Lol the barefoot shoe thumbnail grossed you out (my vid as well). Thanks for this though - made my day! It’s quite the rabbit hole. I’m using an 18 key version now. Very interesting what you’re saying about the role of whole word patterns in different layouts. With the two alpha layers I find it really becomes a lot about whole word patterns. As a result I hit a speed plateau and now feel that improving my whole word patterns is the way to get over the plateau. It’s still super enjoyable to use but it’s still error prone.
Build a Ferris Sweep after watching your video. Still switching between my Moonlander and the Ferris because I am not up to speed for something like pair programming. Thanks for your videos 🙏
3:50 As a hardware engineer i can confirm, its not that complicated. Its just new and unfamiliar to you. You can understand that image after an hour or two of tutorials.
I made an iPhone case with a 16-key mechanical keyboard on the back of it. You wrap your fingers around the back, thumbs still on the glass. It uses braille layout; using circuit Python to implement the chordes layout. Using braille collapses everything down into 8 keys; and the other 8 are special chording, like alt/ctrl, etc. What is great about it is that it fully emulates US qwerty, and you don't need to look at your iPhone while you type. You can respond to text messages while looking ahead of you. I created it because I learned computer braille, due to vision issues. The only problem I have with it is that the USBC to lightning cable sticks out. It drains the battery a bit. If I used bluetooth, it would drain it even more. Chorded layouts are a little slower than non-chorded layouts, because you need to take overlapped keys into account.
sorry, youtube just recommended me this video a year after it came out. But i'm so intrigued about this, because i had the idea of a "handheld" keyboard like that forever but could never make it work. Do you have a video of it?
@@concray ruclips.net/video/dNlG1Czgd4U/видео.html a keybow2040 is a good start for a 4x4 mechanical keyboard. it's perfect for the backside of an iPhone case. However, the USB to lightning cable is special. It has an IC to emulate an Apple dongle. If it wasn't for that cable, and the power draw; I would have a real product for sale already.
Building your own keyboard and your own layout feels like the same vibe as deeply customizing your IDE. It's all about having an intimate relationship with your tools.
Yes ! Absolutely would love to watch you build this / or your own ideal keyboard, it'd be a great learning experience for you and just a great journey to follow along with
I actually wanted to buy an ergonomic keyboard, but after I found out that you'd have to build it yourself I got sad. I'm a dev with no hardware knowledge 😂😂
@@uchennaofoma4624You can buy them as well, but they are standardized for mass production. Building one isn't nearly as complicated as it looks though. Just do your research well and you'll be fine.
I've been following Ben since he did a ZSA Moonlander review. I've got interested and after some time, bought it and got into customization. After a year I decreased the number of keys down to 18 and was very happy with the layout. I had a take on Engram keyboard layout (I had to change it a bit). In the meantime I realized that Ben also did an 18 key layout, but we had a totally different philosophy. I stopped using the layout ultimately, and actually moved back to a regular keyboard, even though I was very confidently using it day-to-day on both MacOS and Windows. I do recommend trying this out, it's gonna teach you a lot about the keyboard ergonomics. My journey started, because I had a chronic index finger pain. And actually, even though I'm not using this keyboard anymore, the pain went away (fingers crossed forever)
Engram's philosophy is good, and the research behind it is really nicely-structure - but it's not for folks who want their results in O("TV episode"). I really like the "punctuation symbols on the middle columns" and how is : and is ; - it makes it slightly tedious to wrote the QMK code for it, because it requires a .h file to define the alternative shift behaviour. Anyone who's keen to try Engram should understand that it really helps to spend plenty of time on "back to basics" using something like Klavaro. It'll take 2 half-hour sessions a day for a month before there is any point using MonkeyType. The benefits of Engram are really significant. I had Engram and QWERTY as keyboard options on my Windows desktop, with as the toggle key-combo. I'm still not competent enough to use Engram if I need something written quickly.
@@thestopper5165 Exactly. Well, for anyone wondering - Engram is super for English and programming (even if you're using vi bindings), but for other languages, e.g. Polish it was too hard to put diacritical marks fast. Since I was using 18 keys only, I decided to help myself just a little bit with hammerspoon on MacOS (which worked, since I connect to Windows machine only through RDP), to set up the usual emacs-like terminal keybindings for the regular delete/esc/enter/etc. keys. Pretty straightforward and fast to do. Unfortunately, the downside was that some windows key combinations weren't working (ctrl-h for instance), but I didn't care. The good thing, that as opposed to what Ben suggests, I only had 3 key layers, with a total bare minimum keys. If you're interested in how the layout looked like, head to on: https:%%configure.zsa.io%moonlander%layouts%n69dJ%latest%0 (change the % to /, YT blocks sending links :/ )
the ferris sweep is so good, i made a sweep with nice!nano's last year and for the past year ive been using that for all my coding, just having all my shortcuts, symbols and numbers within reach without moving my hands is so comfortable. I cannot recommend it enough
I’m contemplating buying the Athreus for weeks now, but am kinda hesitant at because I’m primarily using Vim and thus heavily rely on the number keys due to motions…
I was inspired by you talking about your split keyboard on stream, found this guys channel and ended up building my own ferris sweep split 34 key keyboard, I love how you can totally customise it to fit your own needs.
Fell down the split ergo keyboard rabbithole a few months ago. With no previous soldering experience I built a "Piantor" keyboard. I'm using the Miryoku keymap with Colemak-dh keylayout. I'm currently really slow at typing but it's been a really fun experience, I feel like there is so much potential to be gained if I just keep at it. I was nervous about the soldering (watched a bunch of youtube videos before starting) but everything went great and worked on the first try. Looking forward to building more keyboards
Been trying Colemak DH ISO and it has been quite pleasant layout to write English. I recommend checking it out if you're looking for an alternative to QWERTY layout that will reduce finger movements. Colemak has copy & paste functionality close to the original positions for quick access if you don't want to change the keybinds.
I think he says directly why he doesn't want to hold for layer. His example as I understood it was he wants to hit a key A in layer1, press the modifier and key B in Layer 2, then hit key C in layer 1 faster than he's able to remove his finger from the modifier key. I'm assuming that the reason for the speed difference is that it's slower to press and lift one finger than press two separate fingers in quick succession.
This is really cool. But this remind me of the person given 20 years to cut down a tree that spent 19 years, 11 months, 30 days, 23 hours, and 45 minutes sharpening their axe.
If you watch The Mother of All Demos from the 60s, he has a little chorded device he uses to type with his left hand when he's using the mouse, in addition to having a full keyboard
I started writing on ergo keyboards from ~50 keys on Iris and after 2 years I had so many symbols on my layers that I decided I don’t need as many keys. I finally went down to 36 and I have never felt so comfortable before. That said, I’ve never been very fast (90wpm on simple words) and I don’t think I ever will - not sure how well would it work if I typed >100wpm (especially when using the home row mod). But experimenting with different layers layouts was a lot of fun. Not for everyone probably but I think it is worth trying.
"Hold, what's wrong with hold-for-layer?" When you start to get into these uber-tiny layouts, there's a lot of pressure to start doing key-combos and gestures to increase what your few keys do. I LITERALLY got my 54-key Iris rev7 today, so I don't know who I'll be after a year of this, but I can't see myself using a keyboard that small. The 36-key boards like the Ferris are about as small as I could see myself going.
On macOS, there's a Dvorak with QWERTY command keyboard layout. Text typing is Dvorak, but as soon as you hold the command (meta) key, it switches to QWERTY. Then, all shortcuts have the layout they were designed for.
I use neo2 as my keyboard layout (even though I haven't typed anything in German in years). The layout starts with XVLC so you still have all of those available for left hand copy/paste. Also it has a 3rd layer that gives all the brackets on index/middle finger and just a well thought out layout for programming (I haven't bothered with anything above layer 3, but things would be useful for productivity if you had a 60% keyboard or even smaller. Admittedly I'm currently only at 100 ish wpm (on a Q8 alice layout), but I definitely see much room for improvement.
Prime the patterns you’re referring to are bigrams and trigrams, they’re the “rolls” which you want to feel good. There are layouts which optimise the most common tri and bigrams, colemak-dh for example!
In the context of courtroom proceedings, stenographers or court reporters use a specialized chorded keyboard or typewriter called a steno machine or stenotype machine to transcribe the spoken words into written form in real time . These machines have a limited set of keys, each of which represents a syllable or a group of sounds, allowing stenographers to type much more quickly and accurately than the average typist. The written text produced by these machines is then used to create an official transcript of the proceedings. There are also specialized keyboards and mice designed for courtrooms that are quiet and easy to clean.
6:05 this is why I went back to qwerty. I had moved to another layout and was really enjoying it and gaining speed. However I had to use somebody's keyboard and I just felt like a fool... I immediately gave up and went back to qwerty.
QWERTY "flows" so well because the most used keys are far apart, meaning you can't hit them easily by accident when fast typing. A welcome leftover from mechanical typewriters.
I’ve watched all of his videos. I ended up getting a sofle. I have all of the “programmer keys” on the home row on one layer. And then A for @ and S for $. And arrow keys on hjkl on another layer
I use the corne keyboard. It has 42 keys total. That is all you ever need because the concept of layers exist. That's 4,398,046,511,104 keys essentially... would you ever need more than that? The corne keyboard is essentially the vim of keyboards. It's a more practical version of the keyboard in this video.
You mentioned not understanding why Ben did not use a 'hold' function as the layer, the problem was the hold function itself. In other words, Ben's problem was that he was typing faster than his hand could move, his index finger and thumb would work together to hit a letter that was on a layer. But when his intentions were to hit a character that was not on a layer, his fingers would hit the next key before his thumb has responded and lifted from the key. My moving this to a macro, he made it a one shot layer. His intention to hit a key not on a layer would be typed in, even though his thumb was physically pressing down the key and did not lift in time.
I started with kinesis, then used ferris sweep (like 32 keys) for like 6 mo. I found when I got fast I was hitting wall and it got frustrating because you have to throttle a bit to switch layers. Now i use hillside (52 keys) as perfect compromise. Allows for dedicated layer keys and so no throttling. Give it a try sometime!
I use a Corne daily and only downside is if I need to hit the enter key, I may not have an extra hand available for the layer key if you know what I mean
old video so I'm shouting into the void but... if you want to get into a non qwerty layout, do it at the same time as moving to a non-standard keyboard, like one a split one with ortholinear keys. Something that you will be able to immediately feel is different as soon as you put your hands on it. Yes at sucks for a while starting from scratch and typing slow BUT, because the keyboard is different, you'll be able to hold onto your qwerty muscle memory any time you sit at a normal keyboard which is very useful. Learning two different layouts on the same style of keyboard is really hard and take a lot of flip flopping and practice. I learned colemak on a split ortho keeb and now I don't even think about it, once my hands touch the keyboard it just auto switches layout based on the feel of the board. Very handy. I eventually replaced Colemak (which is way better than dvorak btw) with Engrammer which is pretty obscure but really great for comfortability and speed as a developer. Engrammer really needs an ortho keyboard though, staggered or not, but it's been really great. Focuses on inward rolls and easy placement of common programming symbols
I've been using a self-made FerrisSweep v2 (32 keys, the one you see at 2:35 ) for like 5 months now (thanks to Ben Vallack's video). I created a custom layout with mod keys on the home row (meaning I have to hold f or j to use "shift" or d/k to "Ctrl") and I switch between my layers holding one (or both) the thumb keys. When I got my hands on it, I think my typing speed was like 20wpm instead of my usual 80 and I thought "Ok, let's just say it was a fun experiment, but there is no way I'll ever be able to write at a decent speed with this thing)"... but I'm quite persistent so ...^^ Since then, I hit 110wpm and working has never been so fun, especially since I use vim so that I can keep my hands on the keyboard 90% of the time. It's not so much about the speed, but rather about how comfortable it is to use once you get used to it (mods keys + symbols on home row changes everything).
Primeagen X Ben Vallack crossover yes babyyy - Prime if you dont want to get into making your own keebs, there are programmable prebuilts (I use a Dygma Raise) which allow you to experiment with the thumb clusters and smaller key layouts, I would say a 36 or 38 layout is a good starting point, Miryoku is a well established 36 key layout.
You should take a look at Miryoku layout, for a starter. Ben's layout was too much for me, Miroku was the sweet spot. You can try it on a mechanical keyboard before commiting to a board - removing some keycaps... As for keyboards you can use anything - my suggestios are Ferris Sweep, Draculad or Corne/Helidox. You can buy those as kits for soldering but some vendors will build them for you. As a suggestion if you want to have space for A LOT of features it is better to have a RP2040 microcontroller, but for the basics any Promicro clone will do. Last hint: check if you really need bluetooth - this limits a bunch the microcontroller and firmware choice. QMK (C) and KMK (python) and ZMK (C) are the main players - keyberon is a new player on the block (Rust). To a coder each one has different appeals. Again, not all run on all microcontrollers. I love QMK, but Bluetooth as far as I am aware works only on ZMK. Welcome to the rabbit role.
My only dislike with Miryoku is the use of homerow mods. But if they work for you, it really minimizes the amount of key presses you use for modifiers. I personally use an adaptation of Callum-style mods, which although increase the amount of key presses when using modifiers, I can chord them just as quickly. Bluetooth is supported by QMK, but it's not nearly as optimised as ZMK, so it's one or the other depending on whether you're going wired split, or wireless (although ZMK is adding wired support in the future).
@@ThePrimeTimeagen Definitely not! I thought you were funny. Just think it might be cool if you soldered some stuff on stream. :D Building things is fun!
I use dvorak on a split keyboard (model 100 from keyboardio) - I have a one-handed left hand layer for when my right hand is on the pointing device that I can access for cut/copy/paste, as well as space and enter (both of which are usually on the right side) and arrow keys. (ok also mouse buttons because I was playing with a ploopy nano trackball for a bit and it's just a ball with no buttons, don't ask).
I designed own version of the layout while impatiently waiting for his video on it, back half a year. Now I work with 22 keys -- that's what I found best - 2 rows of 4 keys, 3 keys on each thumb. I did it all until that point -- qwerty, dvorak, workman, colemak -- started having issues every time I approached 70 wpm; I'm prone to RSI I guess! Small hands. I've put comments in his video about my journey, I think I was at 50wpm in 2 days (able to work), 60wpm in a week, 70wpm in a month, 90wpm in 2 months (current speed). I think because there are no movements and only presses, the issues with learning are limited to forgetting to press the layerswitch for letters, and that is really easy to overcome. The rest is just remembering the very few positions -- it makes it really easy to visualize the layout and keep in your head when you're working with two 4x2 boxes of keys! I cannot recommend it enough, if you don't "need" to do above 120wpm (for programming, I find optimized symbols, macros and editor/OS fluency as way more important anyway). Now I literally -cannot- get RSI issues because there is literally no weird angles whatsoever. Sub-50gram switches for comboing columns and you're golden. And you can pick whatever weird switches you want to when there's just 20 of them -- I'm even considering going no-PCB handwired so I can optimize the key angles (esp. thumbs) more due to how approachable and small my keyboard is!
I built one of these following what Ben says. Been using it for a year now. Best keyboard ever. Best keyboard ever. Can't stress it enough. Super comfortable once you get accustomed to it.
QWERTY for life. I touch-typed at ludicrous speed as a kid, then relearned it "the right way" in my teens which was frustrating AF, but at 150+ WPM I just don't see the benefit in learning a new layout. Faster typing isn't going to make NPM suck less.
I'm also a dvoraker and you get used to it. However on my main keyboard now (model 100), my right hand shift layer that I can access with the heel of my thumb gives me regular arrow keys where hjkl are in qwerty
@@Ycros I'm sure you do - I was just wondering. I've got all sorts of layers on my keyboard that feel completely natural now, but the thought of moving hjkl makes me shiver with unease 😂
My solution to copy, paste with one hand on dvorak: holding `-` acts as ctrl, to mirror my esc/ctrl for caps lock. It also makes ctrl-shift combos really nice; hold ctrl-shift with one hand, press the key with the other. I could probably make it a bit nicer with a dedicated layer, but choosing all the hotkeys, mapping them, and remembering them when needed is a lot more work.
If you are already a fan of the dactyl style keyboard, but want less keys, the Charybdis Nano from Bastard Keyboards is amazing, even has a trackball built in.
I can maintain both colemak-dh and qwerty along side each other quite well. Switching is just a skill that you have to practice. There are quite a few tricks for learning this but currently I can full speed switch between the two, while typing.
I went back to QWERTY after using Colemak for like 2 years. I loved the feeling of Colemak, but like Prime said I want to be able to type on any computer, and also I didn’t barely use vim in all these years because of it and I missed it.
5:42 : I think, that is a good Idea. If your keyboard has the posibility to use custom layers, than just put the symbols on one of thouse, and make it aktivate by holding one of your thumbkeys. As for the 16 Key keyboard: By combining even the alphanumerics, you limit yourself, to how fast your keybaord can react between "this key is held" and "this key was tapped". Sure you can tweak those timing values, but your personal timing will also vary over the day. A fast typer as yourself will constantly need to change and tweak thouse timings. My Dygma Raise has the same feature, where I can make any key do something different on hold, and on tap respectively and it just does not work for me. I constantly feel like I'm told by the keyboard, how fast I can go. In addition, without any LEDs to tell what "Mode" the keyboard is in, there is always this uncertainty about if I'm typing at the right speed and I hate that.
Yeah, I'm the same. I've never liked hold-tap functionality, it feels like a deliberate hinders to speed. There is a limit in these smaller keyboards, at least in terms of how fast you can use them, but for the most part I suppose the offset of being extra comfortable outweighs that for them. The lowest I could realistically go is 30-keys (4 thumb keys, and chop off a key from the index and pinkie column on each side) without hindering speed, but I'm yet to try combos, so I can't realistically say for sure.
I went with a 40% otholinear - Planck EZ after watching one of Ben's videos. The don't ship them anymore. Quite an aesthetic keyboard, highly customisable. I have a slight hold on C, P & V to get copy cut and paste. It's nice to have macros stored on the board too... Though even after proper lubing the keys still feel scratchy.
oh man, I started using Dvorak because of you. I guess that half of the Dvorak fanclub has the same source if inspiration :)) After 10 months of using it I reached like 80% performance I had on QWERTY before switching. But hey! the very first thing I did when I moved to this new layout was to remap that f***ing L out from that place. So, I swapped it with D and I'm very happy with my decision since.
Colemak is underrated. Although I recommend the following customizations: 1. Instead of replacing Caps Lock with a second Backspace: Just swap Caps Lock & Backspace. 2. Add a secondary mode/profile where top-row numbers & symbols are swapped but can be retrieved during Caps Lock. Once I went Colemak I never went back. Although it does definitely make it awkward to be stuck using other peoples' keyboards, but at the same time keyboards are like smartphones now. Those things are almost never clean, and especially not the ones that people share. For your own hygiene's sake, just use your own keyboard.
I've heard you mention on stream a few times that you don't like to take on new cognative overhead. Don't you think that having like... however many layers you need for this many keys is kind of a lot of overhead? I use a split, and I was going to get one without the number row, but I found that using numbers on a function layer along with all of their shift variants was too much overhead for me while coding and stuff.
The surprising part for me is how good the human brain is at adjusting to new layouts like that. Like, I was able to feel productive for all my tasks in like a day (vim keybinds on the other hand... I still can't use vim properly on colemak-dh.... gotta train more)
You just build the muscle memory for it. I have my numbers under a layer, because my fingers are too short to hit them in using the conventional method, so they're just pulled one row down for the number row, so I could get rid of it.
@@explosionspin3422 Try using arrow keys on alternate layouts, but _only_ if you have a board with thumb keys so you aren't reaching or moving your hand. Ben Vallack was able to rebind the keys and get away with it, but my concern is if I switch layouts in the future, this won't be so lucky. Being able to use hjkl really depends on where the layout places them, some are in better positions than others (Dvorak for example leaves them in usable locations, no SFBs, but the layout is pretty outdated now).
One of the larger keys could double as a small trackpad (but only acting like a trackpad if pressing another key, otherwise its just a normal key), a bit like the steam deck ones in form factor. Either that or one of those thinkpad trackpoints in between some keys.
I'm using moonlander and corneish-zen in combination with a mbp, with a 3x5 heavily modified miryoku layout and I'm pretty happy with this setup. Moonlander on the work desk when the mbp is connected to a monitor, and Corne-ish Zen everywhere else since it's very easy to transport and setup (no wires and no tenting shenanigans in comparison to the moonlander). Tried the mouse emulation, but felt challenging to click the GUI elements with precision at times. In the end, I just switched to using the Homerow app instead - works like vimium link hints for the OS.
Bro, this video came at the perfect time. I am obsessed with split ergos. I started with an interest in the Kinesis, thanks to you, and then decided on the low profile 5 Column Corne with 36 keys. But I want the “concavity”! So now I’m about to pull the trigger on either a Charybdis Nano or Skeletyl from Bastard Keyboards. 36 keys seems like the sweet spot, and I really want to try the Miryoku layout.
Yeah, I also have regrets going wired. Certainly made the build process easier as my first time soldering, but my next board is 100% going wireless, especially as I have plans to mount tripods to it for tenting.
OK... real talk: if ypu enter the dark realm of self-built QMK keyboards, it never ends. it is simply not possible to _master the concrete_ - every few days you will realise that is would make more sense to shift the arrow keys to layer 5 and also attach some 'tap dance' behaviour to them becasue *WHY NOT* . My first foray was with a keebio Iris 2.5 with a 'stock' controller, no underglow, and no RGB (and *wired* - like a cave-man keyboard)... upgraded the controller to an ElitePi (for 1Mb instead of 32kB); added Bluetooth; added RGB (so I knew what layer was active). I've even retained a *QWERTY* layer - mostly so that I can compare typing speeds (which have never been hot: 70wpm is more than enough). That's *LAYER 12* . Layer 0: *Engram* with {|=~+^&%*} as numrow and 'mod' keys (Ctrl; Alt; Shift, Win) on HOLD of home-row (LH has LShift etc; RH has RShift etc); HOLD of top row activates other layers (some for one keypress; others switch to the layer); tumb keys are SPACE and ENTER. NO DEL or BKSP. Layer 1: RH is numpad; LH is symbols, also some app launchers for mail, web; calculator etc. Layer 2: LH is multimedia controls; RH is arrows/keypad/PgUp/PgDn; top row is F1-F12. ... Layer 12 is QWERTY (alpha-only) with 'mod' keys on strong fingers Layer 13 is an experimental layer, trying to get every vim 'leader' combo to be a single- or double-tap on a single key. Obviously there are layer-nav keys sprinkled about the place - most often on the thumb keys. And the 'mod-keys on hold' applies to every layer where it has any use. Seriously, ThePrimeMegan - once you go there, there is no going back without some sort of cult-deprogramming workshop. I use Artix, dwm, tmux, lf, st, and (usually) *ytfzf* - and vim - btw.
Firmware builders like QMK make this type of thing really really not hard at all, if you wanna start getting into wanting to code your own firmware from scratch too then yeah it’s gonna be hard but just producing a keyboard like that is something prime can do in honestly a day at most.
Yeah the tab thing is suboptimal, you have to process what you see then switch to the app, we can do exactly the same with Rofi, I even have it mapped to super+tab but I never use this option. Never used the popshell more than few minutes because it was buggy at the time but Gnome isn't even capable of hanfdling independant workspaces per monitor so it's a no go for multi monitor users, maybe the PopTeam would do better with the cosmic DE they;re developping since they won't have to deal with the hassle of being a gnome extension. Otherwise it's cool but don't get why he isn't using a tiling wm if his goal is being more efficient by using his keyboard skills, here it's like building a Ferrari but driving it in the sand.
On a tiliing wm although you can use Rofi/dmenu as alt tab (but more efficiently since those programs are more powerful and flexible) but you generally use ... nothing, if your window is already here in the same workspace and tiled you just switch to it, if it's in the same workspace but tabbed/stacked you know it's here or occasionaly check the title bar or just machinally cycle with mod+right/left/up/down which is almost instant. And if they aren't in the same workspace you usually know where they are since you often organize those in the same way and thus just mod+workspace number, and if you make a mistake or for example have multiple workspaces that usually do the same stuff (for me 7-8-9 are usually for local servers terminal emulators for example) and aren't sure where you have your program you can just quickly cycle via mod+7/8/9 or mod+next_workspace, that's way faster and easier to process for the brain to find the windows you're searching (hence his : I hate thinking) than using alt + tab then visually figuring out which program icons/name you want then which instance of this program you want to reach.
pcbs actually very easy to make. so much so that i was able to make some simple circuits at home using printer, lemon asid, hydrogen peroxide and salt. i was 14 at time
In MacOS I use the State Manager in combination with Better Touch Tools that has maps for each of my commonly used programs to bring them in front on specific hotkeys. You can totally turn MacOS into your own, but it's true that the stock experience of MacOS (and Windows) just sucks.
Hardware is hard, but it is also very satisfying . And building something you use every day is even a better thing. Be careful of the rabbit hole though
It's absurd. If I want to press P, then I press one specific key, not learn some weird shortcuts in my head and press 2-3 keys together to get a P. Absolutely absurd. But interesting, enjoyable to see new ideas, even those which are dumb.
I have seen the exact video and made my own ferris sweep because of it. It was very worth it but getting used to the new layout and learning it, took time. I still recoment it!
If you want to build something, then I think the Dactyl Manuform might be something to look at. The designs comes in various sizes, and has a concave shape rather than flat.
im using colemak dh keymap in my split ortholinear keyboard, but I cant still typing using qwerty in normal keyboard. for me, I like different layout on ortholinear keyboard and normal keyboard. I'm using qwerty at first on my ortholiear keyboard, but when I go back on normal keyboard, my brain cant get it right because the keymap are similar, but the key position are little different. then I move to colemak on my ortholinear keyboard, but still using qwerty on normal keyboard, i feel much better. my brain can switch quickly now, when typing on normal keyboard then use qwerty, when on ortholinear keyboard then use colemak.
5:30 I love this take and I did the same. Not for QWERTY but for QWERTZ. I tried using Neo2 for some time and loved the 6 layers but hated that I couldn't have it everywhere. After 6 Month I switched to NeoQWERTZ and it changed my life for programming. Layer 3 is amazing and I can write Greek symbols α, β, Arrows ←↑→↓ and other useful characters, like …- and directly.
Lol the barefoot shoe thumbnail grossed you out (my vid as well). Thanks for this though - made my day! It’s quite the rabbit hole. I’m using an 18 key version now. Very interesting what you’re saying about the role of whole word patterns in different layouts. With the two alpha layers I find it really becomes a lot about whole word patterns. As a result I hit a speed plateau and now feel that improving my whole word patterns is the way to get over the plateau. It’s still super enjoyable to use but it’s still error prone.
Build a Ferris Sweep after watching your video. Still switching between my Moonlander and the Ferris because I am not up to speed for something like pair programming. Thanks for your videos 🙏
Yes learn soldering, understanding computers even one level lower. Its like the C of real hardware creation.
i am scared
To become a true low level programmer, you start with a rock to build your first hand axe and then work your way up to the bronze age...
Next is custom computer... with custom cpu...
@@T33K3SS3LCH3N everybody gangsta until low level learning starts digging the sand
@@ThePrimeTimeagen hold my hand
3:50 As a hardware engineer i can confirm, its not that complicated. Its just new and unfamiliar to you. You can understand that image after an hour or two of tutorials.
agreed, did it in like 10th grade with 0 prior knowledge
I made an iPhone case with a 16-key mechanical keyboard on the back of it. You wrap your fingers around the back, thumbs still on the glass. It uses braille layout; using circuit Python to implement the chordes layout. Using braille collapses everything down into 8 keys; and the other 8 are special chording, like alt/ctrl, etc. What is great about it is that it fully emulates US qwerty, and you don't need to look at your iPhone while you type. You can respond to text messages while looking ahead of you.
I created it because I learned computer braille, due to vision issues. The only problem I have with it is that the USBC to lightning cable sticks out. It drains the battery a bit. If I used bluetooth, it would drain it even more.
Chorded layouts are a little slower than non-chorded layouts, because you need to take overlapped keys into account.
sorry, youtube just recommended me this video a year after it came out. But i'm so intrigued about this, because i had the idea of a "handheld" keyboard like that forever but could never make it work. Do you have a video of it?
@@concray ruclips.net/video/dNlG1Czgd4U/видео.html a keybow2040 is a good start for a 4x4 mechanical keyboard. it's perfect for the backside of an iPhone case. However, the USB to lightning cable is special. It has an IC to emulate an Apple dongle. If it wasn't for that cable, and the power draw; I would have a real product for sale already.
@@robfielding8566 very cool, i was thinking about something like the taipo layout, never even would have thought about braille, thanks so much
So is this the keyboard enthusiast equivalent to a waifu pillow?
Yeah.. but better
Building your own keyboard and your own layout feels like the same vibe as deeply customizing your IDE. It's all about having an intimate relationship with your tools.
Yes ! Absolutely would love to watch you build this / or your own ideal keyboard, it'd be a great learning experience for you and just a great journey to follow along with
I actually wanted to buy an ergonomic keyboard, but after I found out that you'd have to build it yourself I got sad. I'm a dev with no hardware knowledge 😂😂
etsy
@@uchennaofoma4624You can buy them as well, but they are standardized for mass production. Building one isn't nearly as complicated as it looks though. Just do your research well and you'll be fine.
@@uchennaofoma4624 there are quite a lot of shops where you can buy ergo keebs, but they can be very expensive.
I've been following Ben since he did a ZSA Moonlander review. I've got interested and after some time, bought it and got into customization. After a year I decreased the number of keys down to 18 and was very happy with the layout. I had a take on Engram keyboard layout (I had to change it a bit). In the meantime I realized that Ben also did an 18 key layout, but we had a totally different philosophy. I stopped using the layout ultimately, and actually moved back to a regular keyboard, even though I was very confidently using it day-to-day on both MacOS and Windows. I do recommend trying this out, it's gonna teach you a lot about the keyboard ergonomics. My journey started, because I had a chronic index finger pain. And actually, even though I'm not using this keyboard anymore, the pain went away (fingers crossed forever)
Engram's philosophy is good, and the research behind it is really nicely-structure - but it's not for folks who want their results in O("TV episode"). I really like the "punctuation symbols on the middle columns" and how is : and is ; - it makes it slightly tedious to wrote the QMK code for it, because it requires a .h file to define the alternative shift behaviour.
Anyone who's keen to try Engram should understand that it really helps to spend plenty of time on "back to basics" using something like Klavaro. It'll take 2 half-hour sessions a day for a month before there is any point using MonkeyType.
The benefits of Engram are really significant. I had Engram and QWERTY as keyboard options on my Windows desktop, with as the toggle key-combo. I'm still not competent enough to use Engram if I need something written quickly.
@@thestopper5165 Exactly. Well, for anyone wondering - Engram is super for English and programming (even if you're using vi bindings), but for other languages, e.g. Polish it was too hard to put diacritical marks fast. Since I was using 18 keys only, I decided to help myself just a little bit with hammerspoon on MacOS (which worked, since I connect to Windows machine only through RDP), to set up the usual emacs-like terminal keybindings for the regular delete/esc/enter/etc. keys. Pretty straightforward and fast to do. Unfortunately, the downside was that some windows key combinations weren't working (ctrl-h for instance), but I didn't care. The good thing, that as opposed to what Ben suggests, I only had 3 key layers, with a total bare minimum keys. If you're interested in how the layout looked like, head to on: https:%%configure.zsa.io%moonlander%layouts%n69dJ%latest%0 (change the % to /, YT blocks sending links :/ )
the ferris sweep is so good, i made a sweep with nice!nano's last year and for the past year ive been using that for all my coding, just having all my shortcuts, symbols and numbers within reach without moving my hands is so comfortable.
I cannot recommend it enough
really... dang
I’m contemplating buying the Athreus for weeks now, but am kinda hesitant at because I’m primarily using Vim and thus heavily rely on the number keys due to motions…
I was inspired by you talking about your split keyboard on stream, found this guys channel and ended up building my own ferris sweep split 34 key keyboard, I love how you can totally customise it to fit your own needs.
Yes! This is the same board I started with. I'm looking forward to designing my own over the summer.
Fell down the split ergo keyboard rabbithole a few months ago. With no previous soldering experience I built a "Piantor" keyboard. I'm using the Miryoku keymap with Colemak-dh keylayout.
I'm currently really slow at typing but it's been a really fun experience, I feel like there is so much potential to be gained if I just keep at it.
I was nervous about the soldering (watched a bunch of youtube videos before starting) but everything went great and worked on the first try. Looking forward to building more keyboards
Been trying Colemak DH ISO and it has been quite pleasant layout to write English. I recommend checking it out if you're looking for an alternative to QWERTY layout that will reduce finger movements. Colemak has copy & paste functionality close to the original positions for quick access if you don't want to change the keybinds.
I think he says directly why he doesn't want to hold for layer. His example as I understood it was he wants to hit a key A in layer1, press the modifier and key B in Layer 2, then hit key C in layer 1 faster than he's able to remove his finger from the modifier key.
I'm assuming that the reason for the speed difference is that it's slower to press and lift one finger than press two separate fingers in quick succession.
Exactly.
11:10 You can easily change the settings of PopOS to allow you to switch workspaces via hotkey and also open certain application with hotkeys
This is really cool. But this remind me of the person given 20 years to cut down a tree that spent 19 years, 11 months, 30 days, 23 hours, and 45 minutes sharpening their axe.
Just made a keyboard like this with minimal soldering experience and although it was a bit stressful, it was a ton of fun.
Been watching Ben for a while now, his videos are *chefs kiss* and he goes so deep you get pulled in with him.
Super fascinating stuff!
If you watch The Mother of All Demos from the 60s, he has a little chorded device he uses to type with his left hand when he's using the mouse, in addition to having a full keyboard
I build Ben's 34key ergo board, and it's really a great layout. I highly suggest it.
I have an extra pair of PCBs if you want them prime
I guess you mean Ferris Sweep?
@@ivanjermakov I don't remember what it's called
@@Ataraxia_Atom Yeah, it's a modified Ferris Sweep, with the PCB cut around the keycaps, and a different silkscreen.
I started writing on ergo keyboards from ~50 keys on Iris and after 2 years I had so many symbols on my layers that I decided I don’t need as many keys.
I finally went down to 36 and I have never felt so comfortable before. That said, I’ve never been very fast (90wpm on simple words) and I don’t think I ever will - not sure how well would it work if I typed >100wpm (especially when using the home row mod).
But experimenting with different layers layouts was a lot of fun. Not for everyone probably but I think it is worth trying.
"Hold, what's wrong with hold-for-layer?" When you start to get into these uber-tiny layouts, there's a lot of pressure to start doing key-combos and gestures to increase what your few keys do. I LITERALLY got my 54-key Iris rev7 today, so I don't know who I'll be after a year of this, but I can't see myself using a keyboard that small. The 36-key boards like the Ferris are about as small as I could see myself going.
10:47 windows already has these macros, it's windows key + number, and it's related to what's on your windows bar thing.
On macOS, there's a Dvorak with QWERTY command keyboard layout. Text typing is Dvorak, but as soon as you hold the command (meta) key, it switches to QWERTY. Then, all shortcuts have the layout they were designed for.
I use neo2 as my keyboard layout (even though I haven't typed anything in German in years). The layout starts with XVLC so you still have all of those available for left hand copy/paste. Also it has a 3rd layer that gives all the brackets on index/middle finger and just a well thought out layout for programming (I haven't bothered with anything above layer 3, but things would be useful for productivity if you had a 60% keyboard or even smaller. Admittedly I'm currently only at 100 ish wpm (on a Q8 alice layout), but I definitely see much room for improvement.
Big fan of Ben Vallack. I really want someone that is deep into Vim to work through how they'd like their layers on a fewer key keyboard.
Prime the patterns you’re referring to are bigrams and trigrams, they’re the “rolls” which you want to feel good. There are layouts which optimise the most common tri and bigrams, colemak-dh for example!
13:59 was that a rob riggle pop?
"I hate this idea of thinking"
Could be a take from Tom..
He's a genius btw
In the context of courtroom proceedings, stenographers or court reporters use a specialized chorded keyboard or typewriter called a steno machine or stenotype machine to transcribe the spoken words into written form in real time . These machines have a limited set of keys, each of which represents a syllable or a group of sounds, allowing stenographers to type much more quickly and accurately than the average typist. The written text produced by these machines is then used to create an official transcript of the proceedings. There are also specialized keyboards and mice designed for courtrooms that are quiet and easy to clean.
And you don't even have to buy an expensive steno machine to try it, there's plover, you can try it with pretty much any NKRO capable keyboard.
Prime, you are literally already the guy 🫠🤷♂️
Once you have used OSM on qmk, a split keyboard, and i3, your are part of the club. You may try to get out but you will always come back.
6:05 this is why I went back to qwerty. I had moved to another layout and was really enjoying it and gaining speed. However I had to use somebody's keyboard and I just felt like a fool... I immediately gave up and went back to qwerty.
QWERTY "flows" so well because the most used keys are far apart, meaning you can't hit them easily by accident when fast typing. A welcome leftover from mechanical typewriters.
I’ve watched all of his videos. I ended up getting a sofle. I have all of the “programmer keys” on the home row on one layer. And then A for @ and S for $. And arrow keys on hjkl on another layer
I use the corne keyboard. It has 42 keys total. That is all you ever need because the concept of layers exist. That's 4,398,046,511,104 keys essentially... would you ever need more than that? The corne keyboard is essentially the vim of keyboards. It's a more practical version of the keyboard in this video.
would love to see a guy who's "never soldered anything" try to handwire a keyboard lmao
Handwiring will be a huge pain for someone not used to breadboarding, soldering on a PCB would probably feel a lot easier to most people.
You mentioned not understanding why Ben did not use a 'hold' function as the layer, the problem was the hold function itself.
In other words, Ben's problem was that he was typing faster than his hand could move, his index finger and thumb would work together to hit a letter that was on a layer. But when his intentions were to hit a character that was not on a layer, his fingers would hit the next key before his thumb has responded and lifted from the key.
My moving this to a macro, he made it a one shot layer. His intention to hit a key not on a layer would be typed in, even though his thumb was physically pressing down the key and did not lift in time.
I started with kinesis, then used ferris sweep (like 32 keys) for like 6 mo. I found when I got fast I was hitting wall and it got frustrating because you have to throttle a bit to switch layers. Now i use hillside (52 keys) as perfect compromise. Allows for dedicated layer keys and so no throttling. Give it a try sometime!
would you try colemak instead of dvorak? Just for the sake of knowing three keyboard layouts
So what window manager do you use that lets you go back to the browser without alt+tab?
I use a Corne daily and only downside is if I need to hit the enter key, I may not have an extra hand available for the layer key if you know what I mean
old video so I'm shouting into the void but... if you want to get into a non qwerty layout, do it at the same time as moving to a non-standard keyboard, like one a split one with ortholinear keys. Something that you will be able to immediately feel is different as soon as you put your hands on it. Yes at sucks for a while starting from scratch and typing slow BUT, because the keyboard is different, you'll be able to hold onto your qwerty muscle memory any time you sit at a normal keyboard which is very useful. Learning two different layouts on the same style of keyboard is really hard and take a lot of flip flopping and practice. I learned colemak on a split ortho keeb and now I don't even think about it, once my hands touch the keyboard it just auto switches layout based on the feel of the board. Very handy. I eventually replaced Colemak (which is way better than dvorak btw) with Engrammer which is pretty obscure but really great for comfortability and speed as a developer. Engrammer really needs an ortho keyboard though, staggered or not, but it's been really great. Focuses on inward rolls and easy placement of common programming symbols
"I don't even know who this is... Ben Vallack? Ok Ben Affleck..." Lol!
10:09 Yabai!!!!!! (I love linux but some shit is just easier on mac, especially when you have to get weird work programs to work)
I've been using a self-made FerrisSweep v2 (32 keys, the one you see at 2:35 ) for like 5 months now (thanks to Ben Vallack's video).
I created a custom layout with mod keys on the home row (meaning I have to hold f or j to use "shift" or d/k to "Ctrl") and I switch between my layers holding one (or both) the thumb keys.
When I got my hands on it, I think my typing speed was like 20wpm instead of my usual 80 and I thought "Ok, let's just say it was a fun experiment, but there is no way I'll ever be able to write at a decent speed with this thing)"... but I'm quite persistent so ...^^
Since then, I hit 110wpm and working has never been so fun, especially since I use vim so that I can keep my hands on the keyboard 90% of the time.
It's not so much about the speed, but rather about how comfortable it is to use once you get used to it (mods keys + symbols on home row changes everything).
Primeagen X Ben Vallack crossover yes babyyy - Prime if you dont want to get into making your own keebs, there are programmable prebuilts (I use a Dygma Raise) which allow you to experiment with the thumb clusters and smaller key layouts, I would say a 36 or 38 layout is a good starting point, Miryoku is a well established 36 key layout.
I use a ferris sweep, and i absolutely love it.
Yabai is basically i3 for Mac
You should take a look at Miryoku layout, for a starter. Ben's layout was too much for me, Miroku was the sweet spot. You can try it on a mechanical keyboard before commiting to a board - removing some keycaps...
As for keyboards you can use anything - my suggestios are Ferris Sweep, Draculad or Corne/Helidox. You can buy those as kits for soldering but some vendors will build them for you. As a suggestion if you want to have space for A LOT of features it is better to have a RP2040 microcontroller, but for the basics any Promicro clone will do. Last hint: check if you really need bluetooth - this limits a bunch the microcontroller and firmware choice. QMK (C) and KMK (python) and ZMK (C) are the main players - keyberon is a new player on the block (Rust). To a coder each one has different appeals. Again, not all run on all microcontrollers. I love QMK, but Bluetooth as far as I am aware works only on ZMK. Welcome to the rabbit role.
My only dislike with Miryoku is the use of homerow mods. But if they work for you, it really minimizes the amount of key presses you use for modifiers. I personally use an adaptation of Callum-style mods, which although increase the amount of key presses when using modifiers, I can chord them just as quickly.
Bluetooth is supported by QMK, but it's not nearly as optimised as ZMK, so it's one or the other depending on whether you're going wired split, or wireless (although ZMK is adding wired support in the future).
What window manager do you use?
You could become the guy who builds his own keyboard but is still chill about it.
try not to get hurt by a quote
@@ThePrimeTimeagen Definitely not! I thought you were funny. Just think it might be cool if you soldered some stuff on stream. :D
Building things is fun!
I use dvorak on a split keyboard (model 100 from keyboardio) - I have a one-handed left hand layer for when my right hand is on the pointing device that I can access for cut/copy/paste, as well as space and enter (both of which are usually on the right side) and arrow keys. (ok also mouse buttons because I was playing with a ploopy nano trackball for a bit and it's just a ball with no buttons, don't ask).
The man not only types fast, he speaks fast
Currently using an 18 key split board right now with a modification of Ben Vallack's layout. Couldn't be happier with it.
I designed own version of the layout while impatiently waiting for his video on it, back half a year. Now I work with 22 keys -- that's what I found best - 2 rows of 4 keys, 3 keys on each thumb.
I did it all until that point -- qwerty, dvorak, workman, colemak -- started having issues every time I approached 70 wpm; I'm prone to RSI I guess! Small hands.
I've put comments in his video about my journey, I think I was at 50wpm in 2 days (able to work), 60wpm in a week, 70wpm in a month, 90wpm in 2 months (current speed).
I think because there are no movements and only presses, the issues with learning are limited to forgetting to press the layerswitch for letters, and that is really easy to overcome.
The rest is just remembering the very few positions -- it makes it really easy to visualize the layout and keep in your head when you're working with two 4x2 boxes of keys!
I cannot recommend it enough, if you don't "need" to do above 120wpm (for programming, I find optimized symbols, macros and editor/OS fluency as way more important anyway).
Now I literally -cannot- get RSI issues because there is literally no weird angles whatsoever.
Sub-50gram switches for comboing columns and you're golden. And you can pick whatever weird switches you want to when there's just 20 of them -- I'm even considering going no-PCB handwired so I can optimize the key angles (esp. thumbs) more due to how approachable and small my keyboard is!
Building and customizing a keyboard is the natural next step for you
I built one of these following what Ben says. Been using it for a year now. Best keyboard ever. Best keyboard ever. Can't stress it enough. Super comfortable once you get accustomed to it.
having already seeing this video this guy is on another level.
QWERTY for life. I touch-typed at ludicrous speed as a kid, then relearned it "the right way" in my teens which was frustrating AF, but at 150+ WPM I just don't see the benefit in learning a new layout. Faster typing isn't going to make NPM suck less.
Do you still use hjkl when typing Dvorak, or have you remapped it to dhtn?
no remaps, ever
@@ThePrimeTimeagen j and k seem pretty awkward in Dvorak layout!
@@nodidog feels completely natural to me now. Though I have a VIM layer that I rarely use
I'm also a dvoraker and you get used to it. However on my main keyboard now (model 100), my right hand shift layer that I can access with the heel of my thumb gives me regular arrow keys where hjkl are in qwerty
@@Ycros I'm sure you do - I was just wondering. I've got all sorts of layers on my keyboard that feel completely natural now, but the thought of moving hjkl makes me shiver with unease 😂
My solution to copy, paste with one hand on dvorak: holding `-` acts as ctrl, to mirror my esc/ctrl for caps lock. It also makes ctrl-shift combos really nice; hold ctrl-shift with one hand, press the key with the other.
I could probably make it a bit nicer with a dedicated layer, but choosing all the hotkeys, mapping them, and remembering them when needed is a lot more work.
I just make the lower row pinky CTRL and lower row pinky ALT when I hold them for both hands.
If you are already a fan of the dactyl style keyboard, but want less keys, the Charybdis Nano from Bastard Keyboards is amazing, even has a trackball built in.
I can maintain both colemak-dh and qwerty along side each other quite well. Switching is just a skill that you have to practice. There are quite a few tricks for learning this but currently I can full speed switch between the two, while typing.
Ben has awesome tutorials on building those boards! The corne keyboard is my fave
C-c-c-combo Breaker!!!
i too was a fan of glacius on SNESs hit killer instinct
I went back to QWERTY after using Colemak for like 2 years. I loved the feeling of Colemak, but like Prime said I want to be able to type on any computer, and also I didn’t barely use vim in all these years because of it and I missed it.
Tom doesn't even use his fingers to code
5:42 : I think, that is a good Idea. If your keyboard has the posibility to use custom layers, than just put the symbols on one of thouse, and make it aktivate by holding one of your thumbkeys.
As for the 16 Key keyboard:
By combining even the alphanumerics, you limit yourself, to how fast your keybaord can react between "this key is held" and "this key was tapped".
Sure you can tweak those timing values, but your personal timing will also vary over the day. A fast typer as yourself will constantly need to change and tweak thouse timings.
My Dygma Raise has the same feature, where I can make any key do something different on hold, and on tap respectively and it just does not work for me. I constantly feel like I'm told by the keyboard, how fast I can go.
In addition, without any LEDs to tell what "Mode" the keyboard is in, there is always this uncertainty about if I'm typing at the right speed and I hate that.
Yeah, I'm the same. I've never liked hold-tap functionality, it feels like a deliberate hinders to speed. There is a limit in these smaller keyboards, at least in terms of how fast you can use them, but for the most part I suppose the offset of being extra comfortable outweighs that for them. The lowest I could realistically go is 30-keys (4 thumb keys, and chop off a key from the index and pinkie column on each side) without hindering speed, but I'm yet to try combos, so I can't realistically say for sure.
I went with a 40% otholinear - Planck EZ after watching one of Ben's videos. The don't ship them anymore. Quite an aesthetic keyboard, highly customisable. I have a slight hold on C, P & V to get copy cut and paste. It's nice to have macros stored on the board too... Though even after proper lubing the keys still feel scratchy.
oh man, I started using Dvorak because of you. I guess that half of the Dvorak fanclub has the same source if inspiration :)) After 10 months of using it I reached like 80% performance I had on QWERTY before switching.
But hey! the very first thing I did when I moved to this new layout was to remap that f***ing L out from that place. So, I swapped it with D and I'm very happy with my decision since.
Colemak is underrated. Although I recommend the following customizations:
1. Instead of replacing Caps Lock with a second Backspace: Just swap Caps Lock & Backspace.
2. Add a secondary mode/profile where top-row numbers & symbols are swapped but can be retrieved during Caps Lock.
Once I went Colemak I never went back. Although it does definitely make it awkward to be stuck using other peoples' keyboards, but at the same time keyboards are like smartphones now. Those things are almost never clean, and especially not the ones that people share. For your own hygiene's sake, just use your own keyboard.
I've heard you mention on stream a few times that you don't like to take on new cognative overhead. Don't you think that having like... however many layers you need for this many keys is kind of a lot of overhead? I use a split, and I was going to get one without the number row, but I found that using numbers on a function layer along with all of their shift variants was too much overhead for me while coding and stuff.
The surprising part for me is how good the human brain is at adjusting to new layouts like that. Like, I was able to feel productive for all my tasks in like a day (vim keybinds on the other hand... I still can't use vim properly on colemak-dh.... gotta train more)
You just build the muscle memory for it. I have my numbers under a layer, because my fingers are too short to hit them in using the conventional method, so they're just pulled one row down for the number row, so I could get rid of it.
@@explosionspin3422 Try using arrow keys on alternate layouts, but _only_ if you have a board with thumb keys so you aren't reaching or moving your hand. Ben Vallack was able to rebind the keys and get away with it, but my concern is if I switch layouts in the future, this won't be so lucky. Being able to use hjkl really depends on where the layout places them, some are in better positions than others (Dvorak for example leaves them in usable locations, no SFBs, but the layout is pretty outdated now).
One of the larger keys could double as a small trackpad (but only acting like a trackpad if pressing another key, otherwise its just a normal key), a bit like the steam deck ones in form factor. Either that or one of those thinkpad trackpoints in between some keys.
@ThePrimeTime, there is i3 windows manager alt for mac: yabai + skhd
"I just hate this idea of, like, thinking"
I'm using moonlander and corneish-zen in combination with a mbp, with a 3x5 heavily modified miryoku layout and I'm pretty happy with this setup.
Moonlander on the work desk when the mbp is connected to a monitor, and Corne-ish Zen everywhere else since it's very easy to transport and setup (no wires and no tenting shenanigans in comparison to the moonlander).
Tried the mouse emulation, but felt challenging to click the GUI elements with precision at times.
In the end, I just switched to using the Homerow app instead - works like vimium link hints for the OS.
do you have a link to the homerow app?
Bro, this video came at the perfect time. I am obsessed with split ergos. I started with an interest in the Kinesis, thanks to you, and then decided on the low profile 5 Column Corne with 36 keys. But I want the “concavity”! So now I’m about to pull the trigger on either a Charybdis Nano or Skeletyl from Bastard Keyboards.
36 keys seems like the sweet spot, and I really want to try the Miryoku layout.
Edit: you can skip the soldering by getting prebuilts, and the price point is still a little less than the Advantage 360.
The callout for dvorak is wholly why I use workman as my layout instead of dvorak.
As a Kyria rev 3 owner, yes. Go do it.
Next level of customization would be around languages you use, an optimzed design for most use keystrokes in lifetime in a particular language.
Love Ben Vallack's vids. Strongly recommend you get a ferris sweep or a corne for starters though.
Built a ferris sweep a few months ago, my only advice is build a wireless as wired felt messy and get a case for the bottom mayve 3d print one
Yeah, I also have regrets going wired. Certainly made the build process easier as my first time soldering, but my next board is 100% going wireless, especially as I have plans to mount tripods to it for tenting.
The inability to type on other PCs is the number one reason I refuse to learn another type layout
OK... real talk: if ypu enter the dark realm of self-built QMK keyboards, it never ends. it is simply not possible to _master the concrete_ - every few days you will realise that is would make more sense to shift the arrow keys to layer 5 and also attach some 'tap dance' behaviour to them becasue *WHY NOT* .
My first foray was with a keebio Iris 2.5 with a 'stock' controller, no underglow, and no RGB (and *wired* - like a cave-man keyboard)... upgraded the controller to an ElitePi (for 1Mb instead of 32kB); added Bluetooth; added RGB (so I knew what layer was active).
I've even retained a *QWERTY* layer - mostly so that I can compare typing speeds (which have never been hot: 70wpm is more than enough). That's *LAYER 12* .
Layer 0: *Engram* with {|=~+^&%*} as numrow and 'mod' keys (Ctrl; Alt; Shift, Win) on HOLD of home-row (LH has LShift etc; RH has RShift etc); HOLD of top row activates other layers (some for one keypress; others switch to the layer); tumb keys are SPACE and ENTER. NO DEL or BKSP.
Layer 1: RH is numpad; LH is symbols, also some app launchers for mail, web; calculator etc.
Layer 2: LH is multimedia controls; RH is arrows/keypad/PgUp/PgDn; top row is F1-F12.
...
Layer 12 is QWERTY (alpha-only) with 'mod' keys on strong fingers
Layer 13 is an experimental layer, trying to get every vim 'leader' combo to be a single- or double-tap on a single key.
Obviously there are layer-nav keys sprinkled about the place - most often on the thumb keys. And the 'mod-keys on hold' applies to every layer where it has any use.
Seriously, ThePrimeMegan - once you go there, there is no going back without some sort of cult-deprogramming workshop.
I use Artix, dwm, tmux, lf, st, and (usually) *ytfzf* - and vim - btw.
Firmware builders like QMK make this type of thing really really not hard at all, if you wanna start getting into wanting to code your own firmware from scratch too then yeah it’s gonna be hard but just producing a keyboard like that is something prime can do in honestly a day at most.
Yeah the tab thing is suboptimal, you have to process what you see then switch to the app, we can do exactly the same with Rofi, I even have it mapped to super+tab but I never use this option.
Never used the popshell more than few minutes because it was buggy at the time but Gnome isn't even capable of hanfdling independant workspaces per monitor so it's a no go for multi monitor users, maybe the PopTeam would do better with the cosmic DE they;re developping since they won't have to deal with the hassle of being a gnome extension.
Otherwise it's cool but don't get why he isn't using a tiling wm if his goal is being more efficient by using his keyboard skills, here it's like building a Ferrari but driving it in the sand.
What do you use for switching between windows if not alt tab?
On a tiliing wm although you can use Rofi/dmenu as alt tab (but more efficiently since those programs are more powerful and flexible) but you generally use ... nothing, if your window is already here in the same workspace and tiled you just switch to it, if it's in the same workspace but tabbed/stacked you know it's here or occasionaly check the title bar or just machinally cycle with mod+right/left/up/down which is almost instant. And if they aren't in the same workspace you usually know where they are since you often organize those in the same way and thus just mod+workspace number, and if you make a mistake or for example have multiple workspaces that usually do the same stuff (for me 7-8-9 are usually for local servers terminal emulators for example) and aren't sure where you have your program you can just quickly cycle via mod+7/8/9 or mod+next_workspace, that's way faster and easier to process for the brain to find the windows you're searching (hence his : I hate thinking) than using alt + tab then visually figuring out which program icons/name you want then which instance of this program you want to reach.
pcbs actually very easy to make. so much so that i was able to make some simple circuits at home using printer, lemon asid, hydrogen peroxide and salt. i was 14 at time
In MacOS I use the State Manager in combination with Better Touch Tools that has maps for each of my commonly used programs to bring them in front on specific hotkeys. You can totally turn MacOS into your own, but it's true that the stock experience of MacOS (and Windows) just sucks.
Hardware is hard, but it is also very satisfying . And building something you use every day is even a better thing. Be careful of the rabbit hole though
It's absurd. If I want to press P, then I press one specific key, not learn some weird shortcuts in my head and press 2-3 keys together to get a P. Absolutely absurd. But interesting, enjoyable to see new ideas, even those which are dumb.
Ben is so legit, glad your giving him some cred. He is a fellow vim user.
Should try building a witless corne, either 36 or 42 key layout, hands down my favourite out of the custom builds I’ve tried
I have seen the exact video and made my own ferris sweep because of it. It was very worth it but getting used to the new layout and learning it, took time. I still recoment it!
This is "the guy" origin story
If you want to build something, then I think the Dactyl Manuform might be something to look at. The designs comes in various sizes, and has a concave shape rather than flat.
This would be the closest thing to his existing board for sure.
im using colemak dh keymap in my split ortholinear keyboard, but I cant still typing using qwerty in normal keyboard.
for me, I like different layout on ortholinear keyboard and normal keyboard. I'm using qwerty at first on my ortholiear keyboard, but when I go back on normal keyboard, my brain cant get it right because the keymap are similar, but the key position are little different. then I move to colemak on my ortholinear keyboard, but still using qwerty on normal keyboard, i feel much better. my brain can switch quickly now, when typing on normal keyboard then use qwerty, when on ortholinear keyboard then use colemak.
behold for neuralink to install keyboard and window manager directly in your brain.
me who plays piano so my resting position is the same as an normal keyboard
5:30 I love this take and I did the same. Not for QWERTY but for QWERTZ. I tried using Neo2 for some time and loved the 6 layers but hated that I couldn't have it everywhere. After 6 Month I switched to NeoQWERTZ and it changed my life for programming. Layer 3 is amazing and I can write Greek symbols α, β, Arrows ←↑→↓ and other useful characters, like …- and directly.