does this just display a keyboard in the field of view of the vive perspective? why do i need to see my keyboard if i know how to touch type?
I could invest a lot of time to unlearn my current way of typing and learn proper touch-typing technique, but that's a lot of work and doing it just to be able to type in VR feels like a waste of time. With this tech I'd be able to work in VR without changing my way of typing. To me, this makes using VR for work practical for the first time. It's actually huge, and if it works well it's, to me and others in similar situation, potentially life-changing tech.
It's hard to place your hands on the keyboard in pitch black or when you're in a weird position like lying on your back with the laptop on your chest. If you've ever partially closed your laptop so that the monitor would shine on your keyboard so you could find 'f' and 'j', you know exactly what I'm talking about.
And also TFA says "for a true typing experience you need to see your hands, and we’ve created a way to use the Vive’s existing tracking to do that".
As long as I can use such markers to position my hands in the proper initial position, I really don't like to have a lit keyboard in the dark. It's distracting and annoying.
If your keyboard doesn't have such bumps it's easy enough to make them either using some craft materials you can stick on the keyboard (like some tape even) or by cutting small notches in to it using a file or a dremel tool.
“But VR can transform and augment that trusty keyboard – so easy to disregard – into a contextually aware companion for whatever application you use, becoming a palette for your creative workflow, dynamically providing you with any commands and shortcuts you need.”
But that's on a physical keyboard that has something which virtual keyboards lack: tactile feedback.
Tactile feedback is one of the missing pieces of today's VR devices. Without it typing on a fully virtual keyboard is just not going to be nearly as accurate as on a physical keyboard, and providing visual feedback is just about the only thing you can do about it.
If you are playing a VR game where you are using a joystick or some other peripheral, you still may need to use your keyboard for some actions, in-game chat, or simply to pull up a browser and google something while in-game.
If you primarily have your hands on a joystick or game controller, you would have to take your VR headset off just to figure out where your keyboard/mouse are.
the keyboard can follow the user's view... along with the silhouette of the user's hand...
That said, I don't really have a better suggestion. Typing in VR is just going to be plain painful for anyone who can touch type with any speed on a physical keyboard.