Regional Keyboards

[Lorkile]

I would like to see a standardized keyboard, and allow in the future people to get custom keymats so that those who feel they can't work with an on-screen keyboard that they will have those sorely desired buttons printed onto their preferred keymat.

On a side note, here is a design I would love to have on the keys:

Flickr - Pandora keyboard mock-up


I would like to see something like that, which is based on the most recent render in this thread on page 8 by MWeston while also taking many of the ideas I liked from the cosurgi. Perhaps we can start in with the keyboard layout polls again? I do like the most recent one overall, but the lack of ctrl and alt buttons bugs me since I tend to use them a lot while surfing the web and such and don't need , and . as often unless typing and in that case a minor slow down will likely help me think more about what I want to say and won't bother me as much.


Edited to add more relevant information.

 

[lulzfish]

Most keyboard shortcuts use the Ctrl key. If Ctrl+Alt+Backspace is remapped, I would definitely not mind giving up Alt.

 

[God Ginrai]

I would like to see a standardized keyboard, and allow in the future people to get custom keymats so that those who feel they can't work with an on-screen keyboard that they will have those sorely desired buttons printed onto their preferred keymat.

On a side note, here is a design I would love to have on the keys:

Flickr - Pandora keyboard mock-up


I would like to see something like that, which is based on the most recent render in this thread on page 8 by MWeston while also taking many of the ideas I liked from the cosurgi. Perhaps we can start in with the keyboard layout polls again? I do like the most recent one overall, but the lack of ctrl and alt buttons bugs me since I tend to use them a lot while surfing the web and such and don't need , and . as often unless typing and in that case a minor slow down will likely help me think more about what I want to say and won't bother me as much.


Edited to add more relevant information.



You can't just add buttons.

EDIT:

Most keyboard shortcuts use the Ctrl key. If Ctrl+Alt+Backspace is remapped, I would definitely not mind giving up Alt.

And you can't get rid of Alt, either!

-God Ginrai

 

[Lorkile]

Did I leave those two extra buttons in there? I meant to delete the two off to the side, but I'm not particularly skilled with photo editing so I did a fair job mangling it just to try and show what I liked the look of when I take into consideration past discussions and the look of the new board.

My apologies for all who even look at the POS, and for the erroneous extra buttons I don't care to edit out tonight.

Edit: Oh, and it's not like MWeston's last render even showed where ctrl and alt are.

Edit again: Oops, they are on the start and select buttons (making them irritating to use for me).

 

[aliking]

http://www.gp32x.de/board/index.php?s=&am...st&p=699491
ED has said the L and R triggers are unavailable for remapping, since they're dedicated to the mouse buttons. That's why I suggest the drivers would probably need a partial rewrite to do it this way. I would love to be wrong, however.


wow, just read that. I hope that is not something that is hard reserved or printed. Game buttons make MUCH more sense to me as mouse buttons - or is there some conflict with mouse-less selection in that case? I.e. the Y button is planned to select the highlighted icon? I'd rather use the enter button. shoulder buttons make great mod keys, but I've never liked them much for selection.

otherwise, MWeston's layout is looking pretty close to me. I'd probably switch AltGr and Compose for Ctrl and Alt, but that's independent of keymapping.

Also I could live without brightness controls and currencies if they were trying to free up some keys for easy user mapping.

 

[MDave]

oh geez GUYS don't panic. EvilDragon obviously meant shoulder buttons used as mouse buttons WHEN you use a mouse. Like when navigating the OS that has a desktop and mouse. They can be whatever a developer wants them to be in their own application/game. Just like in, you know, windows? Or any other desktop based OS?

 

[aliking]

Well yes, obviously. I meant more that I don't really want to use the shoulder buttons as mouse buttons WHEN I'm using a mouse. I want to use game buttons. Whatever, I'm sure it'll be possible to remap them.

 

[Trip]

FWIW this was my last suggestion for the keypad layout:

This is my favourite layout thus far for the sole reason that it puts the mouse buttons on the game pad and uses L and R for mod keys. Regardless of final layout, that's (at least partially) how mine will be remapped. Given a previous post from ED, I suspect this may require some partial rewrites to the mouse/keyboard driver.

+1 for this too. Splitting up the mouse buttons as the default is a bad idea IMO.

Unlike most operating systems Linux uses the middle mouse button for quick copy and paste, which is a lot easier for new Linux users and can save a lot of time when entering longer commands and file paths within the terminal (especially when using a non standard keyboard and mouse). Having them all together and easy to find on the game pad is just common sense.

Putting two of the mouse buttons on the shoulder pads might be easier when just using the web browser, but will make it harder for swapping between mouse and keyboard control.
It's a lot comfier to thumb type when your hands don't have to stretch all the way around the unit. For people who have smaller hands (as well as some of the older Pandora users), that would really start to hurt after a while.
Were supposed to be trying to find the best layout for the majority of users, but that could alienate a hell of a lot of people.

Not to mention the fact that curling your trigger fingers underneath the unit whilst typing will add stability.

@MWeston - Good layout. The only thing that I would change is the top row of numbers. It will look neater and be easier to read if you do what was suggested in the other thread and have the numbers once with a little blue f next to them (f2), instead of writing 2 and F2.

 

[Monk]

I guess people aren't paying attention?

It doesnt matter where mouse buttons are because they are not printed, you can put them on on game pad, D-pad, L and R.... whatever. The only issue was how control ,alt ,atlgr, and compose worked into (or not) the lower keyboard.

Or maybe, just maybe, they'd prefer to have the mouse buttons (L, R and M) on the game pad by default leaving the left and right shoulder buttons for other purposes? Otherwise the "they can be remapped" works for other features, like the symbols, just as well doesn't it?

It's also possible that the mouse driver will directly access the hardware for the L and R buttons, apparently, making it trickier to reporpose in this way???

 

[MWeston]

My reasoning for not putting the mouse buttons on the shoulders was because they are action buttons. If they get bumped or pressed under your grip of supporting the unit (perhaps while using the touch screen), something will happen. What if the cursor was over the X in the corner of a window? Poof, your app is gone.

If the shoulders only have modifier buttons on them, then accidentally pressing them in an application that isn't using them will do nothing. Also, I like having the face buttons for all the usual acknowledgments and actions. The ABXY buttons are going to be used for OK, CANCEL and stuff like that and it seemed logical to have them do actions in activities requiring the mouse too.

This is just my opinion on the generic keypad and does not reflect the opinions of management.

 

[Trip]

My reasoning for not putting the mouse buttons on the shoulders was because they are action buttons. If they get bumped or pressed under your grip of supporting the unit (perhaps while using the touch screen), something will happen. What if the cursor was over the X in the corner of a window? Poof, your app is gone.

If the shoulders only have modifier buttons on them, then accidentally pressing them in an application that isn't using them will do nothing. Also, I like having the face buttons for all the usual acknowledgments and actions. The ABXY buttons are going to be used for OK, CANCEL and stuff like that and it seemed logical to have them do actions in activities requiring the mouse too.

This is just my opinion on the generic keypad and does not reflect the opinions of management.

Good points too

Lets face it, it's just a bad idea to map mouse buttons to the triggers as default :lol:

 

[salasq]

The two types of accents are there - just use ' (apostrophe) and ` (on the tilde key on a regular keyboard). They are both on all of the recent designs, and should be if they aren't. The circle can be provided by o, the umlaut by : (a colon), and the c with a tail by a c+, combination.

I don't think this approach would be practical for Pandora's keyboard, on visual cues front, as punctuation is exclusively or nearly exclusively on secondary button labels. We could look at OSX conventions, in this case - the diacritical is represented by the most recognizable usage of said diacritical.

So ¨ is Compose+U, ˜ is N, ´is E, ˆis I, for ü, ñ, é and î respectively. Ofc OSX one is heavily optimized, so Compose+A defaults to å, O to ø, S to ß and C to ç, etc.

Diacriticals that should be supported are umlaut, tilde, acute, grave, ogonek for main languagues, then ring above, circumflex, hacek/caron (inverted circumflex, massive in Eastern Europe), strikethrough (both Polish and stuff like ø), macron. Add ß and few other one-offs and I think that'd cover some 99.9% of latin script.

I do write in Russian fairly frequently, but I use a normal English keyboard to do it; after a while, you just remember which English keys stand for which Cyrillic letter, so it's not a problem.

Better start planning your layout, then, as basic CYR is another one that simply doesn't fit, width-wise.

It might make things harder for developers, though, if they have to think of different keyboard layouts.

I don't think any dev would access keyboard directly

Or maybe, just maybe, they'd prefer to have the mouse buttons (L, R and M) on the game pad by default leaving the left and right shoulder buttons for other purposes? Otherwise the "they can be remapped" works for other features, like the symbols, just as well doesn't it?

It's a tidiness issue. Lower keyboard will be printed, gaming buttons not. That makes gaming ones easier to remap w/o discrepancies. That's why I support keeping the more contentious ones, like mouse buttons, ctrl/alt and compose above the Q line.

 

[Monk]

My biggest fear seems to be being realised by page 11 of this thread - design by committee. True, one person can make some bad design decisions by themselves, but it usually takes a committe to truly screw things up.

QUOTE
Typically, committees are relatively small. Size recommendations range from three to nine members depending on the mission and activities of the committee. Larger groups - six or more members - are able to solve a greater variety of problems because of varied skills which are likely to increase with the group's size. Smaller groups tend to be more coordinated and focused.

Where the task requires a broad spectrum of information, the addition of members may increase group performance. Naturally, there is a point beyond which committee size should not increase. As group size increases, coordination of the group becomes difficult. Where a group task requires interaction, consensus, and modification of opinion, the task will be solved better with a small group.

I don't think any dev would access keyboard directly

Not even for a driver?

Or maybe, just maybe, they'd prefer to have the mouse buttons (L, R and M) on the game pad by default leaving the left and right shoulder buttons for other purposes? Otherwise the "they can be remapped" works for other features, like the symbols, just as well doesn't it?

It's a tidiness issue. Lower keyboard will be printed, gaming buttons not. That makes gaming ones easier to remap w/o discrepancies. That's why I support keeping the more contentious ones, like mouse buttons, ctrl/alt and compose above the Q line.


I have no problems with seperating things like mouse buttons from the main keyboard - above the "Q" line. I don't see practical ways to get Ctrl, Caps Lock, Shift, Alt, Pandora, Alt Gr and "Application Button" buttons (to be extreme) on the lowest line of keys without losing some of the alphabet

 

[salasq]

Following from my last post, here's how I'd map diacriticals in international layout:

umlaut: Compose+U (ü)
tilde: Compose+N (ñ)
acute: Compose+E (é)
grave: Compose+G (à)
ogonek/cedille: Compose+C (ç)
ring above: Compose+A (å)
circumflex: Compose+I (î)
hacek/caron: Compose+V (č)
strikethrough: Compose+O (ø)
macron: Compose+M (ū)

Weird ones:

ß: Compose+S
æ: Compose+W
œ: Compose+Q
ð: Compose+D

Edit: please reply if I missed any critical diacriticals.

Edit2: here's a visual of my idea, in Common Forum Notation:

Yellow-ish ones are just examples with given diacriticals, i.e. 3-press letters, white ones are 2-press letters. This solution would be completely independent of punctuation layout.

German mod, for example, would just promote U, A and O to 2-press (cheapest possible) at the loss of only å and ø. If we'd promote ñ and ç as well, we'd get all extras of äñçü layout with same amount of keypresses, but with more intuitive locations.

Edit3: bolded some letters in original part to explain the reasoning as to why I chose the letters I did for each diacritical.

 

[Bronek]

My reasoning for not putting the mouse buttons on the shoulders was because they are action buttons. If they get bumped or pressed under your grip of supporting the unit (perhaps while using the touch screen), something will happen. What if the cursor was over the X in the corner of a window? Poof, your app is gone.

If the shoulders only have modifier buttons on them, then accidentally pressing them in an application that isn't using them will do nothing. Also, I like having the face buttons for all the usual acknowledgments and actions.

+1

 

[rick0815]

Following from my last post, here's how I'd map diacriticals in international layout:

umlaut: Compose+U (ü)
tilde: Compose+N (ñ)
acute: Compose+E (é)
grave: Compose+G (à)
ogonek/cedille: Compose+C (ç)
ring above: Compose+A (å)
circumflex: Compose+I (î)
hacek/caron: Compose+V (č)
strikethrough: Compose+O (ø)
macron: Compose+M (ū)

Weird ones:

ß: Compose+S
æ: Compose+W
œ: Compose+Q
ð: Compose+D

Edit: please reply if I missed any critical diacriticals.

But if Compose+U makes an ü and Compose+O makes an ø, how do I get an ö or an ä?

 

[salasq]

But if Compose+U makes an ü and Compose+O makes an ø, how do I get an ö or an ä?

Nah, those were just examples. Compose+U makes an umlaut (¨), Compose+N a tilde (~), etc.

So full ü would be Compose+U+U, ö would be Compose+U+O and ä Compose+U+A.

 

[nikkopt]

Fair enough, but once there is one regional variation it would seem to me to be unfair to not offer regional variations for other countries. So we'd nee dFrench, Italian, and so on versions.

Not really.. just insert these accents and letters on a keyboard ( ´ ` ç º ª ¨ ) and you will have one that suits LOTS of languages (portuguese, spanish, french, italian, etc)
PS: i didn't mentioned ~ and ^ because they are already on the layout..


The two types of accents are there - just use ' (apostrophe) and ` (on the tilde key on a regular keyboard). They are both on all of the recent designs, and should be if they aren't. The circle can be provided by o, the umlaut by : (a colon), and the c with a tail by a c+, combination.


Well, the apostrophe is not really the same thing as a ´
I know i can get all the chars/symbols/letters i want with key combinations but if in fact regional keyboards are to be made i think those accents should be more accessible to some countries. And i was just stating that one specific layout can suit more than one language. There's no need to make a spanish one, a french one, an italian.. etc

 

[rick0815]

Ah, now I understand. Thanks salasq.

Well, to be honest, I don't really care about Umlaute. I'm German an should use them, but since I found the EN-US-layout more comfortable for my job, I use ae for ä and so on, also in business e-mails.

So I would prefer a keyboard layout that is as close as possible to the EN-US-layout.

What confuses me is than in this render Shift+2 is a "^" but in that render Shift+2 die "#" which both is not EN-US. Is one of them EN-GB?

Pretty please, make the layout close to EN-US

EDIT: EvilDragon just answered in the German forum: QUOTE
Man tippt ja nicht wie an einer normalen Tastatur, sondern hat das Gerät meistens in der Hand und tippt mit den Daumen.
Wenn man links Shift drückt, sind die Tasten rechts am leichtesten zu drücken, die links sind mit dem rechten Daumen schwerer zu erreichen.
Also sortieren wir die nach Häufigkeit des Gebrauchs um
[rough translation]You are not typing like you would on a regular keyboard, but mostly with your thumbs.If you type shift on the left, the keys on the right are most convenience to type, those left are uncomfortable to reach with your right thumb. So we sort the keys after frequency of usage.[/rough translation]
Well, ok. I think you devs know what you are doing go ahead

EDIT 2: added link to ED's post.

 

[Lozrus]

FWIW this was my last suggestion for the keypad layout:

As an English guy it seemed unfair for me to comment in this thread (there's no doubt that whatever is used will support English well), but if this layout is what ships I'll be really happy. For me the Pandora is primarily a gaming device and everything else is a bonus, but I am almost guaranteed to try to use it to track my expenses and write some code so all of the currency symbols and characters required for C/C++/C# are really welcome