DIY analog keyboard

[zoidbergslo]

Some of you probably seen this but for those who didn't. Homemade hall switches made from cherry blacks.

[fossala]

Not seen that, thanks for posting.

[Ascaii]

This is awesome.

[uberben]

This is pretty neat. I feel like the XBOX controller is kind of overkill, though. For those with teensy-like replacement controllers, they could hook the hall effect sensors direct to the teensy and have it act as a dual keyboard/joypad device. This has me tempted to do something like this in my next mod, but I was already looking at adding mini joysticks to act as a mouse.

[guilleguillaume]

Great mod. Never seen something like that.

[The_Ed]

Couldn't you just mount some real hall effect switches in the keyboard?

[fossala]

Hall effects have 3 or 4pins.

[Aleksander]

have to order some parts ASAP

[vun]

As a PC gamer I see no real benefit to this, although it would be nice to have in some RPG games. Except the games that would support this kind of keyboard already support an Xbox controller and will in most cases play better with it. In any game that is equally or better played with mouse and keyboard there is no actual value in having this system.

It's still a cool mod though, even if it is mostly because "why the hell not?"

[Aleksander]

I am also a PC gamer and on rare occations I would like this possibility, and also I am pretty sure that I can use one single Attiny85 chip to do everything, and looking at this as a fun project

[uberben]

Another option that avoids doing anything game pad related (but still requires a custom keyboard controller) is to add an "analog" mode to your firmware which ignores the regular keypress action on those analog keys and instead uses the hall effect readings to basically do PWM pulses on the regular WASD. In effect, it would immitate you tapping the key repeatedly to get different speeds. It might not be as smooth as emulating a joypad, but wouldn't require any key remapping.

[Findecanor]

Maybe the next community-driven DIY keyboard could have the traces, holes and solder pads for hall effect sensors on the PCB.

[Aleksander]

Another option that avoids doing anything game pad related (but still requires a custom keyboard controller) is to add an "analog" mode to your firmware which ignores the regular keypress action on those analog keys and instead uses the hall effect readings to basically do PWM pulses on the regular WASD. In effect, it would immitate you tapping the key repeatedly to get different speeds. It might not be as smooth as emulating a joypad, but wouldn't require any key remapping.

You can probably program it as a joystick in the firmware, as both joysticks and keyboards is covered in the HMI standard...

[uberben]

You can probably program it as a joystick in the firmware, as both joysticks and keyboards is covered in the HMI standard...

Yup, almost like my original suggestion

This is pretty neat. I feel like the XBOX controller is kind of overkill, though. For those with teensy-like replacement controllers, they could hook the hall effect sensors direct to the teensy and have it act as a dual keyboard/joypad device. This has me tempted to do something like this in my next mod, but I was already looking at adding mini joysticks to act as a mouse.

This has me thinking though... I know I have seen mice with joysticks (http://sclick.net/cool%20gadgets/cooles ... -mouse.jpg). I wonder if a full size thumb stick could be added to the front lip of the keyboard (ie on the edge of the keyboard by the space bar, pointing towards you) in a useable way. I have seen these joystick breakout boards on DealExtreme for only a couple dollars.

Has anyone here done a dual keyboard/joystick device before?

[HaaTa]

Hmm, I've done some stuff like this for experimentation.

I don't see why he has to go to an XBox360 controller. I'd be nicer just to add a joystick endpoint to the controller and mimic a controller (XBox360 for kicks).

Also, unless you mod them, all known hall effect keyboard switches are threshold based rather than analog, so you'd have to replace the mini-pcb in each one.

[Icarium]

He doesn't use a switch, though. It probably simply is an analogue sensor.

[Aleksander]

Has anyone here done a dual keyboard/joystick device before?

That reminded me of something, so I had to have a look in the basement, and there I found something I built some years ago, back when I was into ship simulator games.
8 axes and 25 buttons +HAT

Sorry for the dust...

Backside looks a bit cleaner than Ben Hecks project, if I do dare to say...

[CeeSA]

I hate the analog part of gamepads. I always think so less controll with this little bums.
I think it would be the same way with this mod. I am a lowsenser

Very nice mod anyway.

[uberben]

The analog buttons could be interesting for mouse keys too. I just started using hasu's firmware with mouse keys and the fact that i can't precisely control the cursor speed without tapping would be solved with analog keys. I'm getting more tempted to do this mod, but I already have too few pins on my micro...