ErgoMechKeyboards
Ergonomic, split and other weird keyboards
Rules
Keep it ergo
Posts must be of/about keyboards that have a clear delineation between the left and right halves of the keyboard, column stagger, or both. This includes one-handed (one half doesn't exist, what clearer delineation is that!?)
i.e. no regular non-split¹ row-stagger and no non-split¹ ortholinear²
¹ split meaning a separation of the halves, whether fixed in place or entirely separate, both are fine.
² ortholinear meaning keys layed out in a grid
No Spam
No excessive posting/"shilling" for commercial purposes. Vendors are permitted to promote their products/services but keep it to a minimum and use the [vendor] flair. Posts that appear to be marketing without being transparent about it will be removed.
No Buy/Sell/Trade
This subreddit is not a marketplace, please post on r/mechmarket or other relevant marketplace.
Some useful links
- EMK wiki
- Split keyboard compare tool
- Compare keycap profiles Looking for another set of keycaps - check this site to compare the different keycap profiles https://www.keycaps.info/
- Keymap database A database with all kinds of keymap layouts - some of them fits ergo keyboards - get inspired https://keymapdb.com/
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I used to have space on the right, but it was pointed to me that, with my layout (for a reason I cannot remember!), space on the left would be more convenient. So I switched.
However the key symmetrical to space is not enter, but backspace, both keys being the most used in my thumb clusters (I used to have both on the same side, and it was quite bad).
Enter is on the left thumb, next to space.
One argument for moving space to a specific hand is so space is assigned to the vowel hand. If you are on a layout with definitive vowel / consonant hand split, then the theory goes that it is more frequent for words (at least in English) to begin with a consonant, and separately, also end with a consonant. By having space on the vowel hand, you are promoting hand alternation.
Personally I have vowels on the left hand but still use right thumb for space. I do have 'e' on left thumb, but right hand thumb has been a habit since I learned qwerty on a mechanical typewriter..
Right hand consonants must have been the reason indeed (t, s, r, n, ... ). It is counterbalanced by the fact that punctuation is on the vowel side, but I suppose it doesn't count as much.
I'm also a backspace on opposite thumb user. Feels better/makes more sense than enter for me
Yeah, that does make sense. So where’s enter for you?
I have enter on right thumb next to space, and on a combo left hand. I also use the combo as a way to hold enter, since my main enter key is a layer tap
What do you mean by a combo?
It's when you press 2 keys at the same time to get a new output. So I press c+c on qwerty to get enter.
Here are the QMK docs for combos
Oh, interesting! QMK enables some pretty impressive stuff!
They have some great functionality for sure. Combos, tap dances (which I don't use much of personally), and the leader key are all super super useful for compressing the footprint of a keymap down
Now that I understand combos, what are tap dances?
Similar concept in that it let's a key do multiple things. In this case, you can assign a key to have multiple outputs based on how many times you tap it, and another output for hold. Docs for it
Ah, that’s an interesting place to put it, hadn’t considered that location!
Considering that you never press enter next to space, there is no same finger bigram involving these two keys, so I believe it makes sense.
Makes sense to me.