3 ms·

For me, killer feature of Chromebook is keyboard layout - standardized throughout lineup, and with all non-essential keys thrown out. Lower row with bare minimu

by aexaey 10y ago

For me, killer feature of Chromebook is keyboard layout - standardized throughout lineup, and with all non-essential keys thrown out. Lower row with bare minimum: ctrl, alt, space, alt and ctrl - just plain excellent - clean layout, left ctrl/alt keys are of proper size, making them super-easy to hit with a pinky. In contrast, on Windows/Mac side of things - desktop keyboard is already bad enough with bottom row cluttered with win(command) repeated twice, plus menu/right-click key (why does this thing even exist?); On laptop, it gets even worse by adding add "fn" and often pgup/pgdn and other clutter to the mix. Then there's question of order in which they all come - is it fn, then ctrl, or other way around? was that alt beside spacebar, or is that win? etc...

haddr 10y ago
I really hate the vertical enter key. Not present in US, but somehow popular in europe. Brrr!
djrogers 10y ago
You can't conflate the 'windows/mac' side of things for non-standardized keyboard layouts - that's ridiculous. Macs have very standardized layouts, to the extent that the Apple external keyboards are modeled on the laptop ones.
- aexaey 10y ago
  Why can't I? For the purpose of this argument, Windows and Mac keyboards aren't all that different. See for yourself - modern mac keyboards have two layouts: - Full / 105-key layout, which is a copy of Windows 105-key layout with renamed and re-shuffled lower row, featuring: control, option(alt), command(win), space, command, option, control; [1] - Compact (laptop / magic), where lower row has: fn, control, option(alt), command(win), space, command option; [2] Other (Windows) layouts of the bottom row: - Full/Desktop 105-key: Ctrl, Win, Alt, Space, Alt, Win, Menu, Ctrl; - Lenovo laptop: Fn, Ctrl, Win, Alt, Space, Alt, Win[4]. Ctlr; [3] - Dell laptop: Ctrl, Fn, Win, Alt, Space, Alt, Ctrl. [5] ...etc. Now, this is ridiculous. So my point is: sure, there are (ad-hoc) standards, but way too many of them, and all of them try to pack too many keys around core QWERTY field, especially lower row. Chromebook is the first one on record to prune this and offer a clean, usable layout. [1] http://www.apple.com/shop/product/MB110LL/B/apple-keyboard-with-numeric-keypad-english-usa http://www.apple.com/shop/product/MB110LL/B/apple-keyboard-w... [2] http://www.apple.com/shop/product/MLA22LL/A/magic-keyboard-us-english http://www.apple.com/shop/product/MLA22LL/A/magic-keyboard-u... [3] http://www.lenovo.com/images/gallery/main/lenovo-convertible-tablet-thinkPad-helix-keyboard-view-9.jpg http://www.lenovo.com/images/gallery/main/lenovo-convertible... [4] On some models, PrintScreen takes place of second Win key [5] http://kbimg.dell.com/library/KB/DELL_ORGANIZATIONAL_GROUPS/DELL_GLOBAL/Content%20Team/5450_5250_kybd.JPG http://kbimg.dell.com/library/KB/DELL_ORGANIZATIONAL_GROUPS/...

by aexaey 10y ago

haddr 10y ago

I really hate the vertical enter key. Not present in US, but somehow popular in europe. Brrr!

djrogers 10y ago

You can't conflate the 'windows/mac' side of things for non-standardized keyboard layouts - that's ridiculous. Macs have very standardized layouts, to the extent that the Apple external keyboards are modeled on the laptop ones.

aexaey 10y ago
Why can't I? For the purpose of this argument, Windows and Mac keyboards aren't all that different. See for yourself - modern mac keyboards have two layouts: - Full / 105-key layout, which is a copy of Windows 105-key layout with renamed and re-shuffled lower row, featuring: control, option(alt), command(win), space, command, option, control; [1] - Compact (laptop / magic), where lower row has: fn, control, option(alt), command(win), space, command option; [2] Other (Windows) layouts of the bottom row: - Full/Desktop 105-key: Ctrl, Win, Alt, Space, Alt, Win, Menu, Ctrl; - Lenovo laptop: Fn, Ctrl, Win, Alt, Space, Alt, Win[4]. Ctlr; [3] - Dell laptop: Ctrl, Fn, Win, Alt, Space, Alt, Ctrl. [5] ...etc. Now, this is ridiculous. So my point is: sure, there are (ad-hoc) standards, but way too many of them, and all of them try to pack too many keys around core QWERTY field, especially lower row. Chromebook is the first one on record to prune this and offer a clean, usable layout. [1] http://www.apple.com/shop/product/MB110LL/B/apple-keyboard-with-numeric-keypad-english-usa http://www.apple.com/shop/product/MB110LL/B/apple-keyboard-w... [2] http://www.apple.com/shop/product/MLA22LL/A/magic-keyboard-us-english http://www.apple.com/shop/product/MLA22LL/A/magic-keyboard-u... [3] http://www.lenovo.com/images/gallery/main/lenovo-convertible-tablet-thinkPad-helix-keyboard-view-9.jpg http://www.lenovo.com/images/gallery/main/lenovo-convertible... [4] On some models, PrintScreen takes place of second Win key [5] http://kbimg.dell.com/library/KB/DELL_ORGANIZATIONAL_GROUPS/DELL_GLOBAL/Content%20Team/5450_5250_kybd.JPG http://kbimg.dell.com/library/KB/DELL_ORGANIZATIONAL_GROUPS/...