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Making a Keyboard with Mutating Keycaps?
Montreal Geek asks: "I'm currently working on a pet project of mine for which I now find myself with the financial resources to bring to completion: the International Keyboard from Heck. The basic idea (most of the electronics and software for it have already been written) is that the keyboard has a variable layout (and a nice interface to change that layout) with the actual images on the keycaps changing to match what glyph/code-point it will generate. My problem is that I am unsure of which hardware solution to use for the actual, physical keycaps. My original prototype keycap uses a 7x9 array of leds under a lexan surface, but the power requirements of this many leds on a whole keyboard (even when scanning) is a tad prohibitive, and the lexan doesn't feel very good under a finger. Although glowing red keycaps look cool at first, I'm a bit worried that they will end up overly aggressive and annoying in the long run. Can you think of better alternatives? Keep in mind that the design must be resistant to repeated impacts (it is a keyboard after all) and, preferably, have fairly low power consumption so that the device remains practical for laptops." Although a few years from being truly affordable, might OLED technology be appropriate for this project? What other ideas might work out well for such a piece of hardware?
Have you researched optical fiber at all?
THERE IS NO DATA. THERE IS O
Stick the letters on with sticky tape. If you want to change the layout you can easily pull them off.
-- Cheers!
Just guessing here, but what about using an lcd panel under the keycaps, and using clear keycaps?
Misread the title for a moment there. Thought it was talking about muting keycaps.
I was hoping this would be a cure for IRC shouting.
Good judgment comes from experience.
Experience comes from bad judgment.
Lots of Electroluminescent panel squares?
It would be fiddly but be low power and look cool.
no sig.
And.... if you get it to work you could animate the keyboard :-) Imagine ripples spreading out from each key as it is pressed...
no sig.
Check http://www.lcd-keys.com/
Hurga
If you are made of money, check out these push buttons with built in graphical LCD's. They even have multicolor backlights.
www.screenkeys.com
There, it's out in the public now, so use it but don't try to patent it or I'll sue your lame ass.
Sorry, but I don't have any ideas for making the printing on the keycap change dynamically.
If all this should have a reason, we would be the last to know.
I don't think there'll be many options to choose from.
Maybe opaque keys with a hole on the top, and a single-character LCD panel fitted in the hole (not 7-segment but pixelled, like those in "scientific" calculators). Then you can use a single bright light inside the keyboard that will shine through the white dots. And you could add a potentiometer to control the intensity of the light, like a car dashboard, in case it gets annoying. And you can put two lights, one green and one red, and a switch to turn on one or the other, or both, so you can change the light color.
I'm guessing power consumption should be much lower than leds on each key, too.
To paraphrase and mutilate:
I just want to say one word to you - just one word : Software!
Check out a picture and the marketing stuff.
Should be real easy to project any kind of key using this technology.
And talk to CRL Opto.
IANAEE, but 15mm LCD's and Ferroelectric Liquid Crystal Micro Displays both sound promising.
Operator, give me the number for 911!
You would just "calibrate" your "keyboard" by typing "Ok, now lets calibrate this keyboard - the keys are here 123 poi zxc mnb". And after then just start typing.
The only problem with this is that - the "data gloves" are expensive and clumsy. If someone knows how build something like this otherwise, please let me know :))
Or, make the front sides (not the top) magnetic, and then have a lot of little metal rectangles with letters on them. You re-arrange the keys in software, then you move the rectangles to the right keys. The rectangles won't get in the way because you'll be touching the tops of the keys when you type, not the sides. (I remember using keyboards long ago that had things printed on the fronts of the keys.)
Or better yet, find out what material is used for those static-stick stickers that attach to things without glue. Then print up a bunch of those and you can stick them on the sides of the keys instead.
Or, have a small strip of plastic between each row (like the strip between the F keys and the number keys, but thinner). Your software can print out thin strips of paper which you can then attach to the strips of plastic.
Or, have a bunch of non-attached strips of plastic that can fit between the rows of keys and which sit at a 45 degree angle or so. They can attach at either side of the keyboard. Then your software can print out thin strips of paper with the keys on them, you can attach the paper to the plastic strips, and insert the strips.
Of course, none of this is as cool as having it done electronically, but one of these ways actually might work.
You owe the Oracle a Mutating Mouse, a beer, and $1000 if you use his brilliant ideas.
The following is -pure- speculation on my part:
:-)
As the symptoms of RSI (that we experience - all
too often, eg when mousing & keying at all hours
of the day or night) may come, in part, from the
more or less constant touching of cold, at least
in Winter, plastic this guy's idea might help.
Ie, if the dynamic keytops that this inventor is
set to engineer happen to -warm- the tips of the
fingers instead of chilling them... I, for one,
wouldn't be surprised to see a decrease in RSI &
an increase in comfort resulting from their use.
Has anyone else noticed different levels of RSI-
symptoms with different ambient temeratures...?
PS I'm also looking to engineer a comfortable
seat, for my computer desk, that enables me to
peddle &/or otherwise exercise my legs while
at work with my vast array of systems. Ideally,
it will do something with the energy produced
by my moving my legs (eg on bicycle-like ped-
dles, slightly in front of me), like generate
electricity from it...
Hey! With bits from an old exercise bike, an
old automobile alternator, et al. this may be-
come the 2003 Killer DIY Project for Geeks!
Perhaps there should be a contest (annual or
monthly, you choose) for Best DIY Geek Project.
My main keyboard at home doesn't have any keycaps. It's a prototype NeXT keyboard that I bought from one of their hardware engineers. It doesn't have anything printed on any of the keycaps. It keeps people from messing with my computer! I suppose it would work even better if I used a non-qwerty layout
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A lot of people have suggested LCD, but here's my take on this:
take an old LCD display, say, 800x240 or something similar and place it in the cutout for the keys in the keyboard, and cover it with a touch-screen layer. Draw your 'keyboard' on the LCD panel with software (very easy to reconfigure that way), and use the data from the touch-screen layer to determine which areas have been 'touched', mapping them to your 'keyboard'. Naturally, this gives you no keyboard feel, and would be very 'touchy' (pardon the pun).
Or instead of a touch-screen layer, build your own gloves, for which the only requirement would be an optical sensor under each fingertip, hooked up to the computer, which would tell you what area of the keyboard your fingertips are over based on timing data (analogous to the way arcade games "know" where you're pointing your gun at in Wild West Shootout or something). The only problem is, I don't know if this approach would work with LCD panels (somehow I don't think they're refreshed the same way as CRTs). So, the LCD + touchscreen approach might be more practical (if not simply feasible).
Either way, it would probably be expensive. But, if you're catering to an eager market (or planning to), you might be able to pull it off.
Have EVDO, will travel.
Check with police supply houses. I've seen red backlit keyboards for sale for that very purpose. Around $100 IIRC.
A computer once beat me at chess, but it was no match for me at kick boxing -- Emo Phillips
This looks like a great application for the digital ink technology, where small spheres rotate from dark to light sides depending on (I believe it was) electrostatic charges. The result would be a non-luminous keyboard with high-contrast lettering.
Here's a tip.
Go to eInk and check out a few of their products. They'll prototype up some stuff for you at a pretty reasonable cost, in the $20k range.
It's thin, it's light, it's power-saving, it's going to be pretty cheap once large-scale manufacturing kicks in. You could seal this stuff under a clear keycap. The major engineering problem, that I can see, is getting all the graphics data to the keys. Based on how the tech works, you'd probably be making a segmented character display, rather than dot-matrix. If you want a dot-matrix graphics display, they have to put an active-matrix array behind the eInk layer to control the dots.
The stuff is also easy to see in bright light...something difficult to achieve with LEDs. Plus, it stays in the state you left it...no blank keyboard when your KeyCapWriter drivers crash on powerup.
If you really insist on them glowing, put a single LED in the key and front-light the eInk with a plastic light guide.
You'll align your product with another emerging technology, probably strengthing both companies' chances (or pinning your chances on their success, whatever way you look at it).
I don't work for eInk; wish I did. They once had an opening for a hardware engineer.
...
What kind of computer needs to switch layout so often that this is worth it? Why not just buy another keyboard and a good keyboard switch box?
:)
Any computer that plays games, does CAD, or uses any program where keyboard shortucts are useful.
What's wrong with a touch screen and a CRT?
The same thing as gloves used for modeling. Your hands and arms get tired from holding them up for so long. Aside from that, touchscreens wear out. Mechanical switches don't. (That's why my IBM Model M keyboard still works.
What's this Submit thingy do?
I'm thinking it would be magnetic, somehow. You could have electromagnets, that you would turn on and off to reflip them when necessary. Small ball-bearing type permanent magnets would be cheap enough... the only issue I forsee would be one of aesthetics, will it look good?
The LCD under the keycaps approach will be prettier, though continuously applying power will be a bitch. Thanks to USB though, at least the keyboard has an interface capable of moving bitmaps back and forth. Would be neat as hell though, you hit the capslock key, and the font changes on all the keys.
I also like the glasspad approach, where you have a touchscreen LCD. This isn't so cool for typing, but I imagine quite a few games could take advantage of it. Instead of using the mouse when playing warcraft, the game would upload a new layout for the glasspad, where you could click on the "attack" or "gather wood" icon with your finger, using the mouse only to direct peons and knights. Though, to a lesser extent, this could be possible even with the more traditional keyboards.
Here's a thought: paint each keycap in heat-sensitive dyes, like what they use for those postcard thermometers and the lighters with the picture of women with bras that disappear when you heat them. Have, say, 7 of these little ink strips, and put a small resistor under each - you should probably compartmentalize the inside of the keycap, or mold it so that heat from one resistor doesn't spill over to an adjacent ink line. If you work out some way to interface with the resistors - another poster mentioned a pin/socket system that I bet would work well here - you could controll the resistors, and thus control which ink line changes color from the "default", thus giving the ability to create characters. The problems are that this change would be relatively slow - maybe a minute, and you have to put something over the ink to insulate it from the user's fingers. Probably not really workable, but then again there really aren't any cheap solutions to this that are, probably.
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