Maybe I should've interacted more here, but my per peeve is non-ortholinear keyboards. Since the main design up to now was ortholinear, I thought I needn't worry much.
However, for whatever reason, the latest design has reverted to a typewriter layout.
As I wrote in my pine64 blog post comment, I find the design promising, though it could be much improved with a few simple tweaks, like aligning most keys on a grid, and maybe putting the enter key in the middle, inspired from the typematrix (typematrix.org).
This would make it more natural to move fingers (thumbs, 10 fingers or in-between), easier to touch-type as keys are naturally aligned, and spacing hands a bit more definitely helps on a tiny keyboard like this if you plan to use both hands.
Thanks for fixing the STL download. Which version of SolidWorks should I use so that you can open my files? Would you be open to a suggestion as above before I waste my time on this tomorrow?
A further improvement (that comes at a complexity cost) might be bumper buttons. I too am a bit concerned about how to quickly write something or taking a phone call (both could be solved by allowing the keyboard to flip completely on the back, but could complexify the hinge design.
Here is a quick gimp edit of the original to show what I'm thinking of:
I had a bit of fun with the labels, but I don't care too much about key placement, since they can be remapped later in software (I certainly hope the firmware allows to do so, even for fn keys: there is plenty of FLOSS firmware for this, the community could port one). Still, I like this quick and dirty one better, though it's not perfect by any means.
what I care about is the key layout. One could even imagine splitting up the spacebar and enter key for those who want to remap them further (having multiple keys act as a spacebar by default), no idea how usable it would be though.
Note: the spacebar isn't centered on my image. It could be made larger/smaller, centered is better. It isn't that important if keys other than A-Z aren't on a grid, though it would be better, and I thought it would be easier as well for PCB and manufacturing.
However, for whatever reason, the latest design has reverted to a typewriter layout.
As I wrote in my pine64 blog post comment, I find the design promising, though it could be much improved with a few simple tweaks, like aligning most keys on a grid, and maybe putting the enter key in the middle, inspired from the typematrix (typematrix.org).
This would make it more natural to move fingers (thumbs, 10 fingers or in-between), easier to touch-type as keys are naturally aligned, and spacing hands a bit more definitely helps on a tiny keyboard like this if you plan to use both hands.
Thanks for fixing the STL download. Which version of SolidWorks should I use so that you can open my files? Would you be open to a suggestion as above before I waste my time on this tomorrow?
A further improvement (that comes at a complexity cost) might be bumper buttons. I too am a bit concerned about how to quickly write something or taking a phone call (both could be solved by allowing the keyboard to flip completely on the back, but could complexify the hinge design.
Here is a quick gimp edit of the original to show what I'm thinking of:
I had a bit of fun with the labels, but I don't care too much about key placement, since they can be remapped later in software (I certainly hope the firmware allows to do so, even for fn keys: there is plenty of FLOSS firmware for this, the community could port one). Still, I like this quick and dirty one better, though it's not perfect by any means.
what I care about is the key layout. One could even imagine splitting up the spacebar and enter key for those who want to remap them further (having multiple keys act as a spacebar by default), no idea how usable it would be though.
Note: the spacebar isn't centered on my image. It could be made larger/smaller, centered is better. It isn't that important if keys other than A-Z aren't on a grid, though it would be better, and I thought it would be easier as well for PCB and manufacturing.
