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
Love the keyboard itself. Perhaps I'll look into switching switches.
The alphanumeric keyboards I grew up with had light action, as do electronic music keyboards without weighted (or semi-weighted) keys.
Acoustic piano action ranges from moderately light to quite heavy.
I grew up playing on an Emerson baby grand with action so stiff that it seemed to prevent one friend of mine from even trotting out Bach's two-part invention in B-Flat Major. I used to play Hindemith sonatas, Bartok, Franck, various composers' etudes, and multiple kinds of music on that same Emerson, so it didn't pose any problems for me.
That's why I prefer switches with more weight.
It's very possible that another pianist who is also a typist might develop totally different standards for touch in each case, just as I have in using synths with feather-light action in the studio to play things like rapid-fire repetitions on the same key (isn't that why many gamers like lighter switches -- to do the same thing?). For specific kinds of work, light action can be fun.
However, now that I've tried mechanical keyboards, I find that clears and greens are more to my liking than even browns and blues. I might like blacks as well, but I have yet to try them.
Make sense, StoneBone?
I haven't tried anything heavier except an 80g grey switch intended only for the space bar. I didn't love it on the other keys because it seemed slow on the uptake.
I'd love to try 67g and 78g Zealios, though.