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Semaphore: A Full-Body Keyboard

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Re: Semaphore: A Full-Body Keyboard

#72

Author here! Pleasant surprise to find my project at the top of HN this morning with such positive feedback :) I'm happy to answer any questions or hear suggestions for future tweaks. Planning to make this into a customizable full-body game controller as well.

I hope the video was dramatized and that you didn't actually hurt yourself!

Rather than type every letter, a more efficient system is to represent sounds with keys. This is how stenography works. Each stoke of the keys is mapped to a series of characters; a letter, a grouping (such as 'sh' or 'ing'), or a complete phrase. Using such a system would allow one motion, for example for 'b', to map to a whole word, such as 'be'. Something as simple as that would reduce your risk of injury by something like 50%.

A major difference between stenography and typing is that steno is chorded: the signal is sent when the keys are released, not when they are depressed. I'm not sure how that would work with the full body.

Check out the OpenStenoProject for more about steno. Their community would probably enjoy discussing a full body steno theory (if they haven't already) .

Take care and thanks for all the effort that went into producing the video! It was a lot of fun :)

Re: Semaphore: A Full-Body Keyboard

#75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

He mentions Semaphore signaling was invented by Claude Chappe and then proceeds to make fun of him for being French which I don't find acceptable.

I rewatched that part of the video and don't see where he made fun of him. Are you referring to when he mentions that Claude Chappe was "big-brained" and zooms in on his head? If so, that sounds like a compliment to me.

"Big brain" is definitely a compliment, I can support this use of terminology.

Re: Semaphore: A Full-Body Keyboard

#77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

He mentions Semaphore signaling was invented by Claude Chappe and then proceeds to make fun of him for being French which I don't find acceptable.

I rewatched that part of the video and don't see where he made fun of him. Are you referring to when he mentions that Claude Chappe was "big-brained" and zooms in on his head? If so, that sounds like a compliment to me.

I accidentally a word

Re: Semaphore: A Full-Body Keyboard

#78

Genius! Next up: Oauth plug-in so you can authenticate with your own unique “dance”. Reminds me of the OA.

Ooh yes, I wonder if you could use it like gait recognition to define your own not-easy-to-replicate motion. My dance is my password...

I can imagine banks using this as 2FA for the next generation.

Re: Semaphore: A Full-Body Keyboard

#79
I couldn't figure out why he was wearing all the French gear, the author isn't french...! I presume it's a nod to the Frenchman, Claude Chappe, who invented Flag semaphore, the system he build it with. @fheisler, if you happened to see this, please let me know if I'm right! :)

Re: Semaphore: A Full-Body Keyboard

#80

Author here! Pleasant surprise to find my project at the top of HN this morning with such positive feedback :) I'm happy to answer any questions or hear suggestions for future tweaks. Planning to make this into a customizable full-body game controller as well.

As a remote software developer, if this became a product that could be used daily I'd probably buy it. It would be the key link between programming and body exercise.
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