Slashdot Mirror
Keyboardio is a Hackable 'Artisanal Keyboard' That's Already Kickstarted (Video)
I bumped into Jesse Vincent and his keyboard project called Keyboardio at last year's Solid conference. Then, it was a developing project with a lot of literally rough edges, but since I'm a bit of a keyboard enthusiast, it grabbed my attention. In the time since, his plan to bring a truly hackable keyboard to the world has gained momentum, and the dozens of layouts and material combinations that he and partner in design Kaia Dekker have considered have been boiled down into one nearly-ready final version. The result is a compact split keyboard housed in an "heirloom quality" wooden case. It has some features you might consider overwrought -- like an RGB LED beneath each key, a precision mouse feature via WASD keys, and the ability, theoretically, to put more than a dozen feet between each half of the board. But if you're designing a keyboard from scratch, why not?
Vincent and Dekker put their project onto Kickstarter, then spent weeks on a road trip showing it at hacker and maker spaces around the U.S.; the project updates make a nice travelogue about just how widespread and varied is the world of DIY culture. I caught up with him in Colorado Springs, Colorado, on the road between some of those demo gigs, to talk about the long path from idea to (hopefully) shipping a product to backers. By the time we had this conversation, the project was well past fully funded, andI was impressed enough to order one myself; hopefully, the clicky keys will be worth the cost of a middlin' Chromebook, though Vincent admits they're not going to fool anyone looking for a buckling spring action. On the other hand, at least at the Kickstarter price, it beats some of the Maltron keyboards I've been eyeing for years. Plus, it comes with a screwdriver.
Vincent and Dekker put their project onto Kickstarter, then spent weeks on a road trip showing it at hacker and maker spaces around the U.S.; the project updates make a nice travelogue about just how widespread and varied is the world of DIY culture. I caught up with him in Colorado Springs, Colorado, on the road between some of those demo gigs, to talk about the long path from idea to (hopefully) shipping a product to backers. By the time we had this conversation, the project was well past fully funded, andI was impressed enough to order one myself; hopefully, the clicky keys will be worth the cost of a middlin' Chromebook, though Vincent admits they're not going to fool anyone looking for a buckling spring action. On the other hand, at least at the Kickstarter price, it beats some of the Maltron keyboards I've been eyeing for years. Plus, it comes with a screwdriver.
A video
For a product
With a kickstarter
I sure am loving this new corporate slashdot, who needs to know about kernel bugs when we can pre-buy shit that was probably ready for market anyway, but the creators decided they wanted some free PR.
I was liking the idea until I saw that you cannot change the physical layout. I like my big, stupid rectangle. There is a reason that the ctrl and meta keys should be on both sides.
Flash requirement on a "tech" website... Le Sigh
Perl Programmer for hire
I see they're trying to encourage DIY by leaving the space bar as an exercise for the buyer.
How can I believe you when you tell me what I don't want to hear?
instead of a screwdriver, it should come with a fedora
I'm always suspicious of things that are made of wood and advertized as though that were epic quality in materials. I always suspect they're sacrificing quality and price for hipsterism. So, why wood?
Don't waste your vote! Vote for whoever you want, unless you live in a swing state it won't matter anyways
4 minutes of video and (as far as I can tell from skimming through it) not a single picture of the device in question? Just two talking heads with awful sound quality?
We went from text-only summaries to text-with-video. Has it honestly never occured to anyone at Slashdot that images would, in some cases, be a much more preferable option? The old adage is an old adage for a reason.
and the ability, theoretically, to put more than a dozen feet between each half of the board. But if you're designing a keyboard from scratch, why not?
Because it's freakin' pointless, really. Anyway, why only a dozen? Why not 100m?
systemd is Roko's Basilisk.
so like if my hands are larger can I get a custom key layout?
The only reason to ever spend more than $2 on a keyboard is if it is wireless and solar powered.
They will at least support custom layouts, but not at launch. So I'll look into it then.
But I will say this- the idea of holding a function key to get to the rest of the keyboard buttons is a terrible one. Chording has some purpose, but here it really seems bad. Do you want Alt + Tab to become Alt + Function + tilde?
Nice design. If they add more keys to it natively later it might be worth looking into. Honestly, I'd love a keyboard that has good quality and doesn't enforce that ludicrous Qwerty stuff. Sure, sure, touch typing, but it would be great to have the keys do what they say instead of being all lies (unless you use a really old or featureless keyboard).
I'm with Jick on this one:
It's "artisanal," which means it's more expensive than things that aren't "artisanal." Actually, that's a lie. "Artisanal" doesn't mean anything. Seriously. Look it up.
(Incidentally, they later reused the same joke, with the random monster modifier effect "artisanal", which as you might guess, does nothing.)
I'm a gamer, I need access to the entire keyboard with a single hand. I don't just play CoD and LoL.
And I'm not about to switch keyboard between gaming and typing all the time.
Yes, it has whizbang lights, and the split with thumb keys is moving in a better direction, but my 10-year old kinesis is still a superior layout and design.
Wake me when they improve on *that* rather than not even catch up.
Most high end gaming keyboards between 100-200 USD are not made of cheap plastic. I like the API aspect of their keyboard, but a software update for the alluminum body $135 K70 RGB is supposed to be out relatively soon that includes Lua scripting. Keyboardio's price point is just too high.
It's quite high. My current split keyboard (Microsoft Sculpt) is pretty flat with the table, so my mouse hand is about at the same height as the keyboard. That wouldn't be the case here.
It's curved but vertically flat. You can tilt it, but that puts it even higher off the desk.
There's no numpad. My keyboard has a separate numpad so my mouse can be nearer the centre of my desk. Guess you need to buy one for this?
Why would I care about your use of maple? I'm really not a fan of the aesthetics, but I've never bought a keyboard for aesthetics and I assume most "uncompromising typists" value function over appearance as well.
Is the butterfly a Win / Super key?
I kind of like the idea of additional thumb buttons, so kudos for that. Would prefer having one space button for either thumb though, considering the use it gets.
Why is there so much vertical variation in the button shapes? The Sculpt has pretty flat buttons, I barely need to lift my finger to move between them and I don't have any issues with mispressed keys.
I've been typing on a Kinesis Contour for 14 years and wouldn't use anything else. Worth every penny of the $300 I paid for it.
I tried it at the highway 1 demo day. I was skeptical but I did like the experience, it's cool but I would have a hard time spending that much on one.
If I was obsessed with keyboards then I'd buy one. For now I'll stick to my 7 year old apple keyboard or my standard dell one
Is it just a clone of Ergodox in fancy wooden box and slightly different PCB?
It seems that these days, "artisanal" is now a clever way of saying "produced and valued by hipster douchebags." And now the word and that corresponding (actual) meaning have intruded into the tech sector.
For your security, this post has been encrypted with ROT-13, twice.
N/T