A proposal for a new SSK

[M'er Forever]

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[M'er Forever]

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[Muirium]

Upon further thought, it seems the only reason to include Lock lights at all is to accommodate non-touch typists who look more at the keys than at the screen while typing (like me). Touch typists will immediately see on the screen whether or not a Lock is engaged and have little need or use for a Lock LED, since they rarely look at the keys or top of the keyboard anyway. But if Lock LED's are to be included, I think the placement indicated in my previous reply to myself is ideal.

I touch type, and I do still glance to see if caps lock is engaged when something feels awry. There's a lot of password forms with hidden characters and the like out there. Its state is only truly self evident when typing in the open.

[M'er Forever]

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[M'er Forever]

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[Grond]

Unicomp should at least learn from your concept how to make a Mac keycap set right! Their icons look like they come from a 80s remote control.

[M'er Forever]

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[Muirium]

Care to share your master CAD file, M'er? Hopefully Blender can open it for me if you're up for it!

[M'er Forever]

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[matt3o]

Not familiar with Blender. Can it read and load AutoCAD ".DWG" files? What do you plan to do with this file if I decide to share it with you?

make money, sell to pixar, get rich, take over the world!

blender can easily import DXF.

[Muirium]

Yeah, I'm just dabbling with it, but know some people who swear by Blender. I've mostly sworn *at* it, myself, but that's what learning is all about!

By the way Emmer, as you hadn't heard of Kickstarter, I'll point out Dropbox is the way to send large files, and keep them backed up live and in sync across all your computers. Our days of worrying about a few megabytes ended long ago, fortunately.

[M'er Forever]

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[Muirium]

Cool. I'm keen to look at it, when you're able, so I can see how to make such renders for myself. There's not much I can do with your design per se, but the process you're showing us a peek into is giving me ideas!

[M'er Forever]

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[M'er Forever]

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[matt3o]

AFIAK DXF can do 3d

[Muirium]

That's how it starts. Then it becomes an all-consuming obsession. I can't even begin to count how many hours have gone into this project and all the other keyboard designs I've done in the last few years.

Ah, the nerd's life. Our people have always been this way. What else did it take to invent writing, algebra, calculus, and computers!

As for Blender's import options:

Screen Shot 2013-12-23 at 06.39.22 pm.png (705.01 KiB) Viewed 3551 times

There are probably plugins or the like to access more, but that's my stock installation of the current version.

[M'er Forever]

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[M'er Forever]

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[Muirium]

Bet that stainless steel case would weigh as much as a Kishsaver!

2 mm is probably too thick. I made a keyboard body out of stainless steel layers and even 1.5 mm is pretty serious stuff.

[M'er Forever]

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[Muirium]

What about pressed sheet metal? Isn't that how a lot of metal shells are made, from small items right up to car bodies?

[M'er Forever]

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[Muirium]

Only if I can make DeLoreans with it.

[M'er Forever]

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[M'er Forever]

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[matt3o]

Shift or Alt + Fx might be used by the system or application for internal use. The only viable solution is with an FN key imho (in lieu of the Menu key).

Of course ctrl and caps lock should be swappable and once swapper caps could be used as FN itselft.

[Muirium]

I find Caps Lock to be a pretty decent Fn key. It's a lot easier to hit than Insert, lets put it that way. Notably, Apple's own compact keyboard puts Fn in the bottom left corner (before Control). I assume they only have Fn in the strange place it lives on the full size because Insert never did mean anything on the Mac. Used to be a Help key in the early OS X days.

I see the top side logo's back. Bad! If Ducky is classy enough not to do it, then an SSK should be too.

[M'er Forever]

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[matt3o]

I believe Muirium suggests to replace caps lock functionality (that nobody on this forum ever uses) with FN. I find both "menu" and "caps lock" nice spots for an FN key. Shift can't be used as FN.