Why did Android's word completion get worse?

Posted by Sir Four at 11:31pm Apr 12 '13
You must sign in to send Sir Four a message

One thing that bothers me about the [private] 7 is the keyboard's word completion. The [private] is on Android 4.2.2 Jellybean, whereas my older phone is still on 2.2 Froyo. I am very satisfied with the word completion on Froyo! Jellybean seems to get it wrong more often than right, and only offers three suggestions. I mean.. it's just dumber. Froyo offers more suggestions and seems to have a knack for good guessing.

Lemme try some test words.

Okay, the word is "Spanish". On Froyo, by the time I get to "Spa" I see Spanish as one of the suggestions. "Spa" is the default, then "Space", "Spam" and "Spanish". When I type out to "Spani", "Spanish" becomes the default suggestion.

On Jellybean, "Spa" gets me "Spa" (default), Space and Spam. "Span" gets me "Span" (default), "Spam" and "Soon" (?). "Spani", which got me the right word on Froyo, actually yields "Span I" as the default (???), "Spani" and "Spank" (what?). It doesn't get better. "Spanis" yields "Span is" (default), "Spanis" and "Spa is". What the hell man. I have to type out every letter of "Spanish".

"Buffalo". On Froyo, "Buf" gets "Buffalo" as a suggestion, and "Buffa" makes it default. On Jellybean, I don't see it until "Buffal" at which point it's default.

This is extra stupid, because Froyo shows more suggestions even though it's on a smaller screen. The [private] is wasting it's larger screen showing me only three suggestions. And to get more suggestions on the [private], I have to long-press the defaulted suggestion to trigger a pop-up. Whereas on Froyo, it's a simple finger swipe to see more.

So anyway... what should I get from the Play Store to improve my situation on Jellybean?