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Discussion Forum—A Way with Words, a fun radio show and podcast about language

A Way with Words, a radio show and podcast about language and linguistics.

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Digitize the digits
Robert
553 Posts
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1
2015/12/24 - 5:55am

Merry Christmas.

Here's a tech phenomenon that's totally overlooked that I think deserves recognition, and a word for it:   Ever notice the touch pad trains you to be extra aware of the shapes of your finger tips?   True, you always use your fingers to feel out things of all kinds.   But never like with these small characters and icons.   Here to be real real efficient you need to get extra intimate with the anatomies of your own digits, all the irregular ridges, the micro bumps, the tiny calluses, the dry corner pieces that never go away.  Interesting thing is, when in action, all those complex landscapes and the glass that with them  you probe, are blocked away from your most favorite sense, the visual.  So after the initial ballpark guidance by eye sight,  you are left  to depend on pure  digital dexterity of the digits on a micro level.  Awsome.  What would be a good word:  digiterity,  digi-dexterity, digitability, digidigeability?

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2015/12/24 - 8:40am

And a Merry Christmas to all.

I know exactly what you're talking about, Robert, but only as of a few days ago when I first tried to send a text message using my wife's smart phone (I have a dumb phone). After inadvertently hitting the wrong letters several times, I realized that if I used the "corner" of my fingertip I'd get more accuracy. Picked up the skill pretty fast, but still made some errors. Never had that problem with my tablet, but its keys and icons are way larger than those on a phone.

I don't know if there's a single word for what you describe. There probably should be. But using perfectly legitimate existing words I'd describe that skill as "haptic accuracy" or "haptic dexterity" or maybe the more anatomically specific "digital haptic accuracy/dexterity." But for a single word, I like your suggestion of "digidexterity" (not sure any hyphen would be needed).

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