Ergo Keyboards

I have a confession to make. Writing software, playing games, writing books, just existing in the world for the last number of years while technology has advanced means that everyone needs to type. I never really learned how to type properly. I didn’t take typing in high school, so I never learned how to type. I’m what I like to call an advanced hunt & peck style, mostly index and middle fingers, pinky for holding shift or command, and thumbs for spacebar.

It didn’t really matter though, I found a way and to this day I can type pretty fast with my own style I have, and it’s served me well. I remember watching people at work many years ago typing with that Microsoft ergo keyboard that was popular thinking that it would just slow me down.

In the last few years though, I have been intrigued by split ergo keyboards. It all started with a corne I ordered from Typeractive, this was something I could put together in my office, using some of those dormant soldering skills from my school days (and let me tell you they were VERY dormant), and actually build! Cool! The obvious problem though being I need to look at the keys to type.

Well part way down the rabbit hole now, let’s make this even more difficult then and change layouts at the same time. QWERTY always seemed a little inefficient, and there are interesting alternatives like Colemak (and its variant Colemak-DH). Ok then so I’ll do that at the same time, might as well change everything. And maybe it’s not crazy to think so, if my hands are together on a single keyboard then my current muscle memory will take over, and if my hands are apart I can build new muscle memory.

It’s slow going, I’m still slower with the split and Colemak-DH, but it opens up some interesting possibilities. I can sit cross legged at my desk with my back straight and my shoulders back. I could look into mounting kits to the arms of my chair (haven’t tried this one yet), or tilting kits to keep my arms at a natural angle. Since that first Corne, I’ve bought a ZSA Voyager that I am currently typing on, and recently built a Sweep Bling MX. If these names are unfamiliar that’s OK. There is an entire world of customization, layouts, key spacing, wired vs. wireless and umpteen other things. I’m currently interested in a toucan2 (more aggressive pinky stagger, built in trackpad, and wireless) to keep in my bag to replace the corne (I don’t like the positioning of the thumb cluster), and a piantor pro for similar reasons (minus the trackpad), and definitely KLP LAME sculpted keycaps.

So why?

Good question. I recently switched day jobs and the laptop I received had a French Canadian keyboard, so my wireless corne really shone through! Definitely worth the hundreds of dollars I have spent on this hobby. Obviously not, but I am intrigued by the possibilities of distraction free writing on my phone at the coffee shop, of finding different positions to work from, and different ways of interfacing with the machines that drive much of our society.

Or maybe it’s just that it’s an interesting hobby that I wanted to explore just because I’m a nerd at heart. And I hardly scratched the surface. I could have babbled on about choc vs. mx spacing (I like choc switches for their low profile and mx for its spacing), or specific switches (linear, about 35gf, silent I think is my sweet spot), or homerow mods and layers needed for a 40% keyboard. There are things to be learned and it’s something I want to know more about.