5 ms·

I have the UHK and I love it. I would recommend this keyboard to anyone who needs to work with several different operating systems. I have it set up with keybin

by jwr 8y ago

I have the UHK and I love it. I would recommend this keyboard to anyone who needs to work with several different operating systems. I have it set up with keybindings for Mac, Linux and Windows and switch between the three quickly. You can set things up so that switching is relatively painless, e.g. the same shortcut will do similar things in all OSs that you work with (well, to the extent that Linux apps do similar things given the same keypress...). What I also enjoy is that I can place the halves on both sides of my laptop, with my MacBook in the middle. A very comfortable typing setup. BTW: Jamie Zawinski writes "I don't know about you, but the frequency with which I change my keymap is: exactly once ever. So I don't really need this thing glowing at me. You can turn the light off, but even when unlit it's still ugly as sin. It begs for a piece of electrical tape over it. Also, I'm baffled that they chose to devote so much physical space to such a useless indicator." I guess I'm different: I switch keymaps all the time. And this is a killer feature of the UHK: easy management of keymaps, fast switching (using shortcuts which I can define!) and a visible indicator of which keymap is currently active. But then this is a keyboard for hackers, who I'd venture to guess routinely use several computers, right? :)

PurpleRamen 8y ago
> But then this is a keyboard for hackers, who I'd venture to guess routinely use several computers, right? :) Yes, and usually they all come with their own keyboards. I don't think many are rich and crazy enough to spoil 300-400 Euro per keyboard just to have the same at work, home and for the random access on the go. Not to forgotten that you need to sync the settings for all of them when you change something.
- semi-extrinsic 8y ago
  This is one of the big stumbling blocks for me when it comes to fancy keyboards. I'm not going to spend $1000 on keyboards, and I'm definitely not going to be dragging a keyboard back and forth between work, home and the garage. So for me it's a $99 CM Masterkeys Pro M at work, a saved-from-the-trash IBM Model M at home, and a brilliant machine washable Logitech K310 in the garage.
- jwr 8y ago
  So, as a side note, the other thing I really like about the UHK is the size. The two halves put together as a sandwich (bottoms facing each other) take up very little space, which makes for convenient carrying around.
NeedMoreTea 8y ago
There's visible and there's ridiculously large display. Two low brightness caps lock style LEDs showing Mac or PC seem a better solution for it to me. Though I've almost never switched a keymap - I have a selection of keyboards! Aside from that I like the look, the split, especially the trackpoint, then I get to the show stopper. Two micros switches instead of real switches for space and mode so going to be used an awful lot. I once had a keyboard with a few of those on rarely used switches, and despite being expensive it got donated long before the warranty was up. Seems like spoiling the ship for a ha'porth of tar.
erikpukinskis 8y ago
> this is a keyboard for hackers, who I'd venture to guess routinely use several computers, right? :) This brought me back to the old days where the sysadmins had a physical knob that would switch their keyboard+CRT between the several different boxen in their office. Thanks for the memory.

by jwr 8y ago

PurpleRamen 8y ago

> But then this is a keyboard for hackers, who I'd venture to guess routinely use several computers, right? :) Yes, and usually they all come with their own keyboards. I don't think many are rich and crazy enough to spoil 300-400 Euro per keyboard just to have the same at work, home and for the random access on the go. Not to forgotten that you need to sync the settings for all of them when you change something.

semi-extrinsic 8y ago
This is one of the big stumbling blocks for me when it comes to fancy keyboards. I'm not going to spend $1000 on keyboards, and I'm definitely not going to be dragging a keyboard back and forth between work, home and the garage. So for me it's a $99 CM Masterkeys Pro M at work, a saved-from-the-trash IBM Model M at home, and a brilliant machine washable Logitech K310 in the garage.
jwr 8y ago
So, as a side note, the other thing I really like about the UHK is the size. The two halves put together as a sandwich (bottoms facing each other) take up very little space, which makes for convenient carrying around.

NeedMoreTea 8y ago

There's visible and there's ridiculously large display. Two low brightness caps lock style LEDs showing Mac or PC seem a better solution for it to me. Though I've almost never switched a keymap - I have a selection of keyboards! Aside from that I like the look, the split, especially the trackpoint, then I get to the show stopper. Two micros switches instead of real switches for space and mode so going to be used an awful lot. I once had a keyboard with a few of those on rarely used switches, and despite being expensive it got donated long before the warranty was up. Seems like spoiling the ship for a ha'porth of tar.

erikpukinskis 8y ago

> this is a keyboard for hackers, who I'd venture to guess routinely use several computers, right? :) This brought me back to the old days where the sysadmins had a physical knob that would switch their keyboard+CRT between the several different boxen in their office. Thanks for the memory.