suggestions only work using this dictionary; the tools in the dictionary repository cannot create working dictionaries

  • Customize keyboard themes (style, colors, and background image)

    • Can follow the system's day/night setting on Android 10+ (and on some versions of Android 9)
    • Can follow dynamic colors for Android 12+

  • Customize keyboard layouts (only available when disabling system languages)

  • Multilingual typing

  • Glide typing (only with closed-source library ☹️)

    • Library not included in the app, as there is no compatible open-source library available
    • Can be extracted from GApps packages ("swypelibs"), or downloaded here

  • Clipboard history

  • One-handed mode

  • Split keyboard (only available if the screen is large enough)

  • Number pad

  • Backup and restore your learned word/history data

Hidden Functionality

Features that may go unnoticed, and further potentially useful information

  • Long-pressing the Clipboard Key (the optional one in the suggestion strip) pastes system clipboard contents.
  • Long-pressing keys in the suggestion strip toolbar pins them to the suggestion strip.
  • Long-press the Comma-key to access Clipboard View, Emoji View, One-handed Mode, Settings, or Switch Language:
    • Emoji View and Language Switch will disappear if you have the corresponding key enabled;
    • For some layouts, it's not the Comma-key, but the key at the same position (e.g. it's q for Dvorak layout).
  • When incognito mode is enabled, no words will be learned, and no emojis will be added to recents.
  • Sliding key input: Swipe from shift or symbol key to another key. This will enter a single uppercase key or symbol and return to the previous keyboard.
  • Hold shift or symbol key, press one or more keys, and then release shift or symbol key to return to the previous keyboard.
  • Long-press a suggestion in the suggestion strip to show more suggestions, and a delete button to remove this suggestion.
  • Swipe up from a suggestion to open more suggestions, and release on the suggestion to select it.
  • Long-press an entry in the clipboard history to pin it (keep it in clipboard until you unpin).
  • Swipe left in clipboard view to remove an entry (except when it's pinned)
  • Select text and press shift to switch between uppercase, lowercase, and capitalize words
  • You can add dictionaries by opening the file
    • This only works with content-uris and not with file-uris, meaning that it may not work with some file explorers.
  • Debug mode / debug APK
    • Long-press a suggestion in the suggestion strip twice to show the source dictionary.
    • When using debug APK, you can find Debug Settings within the Advanced Preferences, though the usefulness is limited except for dumping dictionaries into the log.
      • For a release APK, you need to tap the version in About several times, then you can find debug settings in Advanced Preferences.
      • When enabling Show suggestion infos, suggestions will have some tiny numbers on top showing some internal score and source dictionary.
    • In the event of an application crash, you will be prompted whether you want the crash logs when you open the Settings.
    • When using multilingual typing, the space bar will show a confidence value used for determining the currently used language.
  • For users doing manual backups with root access: Starting at Android 7, some files and the main shared preferences file are not in the default location because the app is using device-protected storage. This is necessary so the settings and layout files can be read before the device is unlocked, e.g., at boot. The files are usually located in /data/user_de/0/<package_id>/, though the location may depend on the device and Android version.

Planned features and improvements:

  • Customizable functional key layout
    • Will likely result in having the same functional key layout for alphabet and symbols layouts
  • Support for alt, ctrl, meta and fn (#479)
  • Less complicated addition of new keyboard languages (e.g. #519)
  • Additional and customizable key swipe functionality
    • Some functionality will not be possible when using glide typing
  • Ability to enter all emojis independent of Android version (optional, #297)
  • (limited) support for customizing all internally used colors
  • Add and enable emoji dictionaries by default (if available for language)
  • Clearer / more intuitive arrangement of settings
    • Maybe hide some less used settings by default (similar to color customization)
  • Customizable currency keys
  • Customizable clipboard toolbar keys (#513, #403)
  • Ability to export/import (share) custom colors
  • Make use of the .com key in URL fields (currently only available for tablets)
    • With language-dependent TLDs
  • Internal cleanup (a lot of over-complicated and convoluted code)
  • (optionally?) move toolbar key pinning to a setting, so long press actions on unpinned toolbar keys are available
  • Bug fixes

What will not be added:

  • Material 3 (not worth adding 1.5 MB to app size)
  • Dictionaries for more languages (you can still download them)
  • Anything that requires additional permissions
101

Material 3 (not worth adding 1.5 MB to app size)

yes it is! Like am i insane to think that 1.5mb is absolutely worth it>

I agree. Especially as the app is already 20 MB in size... 1.5MB wouldn't make much difference IMO.

and the shittiest of the shittiest phones have like 16gb with sd expansion...

3 more...

I switched from gboard yesterday, added the swipe lib.. I wish there were a standard keyboard layout but other than that it's 🔥. It needs emoji search though.

I switched to this a month or so ago and haven't looked back. The only thing I miss is the ability to add gifs but that's not a big deal.

I miss the gifts, and would love a kB that I can swap to in order to add a gif.

What I miss most is emoji search and recommendation. There's so many that I can never find the one I want when scrolling though each page.

Yes, it's a long list of emojis, a reply below links to how you can add an English emoji dictionary. I just followed the instructions and it works well. 👍

We're in 2024 and you don't think 1.5mb extra package size is worth it for better polish and a user experience?

I test drove Heliboard the past week and I quite liked it, especially the customization options. I've been trying to escape Gboard for years but viable options with swipe typing support are few and far between.

Unfortunately, the lack of Japanese input makes it a total non-starter for my use case so I had to go crawling back.

Thanks for this. I was about to ask if Japanese input was supported. Why is it so hard to find a good keyboard for both Japanese and English? I usually have to end up sacrificing convenience in one or the other.

Unfortunately, the lack of Japanese input makes it a total non-starter for my use case so I had to go crawling back.

Ack, I also need that. Oof. Guess I'll have to keep looking.

It's a pity it doesn't work for you right now, but I'd recommend to keep an eye on it since it's under active development and you might see Japanese input added soon. You could also check open issues on GitHub or open a new one and give feedback about this need.

Love your work, this is fucking great! I've been looking for a decent replacement for Swiftkey for a while now. Anysoftkeyboard is fine, but the emoji and swipe support is less than stellar. Once installed and configured this works great. Solid, clean, simple, intuitive.

I have a few less tech-savvy friends also looking to ditch Swiftkey. I'd love to recommend this but they're going to need a drop in replacement; the lack of swipe and emoji prediction out-of-the-box is going to be a deal breaker. Please keep working on this project, it's genuinely awesome! Looking forward to the next update.

I am surprised at how much more responsive my phone is now. GBoard wad 495 MiB, HeliBoard is nearly 34 MiB. (No idea how much was loaded into RAM.)

Edit: I am aware of the cognitive bias of newness. My phone has 3 GiB of RAM, so it is possible there was a real impact.

I cannot believe how responsive this keyboard is. Absolutely love it and I have multilingual typing enabled. The swiping is also incredibly smooth after loading the library they suggested. Stunning

I am going to check this out because I am cuurently using Florisboard which I haven't been too thrilled with.

It's great seeing HeliBoard come so far, especially after it seemed like OpenBoard was potentially dead. I'm still a (firewalled on CalyxOS) GBoard user, but HeliBoard is the closest I've found to a viable replacement for it. I'm definitely looking forward to seeing what future developments it has in store.

This is amazing. Switched from SwiftKey, it has much better customizability and I love how emojis are shown really large in the picker (a bit too large in fact, but much better than the teensy tiny ones in SwiftKey).

At this point I'd only wish for two things, and they're both quite minor, and one slightly bigger thing:

  • (Super minor) Remove the language text on the spacebar if only one dictionary is enabled.
  • (Minor) Either allow scaling of emoji and kaomoji in the picker, or scale them down regardless. In fact Kaomoji break across lines looking kinda fucked due to how big they are.
  • (Probably bigger) A search field in the emoji picker

Just updated my f Droid, is heliboard not up now? Can't find it via search.

Edit, had to update repositories too. My bad!

It should be available in the main F-Droid repo. It has been only on IzzyOnDroid for a while, but I can already see version 1.2 on the official F-Droid repo too.

Looks awesome! Is a Chinese input method in the works, by any chance? I'm still using Swype & Dragon that has been removed from google play 5 years ago as there is so far no decent alternative, and especially not in the FOSS space.

Thank you for recommending this. Gesture typing works great with the added library, and text suggestions are working nicely too!

I don't really understand where to download that Swipe Lib. Can somebody give me a Pointer?

What wonderful timing given my recent post

The toolbar padding looks weird (top padding too low) and the toolbar key size is too small as well. But all in all totally usable alternative.

And OMG I love the glide typing it just works 🫠

It's great, but how can I install the glide library? I can't see any link...

Here's a link to the open board github where I downloaded it. If you don't want to take my word for it you can find it linked on heliboard github, the link just didn't get copied from their readme.

Definitely check out the Hidden functionality part of the readme (it's also in this post's body)

Huh, I had no idea OpenBoard was discontinued

I would love to switch off gboard, but really need it to support the following:

seamless switching between spanish and english (for duolingo) Emoji support some form of Gifboard.

Anyone know if this supports that?

Under advanced you can enable swipe to change language. Then you can swipe up from space to cycle through your languages. I find it quick enough. No idea about gifs but holding return you can insert emojis.

It's working great. I only can't get multi language and the emoji dictionary to work. The help page says I need to change the spell checker in the android settings but I can't find that option 🤔

I'll give it a shot. I have always been a big fan of swipe to text. But lately the autocorrect options have been shit anyway. I don't know if its Google to blame or if its Motorola that has too small of a side bezel causing my palms to create a fake swipe.

Select text and press shift to switch between uppercase, lowercase, and capitalize words

I love it 🤩🤩

Thanks for sharing! Living the keyboard so far.

If there is anything I would change it would be to make the emoji view the default long press for enter and for it to scroll horizontally.

I partially miss the built in gif integration, but it's really cool to have dual finger typing again.

Yeah, it's silly, but I switch back to the default board to send a gif and then switch back.

Someting close to this for ios ?.

I think the best option for iOS is the default keyboard sadly

Looks good although not sure it will replace Multiling O Keyboard for me. That keyboard still seems to have unparalleled layout customization options.

actually if you want a customizable keyboard, Samsung one probably has no competition
but then it's proprietary and the default english spell checker uses grammarly, which is widely considered a keylogger...

That's with Keys Cafe, right? Have seen that module, but have never looked into it much. Will check it out later.

yeah

Tried it out and it has decent customization although Multiling O still provides more options. That said I think I will give it a shot and maybe finally move to Samsung keyboard since its dictionary and swipe are much better, plus it has some cool features like underlined spelling mistakes, emoji search and translate straight from keyboard.

Edit: Think I have found a deal breaker. My language has diacritics so I need a modifier key to quickly type without holding a key and choosing letter from pop up. There is an option using ALT as modifier, but when it is enabled, keyboard layout is not the standard one where you get like a V shape, second row keys are right under first row and it throws off my typing.

Nice! Downloaded and configured. Looks like a great gboard replacement

Wow this is perfect for the Samsung Z Fold. The split keyboard being tablet only actually works out with the separate screens.

Anybody know how deep keyboard history is? I'd like something like 10+

Looks like a perfect board to migrate to....

Any plans to add Colemak layouts? I know I'm in the minority here, but its what I'm used to!

Edit: tapping on the language lets me add it! Perfect!