Input Device

California-based WayTools has taken a different approach to typing on the go with its TextBlade keyboard, which it claims is the "most compact touch-type machine ever produced" and literally pulls apart to fit in a pocket.

Gizmag tested the Gladius 5, a ruggedized work phablet meant to play nice with the internet of things. Here's our report back from the field.

What happens when you're immersed in a virtual world – such as a game – and you want to use your real-world fingers to control your virtual fingers in that world? Well, China's Dexta Robotics has created an exoskeleton for your hand, which can even provide the user with a sense of touch.

Drawing or making notes with a computer pen or stylus doesn't have the same feeling as using a paper and pen. Sometimes, however, you want to digitize something that you've drawn or written by hand. The new Moleskine Livescribe notebooks let you do both at the same time.

Tokyo-based startup Fove is working on a head mounted display that boasts eye-tracking capabilities, adding another level of user input and promising applications for not only gaming, but medical applications as well.

For all the input methods available, the humble keyboard remains central to most computer usage. Over time different designs have tried to perfect the mechanics, improve comfort and even project the keys. The new Ultimate Hacking Keyboard targets configurability, ergonomics and build quality.

Researchers at the Interactive Geometry Lab at ETH Zurich have developed a whole new way of creating movement in virtual software characters by providing developers with the ability to create 3D model "joysticks" outside the computer that directly create shape and movement inputs.

Aiming to streamline computer input commands beyond quick wrist movement and keyboard shortcuts, Eric Charlton, a US-based engineer and founder of Solid Art Labs, has designed the King's Assembly, an input device which allows control over a keyboard, mouse and joystick simultaneously.

Disillusioned with the range of mechanical keyboards on the market, programmer and prominent blogger Jeff Atwood set out to produce a simple, versatile and clean alternative. The result is the CODE Keyboard.

Logitech's PowerShell Controller + Battery brings conventional games controls to iPhone 5, iPhone 5s and 5th-gen iPod touch devices running iOS7. It also packs an integrated 1,500 mAh battery to extend gaming sessions.

Livescribe's latest smartpen, the Livescribe 3, wirelessly transmits handwritten notes to compatible iOS devices via Bluetooth so that they can be instantly transferred to an iOS device's display.

The MagPen is an experimental new smartphone stylus, that contains a magnet which is detected by the phone's existing magnetometers.