On Thu, 2005-06-02 at 11:54 -0500, Rob Rittenhouse wrote:
TuxType vs Mavis Beacon?)
I just have to say that this semester we needed a typing program. I
tried TuxType2 and found it to a good program, but it doesn't really
compare to Mavis Beacon. Mavis Beacon helps to teach the student how to
type, TyuxType is more of a game to help re-enforce/improve their typing
skills. Mavis Beacon really is fairly cheap, though ($5/copy for an
older version at 5dollarsoftware.com), and works well under Wine (though
the installer fails, just use a repackager like InstallRite on a Windows
machine). What I ended up doing is installing both and the teacher used
Mavis Beacon to help teach them typing, and TuxType for practice. It
worked well, though I would prefer to use something open source and
native. None of the native typing applications I tried cut it.
TuxType is a cool game, but I found that beginning students discarded
good technique to try to achieve speed. I had great results using
Ktouch and Gtypist. Ktouch is graphic and shows you the keys as you
type. Gtypist is text based, but has gobs of lessons . . . plus shows
you speed and errors . . . and you can create your own tests or lessons
as well.