Can you recommend a cheap split keyboard? I’m not sinking 300$ to discover I hate it
Keychron has a cheap one
180£ isn’t cheap
This is just ads with extra steps
So is this the new trend after 60% mechanical keyboards, ultrawide monitors or immutable distros ?
Maybe it would improve my typing speed, but I’ve been using a conventional keyboard layout for so long now, I’m fine with where I’m at. Almost thirty years of muscular memory made it “hard coded” in my hands.
Sawme here! Honmestly I dom"t thinkl I coukd ever go vack tp a mormal keyboard ¶¶¶¶
I think one of my favorite keyboards ever was a Microsoft “Natural” keyboard. I think they were available in the mid ’90s or so. Not quite a real split keyboard, but the ergonomics were great. I think I gave it away…it was great for typing, but I wanted a simpler keyboard for gaming.
Fuck, I don’t want to be a keyboard pervert, but these are some good points
There’s a dude developing out a neat split keyboard that’s ergo but you are typing in like chunks of words or something.
Looks like your fast af once used to it.
Each finger goes up down left right i believe. Can’t remember the name!
It’s quite refined looking.
Do you mean the CharaChorder? I thought about getting one in the past bit it looks like a super steep learn curve and I’m not sure if I’m willing to subject myself to it.
YES, thank you.
My brain was stuck on chroma, which made no sense, lol.
I thought the exact same thing, but the thing is, i switched to a trackball mouse and I will never go back…
So some times it’s worth it.
Pretty sure you’re talking about the Svalboard. I don’t think it uses chunks of words though. Each finger has access to 5 keys and you can map any layout. https://svalboard.com/
But maybe you’re thinking of stenography where you have fewer keys but you press them in combinations (chords) instead of individually. That looks crazy fast. https://youtu.be/7jVXrX5TDk4 https://www.artofchording.com/introduction/#stenography
There is a guy out there developing a mouse less solution so you never have to take your fingers off the keyboard too called mouseless.click I’m just waiting for him to release the Windows version. Only on apple atm
IDK, a mousetrapper (or similar) effectively does the same but doesn’t require retraining your entire workflow and still allows for precision mouse work.
I googled mousetrapper but dont understand what it is? Looks like an old school trackpad?
As long as it’s got mech switches and can run a qwerty layout I’m happy
That’s ok, insanity comes in many forms.
When I was a kid, I got my hands on a PS/2 Y-adapter and so typed on two keyboards - left hand on one in my desk, left hand on one on a keyboard tray. I don’t know what my typing speed and accuracy were then, but a few years back an entire office of people tried to beat me in a typing test and couldn’t. Since then I’ve taken a typing test on a laptop while sitting in a hotel bed and gotten a score of 158 with, IIRC, 98.2% accuracy. (This was my best score but even since then all of my typing evaluations have gone well.)
I also use a trackball as exclusively as my environment allows, including while gaming (other than Minecraft). I’m not remotely a pro, but among my peers I tend to score highly in, for example, FPS’.
I’m not trying to brag; there are many better than I in both categories. The reason I bring these up is to demonstrate that something being the convention doesn’t automatically make it better and something being unfit for your preferences doesn’t make it inferior.
Which trackball? I was looking at them the other day but couldn’t decide
My favorite has always been the Kensington Orbit. Probably a lot of people - even those who like Trackballs - would disagree, but I’ve been happily using these for around 25 years. Except in Minecraft.
Why are you so vehemently opposed to the use of trackballs in minecraft?
I wouldn’t characterize it as vehemence, but rather a combination of consistency and honesty. People are fairly consistently surprised at my enthusiasm for gaming with trackballs, as though it’s automatically a detriment; I don’t find it to be so, except in Minecraft, so I don’t want to represent it as other than it is.
With the style of trackball I use - ball in the middle, left and right click on their respective sides of the ball - and the way I use it - thumb on left click, index and middle finger on the ball, ring and pinky on right click - right clicking can be a stressor. This isn’t a problem when tapping once or holding, such as when engaging a scope; but when repeatedly right clicking, it tires whatever muscles and tendons run between the outside of my hand and my shoulder, which already has its own problems.
Minecraft is the only game I play that requires me to repeatedly right click. (I know that now you can right click and drag to place lots of blocks, but that hasn’t always been true and doesn’t really allow for precision in my experience.) Therefore, it is the only game to which I feel my trackball is not well suited.
Have you considered remapping that control away from right click?
I just want The Wheel.
One of Jobs’ many failures was not getting this into market.
I was the lucky owner of a rare FingerWorks Touchstream keyboard for many years. If you don’t know it, it’s the precursor to the keyboards used in Star Trek Enterprise.
It’s a keyless keyboard. Two large flat mousepads with a keyboard layout printed on top, and you type by pure touch. There’s no mouse; the surface just cleverly detects when you are doing mouse gestures. Or a lot of other gestures.
Trekkie joke aside, it’s actually the magic tech that made the iPhone possible. Of course Apple didn’t invent anything, they bought existing future tech.
I miss that keyboard. They still sell on ebay, for 1400$!
That sounds awful though. There’s a reason why touch pads are so unpopular in cars, there’s no tactile feedback to the buttons. Part of learning to type is getting a feel for the keys.
You mean I can have all of the worst aspects of modern smart phone keyboards with my desktop? Sign me up!
Many, many moons ago (must have been around 2006?) I managed to procure a FingerWorks. It was magic, like holding a piece of computing history!
It allowed a lot of the gestures we take for granted, to switch applications or workspaces, to go back a page, etc. But it also had really cool stuff. You could bind gestures like twisting your fingers clockwise to open a file (just like opening a jar!) or counterclockwise to close it. Pinch and zoom for copy and paste.
I was only able to get a hold on a Dvorak copy. And because the key labels were printed on the board, you couldn’t really change the layout. Getting used to a split layout, no keys and Dvorak at the same time was too much and I had to sell it again. But I’ve been using split keyboards ever since!
Imagine playing Dwarf Fortress in a recliner with a pair of these.
Hmmm… I see a balding fat dude wearing a lot of Cheeto dust on his shirt
As someone who has only played since the Steam version, I don’t know how you people did it with the ASCII graphics and lack of mouse support.
A good tool improves the way you work. A great tool improves the way you think.
May I introduce to you, the Banana Board. A keyboard that works by squeezing a banana shaped device.
😏
