Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

The Amazing Shortcut Keypad

theamazingshortcutkeypad.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

51–60 of 95 posts

Re: The Amazing Shortcut Keypad

#51

Post by StavrosK »

8draco8 wrote: post #50

I use different solution that is arguable better than this and is right now on the market for not much money. I am talking about MMO mouses. Personally I am using Logitech G600 that have total of 20 programmable keys which can be programmed in 3 layers giving grant total of 60 macros, all within a reach of your thumb. This mouse is able to save macros onto on board flash memory which allows use on any system, even An…

Huh, really? That's very nifty, I didn't know it saved commands to flash and didn't need a companion utility. Very useful, thanks for the info.

Re: The Amazing Shortcut Keypad

#52

Post by topher200 »

isaacremuant wrote: post #38

Kind of on-topic, does anyone know what's the smallest industry made USB keyboard/button presser one can find? I'm talking small as in, number of keys. Ideally just one or two keys and a USB connection so that you can interact with a computer. Think like a clicker.

I have a USB foot petal I keep under my desk: https://smile.amazon.com/gp/product/B008MU0TBU/ref=oh_aui_se...

I mostly use it as a quick play/pause video button.

Re: The Amazing Shortcut Keypad

#53

Post by throw_away »

cyberferret wrote: post #34
swah wrote: post #15

Alternative if you feel like spending a little more: https://rama.works/m10-a/

Nice, but nearly everything on their online store appears to be "Sold Out"?!?

I suspect that they might only sell through massdrop: https://www.massdrop.com/buy/rama-m10-a?mode=guest_open

Re: The Amazing Shortcut Keypad

#54

Post by coldtea »

gumby wrote: post #4

Wouldn't it be faster to just input a key accelerator (which you can do on your Mac straight from system preferences -- I would assume Windows has similar)? That way you don't have to take your hands off the keyboard, simply press command-foo. I doubt cmd-foo is harder to remember than the bindings of blank keys on an accessory device.

>That way you don't have to take your hands off the keyboard, simply press command-foo.

And find out that most are taken by the system or various applications (including ones running as UI-level).

>I doubt cmd-foo is harder to remember than the bindings of blank keys on an accessory device.

It's amazing what a $2 permanent marker can do to fix the blank keys issue.

Re: The Amazing Shortcut Keypad

#55

Post by mercer »

I can also recommend QuadroSync, which basically turns your iOS device into a TouchBar. I don't use it much because I prefer keyboard shortcuts, but it's one of the first apps of its kind that I actually can see myself using for a bunch of things.

Re: The Amazing Shortcut Keypad

#56

Post by robinhartley94 »

charlesism wrote: post #30
robinhartley94 wrote: post #16

Hey! Robin here - the creator of TASK: The Amazing Shortcut Keypad. Great to see so many comments and some interesting engagement :D A lot of you are identifying other ways to achieve this sort of automation either with AutoHotKey or custom scripts and if that works for you then good on ya, no point in changing :) However, the keypad was designed to give you quick, easy and intuitive automation in seconds. No writing…

> No writing code, no binding keys or running scripts. This might be a dumb question, but why bother making hardware for that? Could you write software that works with an existing external num pad?

This is a really good point, and in the future it would be really cool to implement it on anything. However, it's tricky to guarantee compatibility with every num pad out there, and there are several pieces of software which try and do this already but come up against numerous problems.

In the spirit of keeping it simple, I'm using an Arduino as the heart of it as they are simple to programme and people can hack and tweak to their own needs, rather than struggling with firmware upgrades etc.

I do really like your idea of making it work with a range of hardware. I'm actually going to release 4 different designs ranging from a single button right up to the 12 mechanical key version you see in the link. That way people can choose their price range. Could be as low as £15 !

Re: The Amazing Shortcut Keypad

#57

Post by robinhartley94 »

nebabyte wrote: post #48
blacksmith_tb wrote: post #2

I like the idea, but can't you achieve most of the functionality just with an add-on $10 USB 10-key, and your choice of scripting? I have used the crazily versatile Controllermate[1] on macOS to do something similar with a gaming keypad that triggered Applescripts and shell scripts. 1: https://www.orderedbytes.com/controllermate/

Yeah, I was thinking this might have a niche in medium businesses/etc, but tbh if they have a bored tech guy they've probably already asked him/her to help automate basic tasks (for which any number of Python/AHK scripts already exist or can be trivially created)

You're right about automating repetitive tasks. Usually they're going to get automated if they come up often enough. But what if you're going to do something tedious for the next 10 minutes, like editing numbers in a data base. You wouldn't write a script because it would take too long. However, with the keypad, you could spend 45 seconds setting up some basic automation and it may save you 4 or 5 minutes in total.

The speed of setting it up makes it possible to do short-term automation which I've not come across before.

Re: The Amazing Shortcut Keypad

#58

Post by robinhartley94 »

to3m wrote: post #6
gumby wrote: post #4

Wouldn't it be faster to just input a key accelerator (which you can do on your Mac straight from system preferences -- I would assume Windows has similar)? That way you don't have to take your hands off the keyboard, simply press command-foo. I doubt cmd-foo is harder to remember than the bindings of blank keys on an accessory device.

Going by the screenshot, it looks like you can do a bit more than the System Preferences keyboard shortcut page lets you! Looks more like something like AutoHotkey, I'd say, but with a non-insane interface.

Yeah, you've got it! You can type text, send keyboard shortcuts, mouse movements, media commands and numpad keys. You can also delay and repeat anything as much as you like.

Now any of that can be done in any combination and it's set up in less than 1 minute.

It hasn't got all the features of AHK - some things have to be sacrificed for simplicity but you are very right in saying it has a lot more to offer than simple key bindings. These are proper macros :)

Re: The Amazing Shortcut Keypad

#60

Post by robinhartley94 »

isaacremuant wrote: post #38

Kind of on-topic, does anyone know what's the smallest industry made USB keyboard/button presser one can find? I'm talking small as in, number of keys. Ideally just one or two keys and a USB connection so that you can interact with a computer. Think like a clicker.

There are a couple of them kicking around the Mechanical Keyboard community. This sort of thing: https://encrypted-tbn0.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcRSutzW...

However, you will be able to make a keypad consisting of anywhere between 1 and 16 keys using the TASK software. In fact, you will be able to make a highly functional single key for about £7 using the designs I will be releasing in the shortcut keypad crowdfunding campaign!

Post reply on HN