t o u c h t y p i e

A touch-typing trainer.

https://play.touchtypie.com/

Philosophy

Touch-typing enables one to be in flow while interfacing with a computer.

In contrast to reading alone, typing while reading engages the visual, linguistic, and especially motor (coordinative, tactile) faculties, which enhances understanding and memory.

Development

Available as vscode tasks.

docker-compose up
# Site now available on http://localhost:8080

Alternatively, if you need to disable caching when working behind a reverse proxy:

docker-compose -f docker-compose.traefik.yml up
# Site now available on http://localhost:8080

The project started out simple, but grew just enough to require a custom frontend framework. Most parts of are is still in pure HTML, CSS, JS.

Practice resources

Here are some resources (libraries, collections, and books) you may like to use for practice:

• Official: https://touchtypie.github.io/touchtypie-libraries/

FAQ - Practice

Keyboard navigation?

Use the ESC key to navigate between Home and Environment (i.e. settings).

In Environment:

• Use the TAB key to navigate between settings.

• Use ARROW keys to navigate between dropdown entries.

• Use ENTER or SPACE keys to select or toggle settings.

Q: What are the red boxes in the Trainer's speech?

The red boxes in the Trainer's speech are indications of errors present in the Student response.

Q: How to practice on my own texts?

Ensure each text you want to practice is available as a URL.

In touchtypie, go to Environment, and click + beside BOOKS, paste a URL and hit enter. Do this for each URL you want to practice.

To save your practice environment, see this answer.

Note: You may like to use the official practice resources for practice, see here.

Q: How to save the practice session?

To save the practice session, go to Environment, and under FAVORITE click:

• L button to favorite the current Library with your custom settings
• C button to favorite the current Collection with your custom settings
• B button to favorite the current Book with your custom settings

A touchtypie URL is saved to your clipboard. You may now bookmark, save, or share that touchtypie URL to practice anytime you want.

Q: How to practice on my own URL?

See this answer.

Q: I get a red exclamation mark when I add a URL.

Check that the URL is valid. Invalid URLs cannot be fetched.

If the URL is indeed valid, the failure to fetch the URL is because that website is protecting that resource from being shared. See this answer. You may try another URL.

Q: Why can't I use any URL as a book (i.e. practice text)?

The browser is subject to a policy called Cross-Origin Resource Sharing (CORS) which limits the browser from consuming resources from a website other than the current website (i.e. touchtypie).

In order for the browser to consume resources of another website, that website's server must return a HTTP header access-control-allow-origin: *. However we have no control over that website's server.

Hence, the solution is to host our library, collection and book file(s) ourselves. This can easily be done by using Github Pages as discussed in this answer, or uploading to your own web server.

Alternatively, another solution is to use a proxy server which fetches the content of that page directly, and returns the content with a HTTP header access-control-allow-origin: *. This can be done by using Cloudflare Workers.

Q: How to practice on custom book(s)?

See this answer.

Q: How to practice on custom collection(s)?

Ensure each collection you want to practice is available as a URL.

In touchtypie, go to Environment, and click + beside COLLECTIONS, paste a collection URL and hit enter. Do this for each collection you want to practice.

To save your practice environment, see this answer.

Q: How to practice on custom library(s)?

Ensure each collection you want to practice is available as a URL.

In touchtypie, go to Environment, and click + beside LIBRARIES, paste a library URL and hit enter. Do this for each library you want to practice.

To save your practice environment, see this answer.

FAQ - Environment

Q: What is libraries?

All of the available libraries for practice. Use the + to add a custom library.

Q: What is collections?

All of the available collections for practice. Use the + to add a custom collection.

Q: What is books?

All of the available books for practice. Use the + to add a custom book.

Q: What is playmode?

The playmode defines how the next book will be retrieved. Much like how a next song is played in a media player.

There are 4 playmodes:

• shuffleglobal - Shuffle across libraries.
• shuffle - Shuffle within a collection.
• repeat - Cycle within a collection.
• repeatone - Repeat the current book.

The default playmode is shuffleglobal.

Q: What is meditation?

As its name implies, meditation declutters the touchtypie user interface to help the Student reach a state of meditation - a state of singularity of the Mind on the book.

Q: What is perfection?

As its name implies, perfection enforces that the Student response (what is typed) must match the Trainer's speech (what is shown) for progress to be made in a book training session.

When perfection is turned on, the book training session starts from scratch. In perfection, errors continue to be tracked in statistics.

Q: What is jumble?

As its name implies, jumble simply jumbles the words present in a book.

Q: What is scramble?

As its name implies, scramble simply scrambles the characters present in a book.

Q: What is statistics?

As its name implies, statistics simply shows statistics summaries on the Home scene.

Even when statistics is turned off, it continues being collected. Statistics are collated into a virtue at the end of each training session.

Q: What is ambience?

As its name implies, ambience is the background of the training setting.

Q: What is virtue?

As its name implies, virtue is the measure of a Student's performance for a particular training session.

A global virtue is a measure of a Student's overall performance across all training sessions.

Q: What is favorite?

As its name implies, a favorite is a touchtypie URL that is copied to your clipboard containing your training settings, which you may save, bookmark, or share with others to practice on one particular book or books.

FAQ - Terminology

Q: What is a book?

A book is a URL. Its content is the content at that URL.

Q: What is a collection?

A collection is a URL. Its content is a list of book URLs.

Q: What is a library?

A library is a URL. Its content is a list of collection URLs.

Q: Who is the Trainer?

The Trainer is the touchtypie who prepares training sessions for you.

Q: What is the Trainer's speech?

The Trainer's speech is the text displayed for you to read and type.

Q: Who is the Student?

The Student is the player of touchtypie who is you.

Q: What is the Student's response?

The Student's response is the text you typed.

Q: What is Home?

Home is the main scene of touchtypie where the Trainer and Student are.

Q: What is Environment?

Environment is the settings scene of touchtypie.

FAQ - Advanced

Q: How to practice on custom book(s)?

Supply GET query parameter book_ids=<URL> (URL-encoding is not required) when accessing touchtypie. For example:

https://play.touchtypie.com?book_ids=https://touchtypie.github.io/touchtypie-libraries/books/keyboard-qwerty-letters.txt

To practice on multiple books, use multiple GET query parameter book_ids=<URL> separated by &. For example:

https://play.touchtypie.com?book_ids=https://touchtypie.github.io/touchtypie-libraries/books/keyboard-qwerty-letters.txt&book_ids=https://touchtypie.github.io/touchtypie-libraries/books/keyboard-qwerty-numbers.txt

Q: How to practice on custom collection(s)?

To practice on one collection, use GET query parameter book_collection_ids=<URL> (URL-encoding is not required) when accessing touchtypie. For example:

https://play.touchtypie.com?book_collection_ids=https://touchtypie.github.io/touchtypie-libraries/collections/keyboard-qwerty.txt

To practice on multiple collections, use multiple GET query parameter book_collection_ids=<URL> separated by &. For example:

https://play.touchtypie.com?book_collection_ids=https://touchtypie.github.io/touchtypie-libraries/collections/keyboard-qwerty.txt&book_collection_ids=https://touchtypie.github.io/touchtypie-libraries/collections/plants.txt

Q: How to practice on custom library(s)?

To practice on one library, use GET query parameter book_library_ids=<URL> (URL-encoding is not required) when accessing touchtypie. For example:

https://play.touchtypie.com?book_library_ids=https://touchtypie.github.io/touchtypie-libraries/libraries/daily.txt

To practice multiple libraries, use multiple GET query parameter book_library_ids=<URL> separated by &. For example:

https://play.touchtypie.com?book_library_ids=https://touchtypie.github.io/touchtypie-libraries/libraries/daily.txt&book_library_ids=https://touchtypie.github.io/touchtypie-libraries/libraries/nature.txt

Q: How to create a custom library, collection, or book?

Simply put, a library, a collection, or a book is a .txt file, available as a URL.

• Library contains collection URL(s), one entry per line.
• Collection contains book URL(s), one entry per line.
• Book contains text

An easy way to host library, collection, and book files is to use Github Pages, by:

1. Creating a new repository
2. Enabling Github Pages in repository settings on the master or gh-pages branch
3. Committing library, collection and book files to the repository's master or gh-pages branch
4. Each file will be available as https://yourname.github.io/your-repository/<file.txt>, where <file.txt> is the name of the committed file.

Once your library URL is up, in touchtypie, go to Environment, click + beside libraries dropdown box, and paste the URL of the library and press enter. The library will be retreived and the practice will start. You may also share the library with others to practice on.

Basic example

For instance, you want to create a library about nature.

• The library URL will be https://yourname.github.io/your-repository/nature.txt.
• A collection URL will be https://yourname.github.io/your-repository/plants.txt.
• A book URL will be https://yourname.github.io/your-repository/apple.txt.

Content of https://yourname.github.io/your-repository/nature.txt library (contains collection URLs, one entry per line).

https://yourname.github.io/your-repository/plants.txt

Content of collection https://yourname.github.io/your-repository/plants.txt (contains book URLs, one entry per line).

https://yourname.github.io/your-repository/apple.txt

Content of book https://yourname.github.io/your-repository/apple.txt:

An apple tree grows apple fruits, which are nice to eat.
Apples are said to keep one healthy.
An apple a day keeps the doctor away.

See this library in the official touchtypie-libraries repository.

Advanced example

For instance, you want to create a library about animals

• The library URL will be https://yourname.github.io/your-repository/animals.txt.
• A collection URL will be https://yourname.github.io/your-repository/dog.txt.
• A collection URL will be https://yourname.github.io/your-repository/cat.txt.
• A book URL will be https://yourname.github.io/your-repository/cocker-spaniel.txt.
• A book URL will be https://yourname.github.io/your-repository/poodle.txt.
• A book URL will be https://yourname.github.io/your-repository/ragdoll.txt.
• A book URL will be https://yourname.github.io/your-repository/persian.txt.

Content of library https://yourname.github.io/your-repository/animals.txt (contains collection URLs, one entry per line).

https://yourname.github.io/your-repository/dog.txt
https://yourname.github.io/your-repository/cat.txt

Content of collection https://yourname.github.io/your-repository/dog.txt (contains book URLs, one entry per line).

https://yourname.github.io/your-repository/cocker-spaniel.txt
https://yourname.github.io/your-repository/poodle.txt

Content of collection https://yourname.github.io/your-repository/cat.txt (contains book URLs, one entry per line).

https://yourname.github.io/your-repository/ragdoll.txt
https://yourname.github.io/your-repository/persian.txt

Content of book https://yourname.github.io/your-repository/cocker-spaniel.txt

Cocker spaniels are the cutest of all dogs.
They have long droopy ears.

Content of book https://yourname.github.io/your-repository/poodle.txt

Poodles are so cute, they look like plushies.
They have short and curly fur.

Content of book https://yourname.github.io/your-repository/ragdoll.txt

Ragdolls are the cutest all all cats.
Their fluff make them look like plushies.

Content of book https://yourname.github.io/your-repository/persian.txt

Persian are the most exotic of all cats.
They carry thmeselves with class.

See this library in the official touchtypie-libraries repository.

Q: Can it be easier to create a library?

It is part of the roadmap to support fetching of .json files as libraries. This will eliminate the need for creating multiple .txt files for libraries, collections, and books.