Ergonomic, split and other weird keyboards
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
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I built this and one other (black and red) with a different thumb cluster in 2021. Not sure if Dactyl Manuform is still "hip" but this has been my daily driver for two years now and I don't really want to type on anything else!
Funny, it reminds me of one I built in 2022:
Tell you what buddy, I absolutely love your taste in colorways. also I love your tenkey, and I'll buy the whole rig if you ever sell it :)
Great minds think alike
That’s really cool looking
Do you find yourself using the thumb clusters much? They look like they would be too far for my hands
My Enter key, as well as space bar (the green ones - one for each thumb), ctrl, alt, ins and del, meta, and function keys are all in the thumb cluster and nowhere else. I use them constantly.
Getting used to enter on the right thumb was the weirdest, but now that I have, it makes perfect sense. Mainly I made that change due to not having room in the right hand to keep hjkl;' and also have enter on the pinky, and I'm really glad I did!
I still have shift on the lower left and right corners, which is different from many peoples' layouts, but I have been a touch typist for years and cannot let go of shift keys in those locations.
There is no caps lock, that button is escape instead, and the upper left is just ` and ~.
So you just decided to go full send on your first ergo, huh?
That's pretty typical of my approach to things. I made two, just in case I screwed one of them up. :)
It wasn't without a healthy amount of research and I also had to learn how to build and tune my first 3d printer to make the chassis. I'd been watching a lot of Zack Freedman at the time so was feeling a bit inspired.
Dactyl was your first ergo mech? That’s hardcore!
Dactyl Manuform is always in style! Beautiful build!
:)
Your wrist rests kinda remind me of the rangers brooches from Babylon 5!
I love it!
I don’t know if you printed the case or not, but the print looks awesome!
Thank you, sir - I did print it, and thank you. I had to buy, tune, and learn how to 3d print as a prereq for the project, and since then have printed a lot of stuff... but the DM shells are by far the longest prints.
Love seeing more dactyls here. Would you mind sharing any more details about how you have the electronics and software set up for it?
I'm exploring a future dactyl build.
Let me look into this later tonight and I'll see what I can do for you.
For starters, there are several "Dactyl Manuform Generator" hits you will find, and most of them depend on similar software which is unfortunately not super accessible to the casual builder. This is what most people use to customize their shells before doing the actual build, which is considerably more straightforward - handwiring keyboards is pretty much the same regardless of formfactor.
This is the one I used. There are several choices with online generators, but you are limited in options to what has been programmed into the interfaces and you might want the extra control you get from setting up your own environment.
I chose to use a single Elite-C on the control side, and an Arduino pro micro on the lag side to save money since it doesn't have to take a connection. I used TRRF for the cross connect. The switches are Gateron Yellow with O-Rings and individually lubed. Therefore I have zero click, bottom-out is shock absorbed, and all the THOCK comes from the cavity inside the shells. Travel is minimal and if you're nimble, you can type almost silently.