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How to Configure your SHIFT Keyboard

Aug 4, 202015174 VIEWS

Hey everybody! Thank you for purchasing your Drop SHIFT Mechanical Keyboard. We hope you’re enjoying it so far. If you’ve landed here, you probably want to take full advantage of the keyboard’s features so you’ve come to the right place. We’ll start with the basics, then we’ll move on to complete custom configuration.

THE BASICS

Default Hot Keys Hold FN + listed keys to activate LED Keys
Fn + A: LED Pattern - Select previous Fn + D: LED Pattern - Select next Fn + Q: LED Pattern - Decrease scrolling speed (for animating patterns) Fn + E: LED Pattern - Increase scrolling speed (for animating patterns) Fn + Caps Lock: LED Pattern - Change scrolling direction (left to right, right to left, bottom to top, top to bottom, radial center to edge, radial edge to center) Fn + W: LED - Increase brightness Fn + S: LED - Decrease brightness Fn + Tab: LED - Toggle breathing effect Fn + X: LED - Toggle all LEDs off/on Fn + Z: LED - Toggle mode (keys + edge, keys only, edge only, all off) Fn + R: LED - Increase brightness of edge LEDs only (up to brightness of keys LEDs) Fn + F: LED - Decrease brightness of edge LEDs only Fn + V: LED - Toggle every other edge LED off Media Keys
Fn + Page Up: Volume Up Fn + *: Volume Down Fn + Page Down: Mute Fn + Home: Play/Pause Fn + End: Stop Fn + Numlock: Previous Fn + /: Next Numpad Keymap w/ Numlock Off 7: Home 9: PgUp 1: End 3: PgDn 8: Up 4: Left 6: Right 2: Down 0: Insert .: Delete Misc Controls
Fn + Print: Scroll Lock FN + Right ALT: Menu Keyboard Option Keys
Fn + N: Toggle keyboard 6KRO/NKRO (Default state 6KRO) Flashing
Fn + B (hold for three seconds then release): Put keyboard into firmware flashing mode (also referred to as “reseting the keyboard”)

CUSTOM CONFIGURATION
How do I configure my keyboard? 1. Create your keyboard configuration and compile it into a firmware file. For this, you can use our web-based configurator tool: https://drop.com/mechanical-keyboards/configurator . See “Drop Keyboard Configurator” section below for more information. If you are comfortable with programming and working with QMK code, you can manually create and compile your configuration by checking out our fork of the QMK repository: https://github.com/Massdrop/qmk_firmware/tree/feature/riot_xap . Our keyboards are under the “keyboards/drop” folder, e.g. “keyboards/drop/shift”. As of August 2022, our fork uses features and keyboard support that have not yet merged to the main QMK repository. For additional details, see this comment: https://drop.com/talk/9382/how-to-configure-your-ctrl-keyboard/2898139 . 2. Flash the firmware file onto your keyboard. This will copy the firmware into your keyboard’s memory. See the “Flashing Your Keyboard” section below.

DROP KEYBOARD CONFIGURATOR
https://drop.com/mechanical-keyboards/configurator When you first go to the configurator, you will be prompted to choose your keyboard. After choosing, you will see a top-down view of the keyboard and a layer selector on the right side. By clicking on a key, you can customize its behavior by selecting another key or function in the panel that appears below the keyboard. The currently available behaviors are:

Keys - Individual keys such as letters, numbers, media keys, and function keys.
Layer - Activate and deactivate layers. The SHIFT Keyboard ships with a keymap where the Fn key activates layer 1.
Modifier - Send multiple modifiers with a single key press or allow a key to be a modifier when held and another key when tapped.
Special - Behaviors specific to the keyboard. For the SHIFT Keyboard, these control the LEDs.

After you have configured the behaviors to your liking, click the "Compile & Download" button in the top right to download the compiled firmware for your configuration. This typically takes around 30 seconds. You will need to load this compiled firmware file onto your keyboard. See the “Flashing Your Keyboard” section below. If you click the arrow next to the “Compile & Download” button, you will be able to customize the version of the compiled firmware. The “Modern” version is set as default and recommended for all users. If you are logged in to Drop, you will see a "Save as a New Copy" button next to the "Compile & Download" button. Clicking this button will save your configuration, allowing you to revisit it and modify it. The next time you go to the configurator, you will see your saved configurations above the list of keyboards. About Layers Layers allow you to configure your keyboard with more behaviors than its number of physical keys. For example with the SHIFT Keyboard, by default, when you hold Fn + A to change the LED pattern, the keyboard is actually activating Layer 1 and sending the code for switching to the previous LED pattern. The physical key that is mapped to the letter A on Layer 0 is mapped to changing LED patterns on Layer 1.

For each key, its behavior is determined by the highest active layer. For the highest active layer, if the key's behavior is "transparent" (denoted by a grayed-out "(trns)" on the keyboard display), then it falls back to the next-highest layer where its behavior is not transparent. The QMK documentation has some tips for working with layers: https://docs.qmk.fm/#/feature_advanced_keycodes?id=working-with-layers

FLASHING YOUR KEYBOARD 1. Download the Drop Keyboard Configurator application.

If you use Windows, download here: https://dro.ps/keyboard-configurator-windows
If you use a Mac, download here: https://dro.ps/keyboard-configurator-mac
If you use Linux or would like to continue using mdloader, download the appropriate loader application here: https://github.com/Massdrop/mdloader/releases . Then follow the instructions here: https://github.com/Massdrop/mdloader .

2. Launch the Drop Keyboard Configurator application. After the application launches, click “Flash Firmware”.

3. Follow the flashing instructions in the application. It will instruct you to select the desired firmware file followed by resetting your keyboard. Note: the Drop Keyboard Configurator application will automatically receive updates. We are currently working on adding configuration capabilities to the application.

Having any issues or generally need some help?

Let us know in the discussion and we’ll give you a hand.

(Edited by moderator jxliu)

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Aug 6, 2022

Stickied

Updates to SHIFT firmware here: https://drop.com/talk/9382/how-to-configure-your-ctrl-keyboard/2898139

neue

Sep 18, 2024

I recently purchased the Shift V2 barebones but the DFU mode never works for me. I am using Pop!_OS linux and all the other layer 1 commands are working except for that one. Are there different or updated instructions for the v2?

Vote

gopinath

Apr 23, 2022

Can you please merge this to main repo ?

JemBijoux

Apr 21, 2022

What the heck is going on with this QMK merge? I can no longer update my kb firmware with the online tool, even trying to just "Compile and download" the base/default configuration. Do I need to search for a new kb?

SergeantDoc

May 3, 2023

JemBijouxThis is where I'm at. Regretting this board more and more.

filteredRays

Feb 1, 2022

QMK Repo merge, please.

Delltar

Oct 26, 2021

Guys this is becoming ridiculous really, how difficult is it to merge the SHIFT specific QMK changes back into the main repo? Like I understand it might not be 2 hours thing, but come on. It's been more than a year now and it is number one thing on the roadmap. With this tempo, the macros support will probably be enjoyed by my grandkids one day. It would be nice to at least know what is the roadblock, or whether this is still planned, or if you decided to follow different path towards similar functionality.

Procrastination

Oct 6, 2021

MERGE THE QMK MAINLINE PLEASE

filteredRays

Sep 17, 2021

QMK repo merge when, massdrop?

fynn.asher

Sep 13, 2021

Would love to finally see the Shift variant merged into the QMK repo!

tysutw

Sep 3, 2021

How can I make the function key work as a function key on MAC? Usually I can achieve page up/down by FN+up/down arrow on a MAC however the FN key on SHIFT keyboard is not functioning as a normal FN key. Any workaround?

Vote

Rebelord

May 9, 2023

tysutwNot sure if you ever got your answer but it works for me with macOS, plus the shift does have dedicated page up / down keys.

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