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Try this peripheral.

HalfKeyboard is another one-hander that's an immediately-obvious win. Unshifted, it's the QWERT keys; shifted it's the YUIOP keys (or POIUY, I forget which, and the shift key is the space-bar in sticky-mode for fast thumb use.) If you've spend way too much time on a standard keyboard, you immediately just KNOW where all the keys are. They were selling versions for the Palm and also USB, unfortunately for left-hand use (which is fine for a right-hander using Palm, but on a PC I'd rather type with my right hand and mouse with my left.) They also have a software driver version that works with standard PCs, letting you use either hand on a full-sized keyboard, but they wanted some ridiculous price for it, I think over $100, because they were selling to the handicapped-access market where there's a willingness to pay.

For text-only niche use, not programming, I've gotten to really like T9 Predictive Typing on cell phones. It's not always correct, but it's usually correct most of the time, and wouldn't be hard to make it adaptive so you could teach it names you type frequently.

Actually, IBM also made non-clacky PS/2 keyboards; you must be referring to the infamous Model M, which is a very nice keyboard. Still, I'm a fan of the clacky Tactile Pro, which is a clone of an old Apple keyboard. Unlike the original Model Ms, however, it can't double as a weapon, but it does have extra USB ports.

They also market to the handicapped market, though their products for them tend to be overpriced - all you really need to implement it is a different driver for a standard keyboard that lets you flipflop both sides. They've got demoware that lets you try it out. And unfortunately, they've patented what they've done, and would probably get annoyed if somebody released a freeware driver...

Another interesting design is the FITALY keyboard, which is designed for one-finger use, or one-stylus use on a palm touchscreen. Like DVORAK, it's designed for low-travel efficient movement.

I can't read the article since it's slashdotted, but if you need to design the keying pattern and write your own software, then what are you buying for $25? Why not just make a keying pattern and write software to work with a normal 101/104-key keyboard to give it a one-handed mode?

It seems far more useful to me not to make a keyboard that must be used only with one-hand but to make a two-handed keyboard that allows one-handed use when you need it (the other hand's on the mouse, you dirty thinkers).

Enter OkayKeybees. It lets Windows users define keying chords to make your own one-handed mode. Its GUI is kind of clunky (I found it easier to edit the configuration file with a text editor), and it kind of sucks that you have to define your own key chords (Matias has a patent on their layout).

I used to have one of these. It was very handy after I had an accident that put my right arm out of action for 6 weeks, but after I healed I wouldn't give it up.

Unfortunately I dumped a drink on it and it broke, so I'm waiting for them to come out with a newer, cheaper model. It used to be $99. But I loved it, and it would let me type full speed.

http://www.halfkeyboard.com/. I've had one for over a year.
No matter how you "slice it", coding uses too many punctuation characters...

1) Trackball you have to keep petting the damn thing, unless you have it super sensitive in which case you lose accuracy. For a solution designed to minimize hand movement making the user pet constantly vs. using an analog stick would be against the entire design philosophy.

2,3) I'm sorry, but 100$ is a mind numbingly cheap price for a low volume device for this. Let's look at some similar products. A close competitor is the DataHand which sells for 10 times that. A gesture keyboard goes for 340$. A chording keyboard/mouse replacement that's been out for many years and used by wearable people, the twiddler, is 220$. Just a half-keyboard with extra letter mappings to make up for it is 295$. All these companies aren't so expensive because they want to be, manufacturing low volume stuff like this is hideously expensive. You say you want a second version for large hands, that would raise the price even more.

If I could make it work with a mac I'd be a happy camper.

Matias Tactile Pro Keyboard

Matias Corp They have had a one handed keyboard for years. I have one and it works very well. You just have to learn how to type all over again. Electronically it is a full size keyboard. Every key serves quadruple or quintuple duty.

Proper keyswitches register well before the end of their stroke, and provide gradually increasing resistance the rest of the way down. Rubber-sheet keyboard register at the end of their squishy stroke, so you have no choice but to bash your fingers against the bottom all day long.

Apple used to make decent keyboards - the Apple Extended Keyboard is wonderful (once modified to put the control key in the right place). The Extended II is almost as good. The smaller M0116 and the compact Apple ADB Keyboard - the obvious inspiration for the physical form of their latest abomination - are good too.

If you plan to keep using your fingers, get one of those old Apple keyboards and an ADB-to-USB converter. Or get one of these. Or, for that matter, get an AT-to-USB converter and an IBM Model M, a Fujitsu FKB4700 (OEM, many labels), or that skinny one with the fold-over function key templates.

For the Google impaired, here's the Tactile Pro page and a review.

Well... From a usability point, the modern keyboard is a mess...

As you are typing, you have to take pains to avoid Caps Lock AND the three Windows keys, all of which are prominently placed and will screw up what you are doing.

I hit Caps Lock in error maybe 40 times for every one time I use it for its purpose. Gamers always pull off the Windows keys.

Many of us use a keyboard for 8+ hours a day. It's incredible that these guys seem to be the only firm producing an old-school quality keyboard:

Tactile Pro

Or how about a two-handed keyboard that lets you mouse?

I bought an IBM TrackPoint keyboard, and I love it. Sure, the TrackPoint is more cumbersome than a regular mouse, but since most OSs these days support multiple pointing devices, you can use it in addition to a regular mouse. If I need to do a lot of keyboarding but only a little mousing, I can use the TrackPoint; if I need to do a lot of mousing but only a bit of keyboarding, I use the mouse.

If you really want a one-handed keyboard, as others have pointed out, there's Matias' Half-Keyboard. It's pricy though. If you use Windows, you also can check out OkayKeybees; it's a free keyboard remapper that lets you define chords. (For example, you could create chords to mimic the half-keyboard's, if you so wanted.)

Oh, but there are several one-handed keyboards.

How about one that straps to one wrist, lets you type with the other hand?
Check out the Half Keyboard
I haven't tried one yet, but they have a demo that lets you practice on half your real keyboard. It seems pretty cool.

This one might be a bit easier to get used to than some of the freakier chorded setups.

Give HalfKeyboard.com a try. It looks very promising. I considered getting one to mount to the arm of my chair, so I can use the other hand just with the mouse. They even have Demo Software so you can see if you like using it before comitting to buying it. Supposedly it work with PDAs and laptops too.

Give HalfKeyboard.com a try. It looks very promising. I considered getting one to mount to the arm of my chair, so I can use the other hand just with the mouse. They even have Demo Software so you can see if you like using it before comitting to buying it. Supposedly it work with PDAs and laptops too.

WRT the DIY version, you can set Linux up to merge inputs from multiple keyboards (actually, that's its default behaviour and dissuading it from doing that is one of the big traumas involved in making multiple independent X instances work), so you could plug two potentially mangled keyboards in and lay one to each side, and potentially also have another unmangled keyboard before you as well.

I had written a small program that would let you use a regular QWERTY keyboard efficiently (it uses your existing QWERTY skills) with one hand, but as it was based entirely on someone else's work, when they asked me to, I took it down.

So instead, try the HalfKeyboard on which my work was based. Failing that, I hear good things about the one-handed DVORAK layouts.

if you're that hard up to show the world you're a big nerd, perhaps this is more up your alley. Pros? You can use a much more substantial PDA, enter text a lot faster, and get beat up much more often! :)

There is a half keyboard that uses chords of left-hand keys and the space bar to give you access to right-hand keys. Costs $300, but it seems like the sort of thing that could be done just as well in software if one were so inclined.
http://www.halfkeyboard.com/halfkeyboard/index.htm l

You're lucky you were able to fit that much on your arms. My wrists have allready been filled up with this.

No, not really.

If you want some kind of fancy chordboard or touchpad thing, fine; one that I like is the Half Keyboard which uses the QWERT half of a keyboard and a shift key, and has one model with USB for Macs and also a wrist-mount version, but it's not usually necessary to do silly things.

What I didn't see mentioned was an Ethernet interface (though USB frobs can work) or any discussion of power (batteries? 3-pound AC power bricks? battery lifetime?) or price, but I assume that everything except price will be reasonable.

The one I really liked was the Half Keyboard for Palm, Mac, and PC, which has the QWERT half of a keyboard, and you shift with your thumb on the spacebar to get the YUIOP side, or numlock to get numbers. It's a total no-brainer to understand how to use it, unlike most of the other systems, assuming you already know the standard keyboard well. The small half-keyboard version is only for left-handed typing. For Palm users drawing with a stylus, that's probably correct for most people, but my preferences for PC use are the opposite. I'm right-handed, and type much better with my right hand than my left, while I've gotten very good at left-handed mousing while trying to avoid various RSI problems. They now make a full-sized left-and-right-halves keyboard, which they want $400 for; I don't understand why....

There's also a software version of the Half-keyboard, but at least when it came out, it was more expensive than the hardware version, being marketed toward handicapped business users who could get their companies to pay for them. (Perhaps that also explains the $400 left-and-right-halves.) Sigh. It's not currently on their web site price list. I don't know if the concept's patented, which could interfere with an open-source implementation.

iPod Armor jacket

Again, these are sort of silly examples, but do illustrate potential.

So what if the average vehicle gets corrosion, it's not because of the vehicle, it's a special paint that's already developed. Instead of using that special paint on say a Porsche Cheyenne and spending $120,000, the military for their next vehicle is getting GM to custom design a military vehicle, already spending several million in research without even a prototype to show for it.

Why can't the military mod current items. There is a consumer protection that is military grade for almost everything I know. If it's not consumer then it's corporate grade. Take for example laptops that are made for electrical companies that CAN withstand shock or electromag shock. The only government agency I know has done this; the police departments. A lot have in recent years used baseball radars and Panasonic Toughbooks. (that was an article in my local paper a while back). Why? Budget. The military is seeing budget cuts too, but is still so bloated that money is just handed out to researchers like Halloween candy. Whereas, police departments, have seen DRASTIC cuts based on new support levels for additional personnel.

Google leads to all kinds of knowledge. Perhaps if you had known about it beforehand, you would have saved yourself some time.

Handkey Corporation
Datahand Ego Keyboard (These are incredible. Used them before.)
Matias Corporation (If you can run it, try their demo -- I found I could get used to this layout in less than 30 minutes)

There's a start. Remember Google.

http://halfkeyboard.com

How do you get by with so few keys?
You can see the support problem he's talking about here.
The sexiest of the lot, but not handheld
This one's straight outta sci-fi

None of these have a pointing device. It seems to me that if you want to type with one hand, you might want to mouse with the same hand. I sent McKown an email to that effect, suggesting that he integrate a small trackball into his design.

For those interested in something that fills this function, leverages your existing typing skills, and does not require chording check out the half keyboard. The disadvantage I can see is that it isn't truly one-handed as you need to strap it to your other arm, and as a result it's also not "stealth". The advantage is you can buy it right now. I do not own one of these or endorse the product in any way, but I had a link that actually seemed to be on topic for once. :)

Have a look at the Half keyboard. There's a demo that only works on windows and mac:-( But I rebooted to windows to see the demo - looks pretty descent.

The Twiddler's not ergonomic for everyone. I find it cramps my fingers (which are longer than average.) I haven't tried the half-keyboard, but that seems more likely to be usable. I'm unsure about this thing: making more use of the thumbs is certainly a good thing; they're a lot stronger than the other fingers.

Me too!! Although I was not impressed with the screen.

I'll wait for retinal projection.

As for input they have a arm mounted half-keyboard similar to this

or you can use a twiddler

When I grow up I want to be just like these folks (see bottom for pic)

I mean QWERTY was an invention to make sure typewriter hammers wouldn't jam together.. Thus it made you type slower

Do you know the URL of a study that shows that QWERTY is significantly slower on average than Dvorak?

and all the commmon keys are far apart for less probable jamming.

Sholes placed the keys far apart so that the keys would have a better chance of alternating between hands (yes, I know, some words such as 'monopoly' fail, but unless you're transcribing a finding of fact in the sequel to the Microsoft case, it shouldn't matter).

Here's a one-handed keyboard that uses the QWERTY or Dvorak muscle memory you already have.

I don't work for them, nor do I own a stake in the company
But I do like their idea better. What I hate about HalfKeyboard is that you have to buy one for the desktop, one for the PDA ( and if you have Palm V and VII, you need to get two keyboards). Otherwise, it's a better solution even for those who need any kind of feedback from the keyboard or to look at the keys.

You can't 'remap' the physical locations of they buttons. The Yopy's keyboard has 6 columns and 6 rows. A qwerty keyboard has 3 rows and at least 9 columns. There is absolutly no way that you could 'remap' the keys to be qwerty.

That's not to say you couldn't do something more efficiant, but in no way could you emulate a full qwerty keyboard with just 6 rows!

Perhaps a half keyboard type layout, but not a full thing.

I've been considering a mobile-platform for a while... essentially a full-powered back-pack pc.

Among several problem spots (goggles/headset displays are expensive, how to power the system for a significant amount of time, and static grounding), I was wondering how I was going to control it.

I'd been hell-bent on glove control. After much thought, I decided you could pull off the glove interface, and do it cheap. But how about lateral finger movment?

You dont use it. Restrict the movement to only three positions for each finger (ie, as if you were manning the keypad from mechwarrior 2) this gives you 16 per hand (4 fingers x three positions plus two thumb functions for one hand). Exactly 26. Tadaa! One Keyboard (well, letters only and no spacebar)

Now what to do about the remaining digit: the dominant thumb: I'd set the thumb on one to control a analog stick/trackball and four-five buttons (it is a mobile application, afterall) and not have it's motions picked up by the glove.

Button layout would be as follows: Click, Right Click, Spacebar, Shift (maybe) and "Function".

The Function key enables the numeric keypad for one hand (like these guys did for half of their keyboard), and punctuation&other keys for the other

It'd be akward until you got the hang of it, but it accomplishes what you're looking for and more.

-Senine

If you look at the picture on this page, it looks like ctrl, alt, and del are all on there, and the ctrl and alt keys seem to be dedicated, so I don't think this would be a problem.

The wearable keyboard implementation could work well, but looks way too bizarre to market to business professionals. If you own a handheld and want to type faster, Fitaly is IMO the best way to go.

On the other hand, they could market this as a software add-on for PC/Mac/Linux very easily, now that they (I hope) have the patent on the idea. If I could buy that and use my existing keyboard with only one hand, freeing up the other one for the mouse while still having access to all my keyboard shortcuts, I'd spring a nominal fee for the shareware. But I can't see enough good reasons to replace my existing hardware with that dinky thing.

The wearable keyboard implementation could work well, but looks way too bizarre to market to business professionals. If you own a handheld and want to type faster, Fitaly is IMO the best way to go.

On the other hand, they could market this as a software add-on for PC/Mac/Linux very easily, now that they (I hope) have the patent on the idea. If I could buy that and use my existing keyboard with only one hand, freeing up the other one for the mouse while still having access to all my keyboard shortcuts, I'd spring a nominal fee for the shareware. But I can't see enough good reasons to replace my existing hardware with that dinky thing.

--

www.halfkeyboard.com

They've got rid of about all redundant keys...

I can see 2 shift keys if you were to split the space bar into three keys

The Half Keyboard for Palm devices overloads Space as a shift key to access the flip side of the keyboard. A tap and quick release produces a space; space + a letter produces the letter from the other side of the G-H line.

After I came down with multiple sclerosis, my whole right side stopped working, and now I'm typing everything left-handed only.

You might want to look at the Half Keyboard, where the space bar doubles as a shift key to access the keys that would normally be on the other side.

It's not yet available for PCs, but when it does come out you can try the Half Keyboard

The Half Keyboard appears to be even smaller, and quite usable.

• Thank you for your reply :) I looked as closely as I could; but I couldn't see properly enough.

Okay, try this: http://halfkeyboard.com/resources/hk4palm/800.jpg.

• I'm looking for a one-handed desktop keyboard replacement, and I'm not interested in five-buttoned chording keyboards ;) So, could you use it fulltime?

Yes, of course. People are buying it for that very purpose. In fact, we've pre-sold more HalfKeyboards for PCs than for Handspring PDAs.

• that nebulous "feel" which allows one to use it for long durations(which I'm not sure about) :)

No need to worry about the feel. It uses the same type of keyswitches found on IBM laptops. They are the best in the business, and higher quality than most desktop keyboards. It's a really nice keyboard.

Edgar

1. I'm intrigued with the Half Keyboard appliance.

   How does this integrate with the rest of a computer system? I've seen things in the past that are basically a keyboard+screen+memory so you can take notes on the go, and then use the device as a normal keyboard (PS/2 Port connected) on your home machine - hit a key combination and it dumps it's buffer across the keyboard interface.

That was supposed to be our first product, but we didn't raise enough $$$ to do it, so went with the straight peripheral keyboard instead.

However, there are a lot of advantages to the appliance design. A PocketPC device with HalfKeyboard+touch-screen would be much better for notetaking than the products out there now.

1. Also, do you intend to support other PDA's other than Palm OS devices with the Half Keyboard?

Yeah, we'll be doing an iPAQ version for sure. We already have a working driver. Just a matter of making the units with the appropriate cable attached.

Edgar