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

Flux Keyboard

fluxkeyboard.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

211–220 of 247 posts

Re: Flux Keyboard

#211

Post by paledot »

ryukafalz wrote: post #199
mickdarling wrote: post #28

I have used a LOT of custom keyboards, looking at an Ergodex DX1 on my shelf now. I wish this is something I could be confident in. but, them not treating the screen as a display I think significantly limits the utility of this. You have to go through their software to customize the screen, layout, and customizations. Many of us know how hit-and-miss esoteric keyboard software tends to be. If they stuck to making it…

> They are trying to tie up too much to their software which they will eventually stop supporting, like my DX1 paperweight. This is precisely why I probably won't buy one despite it looking honestly very cool. Hardware manufacturers these days seem to be allergic to telling their customers how to actually talk to their gadgets, in favor of proprietary bundles of software that inevitably go unsupported within a few ye…

Here I really don't understand why nobody open-sources their drivers when they end-of-life a product. I know some chips are covered by patent agreements blah blah, but that doesn't cover all cases. And part of a code base is better than none, even if the bits covered by the agreement need to be censored.

I also think software companies should/should have to open-source products when they discontinue them like Dropbox did with Zulip (the only example I can think of offhand), but I understand why the profit motive discourages it. But surely for hardware even that tenuous rationalization goes out the window.

Re: Flux Keyboard

#212

Post by cryptonector »

I really want to try this. I'm guessing that key press will feel weird and will take time to get used to it. But the benefits of this keyboard design are very appealing!

Re: Flux Keyboard

#213

Post by coffeebeqn »

sj4nz wrote: post #9

This is interesting... but I can't help but think how much better it might be if instead of a video background just had a simpler e-ink display for indicating what the transparent key caps were for. The animation/videos are very distracting. I never liked the Apple TouchBar or anything that required "active" attention away from the main screen.

Yeah I’m not sure what the target audience is. I just bought a nice keyboard so I’m in the right market but I don’t really look at the key caps nor do I feel the need to have contextual buttons

Re: Flux Keyboard

#214

Post by throwaway675309 »

sj4nz wrote: post #9

This is interesting... but I can't help but think how much better it might be if instead of a video background just had a simpler e-ink display for indicating what the transparent key caps were for. The animation/videos are very distracting. I never liked the Apple TouchBar or anything that required "active" attention away from the main screen.

I mean they're obviously going to make it so that you can set up the backgrounds however you want, and even if they didn't it would be a simple software update to make it so you can disable animations so I don't really think that that's a negative.

Re: Flux Keyboard

#215

Post by stemlord »

jvanderbot wrote: post #95

> Each key is magnetically suspended with rare earth magnets allowing them to be 97% transparent and ultra low friction. Each switch has 4mm of travel and will be available in linear and tactile variants. They also feature a software adjustable actuation point in 0.1mm increments and rapid trigger functionality through analog hall effect sensing. Ok sign me up.

Is the use of a rare earth element really functionally necessary here or are they actually doing it purely for marketing value?

Re: Flux Keyboard

#216

Post by theYipster »

pnathan wrote: post #85
pdntspa wrote: post #74

I would really like it if these fancypants keyboards came in a layout other than the crunch-all-your-fingers-together-in-the-middle-for-extra-RSI design that the keyboard nerds seem to adore

the 3 modern higher end keyboard companies that attend to ergonomic concerns are, afaik, - keyboard.io - kinesis - ergodox and then there's maltron keyboards, a bit older-school. I have a kinesis edge and a keyboard.io, I like the kinesis edge rgb variant. the keyboard.io is very hard for me.

Also Dygma Raise, which I love.

Best of all worlds -- Ergodox thumb cluster with traditional staggered keys. Upgraded from a Kinesis Freestyle RGB and I will tell you, the Dygma is worth every penny!

Re: Flux Keyboard

#217

Post by xvaier »

stemlord wrote: post #215
jvanderbot wrote: post #95

> Each key is magnetically suspended with rare earth magnets allowing them to be 97% transparent and ultra low friction. Each switch has 4mm of travel and will be available in linear and tactile variants. They also feature a software adjustable actuation point in 0.1mm increments and rapid trigger functionality through analog hall effect sensing. Ok sign me up.

Is the use of a rare earth element really functionally necessary here or are they actually doing it purely for marketing value?

I would think so. Rare earth magnets are permanent magnets and can be much stronger than iron based magnets of the same size.

Re: Flux Keyboard

#218

Post by SxC97 »

k_ wrote: post #187
qwery wrote: post #62

As far as I know the "other times this has been tried" all have had individual displays (and controllers) in each key. The difference being that here there is just one panel under the whole board with most of the parts above the display being transparent. This approach should be far less complicated to build, more robust and cheaper. Honestly, I don't think I need an LCD in my keyboard but I'd quite like to have a go…

Looks like a nice use case for eink IMO, as I don't see the point of having video playing under my keys but having keycaps that can change depending on the context sounds nice.

I remember seeing this _exact_ comment back in the late 2000s and being really excited for an eInk keyboard. eInk was always a super cool tech that was _just_ around the corner, but after almost 15 years I'm disapointed that it's applications have been largely restricted to eReades.

Re: Flux Keyboard

#219

Post by 7e »

qwery wrote: post #62

As far as I know the "other times this has been tried" all have had individual displays (and controllers) in each key. The difference being that here there is just one panel under the whole board with most of the parts above the display being transparent. This approach should be far less complicated to build, more robust and cheaper. Honestly, I don't think I need an LCD in my keyboard but I'd quite like to have a go…

If you don’t have the displays in the keys themselves, the symbols get really hard to see at the angles users typically use. I don’t typically look directly down at my keyboard as it’s not in my lap.

Re: Flux Keyboard

#220

Post by insane_dreamer »

thih9 wrote: post #190
insane_dreamer wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I did not. Thanks. The only problem is that I use a split (ergo) keyboard :/

https://ultimatehackingkeyboard.com/ I don’t use it and know little about the project, I just remembered that it’s a split keyboard with an optional trackpoint attachment.

Thanks! I don't think I'm rolling enough to drop $320 on a keyboard, but when I am, this will probably be the one.
Post reply on HN