From: Mark Hubbart <discordantus@...>
Date: 2004-12-25T16:16:45+09:00
Subject: Re: OT: Alternate Keyboards (was vi useability question)

On Sat, 25 Dec 2004 04:16:44 +0900, trans.  (T. Onoma)
<transami@runbox.com> wrote:
> On Friday 24 December 2004 11:45 am, Michael W Thelen wrote:
> 
> | I feel like making some reference to Ruby to stay on-topic, but I can't
> | think of anything to say.  (Ruby rules.)
> 
> How bout writting a Dvorak typing tutorial in Ruby? Then maybe I'd give it a
> go.
> 
> Speaking of which (and sorry I haven't followed this thread more) there are a
> number of things I think keyboard could use to "modernize". Some that I've
> thought of:
> 
>   * A distinction between hyphen and minus.

I have an old typewriter here... it has no numeral one key. The top
row of the keyboard begins with "2". If you want a "1", you are
expected to type a lower-case L :)

>   * Infinity symbol
>   * Keys for Bold/Strong, Italic/Emphasis and Underline.
>   * A Page key instead of pgdn and pgup so combos work:
>       Pg+Up (page up)
>       Pg+Dn (page down)
>       Pg+Home (top of page)
>       Pg+x (close tab or window)
>       etc.
>   * Change the Alt key's name to Menu.
>   * A real Alt key, allows a key to have a variat symbol
>     and antoehr Shift+Alt symbol. Think C64! Plus it could be
>     used to provide literal representations of certain codes
>     like ESC and SPACE.

A few of these things are already done on macos... all the keys type
various extended characters when you hold down option (aka alt), and
option-shift. So you just memorize that, say, option-P is π, or
option-r is ®, and you're set. At the risk of sounding cultist (!!!),
it's one of the features I miss terribly when I'm using non-s.
(option-shift-K :)

> Anyone have other ideas?

Well, one of these days, when nice lcd's become cheap, it would be
kinda cool to show *on the key* what will be typed when you press it.
Then, have a way to cycle through layouts/keymaps, with the results
showing on the keys themselves. So if you want a big shiny infinity
key on your keyboard, and want to sacrifice a function key, you can
have it there :)

But I think that's a long way off... And by then we may have *other*
interfaces...

Cheers,
Mark

> T.
> 
>