Because the characters are single strokes, users can draw each Unistroke character right on top of the previous one, using the entire screen. Practiced Unistrokers found the simplicity and speed of text entry very attractive. We tried a number of different methods. Vertically, eight lines of text fit onscreen. Spreading three text buttons per line across the display increases the number of selections to 24.
Larger lists require alternative approaches.
This scheme takes the horizontal or vertical position of a screen touch as a percentage of the total screen dimension, then moves the cursor to a similar position in the long list of options. Unfortunately, we found that the resolution of the touch-screen restricts accurate selection to lists smaller than the maximum number of pen positions that can be resolved. We also chose not to use this type of interface element because it demands continuous display feedback for each movement of the pen. Typically the feedback would be generated remotely, rather than by the tab itself, because the application generating the feedback is running elsewhere on the network. The contention that would result between pen events and continuous display updates would make poor use of the communication bandwidth.