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
But otherwise idk.
Not too sure what SP and SA means so thats probably my problem, but I'm just trying to learn more about keycaps and mechanical keyboards in general so any info helps!
This causes the costs to produce these sets to skyrocket. Vortex, Tai Hao, and others are making great strides in introducing good-quality PBT sets at low prices lately, but they're all in the standard OEM-style profile (so they'll sell to non-enthusiast folks more readily), and likely made by the tens of thousands in each colorway—thus, lower prices.
SA (and to a lesser extent, DSA) sets are quite a niche item. Either your want for them keeps you up at night, or it doesn't ;)
The best thing you can do is just give SA profile a try and make your own opinion about it.