7 ms·

Around the World in 33 Keyboards

41 points by lelf 11y ago

tcfunk 11y ago
But...but how does one type '#' on a British keyboard?
- zhoutong 11y ago
  Alt-3 instead of Shift-3
- wolfwyrd 11y ago
  ALT+3. Dead easy right~
- m0tive 11y ago
  Use a standard british keyboard[1]. It is a pain using the Mac "british" keyboard for programming in my experience. [1] https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:KB_United_Kingdom.svg https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:KB_United_Kingdom.sv...
  - Guillaume86 11y ago
    I agree the post title should be edited, apple layout is not standard layout.
  - TazeTSchnitzel 11y ago
    The PC British layout is annoying. It swaps @ and " relative to the US layout, among some other important keys, which means that when you're dropped at a US-layout terminal you struggle. It also doesn't have the wonderful set of Alt+ combinations as the Mac British layout for typing various types of diacritics, widths of dashes, Greek letters, mathematical symbols, opening and closing quotes, and other things. PC layout users are stuck with acute accents, the Euro symbol, and nothing else. Luckily, the Mac "British - PC" layout (not the same as the actual British PC layout) does include the extra Alt+ combos. I'm not sure why anyone would find the Mac British layout difficult to program with. It's closer to the US layout than the PC British layout. I suppose # requiring Alt might be bothersome, but # isn't a symbol used that frequently in programming, and Alt+3 is not that difficult to type.
    - m0tive 11y ago
      Having always used a standard british keyboard, the subtle differences, e.g. location of \, #, ", `, ~, really slow me down. It just seems petty for Apple to ignore the standard and go it's own way... then again, it is Apple. Also, I use # loads every day for c++ macros, and #if 0 blocks.
      - TazeTSchnitzel 11y ago
        > It just seems petty for Apple to ignore the standard and go it's own way... then again, it is Apple. Apple's had their own layout for literally decades. There wasn't a standard back then. > Having always used a standard british keyboard, the subtle differences, e.g. location of \, #, ", `, ~, really slow me down. You can adjust to it pretty quickly.
- cannam 11y ago
  Apple keyboards are annoying like that. On a "normal" British keyboard, the '#' is unshifted and is just to the left of the Return key. My habit when I have to use a Mac is to switch to the Australian mapping, which is the same as the British one but with £ and # switched.
  - phillc73 11y ago
    I work in an Austrian company (in Austria). My laptop has a German keyboard layout. My USB keyboard has an American layout. I have them both mapped to British layout and my fingers just "know" where things are. However, my conscious brain might not. I actually had to think really hard about where the '#' key is. On the American layout, it's printed above the number 3 (Shift-3), but actually produces the '£' symbol. The hash is above the return key and is printed as '\'. On the German keyboard it's actually in the "right" place, just to the left of the return key. The biggest key I have problems with switching between American and British keyboards is the @ symbol. If I don't remap the keyboards, I'm forever typing " or @ incorrectly. On un-remapped German keyboards it's Y and Z. I still try to buy my personal laptops from the UK, so I have the correct keyboard. It's a surprisingly big productivity loss to have incorrectly mapped keyboards.
- bonaldi 11y ago
  And how do Americans type the all-important § and ±? Also, there's a nice single-serving site for your Q: http://wheresthehashkeyonamac.co.uk http://wheresthehashkeyonamac.co.uk
egeozcan 11y ago
The first Turkish keyboard in the article is called the "Turkish F Keyboard", and is not in common use, although said to be better suited to write Turkish.
- michaelcampbell 11y ago
  That one fascinated me the most. I don't know Turkish, but among them all it seemed the most different to what I'm used to seeing.
minikites 11y ago
Looking at the subtle layout changes for Roman characters (which I assume are based only on letter frequency for each language) I wonder if it's possible to tell if they are more, less, or the same efficiency as QWERTY is for U.S. keyboards. Also, are there Dvorak equivalents for other languages?
- _-__--- 11y ago
  QWERTY was laid out (at least partially) with the intent of preventing typewriter jams and increasing productivity. This was done by placing commonly paired letters far apart from one another; maybe this was also taken into account when designing each other language's keyboard. Letter pairs will differ, presumably, so the important keys to separate will change from language to language. That's my intuition, anyways.
  - minikites 11y ago
    I knew that but that's a good reminder, did other countries have their own typewriter layouts too or did they just use US/UK English layouts?
    - qb45 11y ago
      Those computer keyboard layouts are based on formerly used typewriter layouts.
- noja 11y ago
  Is there any real evidence that Dvorak layouts are better? I've only seen anecdata.
  - minikites 11y ago
    My understanding is that they're fractionally better speedwise and a bit better for RSI issues, but not enough to justify switching, it would take forever to make up the lost productivity while re-training.
Yabood 11y ago
I once bought a MacBook pro with an Arabic keyboard online thinking it had the standard US keyboard layout, it didn't, so I returned it. I just couldn't get over that return key. So tiny and cramped, basically unusable.
- deleted 11y ago
  [deleted]
- aembleton 11y ago
  It's what you're used to. I'm used to the UK keyboard and when I tried a US macbook the only thing that bothered me was the height of the return key. I found that I must have been hitting the top of it when touch typing and on a US keyboard I was hitting the \ key instead.
desdiv 11y ago
Interesting how the French Canadian keyboard is the only one where the escape key doesn't contain the word "esc". They went with the ISO keyboard symbol for escape instead[0]. I didn't even realize there was such a symbol before today. [0] https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:ISOIEC-9995-7-029--ISO-7000-2029--Symbol-for-Escape.svg https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:ISOIEC-9995-7-029--I...
- germanier 11y ago
  If you use a Mac you can see that symbol in the UI, for example in the "Apple" menu on the top left ("Force Quit"). Interesting, because the key is not labelled as such.
- quernard 11y ago
  You're right, my macbook pro has that symbol, I've never noticed this before. But it looks like they must have recently dropped it, the new magic keyboard uses the word "esc" http://www.apple.com/xf/shop/product/MLA22C/A/magic-keyboard-fran%C3%A7ais-canada http://www.apple.com/xf/shop/product/MLA22C/A/magic-keyboard...
aikah 11y ago
As a french person, I use an AZERTY keyboard, it can become really tedious when programming in some languages. The ` for instance is a pain to type : Atl Gr + 7 then space (though on apple keyboards it seems to have a dedicated key, but I'm pretty sure the space is still needed)... and of course numbers need the shift key to be held ... The issue is I can't really switch to QWERTY (accents).
- dorfsmay 11y ago
  On Linux and MS Windows you can switch between two keyboard layout quickly by a key combination. Beside programing, a lot of the internet content is in English (including hn!), I find it it a lot easier to switch keyboard layout based on the language I need to use, rather than try to type in a language with a layout that wasn't meant for it.
- reirob 11y ago
  I feel with you, but there is a nice solution :-) I moved to France from Germany, I had first to unlearn the German layout (QWERTZ) and then learn the French AZERTY. But as you say it is so bad! Additionally I was travelling for work and sometimes was exposed to type on different layouts and was very frustrated because I was accustomed to AZERTY. After one week in Russia I took the decision and switched to QWERTY, configured it to US International with AltGR dead keys [1]. This give the advantage, to have all the accents you might, the French, the German ones as well as Turkish and some more by combining. Plus you have the convenience of a keyboard layout that was used to design most of the programming languages. When you are in a front of somebody's French computer - the English layout it is just some clicks away (Left Alt + Left Shift on most Windows). Just to give you some idea of how to get the accents: AltGr + ' + a -> á AltGr + ` + e -> è AltGr + " + e -> ë Shift + AltGr + x -> Œ (I don't even know if it possible to get this one on AZERTY) Shift + AltGr + , -> Ç (This one as well is not possible on AZERT AFAIK. I think for this character the , was used because the key has on the top half '<' and on the bottom half ',' so it resembles ç). With Shift you get the capital letter and without the normal letter. and so on. If you buy ThinkPads you can chose to get the US International keyboard layout. Not so sure about other brands. This was definitely one of the better life hacks for me - I never looked back. [1] On Linux you get the US International AltGr layout shipped. But on Windows there is only a US International, but without AltGr dead key. I find it very disturbing, because for example if you want to type a double quote (") you have to type " + Space and the same for tilde, single quote and back tick. So I had to dig around to find US International AtgGr dead key layout. This comment gives some info and hints to another alternative that I didn't yet try out: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10948810 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10948810
deleted 11y ago
[deleted]
deleted 11y ago
[deleted]
- germanier 11y ago
  Except for some programmers (the kind that frequents this site but far from the majority) I can assure you that almost any German laptop buyer expects and prefers a German keyboard. Every keyboard in an office will be a German keyboard. All apps that are used and almost all games work fine with the German layout. Might be different in small countries of course but I expect it to be the same in France, Spain, etc.
  - deleted 11y ago
    [deleted]
    - germanier 11y ago
      If Wikipedia is to be believed both variants were introduced at the same time by the same company (Key Tronic). The European one fits one key more. I never had problems to hit the European-style return-key for what it's worth and need a long time to adjust to the US variant whenever I have use them.
    - sswezey 11y ago
      The left shift on an ISO keyboard is the same distance from your left pinky as the right shift is from your right pinky. I don't see how it would be (objectively) harder. Plus with an ISO keyboard you get to move the `~ key down closer. I prefer to program on a US-International / Dutch Apple keyboard. It may be Stockholm syndrome from having to work with German keyboards.
  - pilsetnieks 11y ago
    That's kind of the point - because of the keyboard you cannot buy your laptop from Bulgaria, Taiwan, or the US where it might be cheaper because your users will want a German keyboard instead of Bulgarian, Chinese, or American.
    - 11y ago
xedarius 11y ago
Apple only do one keyboard layout, it's US of A, anyone from the countries listed there will tell you that.
- astrodust 11y ago
  How could you possibly be more wrong?
  - xedarius 11y ago
    Well when I ordered my first mac I clicked British keyboard. I nearly sent it back as I thought they'd sent the wrong one. The " was not on number 2 The # symbol had appeared on number 3 Where was my £ symbol If they can't get a British keyboard right I have serious doubts about other countries.
    - TazeTSchnitzel 11y ago
      The Mac has its own British layout. The British PC layout isn't the only valid one. Macs (and before them, Apple IIs) and PCs have differed here for a long time. Look at this 1984 British Apple IIe layout: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/9/9f/Apple_IIe.jpg https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/9/9f/Apple_II...
hodwik 11y ago
It seems difficult to program on many of these, as best as I can tell, many are missing symbols common to programming notation -- [] {} | Portugal, Norway, Germany, Belgium, France, Czech R, and Croatia specifically.
- germanier 11y ago
  It's still there but not labelled as such. It's a bit harder to press but not prohibitively so. For example, on a German keyboard you press Alt+5 for [ and Alt+9 for }. The German Windows keyboard has those somewhere else for some reason though...
- dagw 11y ago
  At least on a 'real' Norwegian keyboard {,[,] and } are on AltGr-7,8,9 and 0 respectively. I'm guessing it's the same on an Apple keyboard, but Apple just didn't draw the character on the keys for some reason.
aembleton 11y ago
The Italian keyboard has a £ symbol. I wonder why.
- mbi 11y ago
  That is also the currency symbol of the Italian lira [0], which was in use before the euro. 0: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Italian_lira https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Italian_lira
- ranko 11y ago
  It's a symbol for the now-defunct lira, though a 'L' was probably more usual.
- TazeTSchnitzel 11y ago
  The pound symbol is actually a lira symbol.
nrjames 11y ago
Think of the money that could be saved if the Danes and Norwegians would just use the same keyboard...
lukasm 11y ago
No one uses Polish keyboard in Poland. Since windows 95 the first thing you do is to change from polish 214 (QWERTZ) to polish programmer keyboard (QWERTY)
drops 11y ago
As someone who lives in a russian-speaking country, I must note that the russian keyboard layout is a nightmare. It's already been written about (http://www.artlebedev.com/mandership/105/ http://www.artlebedev.com/mandership/105/) but I only realized how bad the situation is when I learned how to touch type.
astrodust 11y ago
It's interesting that Apple's keyboard designs all revolve around on-demand parts. The holes can be milled to any arbitrary size or shape. The labels on the keys themselves are lasered on as necessary. Apart from the membrane and the key shapes, this keyboard looks like it's intended to be highly reconfigurable. This probably makes it easy for a single assembly line to slot in the keyboard for the destination region without too much fuss. Russian keyboard on one unit, Belgian on the next, no big deal. I can only imagine how complicated that might be for a company like Logitech or Dell where the caps themselves are injection molded with the letters built in.
- TazeTSchnitzel 11y ago
  Indeed that does seem to be how they do it. Here in the UK, when you order a keyboard or a MacBook from the Apple Online Store, it gives you a bunch of language options, which doesn't affect the delivery time. I think you can only get ones with the same physical shape (no Japanese), but there's a choice of lettering.

41 points by lelf 11y ago

tcfunk 11y ago

But...but how does one type '#' on a British keyboard?

zhoutong 11y ago
Alt-3 instead of Shift-3
wolfwyrd 11y ago
ALT+3. Dead easy right~
m0tive 11y ago
Use a standard british keyboard[1]. It is a pain using the Mac "british" keyboard for programming in my experience. [1] https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:KB_United_Kingdom.svg https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:KB_United_Kingdom.sv...
- Guillaume86 11y ago
  I agree the post title should be edited, apple layout is not standard layout.
- TazeTSchnitzel 11y ago
  The PC British layout is annoying. It swaps @ and " relative to the US layout, among some other important keys, which means that when you're dropped at a US-layout terminal you struggle. It also doesn't have the wonderful set of Alt+ combinations as the Mac British layout for typing various types of diacritics, widths of dashes, Greek letters, mathematical symbols, opening and closing quotes, and other things. PC layout users are stuck with acute accents, the Euro symbol, and nothing else. Luckily, the Mac "British - PC" layout (not the same as the actual British PC layout) does include the extra Alt+ combos. I'm not sure why anyone would find the Mac British layout difficult to program with. It's closer to the US layout than the PC British layout. I suppose # requiring Alt might be bothersome, but # isn't a symbol used that frequently in programming, and Alt+3 is not that difficult to type.
  - m0tive 11y ago
    Having always used a standard british keyboard, the subtle differences, e.g. location of \, #, ", `, ~, really slow me down. It just seems petty for Apple to ignore the standard and go it's own way... then again, it is Apple. Also, I use # loads every day for c++ macros, and #if 0 blocks.
    - TazeTSchnitzel 11y ago
      > It just seems petty for Apple to ignore the standard and go it's own way... then again, it is Apple. Apple's had their own layout for literally decades. There wasn't a standard back then. > Having always used a standard british keyboard, the subtle differences, e.g. location of \, #, ", `, ~, really slow me down. You can adjust to it pretty quickly.
cannam 11y ago
Apple keyboards are annoying like that. On a "normal" British keyboard, the '#' is unshifted and is just to the left of the Return key. My habit when I have to use a Mac is to switch to the Australian mapping, which is the same as the British one but with £ and # switched.
- phillc73 11y ago
  I work in an Austrian company (in Austria). My laptop has a German keyboard layout. My USB keyboard has an American layout. I have them both mapped to British layout and my fingers just "know" where things are. However, my conscious brain might not. I actually had to think really hard about where the '#' key is. On the American layout, it's printed above the number 3 (Shift-3), but actually produces the '£' symbol. The hash is above the return key and is printed as '\'. On the German keyboard it's actually in the "right" place, just to the left of the return key. The biggest key I have problems with switching between American and British keyboards is the @ symbol. If I don't remap the keyboards, I'm forever typing " or @ incorrectly. On un-remapped German keyboards it's Y and Z. I still try to buy my personal laptops from the UK, so I have the correct keyboard. It's a surprisingly big productivity loss to have incorrectly mapped keyboards.
bonaldi 11y ago
And how do Americans type the all-important § and ±? Also, there's a nice single-serving site for your Q: http://wheresthehashkeyonamac.co.uk http://wheresthehashkeyonamac.co.uk

egeozcan 11y ago

The first Turkish keyboard in the article is called the "Turkish F Keyboard", and is not in common use, although said to be better suited to write Turkish.

michaelcampbell 11y ago
That one fascinated me the most. I don't know Turkish, but among them all it seemed the most different to what I'm used to seeing.

minikites 11y ago

Looking at the subtle layout changes for Roman characters (which I assume are based only on letter frequency for each language) I wonder if it's possible to tell if they are more, less, or the same efficiency as QWERTY is for U.S. keyboards. Also, are there Dvorak equivalents for other languages?

_-__--- 11y ago
QWERTY was laid out (at least partially) with the intent of preventing typewriter jams and increasing productivity. This was done by placing commonly paired letters far apart from one another; maybe this was also taken into account when designing each other language's keyboard. Letter pairs will differ, presumably, so the important keys to separate will change from language to language. That's my intuition, anyways.
- minikites 11y ago
  I knew that but that's a good reminder, did other countries have their own typewriter layouts too or did they just use US/UK English layouts?
  - qb45 11y ago
    Those computer keyboard layouts are based on formerly used typewriter layouts.
noja 11y ago
Is there any real evidence that Dvorak layouts are better? I've only seen anecdata.
- minikites 11y ago
  My understanding is that they're fractionally better speedwise and a bit better for RSI issues, but not enough to justify switching, it would take forever to make up the lost productivity while re-training.

Yabood 11y ago

I once bought a MacBook pro with an Arabic keyboard online thinking it had the standard US keyboard layout, it didn't, so I returned it. I just couldn't get over that return key. So tiny and cramped, basically unusable.

deleted 11y ago
[deleted]
aembleton 11y ago
It's what you're used to. I'm used to the UK keyboard and when I tried a US macbook the only thing that bothered me was the height of the return key. I found that I must have been hitting the top of it when touch typing and on a US keyboard I was hitting the \ key instead.

desdiv 11y ago

Interesting how the French Canadian keyboard is the only one where the escape key doesn't contain the word "esc". They went with the ISO keyboard symbol for escape instead[0]. I didn't even realize there was such a symbol before today. [0] https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:ISOIEC-9995-7-029--ISO-7000-2029--Symbol-for-Escape.svg https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:ISOIEC-9995-7-029--I...

germanier 11y ago
If you use a Mac you can see that symbol in the UI, for example in the "Apple" menu on the top left ("Force Quit"). Interesting, because the key is not labelled as such.
quernard 11y ago
You're right, my macbook pro has that symbol, I've never noticed this before. But it looks like they must have recently dropped it, the new magic keyboard uses the word "esc" http://www.apple.com/xf/shop/product/MLA22C/A/magic-keyboard-fran%C3%A7ais-canada http://www.apple.com/xf/shop/product/MLA22C/A/magic-keyboard...

aikah 11y ago

As a french person, I use an AZERTY keyboard, it can become really tedious when programming in some languages. The ` for instance is a pain to type : Atl Gr + 7 then space (though on apple keyboards it seems to have a dedicated key, but I'm pretty sure the space is still needed)... and of course numbers need the shift key to be held ... The issue is I can't really switch to QWERTY (accents).

dorfsmay 11y ago
On Linux and MS Windows you can switch between two keyboard layout quickly by a key combination. Beside programing, a lot of the internet content is in English (including hn!), I find it it a lot easier to switch keyboard layout based on the language I need to use, rather than try to type in a language with a layout that wasn't meant for it.
reirob 11y ago
I feel with you, but there is a nice solution :-) I moved to France from Germany, I had first to unlearn the German layout (QWERTZ) and then learn the French AZERTY. But as you say it is so bad! Additionally I was travelling for work and sometimes was exposed to type on different layouts and was very frustrated because I was accustomed to AZERTY. After one week in Russia I took the decision and switched to QWERTY, configured it to US International with AltGR dead keys [1]. This give the advantage, to have all the accents you might, the French, the German ones as well as Turkish and some more by combining. Plus you have the convenience of a keyboard layout that was used to design most of the programming languages. When you are in a front of somebody's French computer - the English layout it is just some clicks away (Left Alt + Left Shift on most Windows). Just to give you some idea of how to get the accents: AltGr + ' + a -> á AltGr + ` + e -> è AltGr + " + e -> ë Shift + AltGr + x -> Œ (I don't even know if it possible to get this one on AZERTY) Shift + AltGr + , -> Ç (This one as well is not possible on AZERT AFAIK. I think for this character the , was used because the key has on the top half '<' and on the bottom half ',' so it resembles ç). With Shift you get the capital letter and without the normal letter. and so on. If you buy ThinkPads you can chose to get the US International keyboard layout. Not so sure about other brands. This was definitely one of the better life hacks for me - I never looked back. [1] On Linux you get the US International AltGr layout shipped. But on Windows there is only a US International, but without AltGr dead key. I find it very disturbing, because for example if you want to type a double quote (") you have to type " + Space and the same for tilde, single quote and back tick. So I had to dig around to find US International AtgGr dead key layout. This comment gives some info and hints to another alternative that I didn't yet try out: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10948810 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10948810

deleted 11y ago

[deleted]

deleted 11y ago

[deleted]

germanier 11y ago
Except for some programmers (the kind that frequents this site but far from the majority) I can assure you that almost any German laptop buyer expects and prefers a German keyboard. Every keyboard in an office will be a German keyboard. All apps that are used and almost all games work fine with the German layout. Might be different in small countries of course but I expect it to be the same in France, Spain, etc.
- deleted 11y ago
  [deleted]
  - germanier 11y ago
    If Wikipedia is to be believed both variants were introduced at the same time by the same company (Key Tronic). The European one fits one key more. I never had problems to hit the European-style return-key for what it's worth and need a long time to adjust to the US variant whenever I have use them.
  - sswezey 11y ago
    The left shift on an ISO keyboard is the same distance from your left pinky as the right shift is from your right pinky. I don't see how it would be (objectively) harder. Plus with an ISO keyboard you get to move the `~ key down closer. I prefer to program on a US-International / Dutch Apple keyboard. It may be Stockholm syndrome from having to work with German keyboards.
- pilsetnieks 11y ago
  That's kind of the point - because of the keyboard you cannot buy your laptop from Bulgaria, Taiwan, or the US where it might be cheaper because your users will want a German keyboard instead of Bulgarian, Chinese, or American.
  - 11y ago

xedarius 11y ago

Apple only do one keyboard layout, it's US of A, anyone from the countries listed there will tell you that.

astrodust 11y ago
How could you possibly be more wrong?
- xedarius 11y ago
  Well when I ordered my first mac I clicked British keyboard. I nearly sent it back as I thought they'd sent the wrong one. The " was not on number 2 The # symbol had appeared on number 3 Where was my £ symbol If they can't get a British keyboard right I have serious doubts about other countries.
  - TazeTSchnitzel 11y ago
    The Mac has its own British layout. The British PC layout isn't the only valid one. Macs (and before them, Apple IIs) and PCs have differed here for a long time. Look at this 1984 British Apple IIe layout: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/9/9f/Apple_IIe.jpg https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/9/9f/Apple_II...

hodwik 11y ago

It seems difficult to program on many of these, as best as I can tell, many are missing symbols common to programming notation -- [] {} | Portugal, Norway, Germany, Belgium, France, Czech R, and Croatia specifically.

germanier 11y ago
It's still there but not labelled as such. It's a bit harder to press but not prohibitively so. For example, on a German keyboard you press Alt+5 for [ and Alt+9 for }. The German Windows keyboard has those somewhere else for some reason though...
dagw 11y ago
At least on a 'real' Norwegian keyboard {,[,] and } are on AltGr-7,8,9 and 0 respectively. I'm guessing it's the same on an Apple keyboard, but Apple just didn't draw the character on the keys for some reason.

aembleton 11y ago

The Italian keyboard has a £ symbol. I wonder why.

mbi 11y ago
That is also the currency symbol of the Italian lira [0], which was in use before the euro. 0: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Italian_lira https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Italian_lira
ranko 11y ago
It's a symbol for the now-defunct lira, though a 'L' was probably more usual.
TazeTSchnitzel 11y ago
The pound symbol is actually a lira symbol.

nrjames 11y ago

Think of the money that could be saved if the Danes and Norwegians would just use the same keyboard...

lukasm 11y ago

No one uses Polish keyboard in Poland. Since windows 95 the first thing you do is to change from polish 214 (QWERTZ) to polish programmer keyboard (QWERTY)

drops 11y ago

As someone who lives in a russian-speaking country, I must note that the russian keyboard layout is a nightmare. It's already been written about (http://www.artlebedev.com/mandership/105/ http://www.artlebedev.com/mandership/105/) but I only realized how bad the situation is when I learned how to touch type.

astrodust 11y ago

It's interesting that Apple's keyboard designs all revolve around on-demand parts. The holes can be milled to any arbitrary size or shape. The labels on the keys themselves are lasered on as necessary. Apart from the membrane and the key shapes, this keyboard looks like it's intended to be highly reconfigurable. This probably makes it easy for a single assembly line to slot in the keyboard for the destination region without too much fuss. Russian keyboard on one unit, Belgian on the next, no big deal. I can only imagine how complicated that might be for a company like Logitech or Dell where the caps themselves are injection molded with the letters built in.

TazeTSchnitzel 11y ago
Indeed that does seem to be how they do it. Here in the UK, when you order a keyboard or a MacBook from the Apple Online Store, it gives you a bunch of language options, which doesn't affect the delivery time. I think you can only get ones with the same physical shape (no Japanese), but there's a choice of lettering.