Hey guys, a while ago I started making a small typing program as a hobby (and c+SDL programming challenge).
It was originally just a remake of TypeRite 2, an OOLLLDDD 16bit dos program my high school still used, which had many weird bugs like typing a backspace would output a square root and move the cursor to the next letter. Because it was made for dos the move to windows 7 64bit also broke compatibility so it has to be ran is dosbox or something similar. My program fixed those issues and added a few other little features. Although it looks like crap right now its using bitmap fonts, textures, etc under the hood so the art style could change a lot.
Over time it has evolved with more features. It's actually now being used at my dad's grade school, which is working well and providing me with some well needed criticism. Kids complained they would accidentally "press any key to continue" and lose the score screen - so now it has a short delay, and all results are stored in a database. Then I made a website to view the database results which was cool. Then I started adding in lots of random aggregation of the data I had collected including a WPM over time graph for the tests, a heatmap of the errors, trend of the WPM between tests, etc. Next on my todo list is some basic training exercises that help teach the different rows and force some % accuracy before moving on to the next lesson - with progress saved between states.
For now the actual tests are just using the TR2 passages which are outdated and pretty bland. I'v considered making the program call to the database and return some random content which would open up a lot of possibilities. If I did that where should I find content? I know TypeRacer uses real quotes which is cool and I believe they are all from older works which are now in the public domain. Can anyone confirm the legality of using those? (I found a website that collects all the TypeRacer passages and some statistics - http://www.seanwrona.com/typeracer/texts.php?texts=full&sort=passage)
Also, this program was designed for a school system (organizing info by tests->student->class), but there is nothing stopping an individual from using it. The only difficult part is getting a database running to keep track of all the test results and other data that is recorded. With that in mind, what features would you want to see in a typing program? Either cool things that other sites do well, or something new no one has thought of before. Looking at the first page of google hits it seems like I do everything the standard tests do and more right now, but I am sure there is more it can do. I look forward to some cool ideas from you guys.
If anyone is curious here are some photos of the website More
(https://i.imgur.com/TiJWPVA.png)
(https://i.imgur.com/WEQM9IS.png)
I apologize if this looks like I giant wall of text. I just wanted to write this all out real quick before I went to bed so hopefully there would be some comments in the morning. Take care everyone.
As far as I know, the passages come from songs, quotes, books, movies, etc... and they can be submitted by users as well. Since they're passages, I think copyright doesn't apply. On top of that, lyric websites exist, quote websites exist, etc...
For instance, Quotations Page uses this disclaimer:
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