Of course ink color selection and customizable pen width are available as are various type styles and sizes for conversion. And there's a "Quick Correct" window for fast correction invoked by a gesture.

Once installed on the Pocket PC, CalliGrapher is easily accessible from within most applications. CalliGrapher seamlessly integrates with PhatPad and PhatNotes, which both allow reminders and hierachical organization of notes with files of up to 1000 pages of both text and writing. I'll be running updated reviews of both of these in future issues of Computing Unplugged.

Kicking the tires
Curious about what applications CalliGrapher would work in, I sampled how it worked in Word, Excel, and Notes and found that all the same functions inherent in CalliGrapher worked uniformly across applications. I also discovered that you can handwrite right on top of existing text to use the full screen and it will convert to text when you get to the bottom of the page and keep scrolling. You can vary the speed for recognition to take place so that you care comfortable with it and you don't feel rushed.

One thing that amused me was that you cannot automatically convert handwriting to text in PhatPad. You have to go through a menu driven character recognition operation. But handwriting in Notes automatically converts to text. This is clearly a problem PhatWare needs to address.

Let me assure you that there is an amazing abundance of features and that an excellent manual is available with tutorials in .PDF format. I really appreciate the well-written, informative, and easy to follow manual that comes with this product.

The advertising says that you can start using the program right out of the box. Well, yes and no. First of all, you need to learn about the various functions and controls built into the program along with a set of specialized gestures. I don't know about you, but my handwriting does not win any awards and I'm never asked to be the secretary. I was pretty disappointed in CalliGrapher when I first started using it. But I must say that when I cleaned up my act and started writing more carefully and more legibly, it converted with incredible accuracy. This program could be thought of as a penmanship improvement system for it trains you and you train it on an interactive basis.

Suggestions for recognition improvement
After using the program for some time, I found a few tips on the Phatware site that will help you get the most out of it:

• You'll have the best recognition quality when using the default letter shape settings. Disabling too many shapes will decrease the recognition quality. There is only one reason to disable a certain shape of a certain letter, which is if CalliGrapher recognizes this letter incorrectly because you wrote its shape similar to another letter. For example, if your "o" is recognized as "u" you can try to disable some shapes for "o" or for "u" or for both. However, if you disable too many shapes you will decrease the recognition quality.