Show HN: I made a split keyboard for large palms

#1

Post by jogme » Thu, Jul 04, 2024, 7:11 AM UTC

I had an issue a few years ago - every ergonomic keyboard I tried had the switches too close to each other and my fingers were cramped in that small space. Then I decided to create a keyboard which is suitable for larger hands and eliminates most of the wrist movement. 34 keys was the most optimized version for achieving as little wrist movement as possible. You can try the fitment for your palm IRL with the printable template on the website.

Show HN: I made a split keyboard for large palms
jogmekeebs.com

Re: Show HN: I made a split keyboard for large palms

#2

Post by weinzierl » Thu, Jul 04, 2024, 8:40 AM UTC

I find it interesting that there was a time when everyone seemed to get overboard with thumb keys and that now things seem to settle at two per hand.

Re: Show HN: I made a split keyboard for large palms

#3

Post by Ballas » Thu, Jul 04, 2024, 8:54 AM UTC

Interesting, I have found the standard key spacing too far apart, I cannot fathom it being too close for some. I guess hand size variance is bigger than I think.

Could you explain what you did to achieve "diodeless" design and how do you prevent masking?

Re: Show HN: I made a split keyboard for large palms

#4

Post by daliusd » Thu, Jul 04, 2024, 9:16 AM UTC

Ballas wrote: post #3

Interesting, I have found the standard key spacing too far apart, I cannot fathom it being too close for some. I guess hand size variance is bigger than I think. Could you explain what you did to achieve "diodeless" design and how do you prevent masking?

34 keys are usually diodeless as many microcontrollers (promicro, elite-c and etc.) have enough connections to connect everything directly on one side of split keyboard and when you need one connection to communicate between sides. RP2040 can accommodate even more keys (even RP2040-zero). You need two microcontrollers of course.

Re: Show HN: I made a split keyboard for large palms

#5

Post by jbarberu » Thu, Jul 04, 2024, 9:21 AM UTC

weinzierl wrote: post #2

I find it interesting that there was a time when everyone seemed to get overboard with thumb keys and that now things seem to settle at two per hand.

I started my ergo-keyboard journey with a corne. I ended up having issues with the thumb cluster positioning and built my own prototype on new years eve this/last year. That board features four thumb keys, six columns, with four rows for index and middle finger and five for ring finger and pinky (essentially a 6x5 board with four of the bottom keys moved into a thumb cluster. A lot of keys ended up unused on that design (the lowest pinkey and ring finger keys were completely useless).

A couple of months back I built another prototype, this time with a 6x4 + 4 layout. I'm still not loving the layout, four keys is too much for the thumb cluster and I'm looking at dropping down to three. Ironically I've already setup my layout so it almost only uses 6x3 + 3 (I use the top row for non-typing keys like F1-F12), and in effect reinvented the Corne that I started out with...

Re: Show HN: I made a split keyboard for large palms

#6

Post by zamalek » Thu, Jul 04, 2024, 9:21 AM UTC

weinzierl wrote: post #2

I find it interesting that there was a time when everyone seemed to get overboard with thumb keys and that now things seem to settle at two per hand.

The consumer ones are still pretty gung-to with thumb keys.

Re: Show HN: I made a split keyboard for large palms

#7

Post by Brajeshwar » Thu, Jul 04, 2024, 9:24 AM UTC

Have you tried or were inspired by The Voyager? My friend has a Moonlander and we were discussing that the Voyager might be the ideal for the setup we were looking for.

https://www.zsa.io/voyager

Re: Show HN: I made a split keyboard for large palms

#8

Post by jogme » Thu, Jul 04, 2024, 9:24 AM UTC

Ballas wrote: post #3

Interesting, I have found the standard key spacing too far apart, I cannot fathom it being too close for some. I guess hand size variance is bigger than I think. Could you explain what you did to achieve "diodeless" design and how do you prevent masking?

> Could you explain what you did to achieve "diodeless" design and how do you prevent masking?

I was not precise with the "diodeless" definition - the keys are directly connected to the processor pins without using a matrix. (Therefore there are no side effects of the matrix design - ghosting, masking, key rollover. The key presses are more precise and for me they seem more responsive - less latency, but unfortunately I have no data to prove this statement.) Thanks for the question, I will fix the definition!

Also eliminating the diodes reduces the cost and the time it takes to build the keyboard, which is always nice IMO!

Re: Show HN: I made a split keyboard for large palms

#9

Post by Findecanor » Thu, Jul 04, 2024, 9:25 AM UTC

Interesting. Back in the '80s, the ergonomic keyboard [0] designed as part of the Japanese TRON project was originally supposed to be produced in three different key pitches for differently sized hands, based on measurements of Japanese people [1].

Another aspect was that some key columns were splayed, being more apart further away. It has inspired many follow-ups in the DIY ergo-mech scene in more recent years.

[0] http://xahlee.info/kbd/TRON_keyboard.html

[1] https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/An-Implementation-of-t...

Re: Show HN: I made a split keyboard for large palms

#10

Post by zamalek » Thu, Jul 04, 2024, 9:28 AM UTC

I'm currently designing a board from actual traces of my finger movements on paper (I was mildly amused when I found that they are not symmetrical, like all human features) in combination with these: https://fkcaps.com/keycaps/hex. It's also my first attempt at using a MCU directly (kinda, MDB50Q).

Probably not possible to make a product from my anthropometrics, but I could try average out a few hands.