TypeFaster: Learn to touch-type in a relaxing way!

Version Tested: 0.4.2

Description: TypeFaster is a touch-typing tutor that uses a timing and “heuristic” method to teach about touch typing. Before entering high school, I used this program to learn touch typing or else typing a post now could take around 2 hours! Recently, I have discovered that this program has improved a lot since the first version, so I am going to write a review about it.

Actually this software is designed for use at school, so there are teacher and student modes available. You have to create a teacher password when installing TypeFaster, so that the adminstrator of the program can have teacher privileges. When a student creates his account, he can select his teacher to use specific lesson files that the teacher selected.

So, what are the differences between a teacher account and a student account? (quoted form the TypeFaster official site)

Users with teacher privileges can edit/create lesson files and edit game settings for their pupils. They can also see statistics for each of their pupils. The statistics for a pupil in a keyboard layout are: the percentage of keys in that layout that the pupil has attempted, the overall accuracy and the overall speed. They can also delete their pupils. Deletion should only be done once the student has left the school. If a pupil moves to another grade that has a different teacher, the old teacher should just exclude that pupil’s statistics from his records by pressing the relevant button under ‘View class progress’.

Students can only see their own stats and they cannot edit anything in the program.

Features

Supports multiple keyboard layouts and more can be added easily (see the developers section). Includes support for non-rectangular keys. The following keyboard layouts are currently supported:

• Danish
• Finnish
• French
• French-Belgian
• German
• Hebrew (no lesson files)
• Italian
• Norwegian
• Numeric Keypad
• Portuguese
• Spanish
• UK-English
• US-Dvorak
• US-English

A clear indication of which fingers to use. This is the essence of touchtyping.

A 3D typing game.

Typing statistics and the option of practising the least accurate/slowest/custom keys.

Keyboard is not a fixed size (resolution independent).

Multi-user support.

Teacher support (view student statistics).

Interface for editing lesson files and game settings.

Backspace support

Right to left text support.

Variable text size.

Lesson files can be prose or poems.

Lesson progress indicator.

How to add a lesson file:

1. First login with a teacher account and press “Edit class settings”.
2. In the dialog box that appears, click “Edit lessons”
3. Under “Add lessons”, select “New lesson”
4. Enter your new lesson.       
5. Click “save”, then “ok”, then “ok” again and the process is completed.
6. A good suggestion as to what new lessons to add would be a passage “copy and pasted” from the internet.

Verdict: This is a very good program that can help you learn typing quickly with it’s built-in lessons and custom editing. There is also a game in which you have to type words quickly to repell an alien invasion (quite lame actually). However, this program is still in beta testing, so be prepared for bugs!

Compatibility: Win 98 and above. Mac version coming!

Download: http://sourceforge.net/project/downloading.php?groupname=typefaster&filename=TypeFaster-v0.4.2-install.exe&use_mirror=nchc