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geekhack Projects => Making Stuff Together! => Topic started by: burli on Thu, 07 January 2016, 08:33:29

Title: My German 40% keyboard MB42
Post by: burli on Thu, 07 January 2016, 08:33:29
I like the idea of small, portable keyboards. The JD40 is nice but the giant space bar is a waste of space and it is difficult to type in german. So I made some modifications to the default JD40 without increasing size. I split the space bar and make it smaller to get two more keys in the lower row.

One of the space bars is used for the green layer. I use only the right thumb for space so the left one is the modifier. On the green layer are the numbers, the german umlauts, the ß and some commonly used characters, but I will do some optimizations. The default function of the top left key is Tab and the option is Esc. The default of the top right button is Backspace and the option is delete. In a later version you can swap default and option. The red layer is QWERTZ default.

The blue layer is inspired by the Neo 2 Layers 3 and 4. I moved the motion keys to the right hand. So you can move the cursor without leaving the home row. There are also backspace, delete, insert, pgup, pgdn, home and end. The rest will be characters for programming like [] {} and so on
 
I will also add options to swap space and the green Mod, swap green Mod and Shift (if you like thumb shift like me) and swap the left blue Mod and Ctrl

The Fn layer is not defined yet, but there will be the F-keys, volume control, some other funktions and maybe mouse control.

Because the layout is not finished yet I will post the link to the Keyboard Layout Editor instead of an image.

http://www.keyboard-layout-editor.com/#/gists/bc4bed854a76e9fb2d16

Please let me know what you think or what could be better
Title: Re: My German 40% keyboard MB42
Post by: jdcarpe on Thu, 07 January 2016, 08:36:07
The new revision JD40 PCB has options for smaller spacebar keys. The original version needed the space under the spacebar for the Teensy controller. :)
Title: Re: My German 40% keyboard MB42
Post by: burli on Thu, 07 January 2016, 08:46:02
The new revision JD40 PCB has options for smaller spacebar keys. The original version needed the space under the spacebar for the Teensy controller. :)

can you show me a link?
Title: Re: My German 40% keyboard MB42
Post by: jdcarpe on Thu, 07 January 2016, 09:03:50
The new revision JD40 PCB has options for smaller spacebar keys. The original version needed the space under the spacebar for the Teensy controller. :)

can you show me a link?
I don't know if I have posted much about the new revision yet, but it's almost the same as my JD45, but with one less column.

https://geekhack.org/index.php?topic=62641.0
Title: Re: My German 40% keyboard MB42
Post by: burli on Thu, 07 January 2016, 09:22:55
Looks nice, but I make my own, because I want to have the option to use Cherry ML and some other features
Title: Re: My German 40% keyboard MB42
Post by: burli on Thu, 07 January 2016, 11:23:13
Made some major changes to the layout.

Split the number row in two rows and moved the cursor keys to the green layer. I want the blue layer equal to the Neo 2 Layer 3 because there are most characters for programmers

(http://www.neo-layout.org/grafik/tastatur3d/tastatur_neo_Ebene3.png)
Title: Re: My German 40% keyboard MB42
Post by: jdcarpe on Thu, 07 January 2016, 12:51:05
Dunno if this might work for you:

https://geekhack.org/index.php?topic=78080.0
Title: Re: My German 40% keyboard MB42
Post by: burli on Thu, 07 January 2016, 16:01:44
It looks similar, but has some differences I don't like. And I want the Cherry ML option
Title: Re: My German 40% keyboard MB42
Post by: yangdigi on Sat, 09 January 2016, 09:17:22
I am building this one.
[attachimg=1]
[attachimg=2]
Title: Re: My German 40% keyboard MB42
Post by: burli on Sun, 10 January 2016, 10:53:06
Colorful. :-)

I decided to build my keyboard with Cherry ML switches. It should be portable and as flat as possible and the key space is 18mm and not 19mm as usual. I think about adding a column to have better support for the german layout. Currently my layout has 46 keys, but stil has a similar widht as the JD40, less height and it is thinner
Title: Re: My German 40% keyboard MB42
Post by: MrMontgomery on Sat, 22 October 2016, 07:52:41
How do you programme this? I built one yesterday and the realised thhat easyavrkeymapper doesn't work for it as the layout isn't included