Build A Custom-Fit One-hand Keyboard

EyesWideOpen writes: "The New York Times (free reg. req.) has an article about a guy who has invented a one-hand keyboard that really isn't a board at all. The 'Stealthy Keyboard', which is in the prototype development stage, is designed to fit in the palm of the hand and uses the fingertips, the middle of the fingers and combinations of those to generate characters. More information (white paper, downloadable engineering plans, photos, etc.) can be found on this website." Inventor John McKown adds "The kit includes (open) source for the firmware. The code is for a PS/2 port but a USB version is slowly progressing."

Comments

groan

[kin_korn_karn]

[Insert One Handed Typing Joke Here]

Re:groan

[Jucius Maximus]

"[Insert One Handed Typing Joke Here]"

look at your sig, man!

"...and you will know me by the trail of dead kittens"

Twice as productive

[x311]

Now I just need two mice for my feet and I can deathmatch myself.

Wow!

[Yoda2]

Now if someone would only invent a one-handed mouse...

It's even worse this time....

[mblase]

Look at the shape of the "keyboard". Cylindrical, held in the hand with a loose comfortable grip. All a savvy inventor needs to do is drill a hole through the center and hey... you can type, mouse AND, um, entertain yourself at the same time.

Re:Wow.... A chording Keyboard...

[stoolpigeon]

Previous chording keyboards haven't been very popular. How is this one different?

One big reason is that the typing fingers don't grip the unit and don't participate in retaining it within the hand. Trust me; this makes it much simpler to use. It's hard to type with fingers that must grip something at the same time. That's why the only portable one-hander you can buy at present, as far as I know, has a big, ugly, wrist strap . Another reason is that the fingers are never far from their relaxed positions. They don't have to curl tightly, which quickly becomes tiring. This keyboard is small enough to be mostly hidden by the hand so it's not so geeky. Since there's no strap, it can go in and out of a pocket quickly. When you actually get one in your hand you see it's great fun to type so casually and with so little effort.

Looking at your link- and looking at his site the differences seem pretty obvious in regards to size and cost.

Cool! covert typing!

[The_Guv'na]

I'll just hide it in my pocket, and I can stand there quickly typing out covert reports on events, movies, or whatever wherever I am!

/me wonders what he'd look like

Uhh... On second thoughts...

Ali

An example of why patents are a good thing

[Anonymous Coward]

This is a fine example of why patents are often a tremendous resource to the technical community. Go download the patent from the USPTO and you'll find the blueprint on how to build one of these yourself.

Patents are in a way the source code for an invention. By law, they must be detailed enough to allow one skilled in the arts to reproduce the invention. Without patents, inventors would be forced to hid the details of the implementation of their invention (or even the entire invention) from others. With a patent we can have all the details on how an invention works and the inventor can still be protected if he or she wishes to sell the invention. Remember, a patent doesn't prevent you from building something as long as you don't do it for profit.

Why the slasdot community is so hostile towards patents in principle I shall never understand. Sure, in practice there have some screwy patents issued that shouldn't have been, but in general patents spread rather than restrict knowledge.

Re:An example of why patents are a good thing

[Jerf]

"Slashdot", inasmuch as it can be said to have an opinion, is hostile to software patents.

In fact, many of us against software patents are just fine with mechanical patents, which is after all where patents came from. However, your own message provides an excellent argument about why software should not be patented. When software is patented, it does not provide enough information to allow one skilled in the arts to reproduce the invention, it only sorta/kinda describes it. It does not provide all the details on how the software works. Read, for instance, the Amazon one-click patent, and then try to implement it. You will find that there are hundreds, possibly thousands, of unresolved issues in how exactly the system should work and persist data.

In fact, patents should really only cover source code. Source code would meet your criteria for the goodness of patents. Source code is already protected under both copyright law (no matter what), and trade secret law (if the company so desires). Why should software be patented, if none of the legitimate advantages of a patent derive from that act, since those advantages and more are covered by the copyright system, yet we get all of the disadvantages that we have seen in software patents (ambiguity, unfair patent grants, patent land grabs)?

If you can answer that question with some degree of usefulness (i.e., applicability in the real world, rather then vague sweeping claims of potentially hypothetical advantages based on pre-conceived notions, which is all I've ever seen in software patent's defense), then maybe you can ask incredulously why Slashdot is so against patents. Personally, after several years pondering the issue, I don't believe there is an answer, which is why I don't think software should be patentable.

For all the reasons you mentioned, and a few others (such as the fact the patent is of limited duration), I think that patenting the keyboard in question is totally legitimate. All the posters claiming "this has all been done" to the contrary, there are some legitimately clever and new ideas in this design that deserve protection before one of the established companies steal them from him. Maybe the ideas are dumb and won't work, but he deserves the shot in a fair market to find out whether this product can sell.

(For those who claim this issue has been done, find me a product with all the characteristics the guy enumerates on his site, and maybe I'll listen then. In particular a chord keyboard with the fingers in neutral like that, that is an excellent idea that apparently isn't obvious, seeing as how no commercial product has done it yet.)

Re:games

[slutdot]

Have you looked at Belkin's Nostromo n50 Speedpad? I use this for most games and it work pretty well once you get used to it.

Not the twiddler at all

[Tony]

Mr. McKown acknowledges the existence of chording keyboards. His patent covers the physical configuration, not the idea of a chording keyboard. His design allows the typing fingers freedom; they do not need to support the keybard at all, providing a more comfortable experience.

Also, the design is unobtrusive. He refers to it as a "stealthy" keyboard. I don't know if that's such a big fat hairy deal, but the comfort aspect is.

Emacs

[cgleba]

Hmm. . .to get a character with this keyboard one often presses many keys at the same time to make a "chord" and produce a character.

Can you imagine the insanity editing in Emacs would be? :). M-> for end of buffer or C-M-w for append next kill to last. . .do we have that many fingers?

We're supposed to be training the technology

[ianscot]

...not the other way around. This approach gets rid of the physically stupid part of keyboards, but it doesn't address the big learning curve for something so basic. If anything it seems like it'd make the learning worse, because one key != one symbol.

Example: In order to pare the number of keys, all these designs resort to "Chords" -- multiple keys hit in combination, or in sequence, to produce a result. This design gets different results from your fingertips as opposed to pressure with the middle of your finger, too. So how many hard-to-recall combinations of left-thumb-tip with right-index-finger knuckle are we going to need to remember to avoid hitting ctrl-q when we meant "Q"? Not the system to learn on the laptop where you keep all your contact info, right?

We're past the point where we should be teaching ourselves elaborate new routines to accommodate new technologies. The Palm handwriting system is a good example of how crappy that model is; I can't stand that the OS is trying to make me learn a new way to write "T" as a capital letter. That's just wrongheaded. The technology's supposed to be conforming to us, and that's not just a physical thing.