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Reminds me of the awesome looking Optimus Maximus Keyboard from 2007: https://www.artlebedev.com/optimus/maximus/ https://www.artlebedev.com/optimus/maximus/ I

by dfee 7y ago

Reminds me of the awesome looking Optimus Maximus Keyboard from 2007: https://www.artlebedev.com/optimus/maximus/ https://www.artlebedev.com/optimus/maximus/ I always thought that’d be the future of keyboards, but instead we got the touchbar.

metalliqaz 7y ago
it was a really, really bad keyboard and it was insanely expensive perhaps modern e-ink could make a better product, but I think the real reason we don't have keyboards like that is because keyboards are at their best when you aren't looking at them. a good old (and free) cheat-sheet works well because you really only need to keep it out on your desk for about two weeks.
- yellowapple 7y ago
  I think e-ink is promising here specifically because you don't have to keep supplying power to the display just to keep an image visible. You could have a separate 'key cap programmer" that would update the display for an individual keycap and that updated display would stick until you reprogram it again. Next step would be to integrate such a keycap programmer into each switch on a keyboard, so that the keyboard could program all its keycaps in one go without requiring the user to pull the cap / program it / reinsert it. ---- On the topic of whether or not you need to look at a keyboard's keys in order to use it: sure, maybe you or I - who are used to touch-typing - might be able to get by on a Das Keyboard or whatever, but ordinary people (that is: people who are not typing enthusiasts ;) ) benefit greatly from having keyboard keys labeled, and especially benefit from having keyboard keys labeled with common shortcuts for whatever applications they're using. This sort of thing could have immediate practical applications in point-of-sale, warehousing, data entry, and everywhere else where people who may or may not be technologically-savvy still need to use computers for their job duties (and sure, we could just declare "well if they use computers for their jobs then tech-savviness should be a job requirement" like the Hacker News elitists we are, but the real world doesn't work that way, nor should it, in my opinion; user-hostility is a design flaw, not a feature). Really, this would be a high-tech replacement for both 1) custom-printed keys and 2) employees taping hand-written legends to their keys.
wishinghand 7y ago
I would love that in a columnar, split setup. Something like the Lily58 or Iris. It's a shame that the standard staggered layout is so dominant still.

by dfee 7y ago

metalliqaz 7y ago

it was a really, really bad keyboard and it was insanely expensive perhaps modern e-ink could make a better product, but I think the real reason we don't have keyboards like that is because keyboards are at their best when you aren't looking at them. a good old (and free) cheat-sheet works well because you really only need to keep it out on your desk for about two weeks.

yellowapple 7y ago
I think e-ink is promising here specifically because you don't have to keep supplying power to the display just to keep an image visible. You could have a separate 'key cap programmer" that would update the display for an individual keycap and that updated display would stick until you reprogram it again. Next step would be to integrate such a keycap programmer into each switch on a keyboard, so that the keyboard could program all its keycaps in one go without requiring the user to pull the cap / program it / reinsert it. ---- On the topic of whether or not you need to look at a keyboard's keys in order to use it: sure, maybe you or I - who are used to touch-typing - might be able to get by on a Das Keyboard or whatever, but ordinary people (that is: people who are not typing enthusiasts ;) ) benefit greatly from having keyboard keys labeled, and especially benefit from having keyboard keys labeled with common shortcuts for whatever applications they're using. This sort of thing could have immediate practical applications in point-of-sale, warehousing, data entry, and everywhere else where people who may or may not be technologically-savvy still need to use computers for their job duties (and sure, we could just declare "well if they use computers for their jobs then tech-savviness should be a job requirement" like the Hacker News elitists we are, but the real world doesn't work that way, nor should it, in my opinion; user-hostility is a design flaw, not a feature). Really, this would be a high-tech replacement for both 1) custom-printed keys and 2) employees taping hand-written legends to their keys.

wishinghand 7y ago

I would love that in a columnar, split setup. Something like the Lily58 or Iris. It's a shame that the standard staggered layout is so dominant still.