And now for something completely different (Keyboard Option)

[Silent-Hunter]

I like it except for the numbers. I still would want the numbers to be the top row. But I love what you did with the F keys and other symbols!

 

[bzar]

Centered spacebar in a thumb keyboard? No thanks. This is one thing Nokia got right:

 

[Kiga]

Note that a wide space bar only makes sense if you put it in the middle. The point of a wide space bar is that both thumbs can use it.

I disagree it makes sense if you want to hit the button with the lower part of your thumb without hitting anotherkey and it can adapt to various type of hand.

But maybe the best choice would be to put a single-width at the extremity so that everyone can hit it with the beginnig of their thumb but I wonder if it will be comfortable for typing during a long time.

 

[_wb_]

If you can't reliably hit single-width keys with your thumb, then the keyboard will be quite useless anyway.

 

[Askarus]

Here is a version with space bar at left and a full numpad in orange: http://www.keyboard-layout-editor.com/#/layouts/c6090ca0280cb61ba2892a57985bd525

Space bar at right a bit improved: http://www.keyboard-layout-editor.com/#/layouts/e507964b30e8d161f0421fe38934a5f9

I like this.

.

Things I would change:

1: Swap Meta and Shift.

2: Special characters like () are centered and hard to reach. Maybe put them on the left side when Meta is on the right.

 

[Kiga]

If you can't reliably hit single-width keys with your thumb, then the keyboard will be quite useless anyway.

The lower part of the thumb is a bit biggger and less accurate than the end especially when you are using the end to hit others keys at the same time, and I though you was understanding why space have to be hitted without moving to much the thumbs since you said

Note that a wide space bar only makes sense if you put it in the middle. The point of a wide space bar is that both thumbs can use it.

Anyway your assertion are incorrect since if you can't hit it with your thumb (if your thumb has been cut by a yakuza for example) you still can use the keyboard with others fingers.

 

[_wb_]

Let's not optimize our layout for thumbs that have been cut by a yakuza.

 

[comradekingu]

For right-handed people its easier to joinpress rather than tip-press on the left side. Otherwise the very far right is quite inaccessible. Space should be drawn in towards the centre for this reason.

 

[Grench]

I suppose we could put space and tab next to each other in the middle so they're accessible via either thumb.

Or space and enter?    Naw - nevermind.

 

[rygD]

The point of a wide space bar is that both thumbs can use it.

I do like the idea of a double wide any key.  If you put it somewhere that is only reachable by one thumb I don't see a benefit of it taking up the space of 2 keys.

I agree that the double-wide trailer space bar works better in the middle than it does on the far right side - makes more sense.

I started saying double wide instead of other things with a similar meaning for similar reasons to you, I think.  Every time I see something along those lines that is what I think of.  The same happened with single wide/width.

Of course the same effect could be had by having single-button keys all around and making those two lower center buttons both space - effectively a left space and a right space - which would be kind of cool in a nerdy way if you think about it.

This works, and is another good idea, but it eliminates the possibility of anything that closely resembles a standard layout.  I don't care, but others might.  To avoid that we can throw a single wide any key on both sides, not centered.  That is probably a stupid idea.

 

[Djhg2000]

All right, let's kill off the keyboard layout discussion once and for all.

This keyboard layout was an absolute train wreck in theory. Yet it feels amazingly good to type and play games with, despite actually lacking some keys (like '§' for instance). I know because I have one and let me tell you this; the reason I stopped using it wasn't because the keyboard layout was awful, it was because the cooling is so bad you could barely hold it for the entire duration of a full charge. Ironically, the keyboard is probably what kept me using it for so long.

ED will do a better job than this with the Pyra and if I can adapt to the Wibrain B1, then you guys can adapt to a revised Pandora keyboard.

As a side note, this thing is what got me into finding the then under development Pandora many years go (which I of course couldn't afford after buying a $600 UMPC) and it is what the Pyra will eventually replace.

Now can we please go back to solving the more difficult issues? Like the shoulder buttons and such?

 

[Null]

All right, let's kill off the keyboard layout discussion once and for all.

 

[Silent-Hunter]

All right, let's kill off the keyboard layout discussion once and for all.

I wanted one of these so bad! Still do, kinda. Even though I want a Pyra more.

 

[Djhg2000]

All right, let's kill off the keyboard layout discussion once and for all.

I wanted one of these so bad! Still do, kinda. Even though I want a Pyra more.

Trust me, you don't want one of these nowadays. Since the company went under and VIA doesn't care, drivers aren't updated anymore. Also, the performance is so bad a Pandora might actually be faster with modern browsers. Keep in mind the Wibrain B1 used a VIA C7-M 1.2GHz single core x86 CPU, which main target was the Celeron M, with 1GB RAM. Linux boots but you need an ancient Ubuntu version if you want accelerated graphics and Wayland on this hardware just isn't ever going to happen.

 

[Silent-Hunter]

I actually wanted to play Half-Life on it. It has better specs than my dad's netbook, and that played it fine. And I bet Gentoo would work fine on it.

 

[Djhg2000]

I actually wanted to play Half-Life on it. It has better specs than my dad's netbook, and that played it fine. And I bet Gentoo would work fine on it.

Well today I installed Half-Life on it out of curiosity and it is just awful. While I had totally forgotten that I had 2GB in it (I guess I don't pay much attention to the memory usage in XP anymore?), it performs worse than I remembered. It occasionally achieves 20-30 fps in small closed areas with everything turned down to minimum graphics quality, but it usually hovers around 5-10 fps. Possibly this is because of the recent OpenGL port? I suspect VIA didn't really care much for OpenGL 10 years ago.

Anyway, emulators is what it's really good at so I guess I'll stick to those.

 

[Silent-Hunter]

Right, but I was thinking of putting Gentoo on it.

 

[Djhg2000]

Right, but I was thinking of putting Gentoo on it.

Bit there's still the issue of graphics drivers. You could draw everything using software rendering but then video isn't going to play very well.

 

[Silent-Hunter]

Well wha graphics chip does it have? It's been out long enough I'd expect there to be an open source driver clone by now.

 

[Djhg2000]

Well wha graphics chip does it have? It's been out long enough I'd expect there to be an open source driver clone by now.

Some S3 UniChrome III variant I think, it's not a very interesting chip to develop drivers for due to it's rarity.