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
LSDJ does offer up an interesting option though: use a keyboard to enter your values in in real-time. This is an interesting little project that requires literally splicing an old school gameboy link cable with a PS2 cabled PC keyboard, and then actually playing that keyboard like a piano using the designated rows of keys. It seems a little extreme, but after you've typed in values for a few days with the DMG, you're ready to try just about anything. It also lets you play 'live' using the gameboy, which is pretty cool.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mi4dRRKKAG8
So my question to this group is, what keyboard and switches would you recommend for this project? Off the top of my head I'm thinking Red switches so you minimize any extra clicking while you're playing music, but I don't know if there's an even better low-noise option. What are some good boards that have PS2 cables instead of USB? Most of the one's I've seen are done with old junky keyboards, but I'd love to make something truly special. Lastly, does anyone know of any LSDJ keycap sets?
Thanks for your ideas!