Miller%SRI-NIC@sri-unix.UUCP (06/06/83)
From: Henry W. Miller <Miller at SRI-NIC> Naw, just give ME user assignable keys at pinky range, the pinky being almost as extensible as the thumb. That, at least, would satisfy me. -HWM -------
wdr@security.UUCP (William D Ricker) (06/11/83)
The ultimate in keyboards for touch typing is not not mechanically laid out like the QWERTY and DVORAK 3-6 rows of 10-15 keys. It's IBM research's CHORD Keyboard, on which each key has not one dimple or recess for the finger, but one in the center plus one on each edge of the square. Thus you may type a common letter by hitting one key with one finger and a less common one by hitting two adjacent keys with ONE finger. And to type 'The ', one hits three keys with the fingers of one hand (the e, h, and t keys, left to right) while the same hand's thumb depresses a large (return key sized) key (or key pair) which signifies 'right to left, Leading Cap, Trailing Space'. In 20 minutes of training I fell in love with this keyboard. I have missed it since 10 minutes later, when my turn at the demo ended. You note i didn't specify which hand. Since it only requires one hand, you can configure it for either.
REM%MIT-MC@sri-unix.UUCP (06/12/83)
From: Robert Elton Maas <REM @ MIT-MC> How about flushing some of the lesser-used letters (ZXQ) and special characters (@&#%`_) from their normal places, letting [control] [meta] [shift] [shiftlock] [top] [untop] and ESC take their places, requiring extra keystrokes for those rare characters but in exchange you can type 20% faster because you never have to reach waaaaaay over there for CTRL or META or anything else? Shift: Gives upper case of letters, second character for numbers Top: Gives second character above letters, third character above numbers Untop:Gives third character below letters, fourth character below numbers Control:gives ASCII control meaning, or 8th bit, depending on mode Meta:gives 8th bit, or 9th bit, depending on mode Keys whose direct representation isn't used by you personally could be reprogrammed to be others you do need directly, like when typing stuff with lots of leftarrows, the ! key (shift-1) could be made into a leftarrow. It seems a more compact keyboard, programmable so that the thirty most often needed keys (including shift-like ones) would always be in easy reach where qwertyuiop asdfghjkl; zxcvbnm,./ are normally, and the next ten where 0123456789 are normally, and all the rest via combinations instead of frantic reaching, would yield easier typing once you get used to it. I suggest *nothing* outside that basic 40-key (4 rows of 10 keys each) at all, thus if your hand is out of position your little fingers fall off the edge or your thumbs bump, you don't accidently rest on alpha-lock or del or whatever is to the left or right of the basic-40 keys, thus it's virtually impossible to accidently type out of reegistry, and it's unnecessary to look at the keyboard to put hands back into registry. Comments?
RUBIN@COLUMBIA-20.ARPA (07/13/83)
From: Michael Rubin <RUBIN@COLUMBIA-20.ARPA>
Perhaps this is a halfway step between the usual keyboard and the IBM
CHORD, or perhaps it's just an extrapolation of those concave
"ergonomic" keyboards: Have a single row of keys which can slide as
well as depress, so that depressing the key gives a home-row letter,
but pushing the key away from you (toward the top of the keyboard)
gives an upper-row letter, and pulling the key toward you gives a
lower-row letter. A separate row of keys would still be necessary
for the numbers, a little higher than the deeply dished letter keys,
so the cross section would look like:
__ <---number keys
\_/ <---letter keys, move 3 ways ( < > and v )
This would take an ordinary touch typist about 15 seconds to learn,
and besides being faster there's no more problems with homing on the
wrong row. The space bar would remain in normal position but there
would now be plenty of space around it for thumb-operated touchpads,
trackballs, shift keys, light sabers, et cetera....
Oh yes, why doesn't anybody make a \real/ detached keyboard, one that
runs on batteries and communicates via infrared or radio instead of
trailing an umbilical cord?
--Mike Rubin
-------