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Glove80 Ergonomic Keyboard

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Re: Glove80 Ergonomic Keyboard

#101

Post by deadlyllama »

I'm very happy with my Glove80. I started with a prototype 3D printed model last year: the creators are friends of mine, and I wrote the LED status display code for them. I also dropped the prototype down a flight of concrete stairs (sorry! It still works though).

I now have a production model with the white clicky keyswitches. Ultra happy with it. I've been using Kinesis Advantage2s for a shade over two decades - the same model DanielDK used for a long time. The Glove80 is simply better. I prefer the clicky keyswitches. Ergonomics are great. It's really repairable - everything is held together with screws (spare parts for my Advantage2s are not available, and the function keys are not repairable). Open firmware so you can make it do wacky stuff if the need arises. Small and light enough for travel - I should get a proper case but it's survived a fair few trips stuffed into my backpack.

Yeah, adaptation to new keyboard layouts is hard. I used a layout that mimicked my old Advantage2 - so I'd paid the cost to learn columnar already. I found the default Glove80 layout was better, but switching meant a month of confusing Ctrl and Shift. All better now!

Re: Glove80 Ergonomic Keyboard

#103

Post by brailsafe »

I appreciate the nerdy customization of this in a way, but every time an ergo keyboard comes to the front page I'm a little disappointed that it's way too niche, and in this case also seemingly a bit unwieldy and stationary.

I've really come to love the now discontinued Sculpt series, despite their flaws, and wish someone would just come along and produce that again with some minor iterations; fix the dongle problems, increase durability, sell it as just the keyboard, and maybe allow it to fold in half for increased portability. I'm glad there are tweakable keyboards, but I never want to do that, I just want speed, confort, versatility, familiarity, and minimal size. It would be neat to order one with custom superficial elements though. I know the Sculpt isn't loved by everyone, and maybe it's my narrow shoulders, long arms, short torso, and alien-like fingers that make it my favorite, but damn I like it. A mac version would also be cool, but I get by.

I use it at home, and when I'm working at a cafe for variety, I can just toss it in my backpack along with the dongle (that frustratingly doesn't have a dedicated compartment in the idiotic mouse+keyboard package I'm forced to buy it in) and then use it on my lap so I can deal with the odd chair to table height ratios of coffee shops.

Re: Glove80 Ergonomic Keyboard

#104

Post by atoav »

nextlevelwizard wrote: post #58
yyt88 wrote: post #44

I wonder if all those "ergonomic" designs really aim at the right corner of the solution space. What about targetted exercise of involved muscle groups and regular breaks to stretch and relax the tendons/joints/muscles/...? I mean, with our societies sedentary life style, surely exacerbated by programmers sitting for 10+ hours a day, I'm a bit doubtful that moving even less is the answer. What about doing a few simpl…

While ergonomic keyboards are big part of some peoples fight against RSI, for many more using them is about comfort. After you get used to having tilted keyboard going back to normal one just feels tight and uncomfortable. Also for me big part about customizing your tools is exactly that - you get to customize your tools. I type professionally so it is insane to me when I see my colleagues working on some random lapt…

Sometimes switching positions dynamically is less straining than staying in the same (ergonomic) position forever, which is why most ergonomic chairs are about dynamic sitting.

But no amount of dynamic sitting and no ergonomic chair will make the bad influence of sitting go away — this can only be dealt with excercise, breaks and stretching. And every ergonomic chair can be misused. A person with good habits can sit healthy on a rock, a person with bad habits can sit unhealthy on a custom made ergonomic chair.

The same is true for the hands. As a life-long multi-instrumentalist with trained hands and fingers I could totally see someone with a laptop and the right habits ultimatly acting healthier as someone with the wrong habits and the best ergonomic keyboard that exists for them.

And this is the truth: Everything that involves the human motor system is never just about the objects we interact with, but always also to a major degree how we interact with them. My grand-grandmother that worked in her garden with 109 didn't have any ergonomic tools (as they didn't exist), but all the right habits. Habits are always more important than tools.

Re: Glove80 Ergonomic Keyboard

#105

Post by czei002 »

Got excited about the function keys but unfortunately the Glove80 isn't a replacement for my Kinesis Advantage. I really dislike a battery powered keyboard, plugging in a cable into my laptop in the morning is something that never bothered me. However, having a failing keyboard/mouse in the middle of some work really annoys me. Maybe I am wrong but aren't two movable parts a bit annoying as well? My keyboard gets moved on my desk quite a bit and repositioning two moving parts sounds quite tedious...

Re: Glove80 Ergonomic Keyboard

#106

Post by microtonal »

yyt88 wrote: post #100
microtonal wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have been doing targeted exercising for a longer period. It helped, but didn't solve my issues. I believe in a multi-faceted approach. Exercises are great, even necessary. But avoiding pronation in the other 55 minutes of an hour, letting the blood flow, is also useful. Why should it just be one thing?

> Why should it just be one thing? I have not suggested that. Quite the opposite. Let's not make gadgets be the only thing that matters, even though it may be more fun to geek out on key alignment.

You are fighting a strawman. No one said that gadgets are the only thing that matters. Most people who had hand/arm issues and use ergo keyboards will tell you to: go to a doctor first, then get a good chair and desk, do regular exercises, and maybe then get an ergo keyboard.

I have been in the MoErgo Discord for a while. When someone new comes in looking to buy a keyboard because they have wrist/hand/arm pains, the first advise consistently: go see a doctor.

Re: Glove80 Ergonomic Keyboard

#107

Post by rgoulter »

strongly-typed wrote: post #83
rgoulter wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I’m actually skeptical of some of the claims, particularly in regards to ortholinear/column stagger key arrangements. In particular I feel like this actually makes the layout worse in some situations. For example, consider the `in` bigram in qwerty. In different arrangements of keys, some words will be easier to type than others (and some will be more difficult). e.g. Comparing Dvorak and qwerty. -- With the exampl…

The fact is that language is itself not symmetrical (consider 5 major vowels vs 21 consonants and semivowels), so really a better solution is to use a keyboard layout that is optimized to fit a physical arrangement of keys. (Side note: I’ve spent the last three years critically thinking about, learning, and designing a few handfuls of keyboard layouts and keyboard layout analyzers/generators. At the moment, the layou…

Here's a video with a direct comparison (typing same text, video above video) of row-stagger qwerty vs ortho dvorak; both at about the same WPM. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cWjgFqy8IE0

Not as fast as 170WPM, though. :)

Re: Glove80 Ergonomic Keyboard

#108

Post by microtonal »

czei002 wrote: post #105

Got excited about the function keys but unfortunately the Glove80 isn't a replacement for my Kinesis Advantage. I really dislike a battery powered keyboard, plugging in a cable into my laptop in the morning is something that never bothered me. However, having a failing keyboard/mouse in the middle of some work really annoys me. Maybe I am wrong but aren't two movable parts a bit annoying as well? My keyboard gets mov…

However, having a failing keyboard/mouse in the middle of some work really annoys me.

Do you mean failing because the battery is empty? Why not hook it up then and power it through USB? There are handy split cables with which you can hook up both halves in one go. Some people even disconnect the batteries.

Maybe I am wrong but aren't two movable parts a bit annoying as well? My keyboard gets moved on my desk quite a bit and repositioning two moving parts sounds quite tedious...

Hasn't been an issue for me. But you could always fix the distance in some way (3D printed tool, measure the distance and cut out some plastic/papes, etc.). Personally I just put my arms how I find them comfortable and then position the halves to align with that. Takes maybe five seconds.

Compared to the Advantage2, I use a slightly wider separation distance, so it's more comfortable (though the KA2 distance was still ok-ish for me).

Re: Glove80 Ergonomic Keyboard

#109

Post by gorbachev »

lars_francke wrote: post #102

Does anyone know where I can get a switch tester from that includes all these keys? I'm in Germany. I found some but they are not for the low profile ones. I found this: https://keycapsss.com/switchestester/switch-tester/174/kailh... but it's sold out.

You won't find a switch tester for all choc switches, because there are way too many to fit in normal size switch testers.

SplitKB's product page lists 15, and that's not the entire product line:

https://splitkb.com/products/kailh-low-profile-choc-switches

Re: Glove80 Ergonomic Keyboard

#110

Post by lars_francke »

gorbachev wrote: post #109
lars_francke wrote: post #102

Does anyone know where I can get a switch tester from that includes all these keys? I'm in Germany. I found some but they are not for the low profile ones. I found this: https://keycapsss.com/switchestester/switch-tester/174/kailh... but it's sold out.

You won't find a switch tester for all choc switches, because there are way too many to fit in normal size switch testers. SplitKB's product page lists 15, and that's not the entire product line: https://splitkb.com/products/kailh-low-profile-choc-switches

I only need the four that are available for the Glove80 and they seem to be available from splitkb, excellent. Thank you!
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