Keyboard Poll, Finally!

[peca]

Honestly, I'm glad that 70% of people want Alt, Ctrl on the keyboard (in various positions) and only 30% do not want it.

IMO it is due to that they:

• didn't realize how small Pandora really is
• still sticks too much on big standard PC keyboard
• didn't get into touch with (pocket) device that have such limited keyboard

@peca: wow, I wish that such design was an option in the poll. CoMiKe's design was like that, but he decided to withdraw it... and I foolishly let him to do this..

Everybody's opinion constantly evolve, even my and your. It is a shame, but live go on.
edit: past tense

 

[cools]

Decent poll

My only concern is that the keyboard should be usable when the Pandora is sat on a desk, as well as when it's held like a gamepad.

 

[Caine]

QUOTE
...Heh, it never crossed my mind that Alt might be less important

I don't agree that it is. I hope to use Emacs on the pandora and it uses alt a lot.

 

[WizardStan]

QUOTE
...Heh, it never crossed my mind that Alt might be less important

I don't agree that it is. I hope to use Emacs on the pandora and it uses alt a lot.

Emacs uses "meta" a lot, not alt. They happen to be the same on PCs, but on systems without an alt, it's esc. You can map it to almost any key. I'd suggest either the Start or Select buttons in the middle.

 

[javaJake]

OK, I voted Kagato because I don't like how the special "brightness" and "playback" functions are mapped to the keyboard. I would rather enjoy keeping all that in the FXX buttons if possible.

This is because I wonder how you'd raise/lower the brightness or whatever while playing a game that used the D-Pad. I'd have to quit the game first, as far as I can tell.

 

[cosurgi]

OK, I voted Kagato because I don't like how the special "brightness" and "playback" functions are mapped to the keyboard. I would rather enjoy keeping all that in the FXX buttons if possible.

This is because I wonder how you'd raise/lower the brightness or whatever while playing a game that used the D-Pad. I'd have to quit the game first, as far as I can tell.

Nope. Brightness is Fn+Dpad. And Fn is a special dead key (unlike Ctrl,Alt,Shift) it makes the next keypress as something entirely different than the usual key. You can normally play the game and change brightness at the same time with Fn key. It will work exactly the same as with Fn+function key.

 

[zaoin]

You missed one option in your poll

"I'm using a ROMAN ALPHABET language (Spanish, Catalan, Portugues) with lots of accented letters (àáèéíïòóúü) but standard keyboards for my language never had specific keys for each accented letter, they use several special (dead) keys instead. I really want these keys"

I agree.

I'm sorry. The option most close to it is c) - "several accented letters" and "WANT them printed".

I hope that keyboard software will be easy to setup. :huh:

Compose key +a = á or à ?

Oh, that will work, you have both acute and grave:
Compose+A+A = Compose + ` + a = à
Compose+L+A = Compose + ' + a = á

satisfied?


Hello.

I have never used a keyboard of this kind. Using the thumbs.
I'm only sure about not < and > at the bottom left.

Sorry I thougt only "`" was on sinthetix's keyboard.

 

[greendots]

...
I'm using Alt for keyboard shortcuts and window management (no, not moving windows around, I'm not planning to do that on 4.3" display). I will also use it in place of windows-meta key shortcuts which is on my keyboard (it should have a tux on it). IMHO those two functionalities cramped together in single key justify its presence on the keyboard.
...

On the other hand I'm defiantly going to be using alt to move windows around. On a 4.3 inch display I cant afford to have a window decorator

In linux I most often use control to switch to another display session. In a full screen game I can still switch to a console to check the time, email, aim, and a few other small things in between maps. Now come to think of it I could not do it with alt and control mapped to the keypad :/ (but could easily be fixed with another key combo)

Im gonna work on another layout now

Edit: is it likely or possible that the first 3000 batch would be the ones to test the keyboard and make a perfect layout? They could then request the 4 or 5 keys (for free) to match the finalized layout used in later batches. Every one here can only make guesses and there still hasnt been a complete pandora keyboard made to date (as far as we've been told).

 

[fusion_power]

This might sound like a stupid question, but what do you use the ALT key for?

CTRL+ALT+DEL ?

Uh, during the Pandora Development process, what did you and Craigix and the other Devs had in mind for the Keyboard labeling or the way, the Pandora Keyboard will work?

 

[Kyo]

aww, as a coder I was really hoping for Kagato

 

[AireTamStorm]

I'll second using Alt for a ton of window management in Linux.

 

[MilanC]

Ctrl and Alt definitely are the most useful keys ever
Allt: (ctrl-)alt-f# (chvt), alt-f2 (run command dialog), alt-tab...

BtW, might be interesting to use them (or L/R triggers) with mouseemu and touchscreen, too.

 

[Esn]

I haven't voted yet, but I really don't like the fact that the winning choice currently has no one-click "comma" and "period" keys. It seems to be designed for those who use texting-speak and have no need for normal punctuation.

If cosurgi's ends up being the final design, I hope there's a way to re-assign the default key functions, because I'll definitely be using "," and "." more than "ctrl" and "alt".

 

[cosurgi]

of course remapping is possible, but here's what Javacat had to say about that problem:

I don't think that not having direct access to the punctuation characters is really a problem. I've got a blackberry where ALL punctuation is done through a second (or third) function of a character and it is no way a problem. It took me all of 5 seconds to get used to it and I can now throw together huge emails in pretty much the same speed as I do on a desktop machine with a full keyboard.

PS, the size of the polls on this thread are insane, although due to the size you do end up thinking about what you are voting for

EDIT: in fact I wish very much there was a way to put ',' and '.' as primary keys.... but there simply were too many symbols to put there. There were already few people complaining that I removed €,£ and ¥ ... I was trying to balance everything in the best possible way...

 

[GuchaRU]

little off: is there possibility of rebinding keys?

 

[greendots]

yes its all in software... but you will still have the print on the keys

 

[_VWV_]

little off: is there possibility of rebinding keys?

Once again , please SEARCH!!! before you ask something. I'm not being paranoid it's in the RULES.

 

[WizardStan]

yes its all in software... but you will still have the print on the keys

Hence my desire for the keys to have QWERTY printed on them, and nothing else. But I am in the far minority

 

[TaG]

little off: is there possibility of rebinding keys?

Once again , please SEARCH!!! before you ask something. I'm not being paranoid it's in the RULES.
It is also good manners. It also helps because no matter how many questions you ask, or even if some turn out to be dumb questions, people will more likely put the effort in to help if they feel you made the efort to find out first.

Have you read the thread?

 

[cosurgi]

Hence my desire for the keys to have QWERTY printed on them, and nothing else. But I am in the far minority

A agree that last design by Peca is very interesting, and I wish that it was in the poll among other choices. It's unfortunate that during all that discusion (a week, or even almost two weeks) nobody had submitted a so clean proposal like that. Unfortunately CoMiKe had withdrawn his design, because it, as he said, was unfinished and lacked punctuation.

Should we make another poll? Personally I'm getting sick of that... And If devs are going to print kays layout soon on the first batch - perhaps it's too late already, it would make things too complicated.