14 ms·

An accessible one-handed keyboard, inspired by FrogPad

134 points by kianryan 3y ago

jiceo 3y ago
A couple of years ago I had to undergo some serious wrist surgery and the recovery period was going to be several months as well. I was worried and didn't want to be out recovering without working, so I started looking into all sorts of alternative ways to type with my left hand. I looked into FrogPad, chorded keyboards, custom keyboards, etc. In the end, I found a blog post about someone who just built a customized Karabiner-Elements bindings, where the keyboard layout is all the same for the "left-handed keys", but if you hold the spacebar the "right-handed keys" get mirrored to the left making it acessible to your left hand. Releasing the spacebar without a second key just inputs the spacebar as usual. I customized that a little bit more to get some other keys in the places I wanted and set out to practice. Within a week I was typing at 60wpm comfortably when measuring at Type Racer. I normally type at around 120wpm, so I was pretty happy with the result. In my IDE I also have been using VIM bindings since a decade, so moving around it wasn't any trouble. I adapted myself to use the mouse with my left hand which wasn't also too difficult. It cost literally zero and I only needed to "re-learn" typing the mirrored letters, and even then, it wasn't as hard because it's just mirrored and your brain quickly adjusts. No need to learn a complete new layout. Edit: Here's the Karabiner-Elements customized binding I used as a base: https://github.com/qubist/mirrorboard-mac?tab=readme-ov-file https://github.com/qubist/mirrorboard-mac?tab=readme-ov-file
fkkffdddd 3y ago
Are there similar projects that focus on the software aspects? Would love to read about that. For English text, you could probably get away with just typing half the letters and having the rest predicted, no?
wkat4242 3y ago
I really hate chords. I just don't have the mental memory for it. Besides shift for capitals, things just need their own buttons. I always hate fighting games with 20 different combos on the gamepad to remember. So 80% and less keyboards also don't work. I use a huge keyboard with numpad, the keys of which I remap to very common functions so I don't have to use combos for them :) I wonder if I'm just weird or if this is a common thing.
- erk__ 3y ago
  There is also one-handed keyboards like that, for example the one from Maltron: http://www.maltron.com/store/p19/Maltron_Single_Hand_Keyboards_-_US_English.html http://www.maltron.com/store/p19/Maltron_Single_Hand_Keyboar...
Findecanor 3y ago
The hardware is one half of the DIY split ergo-mech Lily58. It is open source and kits are widely available. <https://github.com/kata0510/Lily58 https://github.com/kata0510/Lily58> The FrogPad-inspired part is the firmware/layout for only one hand and the labels in the relegendable keycaps.
ChuckMcM 3y ago
This is excellent. I had a frogpad and got reasonably comfortable with it, my use case was mostly messaging so not a heavy use of special characters like {}/|Etc. Given my experience with it, I agree that using it as a model for this project was a good choice. An acquaintance, Steve Roberts, had a really clever keyboard that attached to the handlebars of his recumbent bicycle so that he could type while riding.
- benterris 3y ago
  Out of curiosity, how fast did you type on the frogpad ?
  - ChuckMcM 3y ago
    I really don't know, I didn't measure it. It wasn't as fast as a QWERTY keyboard but it was fast enough. It was definitely way faster than typing using a 10 key numpad on a phone. Based on Steve's recommendation I had also tried a one-hand keyboard that was basically a half sphere with buttons for your four fingers and a number of 'shift' buttons for your thumb (basically all chord all the time) and I never got comfortable enough with it to use it for any length of time.
s_m_t 3y ago
A nice hack for building a small keyboard/macro pad that is 80% of the way there is to buy one of those cherry mx key testers, a microcontroller dev board of your choice, and a small lipo. All together it might cost you something like $40 depending on how many keys your key tester has and you should only need a soldering iron and some wire to put it together.
- gtrevorjay 3y ago
  I second this as a great way to get started. If you look on Amazon there are a bunch of cheap eight key macros (Lichifit makes one) that are built via layers of acrylic: a base layer, a layer that houses the microcontroller, and a layer for the keyboard. It's easy enough to sub your own micro and 3D print a replacement layer.
- TylerE 3y ago
  Those are handy to have anyway. I have a tester that originally had 64 keys that is down to 56 or so… I normally like really light keys, like 30-40g, but it’s nice to have much heavier action on a few keys like backspace and numpad enter so you can give em a really satisfying thwack without bottoming out. Sure there are places that will sell switches in lots of 5 or 10, but it’s really nice to be able to swap out and experiment and see just how much heavier works for a given key. My actual ideal would probably be something more like a layout that aimed for equal perceived (instead of actual) force. So basically heavier towards the middle and lighter towards the outside, but done mindfully of kinematics and ergonomics.
swayvil 3y ago
Optimized voice typing? A special voice-code. Like Thufir Hawat did in Dune (the old one). Because I can talk way faster than type. And if we could just iron out the bumps. Remove ambiguities and such. Surely that's been done. (Or even more specialized, for writing java...)
- densh 3y ago
  Talon Voice with enough tweaking, lots of practice, and a good mic can get you there. https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=Mz3JeYfBTcY https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=Mz3JeYfBTcY
- loloquwowndueo 3y ago
  Cusorless and Talon! https://xeiaso.net/notes/cursorless-alien-magic/ https://xeiaso.net/notes/cursorless-alien-magic/
carom 3y ago
I have dreamed of one of these for driving. Touch typing would make responding to something while keeping eyes on the road much much easier.
- Symbiote 3y ago
  It's necessary to keep your brain on the road, as well as your eyes — and your hands on the wheel.
  - samatman 3y ago
    If it were built into the steering wheel and used a HUD to display the text it might not be criminally irresponsible..
    - loloquwowndueo 3y ago
      No. If you’re focusing on text on the windshield 50cm in front of you you are NOT focusing on the road.
    - al_borland 3y ago
      This would only give the illusion of paying attention to the road, without paying attention to the road. It might actually be worse.
Syzygies 3y ago
I have experience with both the FrogPad and the Matias Half Keyboard (I paid $95; now $595). The Frogpad never caught on with me. https://matias.store/products/half-keyboard https://matias.store/products/half-keyboard The Matias Half Keyboard is based on a theory that our minds mirror each hand, so by holding the space bar to access the missing half keyboard, we already know what to do. I was skeptical. Recognizing that we're modal (do we even recognize that telephone keypads and numeric keypads are different, or do we just use them without thinking?) I decided to learn Dvorak on the half keyboard while continuing to use QWERTY on my full keyboards. One day, on a lark, I tried Dvorak on a full keyboard. I could, easily. The mirror theory holds.
- hinkley 3y ago
  There’s a trick with phantom limb pain and mirrors as well.
- Palomides 3y ago
  I've also tested out a mirror layout on a standard keyboard, it's shockingly easy to pick up
- gnicholas 3y ago
  > the Matias Half Keyboard (I paid $95; now $595) Ha, same here. Seems like they discovered that the mainstream demand for this is quite low, but the reimbursement potential for ADA/HR purposes was much higher.
- eyelidlessness 3y ago
  Another anecdata. I had a bike accident which took my left hand out of commission for a while. It was after the Matias keyboard became so expensive, and I was broke. But I was motivated enough to try the concept that I hacked together a software implementation that behaved more or less the same way on a standard full size keyboard by swapping to a mirrored system keyboard layout while holding the spacebar for a short time. The software itself was buggy as hell (I learned just enough ObjC to get it kinda working), but even so the mirroring concept worked perfectly for me. It was basically no learning curve (full QWERTY to half QWERTY), and I only took a slight hit to typing speed. The first thing I did was prove it out by building another bit of software to relaunch the first whenever it crashed, and then worked full time with it for a couple months. Typing was never quite as subconscious for me as it is with both hands, but it was as close to that as I could imagine.
paradox460 3y ago
I created a one-hand layout, similar to the FrogPad, for my Ergodox, and then wound up never bothering to use it seriously, at which point the muscle memory I spent a few weeks training up fell away
gtrevorjay 3y ago
I can't imagine another cocktail party where my own one handed keyboard would be relevant, so here it is: https://github.com/trevorjay/Handler https://github.com/trevorjay/Handler It's chorded, (based on the https://ardux.io/ https://ardux.io/ layout), but I don't think chorded is really that hard to learn if you're actually willing to give it a week or two (which you have in any situation where you need a one hander). The key (ha) I've found is that you want the keys to be as easy to press as possible while providing feedback. The Twiddler, https://twiddler.tekgear.com/ https://twiddler.tekgear.com/ , is great for this as it uses light tact switches, but it has reliability issues. This is a great project. Of all my one-handed experience, I never got to try a FrogPad because of the expense. Having a software implementation of the FrogPad is awesome.
- stavros 3y ago
  Here's mine: https://www.stavros.io/posts/keyyyyyyyys/ https://www.stavros.io/posts/keyyyyyyyys/ Wildly impractical, but super easy to build.
  - yjftsjthsd-h 3y ago
    Having seen this but not yet having gotten to building it - is it wildly impractical? It looks a little slow (and obviously there's a learning curve) but it seems like it would work nicely in a number of cases where a normal keyboard wouldn't. (Ex. I bet I could use it on an exercise bike)
    - stavros 3y ago
      To be honest, I've only used it twice. It was fine, really, there's just a big learning curve and it can only do 32 characters. I imagine that, with some good autocorrect, it might be fairly usable.
      - extraduder_ire 3y ago
        Something like a t9 dictionary might be useful for it, even if you'd probably need the other device to handle the dictionary unless you wanted it hacky as all hell. Replacing the thumb button with some kind of clicky D-pad (D-pad mounted on a microswitch) would be a somewhat easy way to add more buttons. (my first thought was going with two per finger by adding one around the side or to a strap on the outside of your fingers)
sobkas 3y ago
There is no better keyboard and mouse than no keyboard and mouse. Does anyone knows a solution that allows to provide input without the need to move your arms and/or fingers? I have heard about brainwave detection but apparently it's hard to learn, slow and have a high latency. Any ideas?
- yjftsjthsd-h 3y ago
  There's eviacam, though it's code rotting:(
- morjom 3y ago
  There's many accessibility focused input devices that lets you use your mouth/tongue. There's also foot pedals, voice activation software etc.
- jauntywundrkind 3y ago
  I really wish I had the capacity & skills to take on some hobbyist eye tracking efforts. I think a huge amount of work could be done by looking, or looking with some modifiers. At some point I need to start doing some machine learning stuff. I'm intimidated to get started, and it feels like there's better tooling emerging. Also, I don't want to go Nvidia so it feels like I'm starting out in Hard mode. But some day I need to pick something like Keras and do some basic ML image processing or what not with my Radeon rx580, if it can.
- IggleSniggle 3y ago
  If you don't mind using other limbs, there's a whole ton of products aimed at musicians who have their hands full but still want to be able to manipulate another device. For example, the organ, guitar pedals, and much, much more. Big variety of pedal setups generally, but musicians have been dealing with the "no hands" input problem for a very long time. There are also a number of existing eye tracking input systems, but I think that kinda sucks / is limiting. I'm aware of tongue-activated joysticks for people that are unable to move their bodies. Maybe look into assistive devices of that variety. https://youtu.be/MtvpXr9O0J4?si=S8tJJm08_J5bzWMb https://youtu.be/MtvpXr9O0J4?si=S8tJJm08_J5bzWMb
deleted 3y ago
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nsonha 3y ago
Kinda related, I assume accessibility commercial products to be more expensive. Is there any government incentive to help with that?

134 points by kianryan 3y ago

A couple of years ago I had to undergo some serious wrist surgery and the recovery period was going to be several months as well. I was worried and didn't want to be out recovering without working, so I started looking into all sorts of alternative ways to type with my left hand. I looked into FrogPad, chorded keyboards, custom keyboards, etc. In the end, I found a blog post about someone who just built a customized Karabiner-Elements bindings, where the keyboard layout is all the same for the "left-handed keys", but if you hold the spacebar the "right-handed keys" get mirrored to the left making it acessible to your left hand. Releasing the spacebar without a second key just inputs the spacebar as usual. I customized that a little bit more to get some other keys in the places I wanted and set out to practice. Within a week I was typing at 60wpm comfortably when measuring at Type Racer. I normally type at around 120wpm, so I was pretty happy with the result. In my IDE I also have been using VIM bindings since a decade, so moving around it wasn't any trouble. I adapted myself to use the mouse with my left hand which wasn't also too difficult. It cost literally zero and I only needed to "re-learn" typing the mirrored letters, and even then, it wasn't as hard because it's just mirrored and your brain quickly adjusts. No need to learn a complete new layout. Edit: Here's the Karabiner-Elements customized binding I used as a base: https://github.com/qubist/mirrorboard-mac?tab=readme-ov-file https://github.com/qubist/mirrorboard-mac?tab=readme-ov-file

fkkffdddd 3y ago

Are there similar projects that focus on the software aspects? Would love to read about that. For English text, you could probably get away with just typing half the letters and having the rest predicted, no?

wkat4242 3y ago

I really hate chords. I just don't have the mental memory for it. Besides shift for capitals, things just need their own buttons. I always hate fighting games with 20 different combos on the gamepad to remember. So 80% and less keyboards also don't work. I use a huge keyboard with numpad, the keys of which I remap to very common functions so I don't have to use combos for them :) I wonder if I'm just weird or if this is a common thing.

erk__ 3y ago
There is also one-handed keyboards like that, for example the one from Maltron: http://www.maltron.com/store/p19/Maltron_Single_Hand_Keyboards_-_US_English.html http://www.maltron.com/store/p19/Maltron_Single_Hand_Keyboar...

Findecanor 3y ago

The hardware is one half of the DIY split ergo-mech Lily58. It is open source and kits are widely available. <https://github.com/kata0510/Lily58 https://github.com/kata0510/Lily58> The FrogPad-inspired part is the firmware/layout for only one hand and the labels in the relegendable keycaps.

ChuckMcM 3y ago

This is excellent. I had a frogpad and got reasonably comfortable with it, my use case was mostly messaging so not a heavy use of special characters like {}/|Etc. Given my experience with it, I agree that using it as a model for this project was a good choice. An acquaintance, Steve Roberts, had a really clever keyboard that attached to the handlebars of his recumbent bicycle so that he could type while riding.

benterris 3y ago
Out of curiosity, how fast did you type on the frogpad ?
- ChuckMcM 3y ago
  I really don't know, I didn't measure it. It wasn't as fast as a QWERTY keyboard but it was fast enough. It was definitely way faster than typing using a 10 key numpad on a phone. Based on Steve's recommendation I had also tried a one-hand keyboard that was basically a half sphere with buttons for your four fingers and a number of 'shift' buttons for your thumb (basically all chord all the time) and I never got comfortable enough with it to use it for any length of time.

s_m_t 3y ago

A nice hack for building a small keyboard/macro pad that is 80% of the way there is to buy one of those cherry mx key testers, a microcontroller dev board of your choice, and a small lipo. All together it might cost you something like $40 depending on how many keys your key tester has and you should only need a soldering iron and some wire to put it together.

gtrevorjay 3y ago
I second this as a great way to get started. If you look on Amazon there are a bunch of cheap eight key macros (Lichifit makes one) that are built via layers of acrylic: a base layer, a layer that houses the microcontroller, and a layer for the keyboard. It's easy enough to sub your own micro and 3D print a replacement layer.
TylerE 3y ago
Those are handy to have anyway. I have a tester that originally had 64 keys that is down to 56 or so… I normally like really light keys, like 30-40g, but it’s nice to have much heavier action on a few keys like backspace and numpad enter so you can give em a really satisfying thwack without bottoming out. Sure there are places that will sell switches in lots of 5 or 10, but it’s really nice to be able to swap out and experiment and see just how much heavier works for a given key. My actual ideal would probably be something more like a layout that aimed for equal perceived (instead of actual) force. So basically heavier towards the middle and lighter towards the outside, but done mindfully of kinematics and ergonomics.

swayvil 3y ago

Optimized voice typing? A special voice-code. Like Thufir Hawat did in Dune (the old one). Because I can talk way faster than type. And if we could just iron out the bumps. Remove ambiguities and such. Surely that's been done. (Or even more specialized, for writing java...)

densh 3y ago
Talon Voice with enough tweaking, lots of practice, and a good mic can get you there. https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=Mz3JeYfBTcY https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=Mz3JeYfBTcY
loloquwowndueo 3y ago
Cusorless and Talon! https://xeiaso.net/notes/cursorless-alien-magic/ https://xeiaso.net/notes/cursorless-alien-magic/

carom 3y ago

I have dreamed of one of these for driving. Touch typing would make responding to something while keeping eyes on the road much much easier.

Symbiote 3y ago
It's necessary to keep your brain on the road, as well as your eyes — and your hands on the wheel.
- samatman 3y ago
  If it were built into the steering wheel and used a HUD to display the text it might not be criminally irresponsible..
  - loloquwowndueo 3y ago
    No. If you’re focusing on text on the windshield 50cm in front of you you are NOT focusing on the road.
  - al_borland 3y ago
    This would only give the illusion of paying attention to the road, without paying attention to the road. It might actually be worse.

Syzygies 3y ago

I have experience with both the FrogPad and the Matias Half Keyboard (I paid $95; now $595). The Frogpad never caught on with me. https://matias.store/products/half-keyboard https://matias.store/products/half-keyboard The Matias Half Keyboard is based on a theory that our minds mirror each hand, so by holding the space bar to access the missing half keyboard, we already know what to do. I was skeptical. Recognizing that we're modal (do we even recognize that telephone keypads and numeric keypads are different, or do we just use them without thinking?) I decided to learn Dvorak on the half keyboard while continuing to use QWERTY on my full keyboards. One day, on a lark, I tried Dvorak on a full keyboard. I could, easily. The mirror theory holds.

hinkley 3y ago
There’s a trick with phantom limb pain and mirrors as well.
Palomides 3y ago
I've also tested out a mirror layout on a standard keyboard, it's shockingly easy to pick up
gnicholas 3y ago
> the Matias Half Keyboard (I paid $95; now $595) Ha, same here. Seems like they discovered that the mainstream demand for this is quite low, but the reimbursement potential for ADA/HR purposes was much higher.
eyelidlessness 3y ago
Another anecdata. I had a bike accident which took my left hand out of commission for a while. It was after the Matias keyboard became so expensive, and I was broke. But I was motivated enough to try the concept that I hacked together a software implementation that behaved more or less the same way on a standard full size keyboard by swapping to a mirrored system keyboard layout while holding the spacebar for a short time. The software itself was buggy as hell (I learned just enough ObjC to get it kinda working), but even so the mirroring concept worked perfectly for me. It was basically no learning curve (full QWERTY to half QWERTY), and I only took a slight hit to typing speed. The first thing I did was prove it out by building another bit of software to relaunch the first whenever it crashed, and then worked full time with it for a couple months. Typing was never quite as subconscious for me as it is with both hands, but it was as close to that as I could imagine.

paradox460 3y ago

I created a one-hand layout, similar to the FrogPad, for my Ergodox, and then wound up never bothering to use it seriously, at which point the muscle memory I spent a few weeks training up fell away

gtrevorjay 3y ago

I can't imagine another cocktail party where my own one handed keyboard would be relevant, so here it is: https://github.com/trevorjay/Handler https://github.com/trevorjay/Handler It's chorded, (based on the https://ardux.io/ https://ardux.io/ layout), but I don't think chorded is really that hard to learn if you're actually willing to give it a week or two (which you have in any situation where you need a one hander). The key (ha) I've found is that you want the keys to be as easy to press as possible while providing feedback. The Twiddler, https://twiddler.tekgear.com/ https://twiddler.tekgear.com/ , is great for this as it uses light tact switches, but it has reliability issues. This is a great project. Of all my one-handed experience, I never got to try a FrogPad because of the expense. Having a software implementation of the FrogPad is awesome.

stavros 3y ago
Here's mine: https://www.stavros.io/posts/keyyyyyyyys/ https://www.stavros.io/posts/keyyyyyyyys/ Wildly impractical, but super easy to build.
- yjftsjthsd-h 3y ago
  Having seen this but not yet having gotten to building it - is it wildly impractical? It looks a little slow (and obviously there's a learning curve) but it seems like it would work nicely in a number of cases where a normal keyboard wouldn't. (Ex. I bet I could use it on an exercise bike)
  - stavros 3y ago
    To be honest, I've only used it twice. It was fine, really, there's just a big learning curve and it can only do 32 characters. I imagine that, with some good autocorrect, it might be fairly usable.
    - extraduder_ire 3y ago
      Something like a t9 dictionary might be useful for it, even if you'd probably need the other device to handle the dictionary unless you wanted it hacky as all hell. Replacing the thumb button with some kind of clicky D-pad (D-pad mounted on a microswitch) would be a somewhat easy way to add more buttons. (my first thought was going with two per finger by adding one around the side or to a strap on the outside of your fingers)

sobkas 3y ago

There is no better keyboard and mouse than no keyboard and mouse. Does anyone knows a solution that allows to provide input without the need to move your arms and/or fingers? I have heard about brainwave detection but apparently it's hard to learn, slow and have a high latency. Any ideas?

yjftsjthsd-h 3y ago
There's eviacam, though it's code rotting:(
morjom 3y ago
There's many accessibility focused input devices that lets you use your mouth/tongue. There's also foot pedals, voice activation software etc.
jauntywundrkind 3y ago
I really wish I had the capacity & skills to take on some hobbyist eye tracking efforts. I think a huge amount of work could be done by looking, or looking with some modifiers. At some point I need to start doing some machine learning stuff. I'm intimidated to get started, and it feels like there's better tooling emerging. Also, I don't want to go Nvidia so it feels like I'm starting out in Hard mode. But some day I need to pick something like Keras and do some basic ML image processing or what not with my Radeon rx580, if it can.
IggleSniggle 3y ago
If you don't mind using other limbs, there's a whole ton of products aimed at musicians who have their hands full but still want to be able to manipulate another device. For example, the organ, guitar pedals, and much, much more. Big variety of pedal setups generally, but musicians have been dealing with the "no hands" input problem for a very long time. There are also a number of existing eye tracking input systems, but I think that kinda sucks / is limiting. I'm aware of tongue-activated joysticks for people that are unable to move their bodies. Maybe look into assistive devices of that variety. https://youtu.be/MtvpXr9O0J4?si=S8tJJm08_J5bzWMb https://youtu.be/MtvpXr9O0J4?si=S8tJJm08_J5bzWMb

deleted 3y ago

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nsonha 3y ago

Kinda related, I assume accessibility commercial products to be more expensive. Is there any government incentive to help with that?