Submitted by Bob Bhatnagar on
Looking for a way to improve typing on the iOS virtual keyboard? We've seen how the must-have jailbreak tweak SwipeSelection makes it easier to move the cursor when entering text. Now there's a new tweak in town that further improves the iPhone keyboard, known as AltKeyboard.
Those with jailbroken iPhones running iOS 6 or later can install AltKeyboard from Cydia to quickly type non-alphabetic characters or numbers, without tapping the "123" button. This means no more switching back and forth between keyboards just to enter a single number or question mark. AltKeyboard makes it possible to swipe up on the keys, which will type the alternate character pictured at the top of the key.
For example, to quickly type a question mark, swipe up on the "V" key and a question mark appears. Tap the "V" key and the iPhone will type a V. Of course, you can still tap the "123" button to bring up numbers and punctuation, however the alternate characters will change to brackets and parentheses, etc. from the next level keyboard.
Once installed, AltKeyboard will start working with default settings. If you like, the tweak can be customized from Settings -> AltKeyboard. Not only does the settings area provide a text field to test the keyboard, you can choose to make the keyboard enter a shifted (caps) character when swiping up instead of an alternate character. For typing a lot of words this setting could be more useful in some circumstances, to avoid having to tap the shift key.
This well-designed mod comes to us from developers who teamed up after separately launching the popular tweaks Auxo and Tap to Widgets. AltKeyboard is available on Cydia from the BigBoss repository for $0.99. Check here for instructions on how to jailbreak iOS 6.x with evasi0n. You can also find out how to purchase and install Cydia tweaks with this guide.