And now, for the point I'm infamous for: ISO support.
There are two distinct layers to this:
1) Physical layout: this level requires the physical presence of four keys: a short left Shift (present), a vertical Enter (present, in both mod and accent color), one R3 alpha (present), and one R4 alpha (present); in this level, the alphas may have any legend, or even be blanks — all that's needed is that they ARE present. As can be seen, physical layout support for ISO is correct.
2) National layout: this is where the cat fight starts. :-D
The base kit is based on the US English national layout (as most sets do), and adds exactly TWO keys that are specific to the UK English national layout (R3
#~ and R4
\|), missing the rest of the UK English-specific alpha keys: R3
'@, R1
`¬, R1
2" and R1
3£ (this besides the three AltGr mod keys that would be required as well, in the sizes of 1.5U, 1.25U and 1U). With this, the UK English national layout isn't fully supported, giving rise to what's called "Atlantis ISO"
(as in "it's on neither side of the pond but somewhere in the middle").
Options to fix this?
1) Do nothing. Some European users have come to accept this partial support, and prefer this course of action to avoid any problems that might make a designer drop ISO support, even at the physical layout level.
2) Support the
US English national layout over ISO or ANSISO. This would require replacing the R3
#~ with an R3
\|; meanwhile, the R4
\| can remain as-is
or can be replaced by an R4
<> key (both options are valid, and both have advantages and disadvantages). The total amount of keys does not change.
3) Complete the support for the
UK English national layout over ISO, by adding the missing keys (R3
'@, R1
`¬, R1
2" and R1
3£, plus the AltGr keys).
4) Complete the support for both the
UK English national layout AND the
US English national layout over ISO or ANSISO. If going with the first variant of the "US ISO" layout
(a misnomer), this would mean adding the same keys as in point 3) plus exactly one more (R3
\|).
Obviously, everyone will have his or her own preferences on this (I know I have mine...
), and the decision will ultimately be Hazzy's to take.