Keyboard Builders' Digest / Inspiration
The Two Thirds Keyboard
Inspired by old letterpress type cases, Attoparsec designed a keyboard based on the California Two Thirds layout.
Published December 15, 2022
Matthew Dockrey aka Attoparsec, who usually rocks a 1990 IBM Model M, designed and built the Two Third Keyboard – a meme board based on the arrangement of old letterpress typecases:
I was inspired to create a keyboard based on an old letterpress type case. This may or may not have been a good idea – Attoparsec.
As Matthew explains it in his video, typesetting even just a page of text needs a whole bunch of type, and type cases with a grid of shallow compartments were the containers holding all the characters needed by typesetters.
Over time these type cases became standardized, and one particularly popular option was the California case and the slightly smaller version "Two-thirds California case".
This is what Attoparsec turned into a working keyboard. Check out his video here:
Also nice silkscreen art with warning:
- Impractical
- Shockingly expensive
- This is a mistake you can avoid
After a week using only this letterpress-type-case-inspired keyboard, I doubled my WPM from 10 to 20! – Attoparsec.
Published on Thu 15th Dec 2022. Featured in KBD #107 (source).
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