Some questions that you will have to ask yourself is what keys you're interested in losing. Do you need a number row? Function key row? Expectations for how much you use layers and thumbs can help to decide.
this post was submitted on 20 Jun 2023
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Ergonomic, split and other weird keyboards
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I've always liked a number pad better than the row, so I figure getting used to layers will be the way to go. Function keys would be the same. I'm looking at beekeeb's piantor kit with 42 keys, which seems like a decent starter. Rotary encoders are attractive, but I'll probably save them for the future, especially as the kits he has with optional encoders have either too many keys, or fewer than I want to start with.
I'd like to give a +1 for Beekeeb as a vendor. Leo there is a rockstar with incredible support. They provide kits with everything in them so you can assemble them like Legos, or presoldered and assembled boards too. Beyond that, Beekeeb invests in open source, often releasing new designs but also publishing variations of boards and cases and firmware for all of us to use.
A good place to start is our wiki, you'll find there a small list of some popular keyboards as well as links to other databases of keyboards what hopefully will help you. some obvious ones: Corne (crkbd), Kyria, Iris, Lily58, Sofle, Sweep.
If you search, the open-source ones linked generally are being sold as kits in a few places, so have a look around. you can see a list of vendors in our wiki too, it may not be exhaustive but it's pretty comprehensive.
For keycaps you have a few options. DSA and XDA are uniform profiles so you can arrange them however you want - you’ll just have the homing bumps in the wrong place unless you find a set with extra homing keys or non homing F and J. Some SA and MT3 sets have an add-on “Colevrak” or “typist” kit to support the most common alternative layouts. Or you can just use blanks.
Depending on what region you're in, there's probably gonna be some folks selling cool ergomech kits. I'm personally in the EU, can recommend (https://keeb.supply/)[keeb.supply], (https://keycapsss.com/)[Keycapsss], (https://42keebs.eu/)[42keebs], (https://splitkb.com/)[splitkb.com], (https://keygem.com/)[Keygem], ...
I'm probably forgetting some, and these are only the EU-based ones. Maybe someone else xoukd recommend vendors in other regions :)
Thanks for the recommendations. I'm in Taiwan...so hopefully there is either cheaper shipping somewhere, or I can figure out the right Chinese for these and search...
I did find a vendor in HK. Close by with shipping covered. Looks like I may start there.
Whew boy, what a rabbit hole chancing into this thread was for me.
Went to keeb.supply and then that fantastic word document on keyboard layouts and now I want to buy a soldering iron, hundreds of pounds of keyboard parts, and learn an entirely new layout.
Aay very happy that linking that document in the intro to small keyboards helped someone :)
You can also easily try alternative layouts on your current keyboard via tools such as kmonad.
First, I'd check out the wiki https://gitlab.com/ergomechkeyboards/wiki/-/wikis/useful-resources For a DIY kit, I would check to see what kits the vendors in your part of the world have available. You'll usually need to buy switches and keycaps separately.
You'll want to figure out how many keys you want. For this, I'd recommend reading about how people achieve a 36 key layout (3 keys for each finger, including 3 for each thumb, and an extra column for your index fingers) with techniques like home row mods and decide if going that small is right for you. This https://github.com/manna-harbour/miryoku/tree/master/docs/reference is one of the most popular 36 key layout. 36 is about the smallest you'll get from a kit, though some brave souls go smaller or even much smaller. Here is a more extreme example of someone using a 16 key layout, though you'll likely not find kits that small: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5RN_4PQ0j1A
You'll also want to decide wireless (comes with battery and harder to configure ZMK firmware) or wired (usually you'd use QMK firmware, which has some more user friendly ways to configure it and is a bit more mature). And whether you'll go with MX switches and keycaps (more travel distance) or Choc switches and keycaps (less travel distance)... most boards will only support one or the other of these.
Thanks! I'll also want to use this with both my home and work computers (Linux and Mac), but I imagine info on setting things up should be easy enough to find.
Update: I'll be visiting family overseas for a few weeks so need to wait on my order. :( But, I'm seriously considering the Hillside 46 (though may go down to 38 keys plus 2 Rotary encoders). I'm wanting the splay, and this keyboard has miryoku support, which looks like a good place for me to start. I'm currently working on ideal keymaps for my layers (with a symbol layer customized for my math-teaching needs), and trying to figure out encoders...without having the hardware in front of me.
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