[IC] SA Symbiosis R2 - Group Buy Coming Soon

[dr_unconscionable]

Kind of late to the thread here but I would absolutely go for a sculpted SA set! The smaller legends seem more proportionate to me so I'm glad it seems like we're going in that direction. Some sort of front legends would be amazing if possible, but I understand if it's not. Will be watching developments with great interest.

[floristfran]

 will probably buy almost every kit if this is sculpted, HYPE!!

[shensmobile]

Oh yes.  If this set is a go, so am I.  I'll snag up a few sets for sure!  I'll even be willing to break my SA ban for this.

[soupymeatballs]

Any news to speak of? Still hoping for this to be run with a good vendor!

[nerdblog_io]

can someone explain to me why this is called symbiosis?

[enrique.aliaga]

can someone explain to me why this is called symbiosis?

A play on “Symbolics”, the maker of the original and legendary “Space Cadet” Keyboard?


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[nerdblog_io]

can someone explain to me why this is called symbiosis?

A play on “Symbolics”, the maker of the original and legendary “Space Cadet” Keyboard?


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Thank you very much

[hhkbp2]

Any news to speak of? Still hoping for this to be run with a good vendor!

Thanks for supporting. No much update that has been done and could be shared for now. It's in my mind to cut down the number of kits. It might remain 10 kits or less to be more practical for a real run. And to add more novelties keys. The font printing might not happen.

[hhkbp2]

A few updates:

1. Some kits are removed to reduce the total kit number, to make it concise for a practical GB run.
2. More novelties keys are added
3. The idea of front printing is dropped

Future plans:

1. get my hands on the alpha legends artwork
2. I'm not a NorDe/UK kit user. It's not sure that how it should be for some legends on the NorDeUK kit, e.g., Ü, Since the main alpha "U" has APL legend above. If anyone has this kind of knowledge, please help.
3. rendering

Thank you for supporting.

[gbchk]

A few updates:

1. Some kits are removed to reduce the total kit number, to make it concise for a practical GB run.
2. More novelties keys are added
3. The idea of front printing is dropped

Future plans:

1. get my hands on the alpha legends artwork
2. I'm not a NorDe/UK kit user. It's not sure that how it should be for some legends on the NorDeUK kit, e.g., Ü, Since the main alpha "U" has APL legend above. If anyone has this kind of knowledge, please help.
3. rendering

Thank you for supporting.

Thanks for the update. So has a vendor been decided on or not yet?

Also, one suggestion - it would be great to include a second Meta key to match the original SC (or drop the Alt key, which I don't think was present on the original board). Also, would be cool to see Rub Out

[hhkbp2]

A few updates:

1. Some kits are removed to reduce the total kit number, to make it concise for a practical GB run.
2. More novelties keys are added
3. The idea of front printing is dropped

Future plans:

1. get my hands on the alpha legends artwork
2. I'm not a NorDe/UK kit user. It's not sure that how it should be for some legends on the NorDeUK kit, e.g., Ü, Since the main alpha "U" has APL legend above. If anyone has this kind of knowledge, please help.
3. rendering

Thank you for supporting.

Thanks for the update. So has a vendor been decided on or not yet?

Also, one suggestion - it would be great to include a second Meta key to match the original SC (or drop the Alt key, which I don't think was present on the original board). Also, would be cool to see Rub Out

I'm afraid the vendor is not decided yet. There is still some work to do. And the queue of SP SA is quite full, more SA GBs are coming. Let's see whether there is a good time frame later.

Good suggestion. After a review to the legends, I think it's nice to merge what's present on the SC kb into a current layout by using "META" instead of "ALT". And "RUB OUT" will replace "BACKSPACE". Good idea!

[LightningXI]

Novelties look lovely. Love to hear that development on this is ongoing.

[qq]

The set is so nice, reminding me of the Propositional logic class in college (Hello, De Morgan). As much as I enjoy coding in Clojure, this keyset is definitely on my top most-wanted list.

[hhkbp2]

Updates:

1. revise the legends as gbchk suggested
2. add vim logos into the vim kit
3. simplify nordeuk kit to iso kit

[Rubbermilitia]

100% In for vim and novelties packs

[gbchk]

Updates:

1. revise the legends as gbchk suggested
2. add vim logos into the vim kit
3. simplify nordeuk kit to iso kit

Thanks for taking my suggestion! Just FYI Rub Out was originally used instead of Caps Lock, but Backspace is cool too (not sure if you did it that way on purpose). I guess it actually makes more sense that way though.

[dsaf]

Good to see this still going and still having an ISO/UK kit!

Some comments:

1) the enter key in ISO/UK says "RETURE"

2) will novelties be revised further? They are a bit inconsistent in terms of line width and style.

3) could there be an arrows kit? Usually it sells well. Maybe like those human hands pointing in all directions? Also what about roman numerals?

[hhkbp2]

Thanks for taking my suggestion! Just FYI Rub Out was originally used instead of Caps Lock, but Backspace is cool too (not sure if you did it that way on purpose). I guess it actually makes more sense that way though.

Yeah, it looks like the SC exactly when "RUB OUT" is in the position of "CAPS LOCK", but it seems duplicated when there is already a "BACKSPACE", so i think it is better to replace "BACKSPACE".

[hhkbp2]

Good to see this still going and still having an ISO/UK kit!

Some comments:

1) the enter key in ISO/UK says "RETURE"

2) will novelties be revised further? They are a bit inconsistent in terms of line width and style.

3) could there be an arrows kit? Usually it sells well. Maybe like those human hands pointing in all directions? Also what about roman numerals?

Thanks! I think the NorDe keys would be restored later since there is still requirement for them.

1) The typo will be fixed

2) The novelties would be revised. The quote price of this kit seems to be a bit higher and I would like to remove some keys to reduce the price.

3) It adds 3 more kits if we're going to keep Hand, Roman kit, and Arrow kit, like what's in the previous layouts. It tries to minimize the keys and kits to reduce the complexity of a practical GB for current kit setup. I will talk to the vendor and figure out whether we're good to add them since we already have more than a dozen kits.

[vilagefool]

In for at least 1 R3 set. Not even a fan of SA, but this looks awesome!

[hhkbp2]

Oh yes.  If this set is a go, so am I.  I'll snag up a few sets for sure!  I'll even be willing to break my SA ban for this.

In for at least 1 R3 set. Not even a fan of SA, but this looks awesome!

Thanks for support! Very Encouraging!

[yap68]

Why kits are not updated? I have seen the new ones in Wolfmark qq. Anyway, there are quite some improvements

[hhkbp2]

Why kits are not updated? I have seen the new ones in Wolfmark qq. Anyway, there are quite some improvements

I'm just writing the post of updates when you ask. 

[hhkbp2]

The kit layouts are close to the final, going through all the changes and taking the feedbacks received so far. Here are the changes recently made:

• The artworks for the alpha area were redrawn. We will use these new legends for those keys in Alpha kit, Vim kit and Colevrak kit, as you could see in the layout pictures
• The novelties kit was redesigned. Many icon keys from previous design are remove to reduce the price.
• Some accent keys in yellow were added into Modifiers, Ergodox, CADR, etc
• Some legends were revised to reflect the Space-Cadet keyboard legends, e.g. Now we have, "RUB OUT" instead of "BACKSPACE", "META" instead of "ALT", "TOP" instead of "MENU" or "CODE"
• Some keys in 40s were removed or revised for simplication
• The 6.25u spacebar was moved to Modifiers kit
• The blue 7u spacebar in Non-standard kit was removed
• Previous Spacebars kit was split into two kits: Spacekeys and Spacebars
• A few keys, such as 1u shift, 2u shift are added to the Non-standard kit to cover more layouts
• A few keys were added for Numpad kit, and CADR kit to cover more layouts
• The Arrow kit and Choice kit were added, thanks dsaf for his suggestions. The Choice kit contains the roman and hands symbols from the Space-Cadet keyboard
• The basic colors were changed to BFP, GD, WCK and YCF
• A new kit called Game kit was added, based on a strong requirement from Chinese KB Community
• The NorDeUK kit will come back, based on the requirement

And here are all the kits:

1. Alpha



The APL and A-Z symbols will be bigger than the symbols in the R1 number row.

2. Modifiers



3. Non standard



4. Numpad



5. Ergodox



6. Planck



7. 40s



8. NorDeUK



9. Colevrak



10. VIM



11. Choices



12. Arrows



13. Game



14. Spacekeys



15. Spacebars



16. Novelties



These novelty keys include(from top to bottom):

1) Row 1
Parenthesized lambda, which usually is the symbol of Lisp
Emacs logo, Emacs(a general name for all variants) is the editor popular in Lisp environment
Graphics logo, the combination of a triangle, a square and a circle is usually used to express the advances in the graphic system of Lisp Machine

2) Row 2
A logo named "Symbiosis". I prefer to the name "Symbolics", since Symbolics was one of the most popular Lisp Machine companies back at that time, and it's labeled in the Symbolics Space-Cadet keyboard. But I don't get the permission. I think this keyset name "Symbiosis" will do the trick. It still provide a similar retrospective look with the name "Symbiosis" in a retrospective font style.

A logo "Symbolics" in retro font style, just as the Symbolics Space-Cadet keyboard was labeled. Symbolics, Inc. was one of the two popular Lisp Machine companies back at 1980s.

3) Row 3
Happy Hacking, a jargon among hackers in MIT AI Lab back to 1970s. It's said that Richard Stallman created it to wish another person plenty of hacking fun. It means "May you have happy hacking",  just like the hacking version of "Have a nice trip", or "May the Force be with you". This jargon later is used as one part of the name of a PFU keyboard series, the Happy Hacking Keyboards.

The LMI logo, LMI(Lisp Machines, Inc.) was a company formed in 1979 by Richard Greenblatt of MIT's AI Lab to build Lisp machines.

4) Row 4, Row 5
The same novelty legends mentioned above, just in different size or profile.

17. CADR



Please leave a comment if you have any question or feedback.

It's expected the next update will come up with mock-ups and the details of GB. Stay tuned!

[hansichen]

Norde also needs a row 2 Z key, normally you can use the row 4 Z cause it looks the same then rotated by 180° but that won't work here

[hhkbp2]

Norde also needs a row 2 Z key, normally you can use the row 4 Z cause it looks the same then rotated by 180° but that won't work here

Thanks! It's added in the kit picture above.

Please help to check whether there is any other issue about the NordeUK kit. 

[_ODIN_]

these caps will be abs right?

[hhkbp2]

these caps will be abs right?

Yes, it will be ABS double shot keyset of SA profile, made by Signature Plastics.

[clappingcactus]

Clever VIM kit.

Any estimate as to when the GB might start? Are we talking 2018? 2019?

[gbchk]

Can I ask why the colors were changed? Is it a matter of cost?

I currently have 7bit's SC set but am very interested in this as it will help me achieve 65% compatibility and potentially replace some of the shiniest keys, but I'm not sure if that would be the case due to the color difference.

[ideus]

The CADR set will provide full freedom to users of sub-sixty boards. Awesome.


Are you planning to run this as a private GB or through SP or MD?

[hhkbp2]

Clever VIM kit.

Any estimate as to when the GB might start? Are we talking 2018? 2019?

The overall details of the GB will be released later along with mock-ups when they're ready. The GB will start in a few months. 

[hhkbp2]

Can I ask why the colors were changed? Is it a matter of cost?

I currently have 7bit's SC set but am very interested in this as it will help me achieve 65% compatibility and potentially replace some of the shiniest keys, but I'm not sure if that would be the case due to the color difference.

Previously there are two divisions of the colors used by two SP SA keyset designs inspired by the Symbolics Space-Cadet keyboard: Symbiosis, which uses the colors BE, GTG, WW, NN; and 7bit's SPH, which uses the colors BFP, GD, WV(WCK later, since SP did change to that color), NN. The later combination has brighter blue and higher contrast of WCK on GD, which looks a bit better on various light condition.

After this IC started, I followed these 4 Symbiosis R1 colors strictly all the time. Recently, a friend advised me to change the colors. I thought it's safe to follow the colors used in Symbiosis R1, drawing clear lines in colors in order not to step on 7bit's toes(as I did from the beginning of this IC, rejecting suspicious requests). But my friend saw this issue differently. He thought it's more important to have an overall view of things, and end these trivial subtle divisions(which causes confusion and pain to buyers), since I have the chance now. He made his wise point so I took his advice to change the colors to BFP, GD, WCK, NN.

So, speaking of colors, assure these colors are consistent among different batches of SP production, you could buy some kits from this GB to get along with 7bit's SC kits. But there are still some small issues you should know:

1. SP changed the colors before. The WV color used in 7bit's R4 was no more. Later WCK was used for similar look. I'm not sure what's the difference between these two, since I don't have R4. Currently the best I could do is to choose WCK. If what you have is R4, you should be aware of this

2. The legend differences. You know, 7bit's keys have bigger legends and bolder line for legends, even for modifier keys. We discussed this in previous posts in this thread. I had asked 7bit nicely to use his molds on R6 for those alpha legends before, but he seemed not interested, and I didn't get his permission. We will build new legends in this GB, so the alpha legends might have differences from what you have. I suspect that it would not be a perfect match if you just replace some keys in them. For example, if you like VIM and buy only the VIM kit from this GB, when you install these VIM keys to those you have, it's possible that you might find out the size or position of APL symbols of VIM keys is slightly different.

[hhkbp2]

The CADR set will provide full freedom to users of sub-sixty boards. Awesome.


Are you planning to run this as a private GB or through SP or MD?

I think all R3 keys match small boards quite well, but we will still have a numpad area. 

It's going to be a public GB. The place and date will be announced later.

[dsaf]

• The Arrow kit and Choice kit were added, thanks dsaf for his suggestions. The Choice kit contains the roman and hands symbols from the Space-Cadet keyboard
• The NorDeUK kit will come back, based on the requirement

Awesome!

• A new kit called Game kit are added, based on a strong requirement from Chinese KB Community

I am interested as well! Such a kit started disappearing from SA sets and it would be good to reverse this negative trend.

1) Row 1
Parenthesized lambda, which usually is the symbol of Lisp

I am personally not a fan of how it looks but understand it's accurate... Then again I am not a Lisp programmer.
However for the sake of discussion, what about this variant?


http://ergoemacs.org/emacs/lisp_logo/LISP_logo_small.png

2) Row 2
A logo named "Symbiosis". I prefer to the name "Symbolics" ... But I don't get the permission. ...

Are you sure? I-am-not-a-lawyer but it looks like they don't have a trademark. Doesn't even look like a custom font. Alternatively what about "SPACE-CADET"? I don't have a strong feeling here just thinking out loud.

[dsaf]

Also, would it be possible to add one more colour of the Return key to NorDeUk (just like standard ANSI)?

[hhkbp2]

I am personally not a fan of how it looks but understand it's accurate... Then again I am not a Lisp programmer.
However for the sake of discussion, what about this variant?

Show Image

http://ergoemacs.org/emacs/lisp_logo/LISP_logo_small.png

I thought of this logo at some draft at the very beginning. Its shape doesn't fit perfectly in a 1u square space, and it's not very nice to connect "I" and "P", which creates a line to make the characters' shapes fuzzy. The connection of "L" and "S" is much better.

I think the parenthesized lambda logo does a better job as a novelties key. But it's open for discussion. Any idea is appreciated.

Are you sure? I-am-not-a-lawyer but it looks like they don't have a trademark. Doesn't even look like a custom font. Alternatively what about "SPACE-CADET"? I don't have a strong feeling here just thinking out loud.

I'm not sure. Wish a lawyer could help and confirm it's usable or not.  :p
The font is a bit-map font called symbolics, it's used in old Symbolics system terminal. You could download it from github. In that repo it says

Symbolics was dissolved in the mid 1990s, and the current state of its intellectual property is muddled. The rights holders of VLM and Genera itself are not well understood. There is no longer any "Symbolics, Inc.".

Anyway, I don't think they has IP on this font. Moreover, technically speaking, I didn't use this font since it's bit-map. I vectorized the shape of these characters for this keyset design referring to pictures of Symbolics keyboards, and this logo just has a similar look to this font.

"SPACE-CADET" is a good alternative. Previously it's "LISP MACHINE", which reflects the theme of this design. It looks closer to a novelty key and more subtle for the word "Symbiosis" in a retro style font, so it's changed.

Also, would it be possible to add one more colour of the Return key to NorDeUk (just like standard ANSI)?

You mean a yellow one, right? Usually there is only one color in the UK kit, so as to reduce the price. But yes we could try to add one.

[adamcobabe]

Will the F1-F12 keys be the larger 7bit versions or the small standard SP style? I'm missing these keys on my 7bit kits and want to bastardize.

[wtoe]

This is great, definitely interested in participating in GB. I don't have the budget for the GMK run going on right now and I'd prefer the SA profile/centered legends for this set anyways.

I don't know if it's too late for suggestions like this, but would it be possible to add 2 more hand pointers to R2? They could be used in the nav cluster and would emulate the 2x2 hand key cluster from the original board.

[ideus]

You can always use Symbiolics for the Novelty key.  )

[hhkbp2]

Will the F1-F12 keys be the larger 7bit versions or the small standard SP style? I'm missing these keys on my 7bit kits and want to bastardize.

Bigger function letters, which were used in SA Carbon R2 and SA SONG.

[hhkbp2]

This is great, definitely interested in participating in GB. I don't have the budget for the GMK run going on right now and I'd prefer the SA profile/centered legends for this set anyways.

I don't know if it's too late for suggestions like this, but would it be possible to add 2 more hand pointers to R2? They could be used in the nav cluster and would emulate the 2x2 hand key cluster from the original board.

Good idea. 2x2 cluster, nice meme to the SC keyboard. It's fresh to me for this style of usage. If we have 2x2 cluster for hands, I guess there should be a cluster for Roman letters as an alternation, which would be also useful for layouts which have room for many 1u keys. Will get this updated later.

[hhkbp2]

You can always use Symbiolics for the Novelty key.  )

Sure? We will go for the retro Symbolics then.  )

[wtoe]

This is great, definitely interested in participating in GB. I don't have the budget for the GMK run going on right now and I'd prefer the SA profile/centered legends for this set anyways.

I don't know if it's too late for suggestions like this, but would it be possible to add 2 more hand pointers to R2? They could be used in the nav cluster and would emulate the 2x2 hand key cluster from the original board.

Good idea. 2x2 cluster, nice meme to the SC keyboard. It's fresh to me for this style of usage. If we have 2x2 cluster for hands, I guess there should be a cluster for Roman letters as an alternation, which would be also useful for layouts which have room for many 1u keys. Will get this updated later.

Sounds good! Regarding the Roman numerals, what is the reasoning for the R2 "III" and the R4 "II" and "III"? What layout are they for?

[hhkbp2]

Sounds good! Regarding the Roman numerals, what is the reasoning for the R2 "III" and the R4 "II" and "III"? What layout are they for?

The current R2 is not necessary, since it has R4 already. "II" and "III" just map to thumb up and thumb down to provide flexibility on arrow area. I think this R4 "II" could be removed.

[t8c]

Looks great. Would love to get an ALT GRAPH, SYMBOL AND GREEK  black in blue mods in the minivan kit. R6 never offered those and especially the latter two belong on a space cadet keyboard as they are on the original one.

[hhkbp2]

Looks great. Would love to get an ALT GRAPH, SYMBOL AND GREEK  black in blue mods in the minivan kit. R6 never offered those and especially the latter two belong on a space cadet keyboard as they are on the original one.

Thanks. There is a "ALT GRAPH" on UK kit usually. Because we replace "ALT" with "META", following the Lisp Machine convention, "ALT GRAPH" is removed. As for "SYMBOL", it didn't show its face in the Space-Cadet keyboard or LMI-CADR keyboard, but it happened on later models of Symbolics keyboard in different color theme, so it's not added this time. And "GREEK" was used to output the front-printing greek symbols in the Space-Cadet keyboard. Since front-printing is not a option any more for this project, I chose "TOP" instead. "TOP" was used to output the APL Symbols above "A-Z". "GREEK" looks nicer, but "TOP" seems to make more sense since we still have the APL symbols, although these APL symbols are not used by most computer users any more.

[captsis]

Looks great. Would love to get an ALT GRAPH, SYMBOL AND GREEK  black in blue mods in the minivan kit. R6 never offered those and especially the latter two belong on a space cadet keyboard as they are on the original one.

Thanks. There is a "ALT GRAPH" on UK kit usually. Because we replace "ALT" with "META", following the Lisp Machine convention, "ALT GRAPH" is removed. As for "SYMBOL", it didn't show its face in the Space-Cadet keyboard or LMI-CADR keyboard, but it happened on later models of Symbolics keyboard in different color theme, so it's not added this time. And "GREEK" was used to output the front-printing greek symbols in the Space-Cadet keyboard. Since front-printing is not a option any more for this project, I chose "TOP" instead. "TOP" was used to output the APL Symbols above "A-Z". "GREEK" looks nicer, but "TOP" seems to make more sense since we still have the APL symbols, although these APL symbols are not used by most computer users any more.

Would most people now'a days just use them as macros if they had the keys?

[hhkbp2]

Would most people now'a days just use them as macros if they had the keys?

Shortcuts to applications, Special control(for media, keyboard layers, etc), Macros, vast combinations with other keys.

[t8c]

I will get in on the buy anyway so thanks for your response.