Evaluation time: 30+ days (Jan. 20, 2007 to the present (Feb. 19, 2007))
Tested on: HW2 TI-89 with AMS 2.09
Pros: Small and very compact; really helps with navigating long Home Screen entry lines
Cons: The [Diamond] + [Left]/[Right] key combinations it sets up conflict with some other TSRs and Flash Apps and cannot be changed
* Stability/Reliability: 10/10
* Features: 7/10
* Size/Efficiency: 10/10
* Ease of use/Usability: 10/10
* Documentation: 10/10
* Overall: 9/10
Recommended: Yes
One thing I've always found annoying is the fact that Home Screen entry on the TI-89 is only a single line instead of multi-line like the Z80 calculators (e.g., TI-83, TI-86, etc.) This makes moving around long entry lines a big pain, which isn't helped at all by the TI-89's slow arrow key repeat rate. This nice TSR is a great idea that makes this much less of a problem. It allows using [Diamond] + [Left]/[Right] or [Alpha] + [Left]/[Right] to move the cursor several characters to the left or right at a time. This makes scrolling horizontally through an entry much faster.
These key combinations work just about anywhere within AMS, so they can be very versatile. However, this results in a few problems. At least one Flash App that I know of (TI Planner, if I remember correctly) already uses [Diamond] + [Left]/[Right], and this TSR blocks the use of these keys. Another example: The System Doctor Sensor programs use [Diamond] + [Left]+[Right] to invoke themselves. This interferes with Fast Keyboard, so I have to install Fast Keyboard last so that I can use [Diamond] + [Left]/[Right] for scrolling, but I then lose the ability to invoke System Doctor Sensor.
This problem could have been solved either by allowing the key shortcuts Fast Keyboard uses to be configured, or at least reduced by allowing the user to choose which applications that Fast Keyboard is not active in. Another feature that would have made Fast Keyboard more flexible would have been to allow the configuration of how many characters the various key combinations move. These features would make it a bit larger, but I feel that the extra flexibility would make up for that.
Overall, though, Fast Keyboard is a very useful program. Definitely try it out if you have to work with long lines of entries a lot.
Note: Before using a TSR like this, be sure to get and install HW3Patch or h220xtsr first if you have a Hardware 2.00 or higher TI-89; otherwise, you may experience stability problems. With h220xtsr, this TSR has so far never crashed my calculator.
