7 ms·

A USB Interface to the "Mother of All Demos" Keyset

321 points by zdw 2y ago

kens 2y ago
Author here if there are any questions...
- gargablegar 2y ago
  Thank you for this, wonderful break down of some amazing history. I have watched that demo many many times in my pursuit of human computer interface thinking. I often wondered what happened to this piece of hardware… I still hold a deep belief that our current input methods are flawed(as amazing as they are) and we are in need of another leap forward. Anyway great read - thank you again.
- xkriva11 2y ago
  How did Engelbart render black text on a white background during his 1968 Demo, considering that the display technology at the time was based on vector CRTs, which typically produced glowing light rather than dark areas?
  - kens 2y ago
    Output was displayed on 5" CRTs. High-resolution TV cameras (875-line) transmitted the CRT output to 17" monitors at each work station. By flipping a switch, the video could be inverted, so you could get either black lines on a light background or white lines on a black background. In other words, Engelbart invented dark mode :-)
    - xkriva11 2y ago
      Crazy. This clearly demonstrates their focus on output, even at the expense of cost-effectiveness. Was TREE-META directly linked to META-II?
      - kens 2y ago
        As far as I can tell, TREE-META and META II were unrelated compiler compilers.
        kragen 2y ago
        I vaguely remember the published description of TREE-META crediting META-II, though I might be confabulating that. More broadly, I don't think any compiler-compiler is unrelated to META-II.
    - kragen 2y ago
      Plausibly someone else in Engelbart's lab, or a group of people, invented it. He always complained about people assigning him credit for the whole team's output.
- DonHopkins 2y ago
  Hey, great to see this, thank you so much, Ken! I'm lucky to own an original Engelbart mouse and chord keyset too, and I want to make usable replicas by 3d scanning them, making 3d printable models, and embedding metal and electronic parts so they work via bluetooth! The first step is to take it apart, measure and weigh the pieces, 3d scan it, and make a realistic 3d printable all plastic model (like an easy-to-print toy), but then refine it to make a high quality hybrid version with the exact same weight and feel and materials and electronics using resin printing and off the shelf hardware like the wheel, so it feels as realistic as possible and actually works! I think reproducing the actual weight and feel of the original is really important, the klunky feel of the wheel attached to the potentiometer hitting the rotation limit, how it scrapes across the table, etc. It's really amazing to hold and feel in your own hand, and it belongs in a hands-on museum like the Exploratorium, but it would quickly get destroyed. So it would be great if anyone who wants could 3d print their own quick and easy plastic replica, or assemble their own high quality functional replica too. I want to release the simple model and detailed plans to make your own for free, and think it would be a great kit or pre-assembled gadget that the Computer History Museum could sell in the gift store. It would also be cool to include an accelerometer and gyro in it so it would also work as a gestural game controller -- why not: it would be so cheap and easy to add! Here are some parts I'm considering using, but I'm new to this stuff -- what do people with more experience think? Microcontroller: ESP32-S3 module (USB + Bluetooth capabilities) Motion Sensor: MPU6050 6-axis accelerometer/gyroscope 2× 10KΩ potentiometers for X/Y tracking wheels 3× tactile buttons with pull-up resistors 3.7V LiPo battery (350-500mAh) TP4056 charging module USB-C connector (for both charging and wired mode) I'd love to discuss the project with you, a free open non-profit labor of love, and I hope we can collaborate! I just invested in a Bambu 3d printer and Raptor 3d scanner just for this project, so I'm ready to get started scanning and printing. Please drop me an email at: don@donhopkins.com
  - bch 2y ago
    Hi Don. I think this stuff is great, and applaud your work, so don’t think of this as a slight (depending on the answer, of course): how practical is this? Again, if the answer is approximately “not at all practical”, that’s fair, but I guess I could also see it fitting somewhere on a spectrum like emacs vs vi, QWERTY vs Dvorak, etc…
- ChrisGammell 2y ago
  I always drop everything to read when there are new articles. Keep up the great work Ken!
- unit149 2y ago
  [dead]
- thakoppno 2y ago
  Are there any opportunities for the local community to help preserve this history? There’s a new development planned for the SRI site and I was hoping there’d be some honorary for that hallowed ground.
  - kens 2y ago
    Christina Engelbart is working to preserve the history at the Doug Engelbart Institute: https://www.dougengelbart.org/ https://www.dougengelbart.org/
- kragen 2y ago
  Thanks for writing this! You misspelled "eidophor". Brad Neuberg (the founder of coworking) worked with Doug about 15 years ago to hook up one of these keysets to a then-current computer to use Augment. Any idea what happened to that work?
  - kragen 2y ago
    (I see that "eidophor" is fixed.)
bsindcatr 2y ago
It’s amazing to me not only how much things haven’t changed (many still use mouse, joystick, keyboard) but how much things have changed. A dedicated keyset for frequent functions like this is certainly cool, and there was a time where it was cool to have num pad and function keys, but then most users started to use modifier keys (shift, ctrl, option, later added cmd) on their keyboards. We started with joysticks, then mice, then some trackballs, haptic joystick, light pen, touchpad, then haptic touch screen. And we have some voice interaction, then some immersive VR and augmented reality, then interaction with AI that can hear and see things, and we have some movement in brain interfacing over the years. What is next? (I apologize for leaving many things out and getting them in the wrong order. Just going on memory.)
- deleted 2y ago
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deleted 2y ago
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andrehacker 2y ago
Fascinating read as always Ken. It seems that the concept of a “Chorded Keyboard” from Douglas then spawned several relatively successful successors later on: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chorded_keyboard https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chorded_keyboard Growing up in the Netherlands in the 80s it was hard to not be aware of the “Velotype”: it had more keys and supposedly made it easier to learn the “chords”. Your reference to the book Nerds 2.0.1 is great, the book is a companion to the excelent PBS 3-part series from 1998 https://archive.org/details/movies?tab=collection&query=Nerds+2.0.1 https://archive.org/details/movies?tab=collection&query=Nerd...
- rwmj 2y ago
  Back in the mid '80s our school was given a small number of Microwriter chorded keyboards (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microwriter https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microwriter) for our BBC Micro lab. Even as 12 year olds we were already crazy good touch-typists, so the Microwriter felt very clunky and unintuitive to us. I don't know what the lesson is from that. Just because it seems a good idea doesn't mean that it is. Or typewriter-style keyboards have survived over a century and a half for a reason.
  - Cpoll 2y ago
    I'm not convinced either of those are the lessons. I think the reason for the keyboard's success is that it has a smooth learning curve. A neophyte can hunt-and-peck with a keyboard. Not so with a chorded keyboard.
    - amoshebb 2y ago
      but then it kinda stops, couldn’t we layer on chords as well, you can peck “t h e” or just mash “eth” and both would result in “the”, or maybe some sort of english pinyin where only the first few chars are needed?
      - rwmj 2y ago
        Predictive text? But it's also an example of an incremental improvement that someone could experiment with to see if it works. Much easier than having to prototype entirely new hardware (especially in the 80s, in an era before cheap additive prototyping).
jarpineh 2y ago
I sometimes wonder if chorded keyboard would be better for controlling the computer and keeping better posture against RSI issues. Not to mention more compact space compared to full keyboard. I seem to remember from a recording of the demo (and few writings on subject) that the keyset and mouse were used together for more powerful effect than either one alone. What I haven't found out is how well a multilingual writer could use these. Do the chords rely on properties of particular language, like English. Does the chord order follow from how often you write letter a instead of x. Would another language be adaptable to same chords, or do you need to make an optimized version?
- DonHopkins 2y ago
  Douglas Engelbart used a straightforward binary encoding scheme for the chord keyset: Engelbart Explains Binary Text Input. Douglas Engelbart explains to co-inventor, Valerie Landau, and some blogger how binary can be used for text input. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DB_dLeEasL8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DB_dLeEasL8 Engelbart: Think about if you took each finger, and wrote a one on this one, a two on this one, a four on this one, and a sixteen on this one. And every combination would lead clear up to sixty three. And so writing here like this the alphabet: A... B... C... D. E. F. G, H, I, JKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ! https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43454343 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43454343 The commercially available "TapXR" input device also functions as a mouse and gestural pointing device! It's a wearable tap glove that functions as both a bluetooth keyboard and mouse. I haven't tried it yet though, but it looks really cool. https://www.tapwithus.com/ https://www.tapwithus.com/ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sdm8FcsKeoM https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sdm8FcsKeoM A WRISTBAND THAT REPLACES Your Keyboard, Mouse & Handheld Controller TapXR was designed to help humans adapt to the next generation of personal computing. A Unified Way To Interact With Your PC, Smartphone, Tablet, SmartTV, Projector, VR, AR & XR 80+ Words Per Minute Input up to 10 characters a second with just one hand or go even faster with two. 150+ Customizable Commands Remap any finger combination into your favorite shortcuts, triggers, key-binds and commands 2500+ Tap Layouts Enjoy thousands of user-created Language, Utility, Coding, Production & Gaming TapMaps - or make your own! 8 Hours of Battery Life Get a full day of input on a single charge. Only 1 hour to recharge from zero to full! ---- My previous post about an earlier version from about 7 years ago: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17122717 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17122717 DonHopkins on May 21, 2018 | prev | next [–] I just ran across a new device called "Tap", a wearable tap glove that functions as both a bluetooth keyboard and mouse! https://www.tapwithus.com/ https://www.tapwithus.com/ I've had any "hands on" experience with the Tap, but it looks very cool, like a modern version of Douglas Engelbart's and Valerie Landau's HandWriter glove! I asked Valerie Landau about it (wondering if it was her company), but she hadn't heard of it before. They have an iOS, Android and Unity3D SDK that appeared on github recently, so you can look at the code to see how it works: https://github.com/TapWithUs https://github.com/TapWithUs Does this look legit? Has anybody tried it? If it works as advertised, I'd love to develop TapPieMenus that you can use in VR, mobile, desktop computers, and everywhere else! I'm excited about the possibility of creating easy to use, fast and reliable pie menus for Tap that users can fully customize, and use with one hand in the same way that Douglass Engelbart described you could do with two hands using a mouse and a chorded keyboard: >"Well, when you're doing things with the mouse, you can be in parallel, doing things that take character input. And then the system we had, it actually gave you commands with characters, too. Like you had a D and a W, and it says, "you want to delete a word", and pick on which word, and click, it goes. M W would be move a word. Click on this one, click on that one, that one could move over there. Replace character, replace word, transpose words. All those things you could do with your left hand giving commands, and right hand doing it." It would be cool to have some tactile feedback, so the tutorial could train you to type out letters by vibrating your fingers with a piezo buzzer or something, and maybe it could even secretly spell out silent invisible messages to you while you were wearing it! And you could feel a different silent finger "ring tone" depending on who was calling you, then tap to answer to discard the call, or stroke with a TapPieMenu to send a canned reply. enobrev on May 22, 2018 | parent | next [–] LinusTechTips posted a decent review of the Tap a few weeks ago: https://youtu.be/8za_4g5zCOM https://youtu.be/8za_4g5zCOM
DonHopkins 2y ago
Doug Engelbart's advice to a young software developer [video] (youtube.com) 183 points by DonHopkins on May 21, 2018 | hide | past | favorite | 39 comments https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17121629 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17121629 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=62ig8ecXlrA https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=62ig8ecXlrA Valerie Landau interviewed by Martin Wasserman DonHopkins on May 21, 2018 | prev | next [–] I found this incredibly interesting stuff on Valerie Landau's youtube channel of Douglass Engelbart, her mentor. The videos have apparently been viewed only a few times, but they deserve much more attention, because the ideas presented are so important and relevant today! She was a long time friend and collaborator with Doug Engelbart, and she was responsible for transferring the 1968 film of The Mother of All Demos from film to video so it could be preserved. She tracked him down and interviewed him, and after airing the interview, he asked her to help him articulate his vision to share with the world, which she's been working on since then. https://www.youtube.com/user/islandeweller/videos https://www.youtube.com/user/islandeweller/videos https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Valerie_Landau https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Valerie_Landau Valerie Landau is an American designer, author and educator. She serves as Director of Assessment at Samuel Merritt University where she designed a software application that facilitates analysis and assessment of how effectively an organization is meeting their goals and objectives at course, program and institutional levels. She has filed two patents along with her colleague and mentor Douglas Engelbart. Their most recent patent (filed April 2010) describes multitouch interface for chorded text entry. The new patent is inspired by Engelbart's early work developing the Chorded keyboard. They also released an application for the iPhone for chorded texting called "TipTapSpeech". Engelbart and Landau also collaborated on writing the book "The Engelbart Hypothesis: Dialogs with Douglas Engelbart" along with co-author Eileen Clegg. Landau is also a co-founder of Program for the Future, a non-profit organization that promotes Engelbart's vision of Collective Intelligence. She also is author of the seminal book on online education "Developing an Effective Online Course" and earned the "Online Pioneer" award. Landau, also known for her work in multimedia at Round World Media and for her work mentoring students in a three-year project studying and applying the Engelbart Hypothesis. and created an online archive of Engelbart related events and videos. She is an instructional and interaction designer and has worked on many award-winning projects, educational games and online courses. In addition, she leads high level research delegations to Cuba. Valerie Landau interviewed by Martin Wasserman https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=62ig8ecXlrA https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=62ig8ecXlrA ---- Engelbart Explains Binary Text Input. Douglas Engelbart explains to co-inventor, Valerie Landau, and some blogger how binary can be used for text input. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DB_dLeEasL8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DB_dLeEasL8 Engelbart: Think about if you took each finger, and wrote a one on this one, a two on this one, a four on this one, and a sixteen on this one. And every combination would lead clear up to sixty three. And so writing here like this the alphabet: A... B... C... D. E. F. G, H, I, JKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ! ---- Engelbart Using HandWriter. Douglas Engelbart demonstrates early prototype of The HandWriter with Valerie Landau. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s5wAD2aji3Q https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s5wAD2aji3Q Q: So whose ideas was the glove? Engelbart: I invented actually a separate keyset with the five keys, and her idea, you can make a glove to do that. Q: And what's the advantage of using a five key chording system? Engelbart: Well, when you're doing things with the mouse, you can be in parallel, doing things that take character input. And then the system we had, it actually gave you commands with characters, too. Like you had a D and a W, and it says, "you want to delete a word", and pick on which word, and click, it goes. M W would be move a word. Click on this one, click on that one, that one could move over there. Replace character, replace word, transpose words. All those things you could do with your left hand giving commands, and right hand doing it. ---- iChord: Clips from video of Eric Matsuno & Valerie Landau showing their new iPhone app to Douglas Engelbart. To Douglas C Engelbart and Bill English, and to Karen Engelbart, Roberta English and Mary Coppernoll. Present in spirit but not in molecules were: Evan Schaffer and Dr. Robert Stephenson. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-XXdnu5n9vI https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-XXdnu5n9vI So we're going to be able to be configurable for whoever's hand. [...] Go ahead and give it a try: so swiping it down puts it in the history, and swiping it left takes the last ... ---- Andres Types His Name Andres writing his name on TipTap late on a Saturday night. I arrived home after a party and found him typing on TipTapSpeech. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9WI88q7coEY https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9WI88q7coEY ---- This final silent video is chock full of photos and memories of Douglass Engelbart's friends and family, drawings, whiteboards, posters and brainstorming sessions! Memories with Douglas Engelbart: Photos from my work with Douglas Engelbart creating a Educational Networked Improvement Community Engelbart and working with Eileen Clegg on the writing of the book the Engelbart Hypothesis: Diaglogs with Douglas Engelbart. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dPnsWKikS_w https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dPnsWKikS_w
jntun 2y ago
I've recently been reading lots of books about 50/60/70s computing & especially the San Francisco element of it, so I've been watching Engelbart's demo myself on and off for the last few weeks. It really is amazing being "close" to all this time of history, even if the only way we can interact with it is over USB nowadays! Tiniest footnote correction but not only were the desk & offices designed by Herman Miller; the chair Engelbart is sitting on during the demo was also specially designed by Herman Miller!
- dfc 2y ago
  Can you share some of the titles about computing in the 50-70s?
  - ecliptik 2y ago
    I've been reading The Innovators[1], which includes early computing history, just finished the section on The Mother of all Demos yesterday coincidentally. 1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Innovators_(book) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Innovators_(book)
  - jntun 2y ago
    Of course! What the Dormouse Said: How the Sixties Counterculture Shaped the Personal Computer Industry [2005] Dealers of Lightning: Xerox PARC and the Dawn of the Computer Age [2000] Accidental Empires: How the Boys of Silicon Valley Make Their Millions, Battle Foreign Competition, and Still Can't Get a Date [1996] Palo Alto [2023] (This is more for capturing the full scope of San Francisco / Palo Alto since the founding of California as a state) Those are some off the top of my head right now being away from my library, probably also the most impactful to me in no specific order.
  - pmcjones 2y ago
    The Dream Machine by M. Mitchell Waldrop Computing in the Middle Ages by Severo Ornstein - https://worrydream.com/refs/Ornstein_2002_-_Computing_in_the_Middle_Ages.pdf https://worrydream.com/refs/Ornstein_2002_-_Computing_in_the...
neilv 2y ago
> Engelbart's demo also featured an input device known as the keyset, but unlike his other innovations, the keyset failed to catch on. Chording keyboards were popular among the "wearable computing" researchers (who then went on to work on things like Google Glass). For example, the Twiddler. One advantage of them is that you only need one hand to operate it. And some designs mean you can simultaneously hold it with that same hand, without a steady surface.
- miki123211 2y ago
  chording keyboards are still extremely popular among the blind, after all, chording is how you type Braille. They appear on everything from mechanical Braillers of the 1950's[1], to modern, electronic Braille displays and notetakers. Input methods based on this concept and adapted for the touch screen are even built in to both iOS[2] and Android[3]. [1] https://wecapable.com/perkins-brailler-braille-typing/ https://wecapable.com/perkins-brailler-braille-typing/ [2] https://support.apple.com/en-us/101637 https://support.apple.com/en-us/101637 [3] https://blog.google/products/android/braille-keyboard/ https://blog.google/products/android/braille-keyboard/
- DonHopkins 2y ago
  >[...] but unlike his other innovations, the keyset failed to catch on. I'm sad that he and others like Ted Nelson and Brett Victor would rightly say that his most important innovations have so far failed to catch on. But there's still time to raise awareness and make them real! Ted Nelson's Eulogy for Douglas Engelbart https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yMjPqr1s-cg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yMjPqr1s-cg >Ted Nelson's emotional and moving eulogy for his friend Douglas Engelbart. Given at the Computer History Museum in Mountain View, CA, on December 9, 2013. An Homage to Douglas Engelbart and a Critique of the State of Tech: https://archive.nytimes.com/bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/12/16/an-homage-to-douglas-engelbart-and-a-critique-of-the-state-of-tech/ https://archive.nytimes.com/bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/12/1... >You don’t need me to tell you that Douglas Engelbart was one of the greatest men of all time. We gather today, in pretense of unanimity and concord, to croon over Doug’s ashes and grab for scraps of his robe. >Everyone here will of course say they are carrying on his work, by whatever twisted interpretation. I for one carry on his work by keeping the links outside the file, as he did. >Some are no doubt here to cheer and march behind the mouse, as in the opening of the Mickey Mouse TV Club of yore. Let them be happy in that celebration. >But the real ashes to be mourned are the ashes of Doug’s great dreams and vision, that we dance around in the costume party of fonts that swept aside his ideas of structure and collaboration. >Don’t get me wrong, the people who gave us all those fonts were idealists too, in their way — they just didn’t necessarily hold a very high view of human potential. >I used to have a high view of human potential. But no one ever had such a soaring view of human potential as Douglas Carl Engelbart — and he gave us wings to soar with him, though his mind flew on ahead, where few could see. > Like Icarus, he tried to fly too far too fast, and the wings melted off. [...] Doug and Karen Engelbart marry Marlene and Ted, May 2012: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TsKFbwLeS1k https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TsKFbwLeS1k >Poignant ceremony with sweet pledges, at the Marin Civic Center. Ann and Bill Duvall are co-celebrants. Underexposed and streaky, but the event is the important thing. (Battery ran out before the final verdict. Other camera was far away.) A few words on Doug Engelbart: https://worrydream.com/Engelbart/ https://worrydream.com/Engelbart/ >Doug Engelbart died today. His work has always been very difficult for writers to interpret and explain. >Technology writers, in particular, tend to miss the point miserably, because they see everything as a technology problem. Engelbart devoted his life to a human problem, with technology falling out as part of a solution. When I read tech writers' interviews with Engelbart, I imagine these writers interviewing George Orwell, asking in-depth probing questions about his typewriter. >Here's the most facile interpretation of Engelbart, splendidly exhibited by this New York Times headline: >"Douglas C. Engelbart, Inventor of the Computer Mouse, Dies at 88" >This is as if you found the person who invented writing, and credited them for inventing the pencil. (This analogy may be more apt than any of us are comfortable with.) >Then there's the shopping list interpretation: >His system, called NLS, showed actual instances of, or precursors to, hypertext, shared screen collaboration, multiple windows, on-screen video teleconferencing, and the mouse as an input device. >These are not true statements. [...]
Animats 2y ago
The original chording keyboard was from Baudot, around 1897.[1] The original plan was for the sender to send 5-bit teletype characters with a 5-bit keyboard. This was deployed, not just a prototype. [1] https://collection.sciencemuseumgroup.org.uk/objects/co33197/baudot-five-key-keyboard-1897-1926 https://collection.sciencemuseumgroup.org.uk/objects/co33197...
- pests 2y ago
  Here is a great run down of that history: https://computer.rip/2024-02-25-a-history-of-the-tty.html https://computer.rip/2024-02-25-a-history-of-the-tty.html Early versions had to be mechanically synced at the sending and receiving side. The typists had strict timings so the other end could receive it. This led to a version of punch cards that could be pre-typed and then fed in automatically, reducing the skill needed of the operator. The linage to teletypes were almost obvious. Very good read, don't want to spoil too much.
  - Animats 2y ago
    The form of a keyboard had to be invented. Early printing telegraphs used a piano-like keyboard, with white and black keys.[1] (Keeping both ends in sync was a huge problem. The machine shown was synched by having the sending operator send AAAAAAAAA while the receiving operator made adjustments. If the machines got out of sync, the receiving operator opened the line switch, which stopped local echo at the sending end. Then both ends had to repeat the AAAAAAAAA drill. It took a long time, from 1846 to 1907, until Howard Krum finally came up with a mechanism that didn't have sync problems. Krum had the advantage that steel and stamping were available. The clock industry had figured out how to mass-produce mechanisms. Mechanism design then got out of the handmade brass era. This was, in its day, an advance comparable to going from tubes to ICs.) [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zJCfhbPAv9c https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zJCfhbPAv9c
    - pests 2y ago
      Great video.
Animats 2y ago
Mandatory XKCD.[1] [1] https://xkcd.com/1234/ https://xkcd.com/1234/
KennyBlanken 2y ago
Chorded keyboards always seemed like an ergonomic nightmare - every keystroke is now multiple fingers having to move. You're multiplying the repetitive action...
einpoklum 2y ago
[flagged]
- deleted 2y ago
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adminm 2y ago
I'm sure there's a (mythical at the moment) device just waiting to "disrupt they keyboard industry" It's crazy that most of us are effectively using a fancy typewriter. Qwerty layout dates 1874, clocking in at just over 150 years of age.
- brandonmenc 2y ago
  We already did. It's called the mouse.
  - adminm 2y ago
    You type faster with your mouse than keyboard?
GregDavidson 2y ago
I regularly use my Twiddler with my Android phone. It allows me to fully operate all the applications I use on my desktop computer, e.g. Emacs. https://www.mytwiddler.com/ https://www.mytwiddler.com/
- nanna 2y ago
  Even Emacs? Do say more...
  - mcshicks 2y ago
    I have a twiddler and tried doing this a long time ago i.e. emacs with a twiddler. For me I really needed to use a sticky cntl and alt key because I just couldn't press the cntl button on the top and chord at the same time. And I couldn't figure out how to make the sticky cntl work on the phone. But that was a very long time ago. Now I just use a mini bt keyboard and termux to run emacsclient over ssh and that's good enough for what I want.
vagab0nd 2y ago
It's cool. But it's missing the 411/305Hz sawtooth. Last year I tried to setup my vim to play these beeps in normal/edit modes and on some key presses. It was quite fun but I wasn't able to play a long lasting sound like in the demo.
peteforde 2y ago
I urge you to consider using an RC network with a hex inverter to debounce your switch input without resorting to a 100ms delay. I've wasted enough hours to know that the best kind of software debounce is a few resistors and capacitors. https://mayaposch.wordpress.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/06/debounce_rc.png?w=640 https://mayaposch.wordpress.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/06/d...
- kragen 2y ago
  I feel like the diode in this schematic is the wrong way around for a normally open switch: it speeds up the keyrelease event when the switch opens instead of the keypress event when it closes. But I think the 100ms delay Ken mentions was intended for a different purpose: to wait for all the fingers in the character to be detected. I think a much better approach would be to wait for one of the keys to be released before registering a character. Isn't that what Engelbart did? I suspect this timing-based approach explains why Ken found it so difficult to use. As I understand it, Baudot's original chording keyboard instead mechanically locked the keys down until the character was transmitted over the telegraph line. The telegrapher had time to enter his next character while the system was transmitting the characters of his colleagues, interleaved with his own at a fixed baud rate.
  - peteforde 2y ago
    Oh, that (waiting for all fingers to be detected) does indeed change how I would approach the scenario, and blew past me in my initial reading. That all said, even with 100ms cycles I would hardware debounce the inputs, capture the keystrokes with an ISR to set some semaphore variables, and then create a 100ms loop that checks the current value (and resets) those semaphore variables. Eliminating switch bounce allows far more elegant software handling of the values you're reading, so Ken could turn his attention and development energy towards things like sliding time windows (100ms starting from the first keydown, for example) instead of trying to boil the ocean cancelling bounces.
    - kragen 2y ago
      Yeah, the 100ms wait after stability probably avoids any need to debounce. You need to debounce if you want to detect both keypress and keyrelease events reliably, though. For mass-production products it's cheaper to add 100 lines of code to your firmware than to add a resistor to your PCB, much less a diode, capacitor, and two resistors, but for prototypes and low-volume designs it's less clear. WRT ISRs, plausibly in this case the microcontroller can just poll instead of using interrupts. You probably don't mean "semaphore"; semaphores are a blocking construct, and if there's one thing you can't do in an ISR, it's block.
spit2wind 2y ago
Obligatory mention of the Plover stenography engine: https://www.openstenoproject.org/plover/ https://www.openstenoproject.org/plover/ So far most boards seem to be made in the US. Anyone making them in Europe or elsewhere?
piyushgupta53 2y ago
this is such a great read!
vietjtnguyen 2y ago
Custom mechanical keyboard firmware like QMK [1] and ZMK [2] support custom chords called "combos". Basically if the combo's set of keys is hit (within some timeout which defaults to 50 ms) then a specific keycode is sent. You then get a fun game of identifying low probability combos and mapping then to useful keycodes. You also start realizing there's some prime real estate to take advantage of. Two-key combos require some thought cause bigrams can be surprisingly common. Three-key combos are basically open though. In migrating from the ZSA Voyager to a 36-key keyboard (Chocofi) I've relied on combos as I don't like overloading keys with tap-versus-hold behavior as I can never get the timing down. For example my left index, middle, and ring finger mashed down on the home row (resting position) is escape in my current layout (Colemak mod DK which means keys R, S, and T). It's three fingers but hardly any extra effort. I've managed to do away with a symbol layer and have been quite happy with the result. If anyone is curious here is my "36-key training layout" for the ZSA Voyager [3] and my current Chocofi layout [4]. 1: https://docs.qmk.fm/features/combo https://docs.qmk.fm/features/combo 2: https://zmk.dev/docs/keymaps/combos https://zmk.dev/docs/keymaps/combos 3: https://configure.zsa.io/voyager/layouts/d7L0v/latest/0 https://configure.zsa.io/voyager/layouts/d7L0v/latest/0 4: https://github.com/vietjtnguyen/zmk-chocofi/blob/main/config/corne.keymap https://github.com/vietjtnguyen/zmk-chocofi/blob/main/config...
imcritic 2y ago
The site is infected with CloudFlare.

321 points by zdw 2y ago

kens 2y ago

Author here if there are any questions...

gargablegar 2y ago
Thank you for this, wonderful break down of some amazing history. I have watched that demo many many times in my pursuit of human computer interface thinking. I often wondered what happened to this piece of hardware… I still hold a deep belief that our current input methods are flawed(as amazing as they are) and we are in need of another leap forward. Anyway great read - thank you again.
xkriva11 2y ago
How did Engelbart render black text on a white background during his 1968 Demo, considering that the display technology at the time was based on vector CRTs, which typically produced glowing light rather than dark areas?
- kens 2y ago
  Output was displayed on 5" CRTs. High-resolution TV cameras (875-line) transmitted the CRT output to 17" monitors at each work station. By flipping a switch, the video could be inverted, so you could get either black lines on a light background or white lines on a black background. In other words, Engelbart invented dark mode :-)
  - xkriva11 2y ago
    Crazy. This clearly demonstrates their focus on output, even at the expense of cost-effectiveness. Was TREE-META directly linked to META-II?
    - kens 2y ago
      As far as I can tell, TREE-META and META II were unrelated compiler compilers.
      - kragen 2y ago
        I vaguely remember the published description of TREE-META crediting META-II, though I might be confabulating that. More broadly, I don't think any compiler-compiler is unrelated to META-II.
  - kragen 2y ago
    Plausibly someone else in Engelbart's lab, or a group of people, invented it. He always complained about people assigning him credit for the whole team's output.
DonHopkins 2y ago
Hey, great to see this, thank you so much, Ken! I'm lucky to own an original Engelbart mouse and chord keyset too, and I want to make usable replicas by 3d scanning them, making 3d printable models, and embedding metal and electronic parts so they work via bluetooth! The first step is to take it apart, measure and weigh the pieces, 3d scan it, and make a realistic 3d printable all plastic model (like an easy-to-print toy), but then refine it to make a high quality hybrid version with the exact same weight and feel and materials and electronics using resin printing and off the shelf hardware like the wheel, so it feels as realistic as possible and actually works! I think reproducing the actual weight and feel of the original is really important, the klunky feel of the wheel attached to the potentiometer hitting the rotation limit, how it scrapes across the table, etc. It's really amazing to hold and feel in your own hand, and it belongs in a hands-on museum like the Exploratorium, but it would quickly get destroyed. So it would be great if anyone who wants could 3d print their own quick and easy plastic replica, or assemble their own high quality functional replica too. I want to release the simple model and detailed plans to make your own for free, and think it would be a great kit or pre-assembled gadget that the Computer History Museum could sell in the gift store. It would also be cool to include an accelerometer and gyro in it so it would also work as a gestural game controller -- why not: it would be so cheap and easy to add! Here are some parts I'm considering using, but I'm new to this stuff -- what do people with more experience think? Microcontroller: ESP32-S3 module (USB + Bluetooth capabilities) Motion Sensor: MPU6050 6-axis accelerometer/gyroscope 2× 10KΩ potentiometers for X/Y tracking wheels 3× tactile buttons with pull-up resistors 3.7V LiPo battery (350-500mAh) TP4056 charging module USB-C connector (for both charging and wired mode) I'd love to discuss the project with you, a free open non-profit labor of love, and I hope we can collaborate! I just invested in a Bambu 3d printer and Raptor 3d scanner just for this project, so I'm ready to get started scanning and printing. Please drop me an email at: don@donhopkins.com
- bch 2y ago
  Hi Don. I think this stuff is great, and applaud your work, so don’t think of this as a slight (depending on the answer, of course): how practical is this? Again, if the answer is approximately “not at all practical”, that’s fair, but I guess I could also see it fitting somewhere on a spectrum like emacs vs vi, QWERTY vs Dvorak, etc…
ChrisGammell 2y ago
I always drop everything to read when there are new articles. Keep up the great work Ken!
unit149 2y ago
[dead]
thakoppno 2y ago
Are there any opportunities for the local community to help preserve this history? There’s a new development planned for the SRI site and I was hoping there’d be some honorary for that hallowed ground.
- kens 2y ago
  Christina Engelbart is working to preserve the history at the Doug Engelbart Institute: https://www.dougengelbart.org/ https://www.dougengelbart.org/
kragen 2y ago
Thanks for writing this! You misspelled "eidophor". Brad Neuberg (the founder of coworking) worked with Doug about 15 years ago to hook up one of these keysets to a then-current computer to use Augment. Any idea what happened to that work?
- kragen 2y ago
  (I see that "eidophor" is fixed.)

bsindcatr 2y ago

It’s amazing to me not only how much things haven’t changed (many still use mouse, joystick, keyboard) but how much things have changed. A dedicated keyset for frequent functions like this is certainly cool, and there was a time where it was cool to have num pad and function keys, but then most users started to use modifier keys (shift, ctrl, option, later added cmd) on their keyboards. We started with joysticks, then mice, then some trackballs, haptic joystick, light pen, touchpad, then haptic touch screen. And we have some voice interaction, then some immersive VR and augmented reality, then interaction with AI that can hear and see things, and we have some movement in brain interfacing over the years. What is next? (I apologize for leaving many things out and getting them in the wrong order. Just going on memory.)

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andrehacker 2y ago

Fascinating read as always Ken. It seems that the concept of a “Chorded Keyboard” from Douglas then spawned several relatively successful successors later on: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chorded_keyboard https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chorded_keyboard Growing up in the Netherlands in the 80s it was hard to not be aware of the “Velotype”: it had more keys and supposedly made it easier to learn the “chords”. Your reference to the book Nerds 2.0.1 is great, the book is a companion to the excelent PBS 3-part series from 1998 https://archive.org/details/movies?tab=collection&query=Nerds+2.0.1 https://archive.org/details/movies?tab=collection&query=Nerd...

rwmj 2y ago
Back in the mid '80s our school was given a small number of Microwriter chorded keyboards (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microwriter https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microwriter) for our BBC Micro lab. Even as 12 year olds we were already crazy good touch-typists, so the Microwriter felt very clunky and unintuitive to us. I don't know what the lesson is from that. Just because it seems a good idea doesn't mean that it is. Or typewriter-style keyboards have survived over a century and a half for a reason.
- Cpoll 2y ago
  I'm not convinced either of those are the lessons. I think the reason for the keyboard's success is that it has a smooth learning curve. A neophyte can hunt-and-peck with a keyboard. Not so with a chorded keyboard.
  - amoshebb 2y ago
    but then it kinda stops, couldn’t we layer on chords as well, you can peck “t h e” or just mash “eth” and both would result in “the”, or maybe some sort of english pinyin where only the first few chars are needed?
    - rwmj 2y ago
      Predictive text? But it's also an example of an incremental improvement that someone could experiment with to see if it works. Much easier than having to prototype entirely new hardware (especially in the 80s, in an era before cheap additive prototyping).

jarpineh 2y ago

I sometimes wonder if chorded keyboard would be better for controlling the computer and keeping better posture against RSI issues. Not to mention more compact space compared to full keyboard. I seem to remember from a recording of the demo (and few writings on subject) that the keyset and mouse were used together for more powerful effect than either one alone. What I haven't found out is how well a multilingual writer could use these. Do the chords rely on properties of particular language, like English. Does the chord order follow from how often you write letter a instead of x. Would another language be adaptable to same chords, or do you need to make an optimized version?

DonHopkins 2y ago
Douglas Engelbart used a straightforward binary encoding scheme for the chord keyset: Engelbart Explains Binary Text Input. Douglas Engelbart explains to co-inventor, Valerie Landau, and some blogger how binary can be used for text input. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DB_dLeEasL8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DB_dLeEasL8 Engelbart: Think about if you took each finger, and wrote a one on this one, a two on this one, a four on this one, and a sixteen on this one. And every combination would lead clear up to sixty three. And so writing here like this the alphabet: A... B... C... D. E. F. G, H, I, JKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ! https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43454343 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43454343 The commercially available "TapXR" input device also functions as a mouse and gestural pointing device! It's a wearable tap glove that functions as both a bluetooth keyboard and mouse. I haven't tried it yet though, but it looks really cool. https://www.tapwithus.com/ https://www.tapwithus.com/ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sdm8FcsKeoM https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sdm8FcsKeoM A WRISTBAND THAT REPLACES Your Keyboard, Mouse & Handheld Controller TapXR was designed to help humans adapt to the next generation of personal computing. A Unified Way To Interact With Your PC, Smartphone, Tablet, SmartTV, Projector, VR, AR & XR 80+ Words Per Minute Input up to 10 characters a second with just one hand or go even faster with two. 150+ Customizable Commands Remap any finger combination into your favorite shortcuts, triggers, key-binds and commands 2500+ Tap Layouts Enjoy thousands of user-created Language, Utility, Coding, Production & Gaming TapMaps - or make your own! 8 Hours of Battery Life Get a full day of input on a single charge. Only 1 hour to recharge from zero to full! ---- My previous post about an earlier version from about 7 years ago: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17122717 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17122717 DonHopkins on May 21, 2018 | prev | next [–] I just ran across a new device called "Tap", a wearable tap glove that functions as both a bluetooth keyboard and mouse! https://www.tapwithus.com/ https://www.tapwithus.com/ I've had any "hands on" experience with the Tap, but it looks very cool, like a modern version of Douglas Engelbart's and Valerie Landau's HandWriter glove! I asked Valerie Landau about it (wondering if it was her company), but she hadn't heard of it before. They have an iOS, Android and Unity3D SDK that appeared on github recently, so you can look at the code to see how it works: https://github.com/TapWithUs https://github.com/TapWithUs Does this look legit? Has anybody tried it? If it works as advertised, I'd love to develop TapPieMenus that you can use in VR, mobile, desktop computers, and everywhere else! I'm excited about the possibility of creating easy to use, fast and reliable pie menus for Tap that users can fully customize, and use with one hand in the same way that Douglass Engelbart described you could do with two hands using a mouse and a chorded keyboard: >"Well, when you're doing things with the mouse, you can be in parallel, doing things that take character input. And then the system we had, it actually gave you commands with characters, too. Like you had a D and a W, and it says, "you want to delete a word", and pick on which word, and click, it goes. M W would be move a word. Click on this one, click on that one, that one could move over there. Replace character, replace word, transpose words. All those things you could do with your left hand giving commands, and right hand doing it." It would be cool to have some tactile feedback, so the tutorial could train you to type out letters by vibrating your fingers with a piezo buzzer or something, and maybe it could even secretly spell out silent invisible messages to you while you were wearing it! And you could feel a different silent finger "ring tone" depending on who was calling you, then tap to answer to discard the call, or stroke with a TapPieMenu to send a canned reply. enobrev on May 22, 2018 | parent | next [–] LinusTechTips posted a decent review of the Tap a few weeks ago: https://youtu.be/8za_4g5zCOM https://youtu.be/8za_4g5zCOM

DonHopkins 2y ago

Doug Engelbart's advice to a young software developer [video] (youtube.com) 183 points by DonHopkins on May 21, 2018 | hide | past | favorite | 39 comments https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17121629 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17121629 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=62ig8ecXlrA https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=62ig8ecXlrA Valerie Landau interviewed by Martin Wasserman DonHopkins on May 21, 2018 | prev | next [–] I found this incredibly interesting stuff on Valerie Landau's youtube channel of Douglass Engelbart, her mentor. The videos have apparently been viewed only a few times, but they deserve much more attention, because the ideas presented are so important and relevant today! She was a long time friend and collaborator with Doug Engelbart, and she was responsible for transferring the 1968 film of The Mother of All Demos from film to video so it could be preserved. She tracked him down and interviewed him, and after airing the interview, he asked her to help him articulate his vision to share with the world, which she's been working on since then. https://www.youtube.com/user/islandeweller/videos https://www.youtube.com/user/islandeweller/videos https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Valerie_Landau https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Valerie_Landau Valerie Landau is an American designer, author and educator. She serves as Director of Assessment at Samuel Merritt University where she designed a software application that facilitates analysis and assessment of how effectively an organization is meeting their goals and objectives at course, program and institutional levels. She has filed two patents along with her colleague and mentor Douglas Engelbart. Their most recent patent (filed April 2010) describes multitouch interface for chorded text entry. The new patent is inspired by Engelbart's early work developing the Chorded keyboard. They also released an application for the iPhone for chorded texting called "TipTapSpeech". Engelbart and Landau also collaborated on writing the book "The Engelbart Hypothesis: Dialogs with Douglas Engelbart" along with co-author Eileen Clegg. Landau is also a co-founder of Program for the Future, a non-profit organization that promotes Engelbart's vision of Collective Intelligence. She also is author of the seminal book on online education "Developing an Effective Online Course" and earned the "Online Pioneer" award. Landau, also known for her work in multimedia at Round World Media and for her work mentoring students in a three-year project studying and applying the Engelbart Hypothesis. and created an online archive of Engelbart related events and videos. She is an instructional and interaction designer and has worked on many award-winning projects, educational games and online courses. In addition, she leads high level research delegations to Cuba. Valerie Landau interviewed by Martin Wasserman https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=62ig8ecXlrA https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=62ig8ecXlrA ---- Engelbart Explains Binary Text Input. Douglas Engelbart explains to co-inventor, Valerie Landau, and some blogger how binary can be used for text input. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DB_dLeEasL8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DB_dLeEasL8 Engelbart: Think about if you took each finger, and wrote a one on this one, a two on this one, a four on this one, and a sixteen on this one. And every combination would lead clear up to sixty three. And so writing here like this the alphabet: A... B... C... D. E. F. G, H, I, JKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ! ---- Engelbart Using HandWriter. Douglas Engelbart demonstrates early prototype of The HandWriter with Valerie Landau. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s5wAD2aji3Q https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s5wAD2aji3Q Q: So whose ideas was the glove? Engelbart: I invented actually a separate keyset with the five keys, and her idea, you can make a glove to do that. Q: And what's the advantage of using a five key chording system? Engelbart: Well, when you're doing things with the mouse, you can be in parallel, doing things that take character input. And then the system we had, it actually gave you commands with characters, too. Like you had a D and a W, and it says, "you want to delete a word", and pick on which word, and click, it goes. M W would be move a word. Click on this one, click on that one, that one could move over there. Replace character, replace word, transpose words. All those things you could do with your left hand giving commands, and right hand doing it. ---- iChord: Clips from video of Eric Matsuno & Valerie Landau showing their new iPhone app to Douglas Engelbart. To Douglas C Engelbart and Bill English, and to Karen Engelbart, Roberta English and Mary Coppernoll. Present in spirit but not in molecules were: Evan Schaffer and Dr. Robert Stephenson. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-XXdnu5n9vI https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-XXdnu5n9vI So we're going to be able to be configurable for whoever's hand. [...] Go ahead and give it a try: so swiping it down puts it in the history, and swiping it left takes the last ... ---- Andres Types His Name Andres writing his name on TipTap late on a Saturday night. I arrived home after a party and found him typing on TipTapSpeech. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9WI88q7coEY https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9WI88q7coEY ---- This final silent video is chock full of photos and memories of Douglass Engelbart's friends and family, drawings, whiteboards, posters and brainstorming sessions! Memories with Douglas Engelbart: Photos from my work with Douglas Engelbart creating a Educational Networked Improvement Community Engelbart and working with Eileen Clegg on the writing of the book the Engelbart Hypothesis: Diaglogs with Douglas Engelbart. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dPnsWKikS_w https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dPnsWKikS_w

jntun 2y ago

I've recently been reading lots of books about 50/60/70s computing & especially the San Francisco element of it, so I've been watching Engelbart's demo myself on and off for the last few weeks. It really is amazing being "close" to all this time of history, even if the only way we can interact with it is over USB nowadays! Tiniest footnote correction but not only were the desk & offices designed by Herman Miller; the chair Engelbart is sitting on during the demo was also specially designed by Herman Miller!

dfc 2y ago
Can you share some of the titles about computing in the 50-70s?
- ecliptik 2y ago
  I've been reading The Innovators[1], which includes early computing history, just finished the section on The Mother of all Demos yesterday coincidentally. 1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Innovators_(book) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Innovators_(book)
- jntun 2y ago
  Of course! What the Dormouse Said: How the Sixties Counterculture Shaped the Personal Computer Industry [2005] Dealers of Lightning: Xerox PARC and the Dawn of the Computer Age [2000] Accidental Empires: How the Boys of Silicon Valley Make Their Millions, Battle Foreign Competition, and Still Can't Get a Date [1996] Palo Alto [2023] (This is more for capturing the full scope of San Francisco / Palo Alto since the founding of California as a state) Those are some off the top of my head right now being away from my library, probably also the most impactful to me in no specific order.
- pmcjones 2y ago
  The Dream Machine by M. Mitchell Waldrop Computing in the Middle Ages by Severo Ornstein - https://worrydream.com/refs/Ornstein_2002_-_Computing_in_the_Middle_Ages.pdf https://worrydream.com/refs/Ornstein_2002_-_Computing_in_the...

neilv 2y ago

> Engelbart's demo also featured an input device known as the keyset, but unlike his other innovations, the keyset failed to catch on. Chording keyboards were popular among the "wearable computing" researchers (who then went on to work on things like Google Glass). For example, the Twiddler. One advantage of them is that you only need one hand to operate it. And some designs mean you can simultaneously hold it with that same hand, without a steady surface.

miki123211 2y ago
chording keyboards are still extremely popular among the blind, after all, chording is how you type Braille. They appear on everything from mechanical Braillers of the 1950's[1], to modern, electronic Braille displays and notetakers. Input methods based on this concept and adapted for the touch screen are even built in to both iOS[2] and Android[3]. [1] https://wecapable.com/perkins-brailler-braille-typing/ https://wecapable.com/perkins-brailler-braille-typing/ [2] https://support.apple.com/en-us/101637 https://support.apple.com/en-us/101637 [3] https://blog.google/products/android/braille-keyboard/ https://blog.google/products/android/braille-keyboard/
DonHopkins 2y ago
>[...] but unlike his other innovations, the keyset failed to catch on. I'm sad that he and others like Ted Nelson and Brett Victor would rightly say that his most important innovations have so far failed to catch on. But there's still time to raise awareness and make them real! Ted Nelson's Eulogy for Douglas Engelbart https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yMjPqr1s-cg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yMjPqr1s-cg >Ted Nelson's emotional and moving eulogy for his friend Douglas Engelbart. Given at the Computer History Museum in Mountain View, CA, on December 9, 2013. An Homage to Douglas Engelbart and a Critique of the State of Tech: https://archive.nytimes.com/bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/12/16/an-homage-to-douglas-engelbart-and-a-critique-of-the-state-of-tech/ https://archive.nytimes.com/bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/12/1... >You don’t need me to tell you that Douglas Engelbart was one of the greatest men of all time. We gather today, in pretense of unanimity and concord, to croon over Doug’s ashes and grab for scraps of his robe. >Everyone here will of course say they are carrying on his work, by whatever twisted interpretation. I for one carry on his work by keeping the links outside the file, as he did. >Some are no doubt here to cheer and march behind the mouse, as in the opening of the Mickey Mouse TV Club of yore. Let them be happy in that celebration. >But the real ashes to be mourned are the ashes of Doug’s great dreams and vision, that we dance around in the costume party of fonts that swept aside his ideas of structure and collaboration. >Don’t get me wrong, the people who gave us all those fonts were idealists too, in their way — they just didn’t necessarily hold a very high view of human potential. >I used to have a high view of human potential. But no one ever had such a soaring view of human potential as Douglas Carl Engelbart — and he gave us wings to soar with him, though his mind flew on ahead, where few could see. > Like Icarus, he tried to fly too far too fast, and the wings melted off. [...] Doug and Karen Engelbart marry Marlene and Ted, May 2012: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TsKFbwLeS1k https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TsKFbwLeS1k >Poignant ceremony with sweet pledges, at the Marin Civic Center. Ann and Bill Duvall are co-celebrants. Underexposed and streaky, but the event is the important thing. (Battery ran out before the final verdict. Other camera was far away.) A few words on Doug Engelbart: https://worrydream.com/Engelbart/ https://worrydream.com/Engelbart/ >Doug Engelbart died today. His work has always been very difficult for writers to interpret and explain. >Technology writers, in particular, tend to miss the point miserably, because they see everything as a technology problem. Engelbart devoted his life to a human problem, with technology falling out as part of a solution. When I read tech writers' interviews with Engelbart, I imagine these writers interviewing George Orwell, asking in-depth probing questions about his typewriter. >Here's the most facile interpretation of Engelbart, splendidly exhibited by this New York Times headline: >"Douglas C. Engelbart, Inventor of the Computer Mouse, Dies at 88" >This is as if you found the person who invented writing, and credited them for inventing the pencil. (This analogy may be more apt than any of us are comfortable with.) >Then there's the shopping list interpretation: >His system, called NLS, showed actual instances of, or precursors to, hypertext, shared screen collaboration, multiple windows, on-screen video teleconferencing, and the mouse as an input device. >These are not true statements. [...]

Animats 2y ago

The original chording keyboard was from Baudot, around 1897.[1] The original plan was for the sender to send 5-bit teletype characters with a 5-bit keyboard. This was deployed, not just a prototype. [1] https://collection.sciencemuseumgroup.org.uk/objects/co33197/baudot-five-key-keyboard-1897-1926 https://collection.sciencemuseumgroup.org.uk/objects/co33197...

pests 2y ago
Here is a great run down of that history: https://computer.rip/2024-02-25-a-history-of-the-tty.html https://computer.rip/2024-02-25-a-history-of-the-tty.html Early versions had to be mechanically synced at the sending and receiving side. The typists had strict timings so the other end could receive it. This led to a version of punch cards that could be pre-typed and then fed in automatically, reducing the skill needed of the operator. The linage to teletypes were almost obvious. Very good read, don't want to spoil too much.
- Animats 2y ago
  The form of a keyboard had to be invented. Early printing telegraphs used a piano-like keyboard, with white and black keys.[1] (Keeping both ends in sync was a huge problem. The machine shown was synched by having the sending operator send AAAAAAAAA while the receiving operator made adjustments. If the machines got out of sync, the receiving operator opened the line switch, which stopped local echo at the sending end. Then both ends had to repeat the AAAAAAAAA drill. It took a long time, from 1846 to 1907, until Howard Krum finally came up with a mechanism that didn't have sync problems. Krum had the advantage that steel and stamping were available. The clock industry had figured out how to mass-produce mechanisms. Mechanism design then got out of the handmade brass era. This was, in its day, an advance comparable to going from tubes to ICs.) [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zJCfhbPAv9c https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zJCfhbPAv9c
  - pests 2y ago
    Great video.

Animats 2y ago

Mandatory XKCD.[1] [1] https://xkcd.com/1234/ https://xkcd.com/1234/

KennyBlanken 2y ago

Chorded keyboards always seemed like an ergonomic nightmare - every keystroke is now multiple fingers having to move. You're multiplying the repetitive action...

einpoklum 2y ago

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adminm 2y ago

I'm sure there's a (mythical at the moment) device just waiting to "disrupt they keyboard industry" It's crazy that most of us are effectively using a fancy typewriter. Qwerty layout dates 1874, clocking in at just over 150 years of age.

brandonmenc 2y ago
We already did. It's called the mouse.
- adminm 2y ago
  You type faster with your mouse than keyboard?

GregDavidson 2y ago

I regularly use my Twiddler with my Android phone. It allows me to fully operate all the applications I use on my desktop computer, e.g. Emacs. https://www.mytwiddler.com/ https://www.mytwiddler.com/

nanna 2y ago
Even Emacs? Do say more...
- mcshicks 2y ago
  I have a twiddler and tried doing this a long time ago i.e. emacs with a twiddler. For me I really needed to use a sticky cntl and alt key because I just couldn't press the cntl button on the top and chord at the same time. And I couldn't figure out how to make the sticky cntl work on the phone. But that was a very long time ago. Now I just use a mini bt keyboard and termux to run emacsclient over ssh and that's good enough for what I want.

vagab0nd 2y ago

It's cool. But it's missing the 411/305Hz sawtooth. Last year I tried to setup my vim to play these beeps in normal/edit modes and on some key presses. It was quite fun but I wasn't able to play a long lasting sound like in the demo.

peteforde 2y ago

I urge you to consider using an RC network with a hex inverter to debounce your switch input without resorting to a 100ms delay. I've wasted enough hours to know that the best kind of software debounce is a few resistors and capacitors. https://mayaposch.wordpress.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/06/debounce_rc.png?w=640 https://mayaposch.wordpress.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/06/d...

kragen 2y ago
I feel like the diode in this schematic is the wrong way around for a normally open switch: it speeds up the keyrelease event when the switch opens instead of the keypress event when it closes. But I think the 100ms delay Ken mentions was intended for a different purpose: to wait for all the fingers in the character to be detected. I think a much better approach would be to wait for one of the keys to be released before registering a character. Isn't that what Engelbart did? I suspect this timing-based approach explains why Ken found it so difficult to use. As I understand it, Baudot's original chording keyboard instead mechanically locked the keys down until the character was transmitted over the telegraph line. The telegrapher had time to enter his next character while the system was transmitting the characters of his colleagues, interleaved with his own at a fixed baud rate.
- peteforde 2y ago
  Oh, that (waiting for all fingers to be detected) does indeed change how I would approach the scenario, and blew past me in my initial reading. That all said, even with 100ms cycles I would hardware debounce the inputs, capture the keystrokes with an ISR to set some semaphore variables, and then create a 100ms loop that checks the current value (and resets) those semaphore variables. Eliminating switch bounce allows far more elegant software handling of the values you're reading, so Ken could turn his attention and development energy towards things like sliding time windows (100ms starting from the first keydown, for example) instead of trying to boil the ocean cancelling bounces.
  - kragen 2y ago
    Yeah, the 100ms wait after stability probably avoids any need to debounce. You need to debounce if you want to detect both keypress and keyrelease events reliably, though. For mass-production products it's cheaper to add 100 lines of code to your firmware than to add a resistor to your PCB, much less a diode, capacitor, and two resistors, but for prototypes and low-volume designs it's less clear. WRT ISRs, plausibly in this case the microcontroller can just poll instead of using interrupts. You probably don't mean "semaphore"; semaphores are a blocking construct, and if there's one thing you can't do in an ISR, it's block.

spit2wind 2y ago

Obligatory mention of the Plover stenography engine: https://www.openstenoproject.org/plover/ https://www.openstenoproject.org/plover/ So far most boards seem to be made in the US. Anyone making them in Europe or elsewhere?

piyushgupta53 2y ago

this is such a great read!

vietjtnguyen 2y ago

Custom mechanical keyboard firmware like QMK [1] and ZMK [2] support custom chords called "combos". Basically if the combo's set of keys is hit (within some timeout which defaults to 50 ms) then a specific keycode is sent. You then get a fun game of identifying low probability combos and mapping then to useful keycodes. You also start realizing there's some prime real estate to take advantage of. Two-key combos require some thought cause bigrams can be surprisingly common. Three-key combos are basically open though. In migrating from the ZSA Voyager to a 36-key keyboard (Chocofi) I've relied on combos as I don't like overloading keys with tap-versus-hold behavior as I can never get the timing down. For example my left index, middle, and ring finger mashed down on the home row (resting position) is escape in my current layout (Colemak mod DK which means keys R, S, and T). It's three fingers but hardly any extra effort. I've managed to do away with a symbol layer and have been quite happy with the result. If anyone is curious here is my "36-key training layout" for the ZSA Voyager [3] and my current Chocofi layout [4]. 1: https://docs.qmk.fm/features/combo https://docs.qmk.fm/features/combo 2: https://zmk.dev/docs/keymaps/combos https://zmk.dev/docs/keymaps/combos 3: https://configure.zsa.io/voyager/layouts/d7L0v/latest/0 https://configure.zsa.io/voyager/layouts/d7L0v/latest/0 4: https://github.com/vietjtnguyen/zmk-chocofi/blob/main/config/corne.keymap https://github.com/vietjtnguyen/zmk-chocofi/blob/main/config...

imcritic 2y ago

The site is infected with CloudFlare.