33 ms·

Keyboard innovation is making them worse

155 points by omnibrain 13y ago

zackbloom 13y ago
The only argument is: "We should have a Caps Lock key above Shift cause that's what we've always had". It only takes a few days to get used to a new keyboard, and it seems like, for people who aren't used to rebinding keys, this could be a huge improvement. Caps lock is like the penny, not all that useful in the modern world.
- bashinator 13y ago
  Which is why I always remap it to a second ctrl key. Now, having a second control and a second option/alt key in place of the home/end could be pretty nice, i gotta admit. The missing tilde makes it a total non-starter, though.
  - deleted 13y ago
    [deleted]
  - vizeroth 13y ago
    The tilde isn't missing, it's on the bottom-right, making it very strange for the times you need it. I really thought the fact that the ESC key was in its place was more problematic than moving the key, since it will either do nothing (the best possibility), or perform some default action (being the ESC key, likely one that will cause loss of work as well).
- andor 13y ago
  What about the whole row of function keys missing, and the position of escape and tilde?
- laureny 13y ago
  > The only argument is: "We should have a Caps Lock key above Shift cause that's what we've always had". Did you actually read the article? 1. The caps lock is being replaced by two smaller keys, which breaks muscle memory. 2. No function keys. These two things are a deal breaker for me as well, I use function keys all the time for coding and while I don't care much for the Caps Lock key, I do remap it to "Control" all the time, something I can't even do with this keyboard.
  - mcphage 13y ago
    > 1. The caps lock is being replaced by two smaller keys, which breaks muscle memory. It will, definitely. And after a few days of use, you'll have built up a new muscle memory.
    - laureny 13y ago
      > It will, definitely. And after a few days of use, you'll have built up a new muscle memory. Not as long as this keyboard is the only one in existence with this layout and you have to switch to different layouts all the time. Maybe you are lucky to only ever type on one keyboard for years at a time, but I use at least three different keyboards every day (personal laptop, work laptop, work desktop).
blacksmith_tb 13y ago
Hmm, it has a much better left-control than most Thinkpads (which tend to cram fn down there, not an issue with this design). And good riddance to capslock - I'm not sure that home/end are the perfect replacement, but they're both much more useful. And honestly, the placement of home/end insert/delete etc. varies significantly from keyboard to keyboard, and we somehow manage to adapt...
deleted 13y ago
[deleted]
- sanoli 13y ago
  Google japanese keyboard layouts. They have always been like this. It always made sense to me, as I touch type. I once bought a japanese thinkpad just because of this.
  - moonboots 13y ago
    I actually recently came across Japanese layouts because a user requested support in http://typing.io http://typing.io, a programmer's typing tutor I work on. I like the smaller space bar but dislike the shrunk delete/backspace key [1]. Backspace is already hard to type because of its distance from the home row. The problem is even worse for programmers because the right pinky not only needs to type most of the symbol keys, it also needs to correct typos made when these symbols are mistyped. [1] https://discussions.apple.com/servlet/JiveServlet/showImage/2-23508185-316223/kybard.jpg https://discussions.apple.com/servlet/JiveServlet/showImage/...
    - salgernon 13y ago
      Remap caps lock to control, backspace becomes c-h like in the olden days. And for bonus cred, escape becomes c-[. I learned this a long time ago and have never given escape or backspace any more thought.
    - sanoli 13y ago
      I never use the backspace key. I have had it mapped to 'C-;' for ages. The japanese backspace is terrible, but the normal US layout isn't too good either.
cnlwsu 13y ago
In my opinion, the Home/End keys instead of caps lock would actually be pretty nice. I have a tendency to just remove the caps lock key (on mechanical) since the only time I use it is by accident.
trustyhank 13y ago
The Apple laptop keyboards are pretty fantastic.
- deleted 13y ago
  [deleted]
- kunai 13y ago
  No, they're actually not. Terrible travel, and a completely flat key top is a non-starter – there's no bevel to guide your fingers, and no tactile travel to absorb the shock from your fingers, leaving your hands fatigued. Before you ask, I'm typing this from my MacBook. Yes, it's painful. The sharp edges on the notebooks don't help either.
  - WalterSear 13y ago
    You are typing too deeply and too hard. I urge you: fix your bad keyboarding habits. Your fingers need to glide over the keys, pressing each with as little pressure as possible. I have been disabled by RSI for several years, and now I'm recovered, I won't use anything but these mac keyboards. They are much healthier for your hands - it's that very 'tactile travel' that does much of the damage.
    - adestefan 13y ago
      Same for the people complains about the edges. Your wrists should not be on that edge.
    - reality_czech 13y ago
      Those shiny shallow keyboards cause RSI. http://jeff.ecchi.ca/blog/2008/09/19/apple-aluminium-keyboard-and-repetitive-strain-injury-rsi/ http://jeff.ecchi.ca/blog/2008/09/19/apple-aluminium-keyboar... Rather than urging him to conform his body to the uncomfortable keyboard, how about recommending a keyboard designed to be comfortable to him?
      - xentronium 13y ago
jseliger 13y ago
Incidentally, the only keyboard "innovation" I've used and liked is the Kinesis Advantage (which I wrote about here: http://jseliger.wordpress.com/2011/07/17/further-thoughts-on-the-kinesis-advantage-unicomp-space-saver-and-das-keyboard%E2%80%94two-years-later/ http://jseliger.wordpress.com/2011/07/17/further-thoughts-on... ). But the Advantage is a standalone keyboard, which makes it inherently easy to ditch for anyone who doesn't like it. At $300 it's also a niche product only likely to appeal to people who type a lot—usually meaning programmers and writers. Among laptops, I think Peter Bright is right: path dependence dictates that the more standardized a keyboard is, the better. I actually prefer the old-school Thinkpad keys to the newer Apple chiclet keys, but that difference is pretty small.
- lallysingh 13y ago
  I loved my advantage(s), but eventually dropped it for a happy hacker pro for two reasons: (1) the brackets and arrow keys on the advantage are painfully bad; (2) I fell in love with Topre key switches. The Lenovos have just been getting worse keyboards with every generation. I don't think the people they're going after care about the changes, but I've actively been looking for a new laptop vendor since they started fiddling about with the layouts.
  - sanoli 13y ago
    How good are the Topre switches, compared to the ones on the Kinesis Advantage (I'm assuming you used 'blue' ones on the Kinesis)? I'm about to get a Kinesis Advantage, and the only con that I could think of so far is that I read here an there about how the Topre switches are even nicer than the Cherry MX switches.
    - lytfyre 13y ago
      > I'm assuming you used 'blue' ones on the Kinesis IIRC, the advantage is actually the keyboard for which cherry brown switches where created.
      - 13y ago
pasbesoin 13y ago
Personal pitch: Get rid of the "ginormous" f-ing shelves that push sharp front edges (yes, get rid of those, too) into the users' wrists, especially when working mobile at a table or workspace whose height and resultant forearm position cannot be optimized. Some of us still need to do significant amounts of, you know, typing, which is one reason we are on a laptop and not a tablet or whatever. If you're going to stick a keyboard on your device, make it comfortable and ergonomic. /grump
- sanoli 13y ago
  The Apple laptops I used recently had this sharp edge. Looked clean, modern, etc, but hurt my wrists like a #&$&.
  - TylerE 13y ago
    You could probably fix this...if you dare. Since it's solid aluminum, you could probably take a file and round the edges...just be careful not to get the shaving anywhere inside.
    - nkurz 13y ago
      http://dustwell.com/macbook-pro-sharp-edge.html http://dustwell.com/macbook-pro-sharp-edge.html
  - kalleboo 13y ago
    I started wearing a sweatband to buffer against the edge...
dman 13y ago
Also of note - if youre buying a 15 inch pc laptop you now get a numeric keyboard by default whether you want it or not. This also has the side effect of making the keyboard and mousepad layout assymetric since the keyboard and mousepad are now pushed to the left to make way for the numeric keypad on the right. The only two machines I know that dont do this are the dell xps 15 and the dell m3800 but both of them are > 1800$s. Quest for the perfect laptop continues. EDIT: other major quibble - backspace needs to be the right most key without any nearby power / other buttons. When I violently hit backspace to delete code that I know is wrong I dont want embarassments like hitting delete instead or powering off my machine.
- bashinator 13y ago
  15" MacBook Pros do not have a numpad, but it sounds like you don't want that price range.
  - dman 13y ago
    Money is one factor. The other factor is that I dont want a retina-esque screen right now since I will be running linux on it and kde and chrome's support for hidipi screens is not great right now.
    - TheSoftwareGuy 13y ago
      Man that sucks. Almost every one of this guy's gripes are non-existant on a Mac.
      - dman 13y ago
        I want to run linux - retina displays don't work well with it. If I could make do with OSX I agree the MacBook Pro 15 would be nice (save for the location of the power button)
        bashinator 13y ago
        If you're not tied to the idea of running native, I'm running various linuxes in VMWare Fusion on my MPB and full-screen mode works perfectly. The only thing you might find annoying is the lack of middle-click for pasting selections when using the touchpad.
nextos 13y ago
I think Lenovo is slowly abandoning what used to be the niche Thinkpad had filled in: great laptops for developers. There might be some good opportunities for startups. It's really frustrating to see that nothing ticks all boxes these days: * 4:3 high-res matte screen (like Chromebook Pixel or some old IBMs) * Good mechanical keyboard which includes insert, delete, begin, and end * Robust case with serviceable Linux-friendly components * Trackpoint I'd really pay a high premium for a well-executed laptop with these features, and many people I know would do as well.
- cnlwsu 13y ago
  Mechanical keyboard on laptop with high res matte screen... that would be amazing.
  - chrismorgan 13y ago
    I've wondered about (and wished for) a mechanical keyboard on a laptop before. It'd increase the weight, thickness and cost significantly—but I don't think that would significantly hinder its popularity in certain circles, provided it did a good job of the implementation.
- pekk 13y ago
  We've really never had anything which ticked all those boxes, so I don't see a regression there. Only Lenovo is doing trackpoint seriously these days. Hardly anyone is paying any attention to Linux. I'm no expert, but I've never even heard of a laptop with a good mechanical keyboard. It's not just Lenovo, it's the whole market which decided people want junk like 1mm thick retina tablets with soldered ram and permanent batteries. Lenovo and everyone on the block is selling high-resolution crap though, so I'm sure you'll get that any time.
  - w1ntermute 13y ago
    > Only Lenovo is doing trackpoint seriously these days Actually, even they are not: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UXa0XzNvuZU http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UXa0XzNvuZU
zwieback 13y ago
For true "innovation" you can always go the Twiddler (http://www.handykey.com/ http://www.handykey.com/) route. I've got one of the original models but have never actually tried it. Supposedly this is something the guys at Xerox Parc were excited about and it's based on the much older idea of a chorded keyboard.
brudgers 13y ago
Until I started using EMACS I would have thought the author's argument was a slam dunk four star lock. Now I realize that habits are habits because they're habits, not because they are the right way of doing something. We are more flexible than our machines, and though it might take a day or two to figure out home` and `end`, a laptop is a tool that one uses for years.
- blah32497 13y ago
  I thought the author sounded like a curmudgeony luddite. Ofcourse anything "different" will feel wrong for a little while. You have some muscle memory that you need to get over. So if you really wanna write a review, suck it up and use it till your fingers get rewired. Then write your reviews complaining about keyboard design. I don't think he even tried the keyboards he's talking about, let alone give himself some time to get used to them. I don't go read Vi's man page and then complain how it's too hard and unusual.
  - xradionut 13y ago
    Have you met the author? Peter is opinionated, but most of the time he has a valid reason for it. As a writer and a programmer, a good keyboard is a necessity for his work. (I'd bet he's typed as many or more lines of code than a good number of folks here at HN.) At work we have have folks that order and try out several different keyboards before settling on one that meets their needs. When a programmer makes 80K, a few extra hundred dollars at the extreme to make them efficient and happy is noise in the budget. Even our interns get their choice.
    - keithpeter 13y ago
      I take your point, but the OA was reviewing a laptop. No choice of keyboard, and perhaps need to mode shift between non-standard and standard key positions. I attempt to play piano. Any clever redesigns of that 88 key layout are not going to work.
      - xradionut 13y ago
JoshTriplett 13y ago
Killing caps lock makes perfect sense, especially if it's still around as a shift-lock. Putting Home and End there is not the craziest thing I've seen done with it. (I personally remap it to a larger logo key, and use that with my window manager, but the X1 Carbon actually has a decent-size logo key to use for that.) However, the soft function key row is crazy. It completely breaks touch-typing; if I wanted that, I'd use a tablet. Likewise, putting Delete to the right of backspace makes backspace a smaller target to hit, and it's a very frequently used key. Moving the `~ key is the kind of thing done by folks who think "Oh, nobody ever uses that", and who don't understand that keys used by 5% of typists are still critically important. (Both for people who need to type "jalapeño" and people who need to type ~/Downloads/foo .) More importantly, there's no tradeoff here: this makes it worse for the loyal ThinkPad users, but doesn't actually make it proportionally better for others. And even if it did, that kind of consumer-targeted optimization is for consumer laptops like IdeaPad, not business laptops like ThinkPad.
- dcotter 13y ago
  Why not replace caps lock with a double-tap of the Shift key? This has the advantages of distance (still close at hand when needed) and memorability (Shift upcases temporarily, Shift-Shift upcases indefinitely) and eliminates one of the less useful keys at the same time.
  - saraid216 13y ago
    And Shift-Shift-Shift activates Microsoft StickyKeys! (Is that still a thing in Win8?)
    - georgemcbay 13y ago
      Just tried it in 8.1 and yes it is still a thing.
  - joebadmo 13y ago
    I use https://pqrs.org/macosx/keyremap4macbook/ https://pqrs.org/macosx/keyremap4macbook/ to remap caps lock to ctrl and hit both shift buttons simultaneously for caps lock. Here's my custom config: https://github.com/joebadmo/dotfiles/blob/master/keyremap4macbook.private.xml#L18 https://github.com/joebadmo/dotfiles/blob/master/keyremap4ma...
kunai 13y ago
This is a huge opportunity for Dell on their portable machines. As far as I know, Dell is practically the only OEM that hasn't royally screwed up their professional-grade notebooks. The M4800 is a beauty – extremely powerful, and fantastic to use. The keyboard isn't as good as it used to be, but it's still a traditional, non-Dentyne (yes, chiclet keys type like Dentyne) canted design, with a numpad, but a good keyboard nonetheless. It has a TrackPoint, which isn't as good as the previous model ThinkPads but is now much better because Lenovo have somehow decided that their sole purpose of existence is to copy Apple and "unify" shit that didn't need to be messed around with. I hate to play stereotypes here, but it was kind of expected from a Chinese company. Their pants-on-head retarded marketing videos and even their products – for example, the Yoga tablet copies iOS 7 icons and iOS 6 dock... wtf, and the marketing video for the new X1 is blatant Ive-hyperbolic. The marketing and hyperbole has long stopped working for Apple (thus the Designed in Cali bullshit), what the HELL were Lenovo thinking? Dell isn't perfect. They have horrible QC and design issues on their lower-end products, and the Precision machines aren't cheap. But they're solid and well-built with a ton of features, good battery life, good keyboards, decent pointing devices. If they put in a 3:2, high-density display, 7-row keyboard, Topre short-throw switches, and a nipple mouse that's less recessed, and market it like mad, it would be the perfect machine, one I would pay for and a lot of professionals, too.
- pekk 13y ago
  Lenovo has a huge pile of models, which would let them see pretty directly what people are demanding. Your criticism of Yoga tablet may be valid without really touching much of their overall strategy. Maybe Yoga tablet is the kind of crap people are buying.
muaddirac 13y ago
This is about laptop keyboards, but there is a huge diy scene around improving keyboards. I have an ErgoDox (http://ergodox.org/ http://ergodox.org/) which is very well thought out and open source (and people are iterating on it - see: http://geekhack.org/index.php?topic=44940.0 http://geekhack.org/index.php?topic=44940.0 )
- lytfyre 13y ago
  I've also been using a Cherry Clear switch ErgoDox at work for a couple of weeks now. Tweaked my layout a few times, and am now extremely happy with it. Massdrop (http://massdrop.com http://massdrop.com) runs pretty frequent periodic group buys for the kit, and assembley really isn't that hard - don't be scared off by the need for some surface mount soldering.
moonboots 13y ago
Caps lock should not be changed despite it's ostensible uselessness. Programmers often remap caps lock (I personally use this tool [1]), and it's nice to have a big target for the pinky. Remapping is of course possible with these new keyboards, but the split key design that replaces caps lock leaves a much smaller target. In addition, I'm sure there are hunt and peck typists that still legitimately use caps locks instead of shift because it requires less coordination and hand contortions, so leaving caps lock alone also has accessibility benefits. One area where keyboard designers aren't innovating enough is the spacebar. The left 2/3 of the space bar is rarely used by most touch typists and hogs very accessible real estate. I like how Microsoft split the spacebar on their new keyboard [2] and replaced the left half with backspace, the most commonly typed (but normally most hard to reach) key. I'm disappointed to see thinkpad/lenovo make these mistakes given their reputation for quality laptop keyboards. I personally use an x230 [3], which has a similar chiclet keyboard as the x1 carbon in the article without the transgressions. [1] https://github.com/alols/xcape https://github.com/alols/xcape [2] http://techland.time.com/2012/09/20/new-microsoft-keyboard-splits-space-bar-left-side-used-as-backspace-key/ http://techland.time.com/2012/09/20/new-microsoft-keyboard-s... [3] http://shop.lenovo.com/us/en/laptops/thinkpad/x-series/x230/ http://shop.lenovo.com/us/en/laptops/thinkpad/x-series/x230/
- 9999 13y ago
  I use a Happy Hacking Keyboard which has no capslock key, control is automatically mapped there. On every other keyboard I've applied that same mapping in the OS. I would hate that weird split key set up that Lenovo has done there though.
  - moonboots 13y ago
    I like the minimal ideals of the happy hacking keyboard but I think it went a little overboard. I like having an arrow cluster and page up/down for applications that don't support emacs/vi bindings. I do like how the number pad is removed. It's too infrequently used and increases the distance between keyboard and mouse.
    - 13y ago
tnash 13y ago
I think an important point here is that these aren't really "innovations". It's stripping features to make keyboards more compact. Keyboards are certainly a technology that could be improved. What about a touch screen split keyboard mouse combo that could take 10-finger multitouch and also give incredible haptic feedback that let you "feel" the keys?
dcotter 13y ago
I would like to see keyboards with flexible layouts, where you could reconfigure the positions and sizes of the keys as you choose, so that if you wanted to replace half the spacebar with backspace or move the numbers from the top row to a 3x3 grid on the far side of the keyboard, you could do that. Hackable keyboards, in essence.
freyrs3 13y ago
I'm really not pleased with what Lenovo is doing with the x230 and x240. The old Thinkpad keyboards used to be the a huge selling point for the X series line and now that they've gone chiclet keyboards like everyone else it's almost enough to make me want to shop around for a new Linux laptop.
mcphage 13y ago
> I'm not going to pretend that the Break key is a key you use every single day, but it's not useless, either. For example, Windows' ping command, when used with the -t switch (endless pinging until stopped) lets you type Ctrl-Break to print the current stats without ending the pinging (as opposed to Ctrl-c, which prints stats and ends the pinging). This isn't the most important thing ever, but it's nonetheless useful to be able to do. It might be useful sometimes, but is it useful enough to justify a key on everybody's keyboard, all the time? No.
tobyjsullivan 13y ago
It's cool if you don't like the new keyboard layout. As programmers, we need to use special keys and caps lock a lot. But to say Lenovo is doing it wrong is clearly missing the simple fact that they might not be building these things for programmers. They're building for the other 99.9% of the population that doesn't need caps lock, insert, bars and back-ticks ever. People who don't use function keys regularly and who, quite frankly, find "standard" keyboards incredibly awkward. Couple this with the fact that laptops have always lacked the real-estate for a full keyboard and I have to disagree with the author. This is certainly a positive evolution, just maybe not for programmers.
- deleted 13y ago
  [deleted]
- eddiedunn 13y ago
  Actually, I can see it work for programmers as well; tilde is easily pressed with the right thumb instead of left ring finger, esc is more easily reached for us vim users, and I know I sure don't use caps lock, ever. The soft function keys might be a problem for some, but I, at least, don't use them very often.
xiaomai 13y ago
I was going to replace my first-gen Thinkpad Carbon with the newer model (wanted the hi-res screen and better battery life), but this keyboard is a complete dealbreaker. Like the author, I am distressed at the removal of the caps-lock key (I remap mine). The ~/` key move is plain weird (it was bad enough when they moved print screen down there (I kept accidentally taking screenshots)). Lenovo, please fix your keyboard!
kristianp 13y ago
I agree with this article, standardisation of keyboard layouts would be better. If there was an industry organisation that got companies together to agree on things, the situation might be much better, although I don't hold out much hope for home and end! I feel that a lot of people copy apple because it's designs and hardware are great, but they copy things that aren't really that good at all, such as removing Home and End keys. I like to call this cargo-cult design, people blindly change things to the apple way for no clear reason. I'm looking at you gnome 3. Here are my personal preferences. I don't really care about caps-lock, but I do use it occasionally. I'm more likely to go back and use a keyboard shortcut to change a whole word to upper-case when doing sql programming. I personally want the 6 delete-insert-home-end-pgup-pgdn buttons separate in a way that mirrors the desktop pc keyboard. I quite liked this layout from microsoft keyboards of about 8 years ago which has gone out of fashion: Home End Ins Pgup Del Pgdn I want the arrow keys to have spacing around them so I can feel the triangle without looking at them, no pgup or pgdn touching them, just a gap. I want a laptop keyboard that is sufficiently close to the desktop keyboard that I don't have to adjust as much as I currently do. My T410 isn't too bad in that respect, except for the arrow keys as mentioned above.
- Someone 13y ago
  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ISO/IEC_9995 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ISO/IEC_9995 leads to http://www.iso.org/iso/iso_catalogue/catalogue_tc/catalogue_detail.htm?csnumber=51642 http://www.iso.org/iso/iso_catalogue/catalogue_tc/catalogue_.... CHF 50 buys you the standard for the "Editing function zone" that might (I didn't buy it) proscribe something about home and end. http://www.open-std.org/jtc1/sc35/wg1/docs/madison/SC35N795%20ISO-CEI%209995-5%20FCD(en).doc http://www.open-std.org/jtc1/sc35/wg1/docs/madison/SC35N795%... seems related. It does not mention "home".
  - kps 13y ago
    As with many standards, you can find an unofficial 'final committee draft' for free if you look around. It doesn't prescribe a layout for keys other than the cursor arrows. ISO9995 has been responsible for a lot of nonsense from a programmer's point of view — for instance mandating Control in the lower left rather than beside A. Similarly its sister ISO9241, despite nominally being concerned with ergonomics, helped drive some of the best key switches off the market.
brudgers 13y ago
I am reminded of Xah Lee's page on all things keyboard: http://xahlee.info/kbd/keyboarding.html http://xahlee.info/kbd/keyboarding.html
- claudius 13y ago
  Unfortunately, you can only rebind existing keys in the ‘right’ position. Rebinding doesn’t help you with a physically broken keyboard layout.
chx 13y ago
I have a Lenovo T420 the last of laptops whose keyboard was fair and free erm where was I yes? so the last laptop with a decent keyboard. However, someone reports http://forum.thinkpads.com/viewtopic.php?f=45&t=104797#p719715 http://forum.thinkpads.com/viewtopic.php?f=45&t=104797#p7197... a T410 transplant into a T430 I wonder whether such a feat is possible into the T440p...
zobzu 13y ago
"good keyboards are standard keyboards" <= that
keithg 13y ago
Got a laptop recently for a new project. All of my colleagues raved about Lenovo. I went with a Lenovo ThinkPad W530. Great machine, right? I hate it. I hate it because they put the Fn key in the lower, left and moved the Ctrl key. Now I have to think every time I need to hit the Ctrl key!
- MartinCron 13y ago
  You will get used to it. At least, I did. Other than that one thing, it is the best laptop ever.
  - MichaelGG 13y ago
    Why would you get used to it instead of just swapping the two keys?
    - scott_karana 13y ago
      Well, I shared my laptop with others, so they'd get really confused when I remapped the keys. If only you could swap the keycaps too.
    - fastflo 13y ago
      the bios swapping of "fn" and "left control" on my x121 had its own problems (it was a bit strange, sometimes the remapped fn key didn't actually behaved like a real control key). so i switched back to the original behavior and learned to deal with it. a hardware hack would be cool :) letting the fn key electrically do the same thing as the ctrl key and for the rare use of fn use the capslock-key for it :)
- paol 13y ago
  Have a look in the BIOS, there should be an option to swap Fn & Ctrl.
  - keithg 13y ago
    Thanks. I'll take a look.
acabal 13y ago
I passed over buying an X1 Carbon for a few reasons, but I always check the keyboard of a potential purchase for the pgup/pgdown/home/end keys on the right-hand column. Modern ultrabooks got rid of them (despite there often being more than enough space for them) and it makes me really mad. Those are super-useful keys for coders and also for general web navigation. After reading this article, I went back to take a closer look at the X1 keyboard, and actually gasped. No hardware Fn keys? Home/end replacing Caps (which I remap to ctrl)? Backspace/del next to each other? What were they thinking?? I'm so glad I didn't do an impulse buy on the X1, because my mind doesn't think to inspect the keyboard so closely. I would have returned it 10 seconds after opening the box. I'm going to have to look very closely now at the keyboards of new laptops I'm thinking of buying.
- drdaeman 13y ago
  > home/end keys Actually, they're nearly useless if you use software/OS capable of Emacs-style keyboard navigation and develop a habit of using C-a/C-e shortcuts. (Especially with CapsLock rebound as Control.)
  - acabal 13y ago
    I like them specifically for reading web pages. When reading I can just rest my hand on the right side of the keyboard and browse with home/pgup/pgdown/end. Usually when I'm reading like this I'm not typing and so not in the mood for ctrl gymnastics.
    - darkgray 13y ago
      While it doesn't remove the gymnastics requirement, a relatively nice alternative to webpage pgup/pgdn is shift-space/space.
    - ricardobeat 13y ago
      Pressing the spacebar in a browser has the same effect as the PageDown key.
  - 4ad 13y ago
klazutin 13y ago
This is so odd how people can unknowingly create difficulties for someone else. Remapping Caps lock to switching input language has probably been the most useful thing I've done to improve my computing productivity (followed closely by Linux and tiling wms). What used to require weird combinations like Control-Shift, or worse Shift-Alt (windows default which triggers window's menu half the time) now takes only a quick flick of my left little finger. Typing even the most technical texts with English words in every sentence has been easy and effortless ever since. And now Lenovo is taking this away from me by removing the Caps lock key from what otherwise looks like an absolutely perfect laptop. This is such a shame.
Too 13y ago
It's also missing the context menu button. The one usually located between the altgr and ctrl on the right side. This key is very important if you don't want to use the mouse as it's equivalent of right clicking.
mcantelon 13y ago
When I saw this article I thought of the X1 before reading it. The X1 looks decent, other than the wacky keyboard and the non-removable battery. A big part of the Thinkpad brand is the fact they have good keyboards.
deleted 13y ago
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gaius 13y ago
You won't go wrong with a Cherry keyboard, German quality, same keyswitches that were used on the perfect machine, the BBC Micro.
lucb1e 13y ago
My father bought a Lenovo Thinkpad last week. One evening we were installing and configuring some more things on the laptop, and at some point he mentions that it's annoying that the keyboard has no printscreen button which he had needed that day. This was the first thing I noticed when the laptop arrived, so I pointed out to him that the PrtScn button is between AltGr and the right ctrl key. We both shook our heads at that. Nice try at keyboard innovation, Lenovo.
- fosap 13y ago
  That key is ridiculously placed. I but know i like it very much. I mapped it to f13 and that key opens a new terminal. I think that way it is very useful.
hibbelig 13y ago
They took away the Ctrl key to the left of A!
dasil003 13y ago
There's nothing wrong with keyboard innovation, the problem is with commodity laptop manufacturers trying to innovate in an integrated device. The important differentiators on laptop are numerous: form-factor, specs, screen, etc. Even keyboard quality is a big factor, so trying to get clever with the layout and soft keys is just begging to throw a deal breaker in. What laptop manufacturers should be doing is following Apple's lead and standardizing heavily across their entire line and keeping that reasonably in line with national keyboard standards. Leave the layout innovation to external keyboard manufacturers where there is an opportunity to make drastic changes and sell them based on the strength of that innovation alone. Later the best of the innovations can trickle their way back into laptops.
jakub_g 13y ago
Since we're bashing on laptop keyboards, I hate with passion all the layouts that put FN key in the bottom left corner instead of CTRL. It's far easier to reach the button in the very corner and I use CTRL order of magnitude more often than FN. Also it seems that for each producer, half of the laptops have FN and the other half have CTRL in the corner which just adds confusion when you're using someone else's machine. Can someone persuade me to the superiority of FN-in-the corner?
- rane 13y ago
  I can't, but consider remapping Caps Lock to CTRL. Might just solve your problem and make computer use more ergonomic in general.
- phaer 13y ago
  thinkpads (or at least my x220) have their fn buttons in the bottom left corner but there is a bios setting to swap fn and ctrl.
  - jakub_g 13y ago
    That's a valuable info, thanks for sharing.
loup-vaillant 13y ago
Hail to the dinosaurs! Seriously, this mentality is the main reason why keyboard aren't improving. Dvorak was right: "I'm tired of trying to do something worthwhile for the human race, they simply don't want to change!" > The benefits of the Dvorak layout aren't well proven (if they exist at all), but some people find the layout more comfortable to use. The benefits are obvious and well established. Only irrational fools and extreme believers in the so called "efficient market" would believe otherwise. It just have a learning curve, which most people don't want to suffer. Some people find Dvorak more comfortable? Come on, nearly everyone who has tried it for over a month would reckon it's more comfortable. > Good keyboards are standard keyboards. No. This is a good keyboard: http://ergodox.org/ http://ergodox.org/ This is an okay keyboard: http://typematrix.com/ http://typematrix.com/ (I have tried that one myself, and got used to its layout in a couple hours. And I touch type too.) If we switch to such layouts overnight, people would complain for a few months, then forget about it. I even suspect that after the fact, most would mock the silliness of keeping the staggered design even though the keyboards were no longer mechanical. > Good keyboards are […] keyboards that […] let me switch effortlessly to other systems. Oh, you're the rare breed who use several systems regularly? I suggest you buy a keyboard you like, and plug it to those various systems. Unless you're an even rarer bread who cannot even even plug external keyboards to his computers for security reasons.
- dsr_ 13y ago
  "you're the rare breed who use several systems regularly?" Rare? I don't know anyone who doesn't. In a typical day, I use a MBP, an IBM Model M, a Unicomp EnduraPro (modern equivalent to the Model M, only slightly inferior), and one or two random keyboards. Oh, and my phone. Even my elementary-school-age son will use two or three keyboards in a day: one on a laptop, one on the desktop in the living room, and a virtual one on his tablet.
  - loup-vaillant 13y ago
    (Phones and tablets don't count: they have no keyboard to begin with.) I write custom software for a living. I use 2 desktop computers: one at home, one at work. I plug my typematrix to both. When I'm on vacation, I may use my laptop, to which I pug my typematrix as well. Some of my co-workers (10%) also use a laptop at work, because they have to move around. Others (1%) are sysadmins, and often have to go to the server room. Both could buy a keyboard, and plug it to the computers they use. The sysadmins would have to pay for an additional keyboard that stays on the server room. By the way, I use a completely non-standar keyboard layout. Like Dvorak, only optimized for French (Bépo). Since I only rarely use systems that I don't control, this is okay. 90% of my co-workers are in the same situation. What do you work on that requires you to use several different keyboards you don't choose on a daily basis? To me that doesn't sound rare. That sounds alien.
thecodefoundry 13y ago
I've remapped the caps lock key using AutoHotKey (Windows ) to act as Close Document (Close MDI child window) by double-tapping it. It retains its existing functionality by requiring you to hold Shift before using it. But the ability to quickly close a document in Visual Studio or a browser tab by simply double tapping caps lock instead of stretching for Ctrl-F4 is invaluable.
fastflo 13y ago
i think the capslock function should be disabled by default. let the key stay there, so people can bind it to what ever they want. i'm a passionate programmer and im currently typing on a lenovo x121 keyboard and i have to say its one of the best laptop keyboard i've ever used. the only annoying thing is the "nearly useless" "Fn" key left of the left control key. i'm an emacs user and i can not understand why to place such a rarely used key at the place of such an often used key like the left control key! but i learned to deal with it. @lenovo: the x121 keyboard is good, but please put that useless fn key somewhere else! like replace the right control key with it! (who is using the right control key?) all this is about the german x121 keyboard layout.
jbcurtin2 13y ago
The keyboard is the only thing that keeps me buying my macs-laptops.
JadeNB 13y ago
I would just like to highlight the 'promoted comment' that showed up for me (not mine; the author is listed as 'theotherjim'): > It's been almost 30 years since a colleague suggested to me that all the keyboard designers in the world - except one, any one - should be shot.

155 points by omnibrain 13y ago

The only argument is: "We should have a Caps Lock key above Shift cause that's what we've always had". It only takes a few days to get used to a new keyboard, and it seems like, for people who aren't used to rebinding keys, this could be a huge improvement. Caps lock is like the penny, not all that useful in the modern world.

bashinator 13y ago
Which is why I always remap it to a second ctrl key. Now, having a second control and a second option/alt key in place of the home/end could be pretty nice, i gotta admit. The missing tilde makes it a total non-starter, though.
- deleted 13y ago
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- vizeroth 13y ago
  The tilde isn't missing, it's on the bottom-right, making it very strange for the times you need it. I really thought the fact that the ESC key was in its place was more problematic than moving the key, since it will either do nothing (the best possibility), or perform some default action (being the ESC key, likely one that will cause loss of work as well).
andor 13y ago
What about the whole row of function keys missing, and the position of escape and tilde?
laureny 13y ago
> The only argument is: "We should have a Caps Lock key above Shift cause that's what we've always had". Did you actually read the article? 1. The caps lock is being replaced by two smaller keys, which breaks muscle memory. 2. No function keys. These two things are a deal breaker for me as well, I use function keys all the time for coding and while I don't care much for the Caps Lock key, I do remap it to "Control" all the time, something I can't even do with this keyboard.
- mcphage 13y ago
  > 1. The caps lock is being replaced by two smaller keys, which breaks muscle memory. It will, definitely. And after a few days of use, you'll have built up a new muscle memory.
  - laureny 13y ago
    > It will, definitely. And after a few days of use, you'll have built up a new muscle memory. Not as long as this keyboard is the only one in existence with this layout and you have to switch to different layouts all the time. Maybe you are lucky to only ever type on one keyboard for years at a time, but I use at least three different keyboards every day (personal laptop, work laptop, work desktop).

blacksmith_tb 13y ago

Hmm, it has a much better left-control than most Thinkpads (which tend to cram fn down there, not an issue with this design). And good riddance to capslock - I'm not sure that home/end are the perfect replacement, but they're both much more useful. And honestly, the placement of home/end insert/delete etc. varies significantly from keyboard to keyboard, and we somehow manage to adapt...

deleted 13y ago

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sanoli 13y ago
Google japanese keyboard layouts. They have always been like this. It always made sense to me, as I touch type. I once bought a japanese thinkpad just because of this.
- moonboots 13y ago
  I actually recently came across Japanese layouts because a user requested support in http://typing.io http://typing.io, a programmer's typing tutor I work on. I like the smaller space bar but dislike the shrunk delete/backspace key [1]. Backspace is already hard to type because of its distance from the home row. The problem is even worse for programmers because the right pinky not only needs to type most of the symbol keys, it also needs to correct typos made when these symbols are mistyped. [1] https://discussions.apple.com/servlet/JiveServlet/showImage/2-23508185-316223/kybard.jpg https://discussions.apple.com/servlet/JiveServlet/showImage/...
  - salgernon 13y ago
    Remap caps lock to control, backspace becomes c-h like in the olden days. And for bonus cred, escape becomes c-[. I learned this a long time ago and have never given escape or backspace any more thought.
  - sanoli 13y ago
    I never use the backspace key. I have had it mapped to 'C-;' for ages. The japanese backspace is terrible, but the normal US layout isn't too good either.

cnlwsu 13y ago

In my opinion, the Home/End keys instead of caps lock would actually be pretty nice. I have a tendency to just remove the caps lock key (on mechanical) since the only time I use it is by accident.

trustyhank 13y ago

The Apple laptop keyboards are pretty fantastic.

deleted 13y ago
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kunai 13y ago
No, they're actually not. Terrible travel, and a completely flat key top is a non-starter – there's no bevel to guide your fingers, and no tactile travel to absorb the shock from your fingers, leaving your hands fatigued. Before you ask, I'm typing this from my MacBook. Yes, it's painful. The sharp edges on the notebooks don't help either.
- WalterSear 13y ago
  You are typing too deeply and too hard. I urge you: fix your bad keyboarding habits. Your fingers need to glide over the keys, pressing each with as little pressure as possible. I have been disabled by RSI for several years, and now I'm recovered, I won't use anything but these mac keyboards. They are much healthier for your hands - it's that very 'tactile travel' that does much of the damage.
  - adestefan 13y ago
    Same for the people complains about the edges. Your wrists should not be on that edge.
  - reality_czech 13y ago
    Those shiny shallow keyboards cause RSI. http://jeff.ecchi.ca/blog/2008/09/19/apple-aluminium-keyboard-and-repetitive-strain-injury-rsi/ http://jeff.ecchi.ca/blog/2008/09/19/apple-aluminium-keyboar... Rather than urging him to conform his body to the uncomfortable keyboard, how about recommending a keyboard designed to be comfortable to him?
    - xentronium 13y ago

jseliger 13y ago

Incidentally, the only keyboard "innovation" I've used and liked is the Kinesis Advantage (which I wrote about here: http://jseliger.wordpress.com/2011/07/17/further-thoughts-on-the-kinesis-advantage-unicomp-space-saver-and-das-keyboard%E2%80%94two-years-later/ http://jseliger.wordpress.com/2011/07/17/further-thoughts-on... ). But the Advantage is a standalone keyboard, which makes it inherently easy to ditch for anyone who doesn't like it. At $300 it's also a niche product only likely to appeal to people who type a lot—usually meaning programmers and writers. Among laptops, I think Peter Bright is right: path dependence dictates that the more standardized a keyboard is, the better. I actually prefer the old-school Thinkpad keys to the newer Apple chiclet keys, but that difference is pretty small.

lallysingh 13y ago
I loved my advantage(s), but eventually dropped it for a happy hacker pro for two reasons: (1) the brackets and arrow keys on the advantage are painfully bad; (2) I fell in love with Topre key switches. The Lenovos have just been getting worse keyboards with every generation. I don't think the people they're going after care about the changes, but I've actively been looking for a new laptop vendor since they started fiddling about with the layouts.
- sanoli 13y ago
  How good are the Topre switches, compared to the ones on the Kinesis Advantage (I'm assuming you used 'blue' ones on the Kinesis)? I'm about to get a Kinesis Advantage, and the only con that I could think of so far is that I read here an there about how the Topre switches are even nicer than the Cherry MX switches.
  - lytfyre 13y ago
    > I'm assuming you used 'blue' ones on the Kinesis IIRC, the advantage is actually the keyboard for which cherry brown switches where created.
    - 13y ago

pasbesoin 13y ago

Personal pitch: Get rid of the "ginormous" f-ing shelves that push sharp front edges (yes, get rid of those, too) into the users' wrists, especially when working mobile at a table or workspace whose height and resultant forearm position cannot be optimized. Some of us still need to do significant amounts of, you know, typing, which is one reason we are on a laptop and not a tablet or whatever. If you're going to stick a keyboard on your device, make it comfortable and ergonomic. /grump

sanoli 13y ago
The Apple laptops I used recently had this sharp edge. Looked clean, modern, etc, but hurt my wrists like a #&$&.
- TylerE 13y ago
  You could probably fix this...if you dare. Since it's solid aluminum, you could probably take a file and round the edges...just be careful not to get the shaving anywhere inside.
  - nkurz 13y ago
    http://dustwell.com/macbook-pro-sharp-edge.html http://dustwell.com/macbook-pro-sharp-edge.html
- kalleboo 13y ago
  I started wearing a sweatband to buffer against the edge...

dman 13y ago

Also of note - if youre buying a 15 inch pc laptop you now get a numeric keyboard by default whether you want it or not. This also has the side effect of making the keyboard and mousepad layout assymetric since the keyboard and mousepad are now pushed to the left to make way for the numeric keypad on the right. The only two machines I know that dont do this are the dell xps 15 and the dell m3800 but both of them are > 1800$s. Quest for the perfect laptop continues. EDIT: other major quibble - backspace needs to be the right most key without any nearby power / other buttons. When I violently hit backspace to delete code that I know is wrong I dont want embarassments like hitting delete instead or powering off my machine.

bashinator 13y ago
15" MacBook Pros do not have a numpad, but it sounds like you don't want that price range.
- dman 13y ago
  Money is one factor. The other factor is that I dont want a retina-esque screen right now since I will be running linux on it and kde and chrome's support for hidipi screens is not great right now.
  - TheSoftwareGuy 13y ago
    Man that sucks. Almost every one of this guy's gripes are non-existant on a Mac.
    - dman 13y ago
      I want to run linux - retina displays don't work well with it. If I could make do with OSX I agree the MacBook Pro 15 would be nice (save for the location of the power button)
      - bashinator 13y ago
        If you're not tied to the idea of running native, I'm running various linuxes in VMWare Fusion on my MPB and full-screen mode works perfectly. The only thing you might find annoying is the lack of middle-click for pasting selections when using the touchpad.

nextos 13y ago

I think Lenovo is slowly abandoning what used to be the niche Thinkpad had filled in: great laptops for developers. There might be some good opportunities for startups. It's really frustrating to see that nothing ticks all boxes these days: * 4:3 high-res matte screen (like Chromebook Pixel or some old IBMs) * Good mechanical keyboard which includes insert, delete, begin, and end * Robust case with serviceable Linux-friendly components * Trackpoint I'd really pay a high premium for a well-executed laptop with these features, and many people I know would do as well.

cnlwsu 13y ago
Mechanical keyboard on laptop with high res matte screen... that would be amazing.
- chrismorgan 13y ago
  I've wondered about (and wished for) a mechanical keyboard on a laptop before. It'd increase the weight, thickness and cost significantly—but I don't think that would significantly hinder its popularity in certain circles, provided it did a good job of the implementation.
pekk 13y ago
We've really never had anything which ticked all those boxes, so I don't see a regression there. Only Lenovo is doing trackpoint seriously these days. Hardly anyone is paying any attention to Linux. I'm no expert, but I've never even heard of a laptop with a good mechanical keyboard. It's not just Lenovo, it's the whole market which decided people want junk like 1mm thick retina tablets with soldered ram and permanent batteries. Lenovo and everyone on the block is selling high-resolution crap though, so I'm sure you'll get that any time.
- w1ntermute 13y ago
  > Only Lenovo is doing trackpoint seriously these days Actually, even they are not: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UXa0XzNvuZU http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UXa0XzNvuZU

zwieback 13y ago

For true "innovation" you can always go the Twiddler (http://www.handykey.com/ http://www.handykey.com/) route. I've got one of the original models but have never actually tried it. Supposedly this is something the guys at Xerox Parc were excited about and it's based on the much older idea of a chorded keyboard.

brudgers 13y ago

Until I started using EMACS I would have thought the author's argument was a slam dunk four star lock. Now I realize that habits are habits because they're habits, not because they are the right way of doing something. We are more flexible than our machines, and though it might take a day or two to figure out home` and `end`, a laptop is a tool that one uses for years.

blah32497 13y ago
I thought the author sounded like a curmudgeony luddite. Ofcourse anything "different" will feel wrong for a little while. You have some muscle memory that you need to get over. So if you really wanna write a review, suck it up and use it till your fingers get rewired. Then write your reviews complaining about keyboard design. I don't think he even tried the keyboards he's talking about, let alone give himself some time to get used to them. I don't go read Vi's man page and then complain how it's too hard and unusual.
- xradionut 13y ago
  Have you met the author? Peter is opinionated, but most of the time he has a valid reason for it. As a writer and a programmer, a good keyboard is a necessity for his work. (I'd bet he's typed as many or more lines of code than a good number of folks here at HN.) At work we have have folks that order and try out several different keyboards before settling on one that meets their needs. When a programmer makes 80K, a few extra hundred dollars at the extreme to make them efficient and happy is noise in the budget. Even our interns get their choice.
  - keithpeter 13y ago
    I take your point, but the OA was reviewing a laptop. No choice of keyboard, and perhaps need to mode shift between non-standard and standard key positions. I attempt to play piano. Any clever redesigns of that 88 key layout are not going to work.
    - xradionut 13y ago

JoshTriplett 13y ago

Killing caps lock makes perfect sense, especially if it's still around as a shift-lock. Putting Home and End there is not the craziest thing I've seen done with it. (I personally remap it to a larger logo key, and use that with my window manager, but the X1 Carbon actually has a decent-size logo key to use for that.) However, the soft function key row is crazy. It completely breaks touch-typing; if I wanted that, I'd use a tablet. Likewise, putting Delete to the right of backspace makes backspace a smaller target to hit, and it's a very frequently used key. Moving the `~ key is the kind of thing done by folks who think "Oh, nobody ever uses that", and who don't understand that keys used by 5% of typists are still critically important. (Both for people who need to type "jalapeño" and people who need to type ~/Downloads/foo .) More importantly, there's no tradeoff here: this makes it worse for the loyal ThinkPad users, but doesn't actually make it proportionally better for others. And even if it did, that kind of consumer-targeted optimization is for consumer laptops like IdeaPad, not business laptops like ThinkPad.

dcotter 13y ago
Why not replace caps lock with a double-tap of the Shift key? This has the advantages of distance (still close at hand when needed) and memorability (Shift upcases temporarily, Shift-Shift upcases indefinitely) and eliminates one of the less useful keys at the same time.
- saraid216 13y ago
  And Shift-Shift-Shift activates Microsoft StickyKeys! (Is that still a thing in Win8?)
  - georgemcbay 13y ago
    Just tried it in 8.1 and yes it is still a thing.
- joebadmo 13y ago
  I use https://pqrs.org/macosx/keyremap4macbook/ https://pqrs.org/macosx/keyremap4macbook/ to remap caps lock to ctrl and hit both shift buttons simultaneously for caps lock. Here's my custom config: https://github.com/joebadmo/dotfiles/blob/master/keyremap4macbook.private.xml#L18 https://github.com/joebadmo/dotfiles/blob/master/keyremap4ma...

kunai 13y ago

This is a huge opportunity for Dell on their portable machines. As far as I know, Dell is practically the only OEM that hasn't royally screwed up their professional-grade notebooks. The M4800 is a beauty – extremely powerful, and fantastic to use. The keyboard isn't as good as it used to be, but it's still a traditional, non-Dentyne (yes, chiclet keys type like Dentyne) canted design, with a numpad, but a good keyboard nonetheless. It has a TrackPoint, which isn't as good as the previous model ThinkPads but is now much better because Lenovo have somehow decided that their sole purpose of existence is to copy Apple and "unify" shit that didn't need to be messed around with. I hate to play stereotypes here, but it was kind of expected from a Chinese company. Their pants-on-head retarded marketing videos and even their products – for example, the Yoga tablet copies iOS 7 icons and iOS 6 dock... wtf, and the marketing video for the new X1 is blatant Ive-hyperbolic. The marketing and hyperbole has long stopped working for Apple (thus the Designed in Cali bullshit), what the HELL were Lenovo thinking? Dell isn't perfect. They have horrible QC and design issues on their lower-end products, and the Precision machines aren't cheap. But they're solid and well-built with a ton of features, good battery life, good keyboards, decent pointing devices. If they put in a 3:2, high-density display, 7-row keyboard, Topre short-throw switches, and a nipple mouse that's less recessed, and market it like mad, it would be the perfect machine, one I would pay for and a lot of professionals, too.

pekk 13y ago
Lenovo has a huge pile of models, which would let them see pretty directly what people are demanding. Your criticism of Yoga tablet may be valid without really touching much of their overall strategy. Maybe Yoga tablet is the kind of crap people are buying.

muaddirac 13y ago

This is about laptop keyboards, but there is a huge diy scene around improving keyboards. I have an ErgoDox (http://ergodox.org/ http://ergodox.org/) which is very well thought out and open source (and people are iterating on it - see: http://geekhack.org/index.php?topic=44940.0 http://geekhack.org/index.php?topic=44940.0 )

lytfyre 13y ago
I've also been using a Cherry Clear switch ErgoDox at work for a couple of weeks now. Tweaked my layout a few times, and am now extremely happy with it. Massdrop (http://massdrop.com http://massdrop.com) runs pretty frequent periodic group buys for the kit, and assembley really isn't that hard - don't be scared off by the need for some surface mount soldering.

moonboots 13y ago

Caps lock should not be changed despite it's ostensible uselessness. Programmers often remap caps lock (I personally use this tool [1]), and it's nice to have a big target for the pinky. Remapping is of course possible with these new keyboards, but the split key design that replaces caps lock leaves a much smaller target. In addition, I'm sure there are hunt and peck typists that still legitimately use caps locks instead of shift because it requires less coordination and hand contortions, so leaving caps lock alone also has accessibility benefits. One area where keyboard designers aren't innovating enough is the spacebar. The left 2/3 of the space bar is rarely used by most touch typists and hogs very accessible real estate. I like how Microsoft split the spacebar on their new keyboard [2] and replaced the left half with backspace, the most commonly typed (but normally most hard to reach) key. I'm disappointed to see thinkpad/lenovo make these mistakes given their reputation for quality laptop keyboards. I personally use an x230 [3], which has a similar chiclet keyboard as the x1 carbon in the article without the transgressions. [1] https://github.com/alols/xcape https://github.com/alols/xcape [2] http://techland.time.com/2012/09/20/new-microsoft-keyboard-splits-space-bar-left-side-used-as-backspace-key/ http://techland.time.com/2012/09/20/new-microsoft-keyboard-s... [3] http://shop.lenovo.com/us/en/laptops/thinkpad/x-series/x230/ http://shop.lenovo.com/us/en/laptops/thinkpad/x-series/x230/

9999 13y ago
I use a Happy Hacking Keyboard which has no capslock key, control is automatically mapped there. On every other keyboard I've applied that same mapping in the OS. I would hate that weird split key set up that Lenovo has done there though.
- moonboots 13y ago
  I like the minimal ideals of the happy hacking keyboard but I think it went a little overboard. I like having an arrow cluster and page up/down for applications that don't support emacs/vi bindings. I do like how the number pad is removed. It's too infrequently used and increases the distance between keyboard and mouse.
  - 13y ago

tnash 13y ago

I think an important point here is that these aren't really "innovations". It's stripping features to make keyboards more compact. Keyboards are certainly a technology that could be improved. What about a touch screen split keyboard mouse combo that could take 10-finger multitouch and also give incredible haptic feedback that let you "feel" the keys?

dcotter 13y ago

I would like to see keyboards with flexible layouts, where you could reconfigure the positions and sizes of the keys as you choose, so that if you wanted to replace half the spacebar with backspace or move the numbers from the top row to a 3x3 grid on the far side of the keyboard, you could do that. Hackable keyboards, in essence.

freyrs3 13y ago

I'm really not pleased with what Lenovo is doing with the x230 and x240. The old Thinkpad keyboards used to be the a huge selling point for the X series line and now that they've gone chiclet keyboards like everyone else it's almost enough to make me want to shop around for a new Linux laptop.

mcphage 13y ago

> I'm not going to pretend that the Break key is a key you use every single day, but it's not useless, either. For example, Windows' ping command, when used with the -t switch (endless pinging until stopped) lets you type Ctrl-Break to print the current stats without ending the pinging (as opposed to Ctrl-c, which prints stats and ends the pinging). This isn't the most important thing ever, but it's nonetheless useful to be able to do. It might be useful sometimes, but is it useful enough to justify a key on everybody's keyboard, all the time? No.

tobyjsullivan 13y ago

It's cool if you don't like the new keyboard layout. As programmers, we need to use special keys and caps lock a lot. But to say Lenovo is doing it wrong is clearly missing the simple fact that they might not be building these things for programmers. They're building for the other 99.9% of the population that doesn't need caps lock, insert, bars and back-ticks ever. People who don't use function keys regularly and who, quite frankly, find "standard" keyboards incredibly awkward. Couple this with the fact that laptops have always lacked the real-estate for a full keyboard and I have to disagree with the author. This is certainly a positive evolution, just maybe not for programmers.

deleted 13y ago
[deleted]
eddiedunn 13y ago
Actually, I can see it work for programmers as well; tilde is easily pressed with the right thumb instead of left ring finger, esc is more easily reached for us vim users, and I know I sure don't use caps lock, ever. The soft function keys might be a problem for some, but I, at least, don't use them very often.

xiaomai 13y ago

I was going to replace my first-gen Thinkpad Carbon with the newer model (wanted the hi-res screen and better battery life), but this keyboard is a complete dealbreaker. Like the author, I am distressed at the removal of the caps-lock key (I remap mine). The ~/` key move is plain weird (it was bad enough when they moved print screen down there (I kept accidentally taking screenshots)). Lenovo, please fix your keyboard!

kristianp 13y ago

I agree with this article, standardisation of keyboard layouts would be better. If there was an industry organisation that got companies together to agree on things, the situation might be much better, although I don't hold out much hope for home and end! I feel that a lot of people copy apple because it's designs and hardware are great, but they copy things that aren't really that good at all, such as removing Home and End keys. I like to call this cargo-cult design, people blindly change things to the apple way for no clear reason. I'm looking at you gnome 3. Here are my personal preferences. I don't really care about caps-lock, but I do use it occasionally. I'm more likely to go back and use a keyboard shortcut to change a whole word to upper-case when doing sql programming. I personally want the 6 delete-insert-home-end-pgup-pgdn buttons separate in a way that mirrors the desktop pc keyboard. I quite liked this layout from microsoft keyboards of about 8 years ago which has gone out of fashion: Home End Ins Pgup Del Pgdn I want the arrow keys to have spacing around them so I can feel the triangle without looking at them, no pgup or pgdn touching them, just a gap. I want a laptop keyboard that is sufficiently close to the desktop keyboard that I don't have to adjust as much as I currently do. My T410 isn't too bad in that respect, except for the arrow keys as mentioned above.

Someone 13y ago
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ISO/IEC_9995 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ISO/IEC_9995 leads to http://www.iso.org/iso/iso_catalogue/catalogue_tc/catalogue_detail.htm?csnumber=51642 http://www.iso.org/iso/iso_catalogue/catalogue_tc/catalogue_.... CHF 50 buys you the standard for the "Editing function zone" that might (I didn't buy it) proscribe something about home and end. http://www.open-std.org/jtc1/sc35/wg1/docs/madison/SC35N795%20ISO-CEI%209995-5%20FCD(en).doc http://www.open-std.org/jtc1/sc35/wg1/docs/madison/SC35N795%... seems related. It does not mention "home".
- kps 13y ago
  As with many standards, you can find an unofficial 'final committee draft' for free if you look around. It doesn't prescribe a layout for keys other than the cursor arrows. ISO9995 has been responsible for a lot of nonsense from a programmer's point of view — for instance mandating Control in the lower left rather than beside A. Similarly its sister ISO9241, despite nominally being concerned with ergonomics, helped drive some of the best key switches off the market.

brudgers 13y ago

I am reminded of Xah Lee's page on all things keyboard: http://xahlee.info/kbd/keyboarding.html http://xahlee.info/kbd/keyboarding.html

claudius 13y ago
Unfortunately, you can only rebind existing keys in the ‘right’ position. Rebinding doesn’t help you with a physically broken keyboard layout.

chx 13y ago

I have a Lenovo T420 the last of laptops whose keyboard was fair and free erm where was I yes? so the last laptop with a decent keyboard. However, someone reports http://forum.thinkpads.com/viewtopic.php?f=45&t=104797#p719715 http://forum.thinkpads.com/viewtopic.php?f=45&t=104797#p7197... a T410 transplant into a T430 I wonder whether such a feat is possible into the T440p...

zobzu 13y ago

"good keyboards are standard keyboards" <= that

keithg 13y ago

Got a laptop recently for a new project. All of my colleagues raved about Lenovo. I went with a Lenovo ThinkPad W530. Great machine, right? I hate it. I hate it because they put the Fn key in the lower, left and moved the Ctrl key. Now I have to think every time I need to hit the Ctrl key!

MartinCron 13y ago
You will get used to it. At least, I did. Other than that one thing, it is the best laptop ever.
- MichaelGG 13y ago
  Why would you get used to it instead of just swapping the two keys?
  - scott_karana 13y ago
    Well, I shared my laptop with others, so they'd get really confused when I remapped the keys. If only you could swap the keycaps too.
  - fastflo 13y ago
    the bios swapping of "fn" and "left control" on my x121 had its own problems (it was a bit strange, sometimes the remapped fn key didn't actually behaved like a real control key). so i switched back to the original behavior and learned to deal with it. a hardware hack would be cool :) letting the fn key electrically do the same thing as the ctrl key and for the rare use of fn use the capslock-key for it :)
paol 13y ago
Have a look in the BIOS, there should be an option to swap Fn & Ctrl.
- keithg 13y ago
  Thanks. I'll take a look.

acabal 13y ago

I passed over buying an X1 Carbon for a few reasons, but I always check the keyboard of a potential purchase for the pgup/pgdown/home/end keys on the right-hand column. Modern ultrabooks got rid of them (despite there often being more than enough space for them) and it makes me really mad. Those are super-useful keys for coders and also for general web navigation. After reading this article, I went back to take a closer look at the X1 keyboard, and actually gasped. No hardware Fn keys? Home/end replacing Caps (which I remap to ctrl)? Backspace/del next to each other? What were they thinking?? I'm so glad I didn't do an impulse buy on the X1, because my mind doesn't think to inspect the keyboard so closely. I would have returned it 10 seconds after opening the box. I'm going to have to look very closely now at the keyboards of new laptops I'm thinking of buying.

drdaeman 13y ago
> home/end keys Actually, they're nearly useless if you use software/OS capable of Emacs-style keyboard navigation and develop a habit of using C-a/C-e shortcuts. (Especially with CapsLock rebound as Control.)
- acabal 13y ago
  I like them specifically for reading web pages. When reading I can just rest my hand on the right side of the keyboard and browse with home/pgup/pgdown/end. Usually when I'm reading like this I'm not typing and so not in the mood for ctrl gymnastics.
  - darkgray 13y ago
    While it doesn't remove the gymnastics requirement, a relatively nice alternative to webpage pgup/pgdn is shift-space/space.
  - ricardobeat 13y ago
    Pressing the spacebar in a browser has the same effect as the PageDown key.
- 4ad 13y ago

klazutin 13y ago

This is so odd how people can unknowingly create difficulties for someone else. Remapping Caps lock to switching input language has probably been the most useful thing I've done to improve my computing productivity (followed closely by Linux and tiling wms). What used to require weird combinations like Control-Shift, or worse Shift-Alt (windows default which triggers window's menu half the time) now takes only a quick flick of my left little finger. Typing even the most technical texts with English words in every sentence has been easy and effortless ever since. And now Lenovo is taking this away from me by removing the Caps lock key from what otherwise looks like an absolutely perfect laptop. This is such a shame.

Too 13y ago

It's also missing the context menu button. The one usually located between the altgr and ctrl on the right side. This key is very important if you don't want to use the mouse as it's equivalent of right clicking.

mcantelon 13y ago

When I saw this article I thought of the X1 before reading it. The X1 looks decent, other than the wacky keyboard and the non-removable battery. A big part of the Thinkpad brand is the fact they have good keyboards.

deleted 13y ago

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gaius 13y ago

You won't go wrong with a Cherry keyboard, German quality, same keyswitches that were used on the perfect machine, the BBC Micro.

lucb1e 13y ago

My father bought a Lenovo Thinkpad last week. One evening we were installing and configuring some more things on the laptop, and at some point he mentions that it's annoying that the keyboard has no printscreen button which he had needed that day. This was the first thing I noticed when the laptop arrived, so I pointed out to him that the PrtScn button is between AltGr and the right ctrl key. We both shook our heads at that. Nice try at keyboard innovation, Lenovo.

fosap 13y ago
That key is ridiculously placed. I but know i like it very much. I mapped it to f13 and that key opens a new terminal. I think that way it is very useful.

hibbelig 13y ago

They took away the Ctrl key to the left of A!

dasil003 13y ago

There's nothing wrong with keyboard innovation, the problem is with commodity laptop manufacturers trying to innovate in an integrated device. The important differentiators on laptop are numerous: form-factor, specs, screen, etc. Even keyboard quality is a big factor, so trying to get clever with the layout and soft keys is just begging to throw a deal breaker in. What laptop manufacturers should be doing is following Apple's lead and standardizing heavily across their entire line and keeping that reasonably in line with national keyboard standards. Leave the layout innovation to external keyboard manufacturers where there is an opportunity to make drastic changes and sell them based on the strength of that innovation alone. Later the best of the innovations can trickle their way back into laptops.

jakub_g 13y ago

Since we're bashing on laptop keyboards, I hate with passion all the layouts that put FN key in the bottom left corner instead of CTRL. It's far easier to reach the button in the very corner and I use CTRL order of magnitude more often than FN. Also it seems that for each producer, half of the laptops have FN and the other half have CTRL in the corner which just adds confusion when you're using someone else's machine. Can someone persuade me to the superiority of FN-in-the corner?

rane 13y ago
I can't, but consider remapping Caps Lock to CTRL. Might just solve your problem and make computer use more ergonomic in general.
phaer 13y ago
thinkpads (or at least my x220) have their fn buttons in the bottom left corner but there is a bios setting to swap fn and ctrl.
- jakub_g 13y ago
  That's a valuable info, thanks for sharing.

loup-vaillant 13y ago

Hail to the dinosaurs! Seriously, this mentality is the main reason why keyboard aren't improving. Dvorak was right: "I'm tired of trying to do something worthwhile for the human race, they simply don't want to change!" > The benefits of the Dvorak layout aren't well proven (if they exist at all), but some people find the layout more comfortable to use. The benefits are obvious and well established. Only irrational fools and extreme believers in the so called "efficient market" would believe otherwise. It just have a learning curve, which most people don't want to suffer. Some people find Dvorak more comfortable? Come on, nearly everyone who has tried it for over a month would reckon it's more comfortable. > Good keyboards are standard keyboards. No. This is a good keyboard: http://ergodox.org/ http://ergodox.org/ This is an okay keyboard: http://typematrix.com/ http://typematrix.com/ (I have tried that one myself, and got used to its layout in a couple hours. And I touch type too.) If we switch to such layouts overnight, people would complain for a few months, then forget about it. I even suspect that after the fact, most would mock the silliness of keeping the staggered design even though the keyboards were no longer mechanical. > Good keyboards are […] keyboards that […] let me switch effortlessly to other systems. Oh, you're the rare breed who use several systems regularly? I suggest you buy a keyboard you like, and plug it to those various systems. Unless you're an even rarer bread who cannot even even plug external keyboards to his computers for security reasons.

dsr_ 13y ago
"you're the rare breed who use several systems regularly?" Rare? I don't know anyone who doesn't. In a typical day, I use a MBP, an IBM Model M, a Unicomp EnduraPro (modern equivalent to the Model M, only slightly inferior), and one or two random keyboards. Oh, and my phone. Even my elementary-school-age son will use two or three keyboards in a day: one on a laptop, one on the desktop in the living room, and a virtual one on his tablet.
- loup-vaillant 13y ago
  (Phones and tablets don't count: they have no keyboard to begin with.) I write custom software for a living. I use 2 desktop computers: one at home, one at work. I plug my typematrix to both. When I'm on vacation, I may use my laptop, to which I pug my typematrix as well. Some of my co-workers (10%) also use a laptop at work, because they have to move around. Others (1%) are sysadmins, and often have to go to the server room. Both could buy a keyboard, and plug it to the computers they use. The sysadmins would have to pay for an additional keyboard that stays on the server room. By the way, I use a completely non-standar keyboard layout. Like Dvorak, only optimized for French (Bépo). Since I only rarely use systems that I don't control, this is okay. 90% of my co-workers are in the same situation. What do you work on that requires you to use several different keyboards you don't choose on a daily basis? To me that doesn't sound rare. That sounds alien.

thecodefoundry 13y ago

I've remapped the caps lock key using AutoHotKey (Windows ) to act as Close Document (Close MDI child window) by double-tapping it. It retains its existing functionality by requiring you to hold Shift before using it. But the ability to quickly close a document in Visual Studio or a browser tab by simply double tapping caps lock instead of stretching for Ctrl-F4 is invaluable.

fastflo 13y ago

i think the capslock function should be disabled by default. let the key stay there, so people can bind it to what ever they want. i'm a passionate programmer and im currently typing on a lenovo x121 keyboard and i have to say its one of the best laptop keyboard i've ever used. the only annoying thing is the "nearly useless" "Fn" key left of the left control key. i'm an emacs user and i can not understand why to place such a rarely used key at the place of such an often used key like the left control key! but i learned to deal with it. @lenovo: the x121 keyboard is good, but please put that useless fn key somewhere else! like replace the right control key with it! (who is using the right control key?) all this is about the german x121 keyboard layout.

jbcurtin2 13y ago

The keyboard is the only thing that keeps me buying my macs-laptops.

JadeNB 13y ago

I would just like to highlight the 'promoted comment' that showed up for me (not mine; the author is listed as 'theotherjim'): > It's been almost 30 years since a colleague suggested to me that all the keyboard designers in the world - except one, any one - should be shot.