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Mark A. Rayner

Adept at touch typing? Want to go insane? Try the latest toggle switch "keyboard."

#typing #writing #writingcommunity #humor #humour

A qwerty keyboard but all the keys are replaced with switches
71 comments
Jonathan👣🚲

@markarayner Finally, modifier keys not limited by fingers. Just be sure to have some diodes in the matrix to avoid ghosting/blocking.

geoffl

@markarayner Should be compulsory for anyone still on twitter.

Emelia/Emi

@edward @markarayner @foone If it were a true Foone keyboard, they'd all be triple-throw switches and you'd get upper or lower-case by toggling the switch up or down.

Foone🏳️‍⚧️

@becomethewaifu @edward @markarayner I don't have the pictures or links handy but I have worked on a keyboard which just had a big lever switch for a capslock, instead of shift keys

Charles Eckman

@becomethewaifu @edward @markarayner @foone But seriously: I had a coworker where each finger sat in a little cup, with up/down/left/right switches around the edges. Hit keys by moving finger side-to-side instead of up and down. I don't know the name of the keyboard though!

zxm

@markarayner ok, how do you ctrl-alt-del on this? :-D

Pete Prodoehl 🍕

@markarayner This is something I would have built a decade ago if I had even less sense.

Billy O'Neal

@markarayner I am already insane just knowing such a thing exists

Michael Porter

@markarayner I feel like the “enter“ key should be one of these:

Antique, slightly rusty, knife switch–like the kind you would use to deliver electricity to your monster.
Riccardo Mori

@MichaelPorter @markarayner Yes! Caps Lock too, connected to a big red ENGAGED beacon when, er, engaged. :-)

Mark Eichin

@MichaelPorter
We lost something when Carriage Return no longer returned the carriage... zzzzt ding!
@markarayner

Michael Porter

@eichin @markarayner Yeah, the 20-minute workout as you typed an essay on a manual typewriter 😄

(I still think Grade 9 Typing was the most useful course I ever took in my life 👍🏻)

Eraitch

@MichaelPorter @markarayner I hope that plays the opening bars to Beethoven's 5th when closed

wakame

@markarayner
Seems way too complicated compared to a potentiometer-and-button setup. :blobcatgiggle:

LisPi
@markarayner @wakame Hm, the wear on those will be quite harsh.

How do you handle key up/down event emission?
bignose

When I say mechanical key switches, I mean it @markarayner

Ángela Stella Matutina

@markarayner

I could adapt to this in one day. My speed would suffer, of course.

Mark A. Rayner

@angelastella I once had a job at CBC Radio with VERY OLD manual typewriters. The greens we had to use for shows (three sheets at once, one for the producer, one for the host, and one for the archive) made it impossible to touch type. I had to use my thumbs. I imagine my speed would be about the same on this nightmare contraption.

Ángela Stella Matutina

@markarayner

Wow. Flashback to cop taking my statement back in the nineties. Index fingers, but still.

oscarfalcon

@markarayner

This would make for a very interesting "stream of consciousness" exercise... while high of course.

I kind of want to try it...

Tor Kingdon

@markarayner going insane was not on my list of things I wanted to get done today, so I'll pass

Baloo Uriza

@markarayner This might actually be kinda usable if the switches flipped the other way.

Haelwenn /элвэн/ :triskell:
@BalooUriza @markarayner And switches that spring back to off mode (like some light switches) rather than toggle switches.
MAGIC____

@markarayner imagine using this for fighting or rhythm games. truly unhinged

Liah

@markarayner buying zhis for ada and lara's enrichment

tyx

@markarayner
I definitely need a smaller version with "PgDn", "Down", "Shift", "Ctrl", "Alt", "Space" and "A". Maybe "+/=", "-" and "#" as well. And a pot to smoothly adjust repetition rate.
the one with "(" ")" for lispers and "{" "}" for c/java would also probably find it's market niche.

Json Doh

Sticky keys. The hardware implementation. @markarayner

Jochen Marschall

@markarayner
I have a question about the toggle direction for the arrow switches…

Henrik Pauli

@markarayner How many curses per minute would we get from a chyrosran22 video reviewing this? :D

Fulgerion, Best Purple Noodle

@markarayner You really don't understand how tactile individuals work. I would love this. Especially for gaming. If I had that for my space simulators and MMORPGs. Would need a keyboard of course. But a board like that to use for various flight toggles without spending thousands of dollars for a specified flight-sim controller would be amazing. I dreamed of having a gaming switch-board like this for 30 years. It wouldn't be fashioned like a keyboard though XD. I am the guy in the office with the loudest possible keyboard.

@markarayner You really don't understand how tactile individuals work. I would love this. Especially for gaming. If I had that for my space simulators and MMORPGs. Would need a keyboard of course. But a board like that to use for various flight toggles without spending thousands of dollars for a specified flight-sim controller would be amazing. I dreamed of having a gaming switch-board like this for 30 years. It wouldn't be fashioned like a keyboard though XD. I am the guy in the office with the...

slash

@markarayner I used to write programs with toggle switches, but I only had 16 address lines, 8 data lines, and a "Deposit" switch to deal with. Oh, and the address lines would auto-increment for me, so really it was flipping 8 switches and hitting "Deposit". Then set the addr lines to the start of my program, and hit "Run".

I did this up through the end of the 90's, on a *very* high-tech, expensive, and widely known US DoD project...

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