5.3 KiB
What the hell is that keyboard on my laptop? The Keyboardio Atreus
The Keyboardio Atreus is a minimalist 44-key keyboard that is sculpted to fit the natural length of the fingers in a way that minimalist keyboards like the Planck can't. it has just enough keys to be able to express most of the keys on a "full-sized" keyboard with a "phone tree" of layers. It's based on a keyboard designed by roam:Technomancy, FOSS lisp extraordinaire and itinerant Fediverse shitposter.
I work my fingers like I expect to type QWERTY with much less finger-travel and much less risk of RSI. to get to numbers, symbols, and "action keys" like function keys, navigation, etc, by entering key-chords like you would with Ctrl, Alt, and the Windows or Super key. My right thumb's resting key gets me to a layer where I have a ten-key and access to common punctuation and braces, and it is close to Ctrl and Escape and Space. The left thumb is my shift key, and is close to Alt/Meta/Option, Super/Windows, and backspace. Other buttons take me to arrow keys, function keys, etc. One of my Mental Models for computing is fundamentally about modes and navigate through them (as in Emacs major and minor modes). This is a hardware extension of this mental model which melds nicely when working in Emacs and using a roam:Tiling Window Manager.
It sucks when I travel sometimes because I obviously don't have it built in to a laptop and it's not as comfortable or as smooth to use than sitting at my desk at home. So this keyboard layout is a sort of local-minima I've dug myself in to. It's also roam:Hashtag Aesthetic as frick and is fun to type on, and represents nearly the "end game" sort of build for the /r/battlestations ❌ /r/mechanicalkeyboards Reddit Consumerist Poster I may have been in my 20s. Maybe this is just that exact kind of post. CCE and The Arcology Project are that exact kind of "post".
This Atreus is equipped with Kailh BOX Brown switches and Laser GMK keycaps, I can type on "tactile" keyboard switches without bottoming out, and this thing can crush prose writing while looking rad as hell, both of which acting as a huge multiplier of my descent in to org-mode and using this digital journal to think well.
In that sense, it is a physical representation of my folly. Some people learn DVORAK or COLEMAK and give up on using vim-style navigation vocabulary. Most people don't ever consider vim-style navigation vocabulary to be a threat and store their thoughts organized chronologically in Apple Notes or Google Docs. This is not a place of honor.
The Keyboard and Layout ATTACH
I use QWERTY, a custom symbol layer, and a mouse layer which I may not use much.
Mostly this works on any computer, except I have to apply some Xmodmap Hacks to set up matching braces on the left hand for <> and changing shifted version of ,./ to be much more useful !?\. ZMK might be able to handle this better, but that's not an option with most of my keyboards.
These screenshots were taken out of Chrysalis, the Keyboardio configurator on [2020-10-13].
There have been some minor changes since then but I am using QMK now so getting nice labelled images of the layout is not so simple.
(My site engine currently does not support image uploads, sorry.)
So what is my endgame?
This thing with either a trackpoint or trackball.
This thing except I have re-habitualized my typing so that my hands travel less "across" the keyboard, even this one i sometimes manage to play like a piano.
This thing but it has little legs that fold out so that it can sit in my lap and still be small enough to travel with or use with my laptop.
This but it's bluetooth and battery powered, running ZMK.
This but the keys are aligned to match my finger-lengths based on my own measurements.
One of these days I'm going to teach myself enough PCB design and KiCad and Machining to produce this.