Any idea about the layout of the keyboard, check this out

Hey guys!
Have been hearing about ideas about the keyboard layout.
Some want to swap some certain keys, some want French or German version.
Good thoughts.
I’ve been collecting advices for the management, and maybe I can convince them to do a thing or two.
So, if you have anything to say about the keyboard, please, say it here. I’ll bring your thoughts to the meeting.

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There are too many layouts in the world to be able to cover everything efficiently.

I can’t think of an universal solution, but something that I guess would appeal alot to the hacking community is to have doubleshot keys, obviously for rubber keys wont work, but for keyboards like the DevTerm one could be nice.

You could even print your own layouts with the devterm printer!

Here are some examples i found on google images:
image
image

image

Basically you could put any legend or image on the key :smiley:

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Hi,

I like the Keyboard, no need to change.

Thanks and Greetings,
Rene

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Just a random idea…

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Since the keyboard is basically just a rubber mat, just sell mats with different layouts and languages. This way you could take advantage of the uConsole’s modular design and just swap whichever keyboard layout you want.

No solution is going to make everyone happy, but I think this would help most.

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Strongly in support of swapping the planned positions of the enter and backspace keys.

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This is a good idea, offer a two different keypads, and a way to swap the keyboard layout in the software. Since the keyboard seems to be the biggest issue people are having, this could be an easy solution for fixing things without holding up the production.

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I second this. The muscle memory for such important keys when in a terminal is a hard thing to fight.

Hi,

I think the keyport layout is not that important. It’s not a 10-finger device where the location of the button is in your muscle memory. It’s a thumb keyboard for a mobile device and there is no standard out there and muscle memory is device dependent.

I like the current layout und the placement of the enter key. I can not wait to try it out.

Greetings,
Rene

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I would prefer swapping the enter and backspace keys. that would make it more in line with standard keyboards.

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in fairness everyone, from what i can tell, the uConsole’s keyboard (and maybe the DevTerm too, i haven’t checked) have an arduino-compatible microcontroller, or something along those lines. i think you could modify the keyboard firmware to swap enter & backspace, and maybe make a few other alterations, then just build it and upload it to the device over USB. i plan to do that when i get mine, so if anyone wants the firmware code and/or binaries once i get mine, i’ll put a fork up on GitHub or GitLab.

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Very good point and if not mistaken one can use a sugar cube as a sanding agent on specific types of plastic to remove key caps / logos. I’m super excited about this particular form factor and the overall size, shape, capacity and potential, key mappings are ‘all’ ephemeral and I will happily contribute @spv if you create a Git repo. Feature on this keyboard that I’m most excited about is the back-light low lit room and hitting | or ~ or # vs $ when home row is lost will be a game changer.

TL;DR - Will happily contribute to Git code base(s) for mapping changes and in spirit open-hardware/open-source will happily share any mods or methods. “happy hacking and super excited for uConsole”

Keyboard is ok, no changes.

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I don’t care about the keyboard layout any more, but when can I get it? How is the current progress of the product? Can the clockwork team regularly update the development progress of the product, such as once every two weeks

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@AlexDuan , can you confirm that the renders of the uConsole keyboard layout, specifically how Enter and Backspace are swapped relative to any normal keyboard layout, actually represent the real keyboard? It looks like a simple rendering mistake to me, but if it’s not then that’s a really major flaw. I have a lot of thoughts and preferences about how to squeeze a full-sized keyboard layout onto a tiny device with more space above the keyboard than on the sides, but this is something else entirely. If Enter and Backspace are swapped as per the renders, that’s a deal breaker.

Anyway, this is a really cool device (modulo that one issue). Nice job to you guys, you keep coming up with great stuff.

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Hi,

I tested it with my paper model and the place of the enter key is really good. It’s just below the right thumb.

Greetings,
Rene

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Hi @AlexDuan, could you tell us weather the keyboard’s layout is designed as this, or it’s just a casual CG render?
I’d like to hear Clockworkpi’s opinion.

Not sure if you guys had your meeting yet or not, but the arrow keys are the sticking point for me. If this is aimed at games or game dev work then I think the arrow keys are better off as a d-pad and a better one than the Gameshell–one that mimics more solid ones in handhelds like the GB/GBC/GBA. Without a change like that I’ll probably just stick to my Gameshell (and non-high-action games). I also like the idea of swapping enter/backspace positions.

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I’d be for this as well (swapping enter and backspace).

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Seems like a pretty easy thing to fix in software, and hardware with an exacto knife.
It’s not like we’re going to be touch typing on these things anyway, so muscle memory isn’t really a thing.

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