Support for Alternative Layouts
This is a summary of how alternative layouts have been supported by kits such as Colevrak and Homing. It is not a discussion of alt layout performance and development, but if that interests you I highly recommend starting with Pascal Getreuer’s A guide to alt keyboard layouts (why, how, which one?). It’s a concise and comprehensive overview with links to some great sites that go deeper. He also has a separate Links about keyboards page. The Keyboard layouts doc he recommends explains layout goals and metrics in detail, summarizing the alt layouts discussed here as well as more than one hundred others. Sculpted-profile The majority of custom keycap sets are sculpted-profile (Cherry, SA, MT3, KAT, etc. - more on profiles generally here) so let’s start there. Because each row has a unique keycap shape, alt layouts require a unique keycap for each legend that moves off its QWERTY row. At first there were two The Dvorak layout was patented in 1936 by August Dvorak & William L....
Apr 23, 2024
https://www.massdrop.com/buy/ikbc-87-rgb-mechanical-keyboard
This video explains things better though. Skip to around the middle.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ScXf7zfwzcM
1. What the hell is the manual referring to under the Light Mode table for Fn + Blank = Pause current dynamic lighting/resume dynamic lighting. Seriously, wtf is "Blank". It's even mentioned again in the text under #3 "...press Fn+blank to pause current keyboard lighting". The only thing I can think of is it's a printing error, and "Blank" was a placeholder.
2. In the video at about 6:39 he displays a reactive mode that flashed the lights in "quadrants". I'm not seeing that mode on this keyboard. I know this is a different model, but they even include the manual to the F108/F87 with this keyboard, so I would have figured that they're indicating that the modes are the same. Is this mode missing in this model, or is my keyboard defective?
3. Speaking of the manual.....just wow, what a mess. I'll give them the benefit of the doubt as it appears to have been a best effort to translate into English. But, still, for a keyboard that has fairly complex lighting/RGB controls, and no software to control it, the manual is pretty vague and confusing.
4. Another thing that makes me think that this model is slightly different than the F108/F87: The manual states under "Speed mode and others" that the light to the right of the space bar will change with those settings. On this keyboard, the light that changes is in the Capslock. So, if that's different, what else is different?
5. Hey, another complaint about the manual: In the manual Fn+F4 only lists three modes. However, when you press Fn+F4 on this keyboard, there's five modes. So, great that we get five modes, but still makes me wonder what we'd know if we had an accurate manual.
Other than all that, I'm one of the lucky ones. I don't appear to have any issues with my keyboard. However, it's a bit disheartening to hear others are having issues. I don't remember how many people joined this drop, but my email from before it ended indicated there was at least 122 people. There appears to only be a "handful" reporting back in the discussion here about issues, but that doesn't factor in people that aren't reporting their issues, or don't know they have issues.
Anyways, all that said, I like the keyboard. It's very solid, and has a great feel to it. The lighting and RGB modes are pretty neat. Hopefully I'll either get answers to my questions above, or I guess I could become an electrical engineer so I can figure out the modes without - or in spite of - the manual.