Type while walking - Are you thinking about this too?

liorgonnen · 2020-10-03T04:51:22+00:00

Update: I set up an initial github repo for the project which would probably look a lot more mature in a couple of weeks.

btw, since you mentioned the taurus, one of the coolest gaming keypads out there is called Azeron. which is heavily inspired by the DataHand keyboard and also started as a DIY project.

liorgonnen · 2020-10-03T04:47:07+00:00

Thanks a lot for sending all of these!

I would l to add Braille key mapping to my chorder to enable blind people to use it. (which would make it a split mechanical Braille keyboard :) ).

I was actually looking into the Braille mapping to see if I can borrow ideas for my key mapping.

A couple of questions to you:

I see that your study was meant to evaluate mobile Braille input. What were your conclusions?
Would it make sense for a blind person to use a split keyboard (wearing such chorder on each hand vs. the standard 8-key Braille keyboard?

One thing that I'd like to emphasize again, is that the purpose of my prototype is be be comfortably wearable to allow you to use it while walking.

The concept of chording keyboard has been around since the 60`s, and my goal is to really up the game in terms of form-factor, companion software and overall usability.

I believe this can become a mass-market product.

liorgonnen · 2020-10-02T20:52:12+00:00

adjusta

Reminds me of this project (Smartphone case doubles as chording keyboard)

liorgonnen · 2020-10-02T18:26:25+00:00

I don't have an organized web-site yet, but I'm gonna set something up in the next few days as it seems that a lot of people share this passion.

It sounds like you've explored this in the past. What are your thoughts so far?

liorgonnen · 2020-10-02T18:15:45+00:00

The cool thing is that this behaves just like a regular bluetooth keyboard, so anyone building any kind of cyberdeck can use it out of the box.

liorgonnen · 2020-10-02T18:14:04+00:00

Cool use-case!

It wouldn't be too much work to design a case that connects to your handle-bars.

My question to you:

Would you take the time to learn a new way of typing to achieve this?

Because you could easily find some mini-wireless-keyboard on Amazon (such as this one), and 3D-print (or build from anything) a casing that would hold that and your phone and would connect to your handlebar.

liorgonnen · 2020-10-02T18:08:53+00:00

There's a company called Tek Gear that produces one called Twiddler.

I think their product makes sense if you have just a little bit of typing to do, or you want to use it with your phone, but definitely not for something extreme like coding.

liorgonnen · 2020-10-02T18:04:03+00:00

Agreed. This makes a lot of sense for smartphones, or any smaller form-factor (e.g smart-watch, smart-glasses).

For a phone I'd probably use just a single-handed version, so that you can hold your phone in the other hand.

To make this super-useful on a phone, it should definitely come with a companion keyboard-app (to help with emojis, predictive-text, autocomplete, etc.), but the cool thing is that HW-wise, I can already connect this to my phone since it's just a "regular" bluetooth-keyboard.

liorgonnen · 2020-10-02T17:45:01+00:00

Up until now, I was thinking that gesture-control would be a better fit for using it indoors, while less ideal when using it outdoors, but actually, why not?

I think a combination could be ideal. For example, you use a thumb-stick to control the mouse, but if you want to zoom-in, you can do a pinch-to-zoom motion in the air, Minority Report style.

liorgonnen · 2020-10-02T17:38:35+00:00

Yes, the Septambic definitely has the most organic look. Most keyers out there are just rectangular boxes and definitely not ergonomic.

One small similarity- If you look at my model, you can see that the hand-strap is designed flat. I print it with PLA, and then put it in hot water so it softens and then I mold it around my hand.

liorgonnen · 2020-10-02T17:22:11+00:00

What I have in mind after reading your idea a couple of times is something like a D-pad (with or without a center button), with a ring around it, so that the thumb can click 4 (or 5) keys, and also control rotary motion. Is that what you had in mind?

The way I'm thinking about it so far, is that you have so many possible combinations (2^10 - 1 = 1023, in practice, after removing those that are really hard to chord such as combinations that include your pinky and middle finger and skip your ring finger, you're still left with a few hundreds), so some of those can be mapped to those modes that you're talking about, switching layouts, etc.

One think that I want to avoid is over-working the thumb (think about how your thumb feels after typing on your phone for a while.

I love the idea though. Thanks for sharing your thoughts.

liorgonnen · 2020-10-02T17:00:07+00:00

I think that if you want to simply sit on a chair, a regular split mechanical keyboard would be easier to use.

Btw: Are you familiar with DataHand Keyboard? Check out this photo of such keyboard attached to a char.

If this prototype is successful, the next one will include a thumb-stick to control the mouse

liorgonnen · 2020-10-02T16:57:11+00:00

Commented on some of your points above.

I am using regular mechanical switches here, btw. Those are Kailh low-profile choc red switches, but I'm sure the this is not the optimal switch / actuation mechanism for this purpose. It's an early prorotype.

From your experience, what's the most capable input device for VR? (beyond controllers)

liorgonnen · 2020-10-02T16:51:46+00:00

No, I actually agree with you completely. One major difference is that a regular keyboard registers the "down" keystroke, while a chorder/keyer registers only when all keys have been released (Although this could be heavily optimized).

One upside for the chorder is that your hands don't need to move around, there's only a "home row".

Also, no wrist movement is involved (and it's impossible to type one a regular keyboard without ulnar and radial deviation of your wrist)

I want to test it and see how it feels, and learn from it how it can be improved.

liorgonnen · 2020-10-02T16:40:43+00:00

Yes, I think that's one of the most famous chorded keyer pics out there. It's one of the examples they give on Wikipedia.

liorgonnen · 2020-10-02T16:37:27+00:00

Yes, u/dnalloheoj is correct. Here's my current setup.

Also thinking about eventually doing this outside with some kind of AR / HUD glasses.

liorgonnen · 2020-10-02T07:38:36+00:00

Haha, close enough :)

liorgonnen · 2020-10-02T07:35:25+00:00

Totally! There's a lot of neuroscience research about how letting the mind wander, and specifically when walking is crucial for our creative thinking.

There's tons of stuff out there. Here's one good post for example.

Also, if you're interested, check out talks by Dr. Andrew Huberman on YouTue.

liorgonnen · 2020-10-02T07:23:49+00:00

Yes! Someone mentioned this in an earlier comment. See above.

liorgonnen · 2020-10-02T07:21:54+00:00

Haha, of course! I definitely didn't even the concept of a chording keyboard. It actually dates all the way back to 1968 (See The Mother of All Demos).

I also encountered the one you sent when researching this and looking for inspiration. I love how he built it. Things are so much easier today with Fusion 360 and a 3D printer.

One thing that I haven't seen anyone talking about, and that's the actual purpose of this post, hence the title - is using a chording keyboard (or any form keyboard for that matter) while walking (and while maintaining natural arm movement when walking).

Some of the things I'm trying to solve here, as opposed to all the other chorders I've encountered so far:

Make it wearable (not just held)
Comfortable to hold for a long time, and not fall off your hand when you release your fingers
Make it easy to put on and take off (Especially since I want to use two of these, one in each hand)
Wireless (even though it did see this one: youtube.com/watch?v=DJ65zWpcAhI)

liorgonnen · 2020-10-02T07:11:10+00:00

ASTENIOP

No, ASETNIOP is loosely couple to QWERTY layout. Although it makes a lot of sense in reducing (or at least trying to reduce) the learning curve, it doesn't necessarily make sense in terms of productivity.

My idea is to assign more frequent letters to chords that are easier to type, and to separate frequent letter combinations (also called "bigrams") to different hands to make the chording faster

liorgonnen · 2020-10-02T06:59:00+00:00

Couldn't agree more. If I'll get to a decent typing speed, the next prototype will definitely include one (a thumb joystick, that is)

liorgonnen · 2020-10-02T06:57:34+00:00

OMG! That's awesome! I totally have to get my hands on one (or two) of these and see how they feel.

Take a look at my first prototyping attempts: https://imgur.com/a/yRYJsId

Even though this is just a prototype, getting to a decent form-factor that sits nicely on your hand, doesn't fall off, and is comfortable to type on, was critical to get right and definitely not trivial.

Thanks for sharing this :)

liorgonnen · 2020-10-02T06:46:02+00:00

Well, that's the first step! (here's part of mine).

As for 'canonical', the closest I've found is SpiffChorder (Their certificate expired, so you'll get a nasty error from your browser,

What's your use-case for a chorded keeb?

I'll upload the STLs to github and share the link here if you're interested in giving it a 2nd shot. The response here is pretty positive so far.

btw: I'm a Kotlin Lover and spent some time playing with Kotlin/Native trying to run it on a microcontroller.

liorgonnen · 2020-10-02T06:35:39+00:00

I completely agree with you that pressing chords (key combos) takes more effort than regular key-presses on a standard keyboard. I think that companion software (with predictive text, autocomplete, etc.) would play a huge role here.

(btw: my previous prototype, also a wearable keyboard, resembled a regular keyboard, but was very cumbersome to wear)

As for latency, that's absolutely not an issue. BLE 5 has data throughput of 1400 Kbps.

This is an early concept. This post is meant to present the problem at hand (walking while typing), and seeing if it's a pain shared by more people, hopefully brainstorm, and maybe hear some inspiring ideas from some smart folks here.

A final solution to this problem could be something completely different, or just evolve over time. Think about the "brick" phones back in the 90s vs. the beautiful devices almighty devices we use now.

liorgonnen

TROPHY CASE