Explaining keyboard layout proposals. Fn hotkeys updated, language switching, powertoggles etc

[ible]

Keyboard design = soul searching

 

[comradekingu]

Or soul-crushing. I managed to simplyify something today. Now only black and white

http://www.keyboard-layout-editor.com/#/layouts/fe9096f8e4a39c98c386dc24912bd967

Im questioning printing L1 L2, because i dont see it as being a useful way to refer to the shoulders. Top and bottom left or right shoulders sound a lot more natural.

Remembering that top is the 1 is arbitrary, and I think the bottom one is the primary shoulder.

Also, if you are using it in a game,

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Is a lot more clear than "press L1".

Also made Alt and Ctrl the primary label of the columnkeys, because thats the case, and you use them for that a lot more on average.

http://www.keyboard-layout-editor.com/#/layouts/4980ced0d87552d49ec909700f45fc01 is my new benchmark for how clean things can look.

 

[comradekingu]

http://www.keyboard-layout-editor.com/#/layouts/b9624e61cc210f254f5a325f75c31a52
Is the recent development, trying to please everyone by having a super. Dont know why, but there it is. Meaning the only thing you dont get is shoulders+F-keys. All other problems are solved. And obviously problems are avoided.
 
One less dedicated powertoggle.
 
http://www.keyboard-layout-editor.com/#/layouts/3218f072fccb9a47c525364f94d18201
 
This is interesting, because it has no overlap. Which is visually and functionally simpler.
 
Ctrl and Alt are just as close to rightnub, but now also closer to buttoncluster, at the cost of being farther away from keyboard. With them now being in the right orientation and not doubleprinted, i like it a lot.
 
No dedicated powertoggles and no super.

Edit: I wonder if these shoulders make more sense?

Edit2: Or maybe this.

 

[comradekingu]

Incorporating a default (hidden) AltGr layer isnt a bad idea. Considering having the user select it as per their region is a wtf choice.

Not printing it is a good idea in case the user does want to do that.

http://www.keyboard-layout-editor.com/#/layouts/30a0088d8122d438eb0dfe55b9cb6a53 here it is

 http://www.keyboard-layout-editor.com/#/layouts/7e81eec1ad02e9be1ff546537db1d32b keyboard it belongs to

Now you dont need any hacks for making P+2 and L+2 into dedicated letters.

{ [ ] } are in, in the orientation the people who dont have US/UK keyboards are used to. (the people who would trade dedicated brackets for letters)

< > brackets are in

German letters are in  Ä Ö Ü ß

German quotes are in « »

French dedicated number-row symbols are in. ḉàéè

Spanish letters are in ḉñ

Spanish symbols ¡ ¿ are in

The reason for including these, is the inter-lingual aspect. They are covered in a dedicated way, but there might be speakers with other letters on the dedicated letters that wish to type them.

Currency symbols £ € ¥ are in

Symbols µ ½ § Ω I (roman numeral) are in

Is there anything that should have been in here?

There is still room for Shift+AltGr on the AltGr symbols.

Old-english and scandinavian-only letters are out because of obscurity and non-interlingual aspect. Scandinavians have enough coverage with the dedicated keys.

 

[comradekingu]

With the help of http://typeit.org/

http://www.keyboard-layout-editor.com/#/layouts/290dc2cab3340a92d913d1bb21f62565 is the preliminary result of trying to get as many languages

into the AltGr+ and Shift+AltGr+ as possible

German, Dutch, Spanish and Italian is in.

If French wants to join, it has to be a FN+ map, with that they could get their à on 0 (it is now ¿ with shift+altGr+)

It makes a lot of sense for the french people who dont want to use shoulders, however relying on FN to type language is a hack.

In addition to this, danish has all its diactrics covered. Just Need æøå. Swedish would be completely covered by adding one å.

 

[_wb_]

Here is a "_wb_ endorsed" variant of a comradekingu-style, P+1, L+2 available-for-remapping layout:

http://www.keyboard-layout-editor.com/#/layouts/a46e5a64b096c2413b0b5fdbb11f244b

 

[_wb_]

Here another variant of comradekingu's proposal: http://www.keyboard-layout-editor.com/#/layouts/dad5cef0461542a8d2e16800aaec84bd

 

[WizardStan]

Shift and meta on opposite sides of the keyboard automatically fails it, I think. Makes it all but impossible to shift-fn-<key>

 

[_wb_]

Not if Fn is sticky like on the Pandora...

 

[WizardStan]

Ok, that wouldn't make it impossible, just awkward, requiring two completely distinct presses instead of near-simultaneous ones.

 

[Grench]

Ok, that wouldn't make it impossible, just awkward, requiring two completely distinct presses instead of near-simultaneous ones.

This is an entertaining exercise, but it makes far too many compromises to general usability to satiate the desire of very few who don't even plan to use it as it's mapped anyway.

 

[_jr_]

I do like _wb_'s first P+1 L+2 variant above. Because (unlike some other versions) it uses the 'normal' color scheme it makes it very easy to compare such a layout to the more densely labeled ones. I think one could remove all the orange 'F's (and 'F1', but probably not F11 and F12) and the dead diacritic labels, too, without loosing anything. Some further rearrangements (like moving - and = to replace the dedicated brightness controls) would give a layout that truly deserves to be called uncluttered. And still be usable for both code and text I think. As a German I'd be actually tempted to map öäü to meta-P+1/L+2 and ß to meta-backspace. For desktop gaming Grench's layout with lockable numeric keypad and F keys is obviously better suited, but that could be an unlabeled (typically there isn't much time to look at the keyboard labels while gaming) alternate layout to be switched to on demand.

 

[ible]

I wonder why we are insisting on Alt being on a shoulder when AltGr will do:

http://www.keyboard-layout-editor.com/#/layouts/ba574ebfb533e8bd7da783993c87ab73

I don't often use Alt, except for changing into a tty session (Ctrl+Alt+F1), or by force shutting down when boot doesn't work (Ctrl+Alt+Delete).  Might as well put it in a more remote place (like in the center of the board).  Then you can put F up in the shoulders as well.  Since comradekingu intends F as a software modifier, it won't hinder game play.

 

[_wb_]

I do like _wb_'s first P+1 L+2 variant above. Because (unlike some other versions) it uses the 'normal' color scheme it makes it very easy to compare such a layout to the more densely labeled ones. I think one could remove all the orange 'F's (and 'F1', but probably not F11 and F12) and the dead diacritic labels, too, without loosing anything. Some further rearrangements (like moving - and = to replace the dedicated brightness controls) would give a layout that truly deserves to be called uncluttered. And still be usable for both code and text I think. As a German I'd be actually tempted to map öäü to meta-P+1/L+2 and ß to meta-backspace. For desktop gaming Grench's layout with lockable numeric keypad and F keys is obviously better suited, but that could be an unlabeled (typically there isn't much time to look at the keyboard labels while gaming) alternate layout to be switched to on demand.

Minimalist 'designer' keyboard:

http://www.keyboard-layout-editor.com/#/layouts/bae9d87864a829d6168c2927a3fb1bbd

I wonder if -= at the very top would be practical, though. Shouldn't be worse than the number row on the Pandora, so in principle it could work.

 

[comradekingu]

Because Alt+tab. And the aspect of having common buttons in one place.

The real question is why insist having F-keys on shoulderpress.

Its a very non-obvious way to press F11 and get stuck wondering why something happened.

When you clean it up like that, you see exactly how little FN on shoulders do, and what shift and altGr can do to bring the keyboard back to "normal"

By that i mean buttons people have heard about and know how to use, with concepts that look like it was planned like any ordinary keyboard.

 

[WizardStan]

I wonder why we are insisting on Alt being on a shoulder when AltGr will do:

Is your "AltGr" supposed to be a full-sized keyboard AltGr? Or are you using AltGr in the same way that comradekingu is?If the former, then AltGr *is* alt. They are identical keys on a full sized keyboard. You have a left alt and a right alt but on international keyboards the right alt becomes AltGr, but it's still right alt. Putting two such AltGrs on your keyboard is problematic because there is only one "right alt" scancode to map it to.

If the latter... whyyyyyy?

 

[Grench]

I do like _wb_'s first P+1 L+2 variant above. Because (unlike some other versions) it uses the 'normal' color scheme it makes it very easy to compare such a layout to the more densely labeled ones. I think one could remove all the orange 'F's (and 'F1', but probably not F11 and F12) and the dead diacritic labels, too, without loosing anything. Some further rearrangements (like moving - and = to replace the dedicated brightness controls) would give a layout that truly deserves to be called uncluttered. And still be usable for both code and text I think. As a German I'd be actually tempted to map öäü to meta-P+1/L+2 and ß to meta-backspace. For desktop gaming Grench's layout with lockable numeric keypad and F keys is obviously better suited, but that could be an unlabeled (typically there isn't much time to look at the keyboard labels while gaming) alternate layout to be switched to on demand.

 Minimalist 'designer' keyboard:

http://www.keyboard-layout-editor.com/#/layouts/bae9d87864a829d6168c2927a3fb1bbd

I wonder if -= at the very top would be practical, though. Shouldn't be worse than the number row on the Pandora, so in principle it could work.

Still not a fan of those. It simply feels wrong.

 

[_wb_]

I do like _wb_'s first P+1 L+2 variant above. Because (unlike some other versions) it uses the 'normal' color scheme it makes it very easy to compare such a layout to the more densely labeled ones. I think one could remove all the orange 'F's (and 'F1', but probably not F11 and F12) and the dead diacritic labels, too, without loosing anything. Some further rearrangements (like moving - and = to replace the dedicated brightness controls) would give a layout that truly deserves to be called uncluttered. And still be usable for both code and text I think. As a German I'd be actually tempted to map öäü to meta-P+1/L+2 and ß to meta-backspace. For desktop gaming Grench's layout with lockable numeric keypad and F keys is obviously better suited, but that could be an unlabeled (typically there isn't much time to look at the keyboard labels while gaming) alternate layout to be switched to on demand.

 
Minimalist 'designer' keyboard:

http://www.keyboard-layout-editor.com/#/layouts/bae9d87864a829d6168c2927a3fb1bbd


I wonder if -= at the very top would be practical, though. Shouldn't be worse than the number row on the Pandora, so in principle it could work.

Still not a fan of those. It simply feels wrong.

Me neither: non-mashable Shift+Meta, Tab in a weird place, number row not aligned with QWERTY row. Personally I don't need the P+1, L+2, and I think they are only really useful for Scandinavians and Germans.

Moreover, minimalism is overrated; if we're going to pay for the printing of labels, then they better print some damn symbols on that keymat!

 

[_jr_]

...

Minimalist 'designer' keyboard:http://www.keyboard-layout-editor.com/#/layouts/bae9d87864a829d6168c2927a3fb1bbd


I wonder if -= at the very top would be practical, though. Shouldn't be worse than the number row on the Pandora, so in principle it could work.

Still not a fan of those. It simply feels wrong.

I can understand that and _wb_ is probably right that -= is awkward up there. OTOH because of the few meta labels it really is looking mostly like a standard keyboard (imagine the number row labels white). And (what I wouldn't have thought possible with only 4 rows of 11/12 columns, double width space, and two modifiers on the main keyboard) for a lot QWERTY and QWERTZ based national layouts it actually seems viable to create a corresponding Pyra variant that is close enough to be usable without labels. For which ones exactly depends on where we put the few remaining labeled meta bindings and compose.

 

[ible]

I'm trying to see how CK's layout looks in the "standard" colors.  (I think it would help CK to get a better score, at least from the keyboard designers who are trying to make their keyboards easy to grasp .)  But I couldn't help myself to move some things around.

visible keyboard symbols:

http://www.keyboard-layout-editor.com/#/layouts/373a87c70b723f63738c146d7dc51255

Compared to CK's original, I moved F11, F12 up top instead of on Q and W (though I don't have a strong preference here).  I also shuffled some of the AltGr+Number symbols.  I wanted ' closer to S for possessiveness (Bob's apostrophe), moving `~ further in (to less prime territory).  I also put / on AltGr+8 (mnemonic divide is the "opposite" of asterisk, or multiply); + on AltGr+7 (making + next to & for "and").  

I also made it so there's only one AltGr (right Alt), compared to CK, to avoid WizardStan's confusion.

hidden symbols for a default AltGr:

http://www.keyboard-layout-editor.com/#/layouts/dd66b39c789c5e63527d1a629a5f4acd

I tried to put slanty-accents up in a nice direction from their vowel (e.g. ú is up and to the right of u).  The exceptions are the accents on E, which correspond instead to the ', ", and ` AltGr marks.  For people who would actually use those accented vowels, they should probably make the default template, but this is my suggestion.

I also moved CK's {[]} to {}[] so that {} would be next to each other, and [] would be closer to i, j, and k (for my own coding combos).  But here no big preference.  I also put ç on C instead of Shift+AltGr+0 or wherever CK had it.  IMO this makes most sense.

For most of these non-visible changes (besides ç) I don't have a huge preference, so I don't mind CK's original positions.

Any people have qualms with no AltGr on the main keyboard?  Does Ctrl+Alt suffice for AltGr?  Certain symbols aren't available without it:  | ' " ` ~ \ + / - = _ ?