Behind the Scenes of Issue 35

Issue 34 follow-up, latest progress, PCB design, forgotten podcast appearance, MK Dry July, venturing into mechanical typewriter territory, updated todo list.

Summary

This week I've done mostly PCB design and written a lot. Not much progress with other stuff on my todo list though. I got quite a lot of new subscribers and we had a good week in general regarding useful keyboard projects and tips.

Issue 34 follow-up

I don't want to regularly spam all the keyboard related communities with my weekly posts but this time I crossposted the r/mk one on r/olkb and r/ergomechkeyboards as well.

As a result, the number of subscribers increased by…

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Santoku Gen 2

Dracula teeth mouseclicks, trackpoint as a first-class citizen, split (or unsplit), 40%, mouse scroll wheel, OLED, etc. by tyered.

After using the original Santoku for more than a year, tyered announced its newest revision. However, Gen 2 is a new design from the ground up keeping the original's spirit and goals intact.

Unfortunately, this design is not open source, but it comes with a detailed description of the concept and features, e.g.:

• FFC (Flat Flexible Cable) connecting the halves.
• Easily switch between split or unsplit depending on your situation.
• Tightly integrated trackpoint with mouse buttons on both sides and a real usable mouse scroll wheel.
• Very low profile. Portable. Easily fits in a work bag.
• Custom, recessed, no-slip pads on the bottom.

Peregrine

Peregrine, a wireless ergonomic board by SouthPawEngineer with a built in trackpad module that can be removed and used separately.

The Peregrin is hot swappable, low profile, and uses Choc spacing for the sake of compactness.

The trackpad module is a ProLab mouse, which was a kickstarter. It uses a trackball module that is similar to the ones popping up around here, but is self contained and has a few additional buttons and acts as fully independent mouse.

It's a low tech way to integrate pointing functionality into a ZMK keyboard - it's simply attached with some velcro, so you can pull it out and use it separately.

Otherwise, the board has a Pro Micro compatible footprint because SouthPawEngineer has got lots of compatible boards that are both wired and wireless, so it makes it easy to throw in whatever controller.

I'm using the two five way switches and the small black tactile buttons you see in the top middle section as its own number row. The bottom middle piece is a low profile jog wheel rotary encoder.

Barobord

barobord by sadekbaroudi – handwired edition, PCB design in progress.

40 keys, 25% typing angle:

My previous designs have ~15% typing angle, which I love, but there are times when the keyboard is a bit closer to my body.

The extra 1-4 keys are numbered macro keys:

My other boards are 36 key, and I always saw that dead space, so I added those 4 to give me a little more flexibility to do cool stuff.

Walnut keyboard

Next revision of the wooden keyboards by priceT00High.

Specs:

• case is milled from a single piece of walnut
• plateless, cutouts milled into the case
• controller: Teensy 2++, testing bluetooth right now.

This is revision 6 of my daily driver. This is an improvement over the last because I wanted a touch pad. With a lot of splits, guys will sometimes put their mouse in between. I think that's awkward. A trackpad here is not meant to be a mouse replacement, it is meant to be used in conjunction with a mouse. Often time if a tap is all you want, it would be much easier to grab the pad. Other times, you want precision for things like AutoCAD, so a mouse is preferred – priceTOOHigh.

The CNC machine used was a Shapeoko 3xl. The finish is satin laquer finish underneath a coat of wax. Finally, the touchpad is a Keymecher Mano – a Bluetooth one independent from the keyboard.

36-key Corne

A 36-key Corne by steerpyke_.

Depending on the languages you use you may not need the outer column of the originl Corne.

That's exactly what steerpyke_ had in mind:

My 36-key Corne: 35g Kailh Choc linears, hot-swap PCBs, carbon fibre plates, self-coiled TRRS cable, and Elite Cs (ft. slightly sweaty x270). Running my own layout, built around Colemak mod-DH and homerow mods.

It's still a work in progress. Keymap here.

Planck/Preonic SVG generator

Create you own Planck/Preonic keymap with this tool by BXO511.

This Python script was made by BXO511 to generate a keymap for his Planck keyboards - it can be used for Preonic and other ortho boards as well.

The style is close to the "official" Planck folder you get with your Planck keyboard from OLKB. You can edit the style, fonts and colors in the generated .svg file.

The script and description is on this github page: https://github.com/brianoverby/OrthoKeymapSVG

The script itself is not very refined, you have to edit the SVG by hand to put in the legends, but it has potential and still may come in handy for some ortho users.

The default prints random chars in the center of the caps and on all corners. After you generate the .svg file you have to edit the file (with a text editor) to add your own legends to the different layers. The random chars are just placeholders.

Keyboard Layout Editor is definitely an alternative, and it lets you edit the keymap graphically not only as text content:

Yes, I have used that before – it’s a nice tool, but I liked the layout from the official OLKB folder - so I tried to recreate that ;-)

Stabilizer tester

Stabilizer tester posted by RatratanX.

I mean…this hobby revolves around things that are useless but done for the sake of feel/aesthetics but I think this "stab tester" takes the crown as the most pointless creation yet – kikomir.

Since I've been using an all-1u setup for the past three years, I can't really judge if this tool is of any use.

Designed by LDN.

According to the description at Swagkeys, the concept behind the design was:

We found that installing the stabilizer directly to the PCB might be cumbersome. Therefore, we came with the idea that it might be useful to test the stabilizer on the “stabilizer tester” before the installation.

Coding Speed Test

Coding Speed Test by dominicwhyte42.

How fast can you type code?

We've already seen typing apps like this but give a chance to:

https://codingspeedtest.com/

I personally don't consider programming a form of typing - but editing. Workflows differ though, it may come in handy for you.

Coding Speed Test is a (hopefully) fun weekend project I put together. I shared the site at work and it's led to some fierce competition… – dominicwhyte42

Magnetic levitation Void switches

Chyrosran22 reviewing Riskable's Hall-effect switches.

We've been following Riskable's magnetic switch project (KDB #5) for a while now and it seems Chyrosran22 likes it too:

Anubis switch review

Anubis switch review by Zenjh.

The thockiest tactile switch?

SP Star Magical Girl

SP Star Magical Girl switch review by ThereminGoat.

Read it here:

https://www.theremingoat.com/blog/sp-star-magic-girl-switch-review

Torn HiPro case

Open source 3D-printble Torn HiPro case by hcir321.

I'd like to share a HiPro case for my Torn keyboard that I've designed. Each side of the case has 200g of weights added for a quality feel.

If you'r interested you can find STLs and instructions for both MX and Choc versions here.

The left keyboard on the photo features keycaps designed by Shoggot aka shogzilla. STLs here.

YEET keycap profile

YEET is a keycap profile by shogzilla with both MX and Choc compatible files.

YEET is a set of open source STLs to produce MX or Choc compatible keycaps.

I was made aware of this profile by hcir321's Torn-case post.

How to:

• Open 3d modeler of choice, one able to import STLs. Meshmixer is free and can do everything required.
• Select a base; Choc or MX-spaced.
• Select a stem; Choc or MX. Rotate it 90 degrees if desired. Apply it to the cross-shaped hole in the base so it fills the hole.
• Select an indicator; apply it to the rectangular opening on the base.
• Select a top. This, you'll need to resize so it matches the base.
• Export as STL, import to chitubox or slicer of choice, slice, and print!

Handmade doubleshot keycaps

A video on the process of making double-shot keycaps by lispnick.

Finally, I got the time to make video on making a keycap! I have been asked to make a custom ESC key based on an SVG graphics. I took this as an opportunity to make video of the whole process – lispnick.

Here it is:

Thread at Deskthority: here

Colemak-DH progress data

Colemak-DH progress data in 10 weeks by hocusparibus.

I'm sick of most monkeytype posts but this one is actually quite useful.

The time range presented here could come as a good indication for those who are trying to learn a new layout.

There are many scientific papers about learning new physical layouts (e.g. split or ergonomic ones), and research indicates that in only 1-2 hours of practice you can reach your previous speed (well, 90% of it – that was the threshold if I remember right).

However, learning a new logical layout takes a lot more time. Now we have some hard numbers:

Small changes in about 1-2 weeks, a completely new layout in about 2-3 months…

Outputting date on a keypress

Sending a string of the date? Question posted by jma0612 and answered by the community.

One solution seems to be AutoHotKey. I tried it and can confirm that this script works fine (on pressing Win+Space in this specific case):

#Space::
FormatTime, CurrentDateTime,, yyyy-MM-dd HH:mm:ss
SendInput %CurrentDateTime%
return

Vintage Lexmark M15

A vintage Lexmark M15 split keyboard spotted by Theotherab at garage sale.

IBM 5291

Kirkwood1994 picked up a beautiful IBM 5291 terminal.

Dolch luggable

A Dolch luggable posted by bakedbeens11.

I love those Dolch luggables. I bought one from eBay to console myself when the lockdown first began, so very long ago. Was disappointed to find that it had cherry ML switches, which feel absolutely terrible and are sticky af. But it still looks gorgeous so it has that going for it – ChetJettison.

This one features "vintage" Cherry MX blues though.

Cherry's Lily58

A layered rainbow unicorn-pony barf designed by cherryvellia and obosob.

A cherry blossom themed layered acrylic case designed by cherryvellia and /u/obosob.

More pictures: https://imgur.com/a/aAddc1x

The software used to design and modify the acrylic case were:

From my end mostly LibreCAD and FreeCAD, from hers she added the various bits of intricate graphic detail in vectornator for iPad. the patterns are laser engravings, from the plate upwards to the very top each layer has different engravings that go together to make a kind of paralax falling petals effect – obosob.

The underside and wrist rest have some rose gold mirror acrylic inside a clear acrylic of the negative space, all sandwiched between a layer of clear acrylic on either side.

Am Hatsu

Am Hatsu with prototype pics.

Am Hatsu is a wireless 3D split ergo keyboard in a CNC machined case.

It the thread the discussion is about if this project is a scam. Regardless, it looks cool and inspiring.

Proto pictures: https://imgur.com/a/5zM19RJ