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geekhack Community => Keyboard Keycaps => Topic started by: santela on Thu, 10 June 2021, 22:08:14

Title: Tilde/Pipe - Mod or Alpha colors?
Post by: santela on Thu, 10 June 2021, 22:08:14
Some recent sets have decided to drop the mod tilde/pipe keys from the base set into a child kit, and others do not offer these two keys in mod colors at all and the designers claim this is due to cost.

But in my experience and from the photos I see posted on keyboard forums mod colored tilde/pipe seems to be overwhelmingly preferred over the alpha colored ones. So my question is which one do you prefer? And can someone give a reasonable explanation why some designers do this? I don't think anyone actually buys the cost excuse as the keys would probably only increase the price by a dollar or two.
Title: Re: Tilde/Pipe - Mod or Alpha colors?
Post by: zslane on Fri, 11 June 2021, 11:33:14
99% of the time I use the alpha-colored |\ key. It is an alpha after all. It is extremely rare that the aesthetics of a mod-colored |\ would override the illogic of it for me. But then again, I am not a fan of the dumb alternating blocks of F-row key colors either.
Title: Re: Tilde/Pipe - Mod or Alpha colors?
Post by: udller on Fri, 11 June 2021, 11:42:59
i sometimes like the divide the mod |\ key gives on 65%. i dont care about the other as i normally use esc.
Title: Re: Tilde/Pipe - Mod or Alpha colors?
Post by: rowdy on Fri, 11 June 2021, 20:43:44
Most modern keyboard layouts are based on the IBM Model M, which is arguably the first keyboard to sport that layout.  That has alpha-coloured \| and `~.

The argument for alpha-coloured is that they are indeed alpha keys - they generate printable characters that appear on the screen.  Modifiers are a different colour, and are so-called because they modify the behaviour of other keys on the keyboard.

The tendency towards mod-coloured \| and `~ most likely stems from people wanting a mod-coloured block of keys on either side of the keyboard to balance the visual aesthetics.

As an aside, RGB mods were popular due to the use of keyboard overlays in the past - a card or plastic sheet would be fitted around the function keys, usually, and had application functions highlighted in red, green or blue.  The addition of RGB modifier keys to the keyboard helped non-technical users to generate the correct key sequences.