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
Layout: (CM Storm Quickfire TK key layout), ANSI - That's because I sometimes work on other people's KBs and have to keep mine in line. Legends: shine-through, medium-sized, centered, pretty standard font, nothing too fancy. Color of the keycaps: black - It keeps the colors of the backlighting really pop. Keycaps: made of PBT, legends - POM plastic, double-shot injection molded Profile of the keycaps: in terms of height something between OEM/Cherry and Low Profile. I like the height of Apex M800's keycaps but I also like the *ergonomic* profile of OEM ones. Switch: SteelSeries QS1. I don't like Cherry MX Speed that much because it has non-centered LED. Case: Aluminum, frameless - BUT not the like of Corsair K70's (it gathers dust a lot), much more like Natec Genesis RX75 or Ducky Shine 5. It has to save as much width and length as possible. LEDs: RGB of course. Lightweight design: Genesis RX75've managed to keep it very close to 1 kg. Drivers: Not needed. Picking the color directly with the keyboard (with 6 RGB scale buttons, editor's buttons for example (Home, Page Up, etc.) or the way Ducky Shine 5 does) should suffice. Volume knob - Das Keyboard anyone?