I started having RSI issues 2 years ago, what a way to welcome me to my 30s. It was excruciatingly painful just getting through a workday even with plenty of breaks. I didn't care for building my own keyboard I literally just wanted something to help me not be in pain no matter how weird it looked.
I've ended up on a Kinesis advantage 360 pro after spending thousands of dollars on keyboards because I needed something that allowed me to type for more than 5 minutes at a time without pain.
The things I think are key for people with persistent issues:
- programmable keys
- tenting
- concavity (rules out most keyboards)
- thumb clusters
- ortholinear
I know some go without the concavity but I just cannot go back. Its so much more comfortable on my hands.
Programmable keys are probably the most important though, primarily so you can pick which stretches and awkward movements to completely remove and no longer have to do.
For example I've entirely removed the need to ever stretch my pinkies and ring fingers on both hands. It destroys my hands having to do so on a normal keyboard and so many normal shortcuts require excessive pinky finger movement.
I honestly think anybody who plans on using a keyboard for the rest of their life should invest in a high quality keyboard even if it's expensive. I would not be able to continue working today without having done so.
Runner up is the glove 80, but the only thing is I don't like how flimsy it feels in my hands compared to how solid the kinesis feels.
As an FYI, I had a similar issue and tried a whole lot of things, including different mechanical keyboards, with which I had a variety of successes and failures.
But ultimately what REALLY helped was going to physiotherapy and identifying muscle groups in my back that were weak, causing me to sit weird and support my arms with muscles in my shoulders that weren't designed for that. And because all of this is connected in weird ways, the pain I was feeling in my wrists originated way back in over-stressing those shoulder muscles.
After a few weeks of an exercise program designed to target those muscles, all my RSI pains aren't just reduced, which was the sum total of the results I got from different mechanical keyboards, they were GONE. Plus, I had the added benefit of naturally sitting and walking "better" and feeling better about it.
So if you've tried different mechanical keyboards with only limited degrees of success (or have a fave keyboard you don't want to have to switch from), consider an exercise program designed to improve your posture! It is literally the single biggest thing I've done in the past year to make me feel significantly better, and not just in the case of the RSI!
I have a similar story. Bought a Kinesis advantage II at the time and it provided at best some solace. Started lifting weights and all pain was completely gone within two weeks.
Not saying it will work for others but it’s at least worth trying.
PS I ended up sticking with the kinesis, now on a 360 pro. Hands down the best keyboard I’ve ever seen or used. I recommend both deadlifts and kinesis :)
Unfortunately I was probably what most people would think is a model person in terms of activity. I used a standing desk or sitting with no backrest to maintain upright posture - I exercised all the time, did yoga with my wife, competed in powerlifting, did plenty of walking/cardio, rucking etc. I played guitar regularly and had since I was like 12 and had bouldering as a hobby so finger strength didn't seem to be an issue.
I did physical therapy for months and the issue basically came down to my nerves being the issue. I was diagnosed with Cubital Tunnel Syndrome in both elbows and also a torn TFCC tear in one hand causing pressure on the ulnar nerve in my wrists when the wrist was flexed even a little or in what was called ulnar deviation (wrist extended outwards/away from your body). I was told the most likely cause was as simple as the way I slept - with my elbows bent and potentially exacerbated due to excessive heavy gripping combined with my bone structure in my elbow simply not being very kind on me.
I've since recovered from the elbow surgeries and they are evaluating wrist surgery as well, I still sometimes have issues with my fingers going numb in the wrong position - but trust me, I went to all kinds of doctors trying to figure this out since practically every hobby I had required using my hands/fingers. Unfortunately it just seems like I was unlucky. But having keyboards that allow my hands to be in more natural positions at the very least has allowed me to continue working.
Hey I have cubital tunnel and also have an ulnar deviation in my left arm. Have you tried ergos with low profile keyboards? ZSA also makes a model called the Voyager, which is the best keyboard that I’ve ever had. Might be worth checking out. Like you with the Kinesis, the Voyager has been able to keep me in the game.
I wonder if anyone who's switched to an ergonomic setup has found that it stops working as well over time. Because I have long suspected that the real problems (in many cases) come down to weak muscles. But these ergonomic setups are likely to weaken them even more over a long enough period of time given that they try to avoid all of the strain.
Programmers are far more likely to have hyper-mobility than the general population, it makes it far more difficult / impossible to maintain good posture. If they don’t strength train they’ll end up rather weak regardless. So my general recommendation is to reduce injuries by being as ergonomic as possible while also hitting the gym. I use a reclining chair because I can’t avoid slouching no matter how ergonomic the chair is and it works for me. I also take Performance Enhancing Drugs (PEDs), hgh peptides and test cypionate. If you’ve seen what happens to people like myself with severe hEDS you’d understand why. Most programmers are not as severe but tend to have some form of ‘benign’ generalized hyper mobility.
I have somewhat similar experience. I had wrist pain for years, using a wrist support and topical pain gel. MRI and other tests were inconclusive, it wasn't any of the typical problems.
A physiotherapist said the problem is not the wrists but that the pain comes from higher up in the arms. I started going to the gym, and like for you, the issues are just gone now. I haven't worn the wrist support since.
A person in good health with good form can type with reasonable (not ideal) comfort on a standard keyboard on any height table (within reason), but:
(0) Try to feel in your body what kind of static load is on your muscles and joints. Ideally you want your body parts to be in neutral relaxed positions. It's not always possible to completely avoid static load, so try to take routine breaks, change positions, etc.
(1) At all costs avoid having nontrivial wrist extension or flexion (wrists bent upward or downward) while doing repetitive finger motions. Your hands need to be coming straight out of your forearms. The tendons that flex and extend the fingers need to pass through the wrists, and a bent wrist leaves them moving in a weak and uncomfortable part of their range of motion. My understanding is that most keyboard-related RSI comes from wrist extension or flexion.
(2) You should try to get your arms to be supported as much as possible passively from the shoulders. When sitting or standing, the upper arms should be hanging loosely at your sides with back reasonably straight and head up. The keyboard needs to be close enough to the torso for this to be possible. If your elbows are not close to your body, but are forward or out to the side, try to change your position. Being in a position where the weight of the arms is supported by the arm muscles causes fatigue and encourages compromising other joint positions in uncomfortable or damaging ways to relieve the strain. While actively typing the hands do not need to be supported by any kind of surface: let the palms "float" above the keyboard. Use the palm rest for resting, not typing.
(3) For a single-piece flat keyboard, I find it is most comfortable for the plane of the keyboard to be parallel to the forearms. The appropriate front/back tilt of the keyboard is therefore dependent on the relative height of the keyboard and the torso: if the table is high relative to the chair, the keyboard needs to be tilted up at the far side; if the keyboard is on your lap, on a low under-desk keyboard tray, or on a belly-height standing desk, then the keyboard needs to be flat or even tilted down at the far side. The major reason that old typewriters had an aggressive tilt to them was because desks are historically the right height for handwriting (i.e. tall).
(4) I find it helps a lot on a one-piece keyboard to keep the wrists with little to no ulnar deviation (turn toward the outside). It also helps to try to pronate them less (i.e. leave them turned so that the pinkies are a bit below the pointer fingers, instead of rotating them all the way flat). Split ergonomic keyboards eliminate the need to make some of these compromises by allowing the hands to be separated and allowing the sides to be "tented" (so the wrists can be less pronated) and positioned/oriented to eliminate ulnar deviation.
(5) Try not to have too sharp an impact on each keystroke. Ideally use only the necessary force for each key press to register, and try to avoid slamming your fingers down hard through the bottom of the keystroke. A keyboard with better switches can help a lot here, with reliable actuation halfway through the keystroke and tactile/auditory feedback at the actuation point. Key switches that don't reliably actuate unless smashed are the worst.
That is exactly my experience, although a bit earlier.
I landed on a Kinesis Advantage 2, at the time as the 360 wasn't even announced yet.
Spent entirely too much money on other ones. There's a reason the Kinesis Advantage line has been around for decades. It really is a just a great ergonomic shape without many compromises. And mine has held up 7 years now with no issues.
Anyone looking for pain relief should really try the Advantage 2 or 360. If the 360 Pro is too expensive don't shy away from considering a used Kinesis Advantage 2. Don't get an Advantage 1 as they have compatibility issues with newer machines.
There are some great 3D printing services out there for those who don’t have access to a 3D printer locally. You can upload the CAD file and get an instant quote.
Also agree with the sibling commenters. In order, get:
- Help from an expert/exercise/do very regular breaks.
- A properly adjustable chair.
- A height-adjustable desk (get an electronic one, it's the only one you will ever tune properly, other desks are too much effort).
- Only then an ergo keyboard.
An ergo keyboard is worthless if you do not get the basics right (diagnose the issues, letting the blood flow, having a good posture). I am in some ergo keyboard Discords and it happens far too often that people by an ergo keyboard, but do not even have a setup where they can have a good posture.
I used kinesis advantage for 15 years, switched to a glove80 for the past 2, but recently went back to kinesis with an advantage2. The glove80 is very nice, but my hands are big enough that the kinesis thumb cluster works better for me and the cherry mx brown switches are much more satisfying than the low profile chocs.
So ymmv, but for those with larger hands, it may make sense to try a kinesis.
I fairly recently got a Glove 80, still not entirely used to the thing but I can certainly tell my wrists are a lot happier. Was also looking at the Advantage 360, but with shipping it's nearly twice as expensive where I live so it was hard to motivate.
Before that I was using a Keychron Q11, which is a split keyboard with a regular staggered layout. That helped my shoulders feel better, I have a pretty broad frame and regular keyboards put me in a kinda t-rex position, but my left wrist in particular was killing me since I couldn't type a fair few keys on the left side, c, x, z, and q, without constantly adjusting my hand position.
Must say that the Glove 80 is growing on me as one heck of a comfortable experience. No idea how durable it is, it's certainly a light keyboard, though at the same time I'm not sure how well that actually conveys build quality. Like would the solder joints really have been more resistant to drops and impacts if it had a steel plate in the bottom like the Kinesis does?
I got RSI using a touchpad, which then transferred to using a normal mouse. I couldn’t do anything with a mouse for longer than a few minutes. I completely fixed it with a DXT Mouse 2 (and later 3).
My normal (mechanical) keyboard doesn’t give me any issues, as long as it’s narrow enough (75% layout or less) that I can keep my mouse close enough to the center of my body that I don’t have to rotate my shoulder outwards too much.
My natural resting position on my keyboard is with both arms coming in diagonally without bending at the wrists. I do a lot of work on the terminal, including programming, so I’m using it quite intensively and I never feel any strain.
I tried to get used to a split orthogonal keyboard, but I couldn’t use it for extended periods without getting RSI like symptoms. Would I have persisted, I might have gotten used to it. Or maybe it just wasn’t the right one for me.
Anyway, this is not to counter any of the things you said, because I basically followed the same path with my mouse, but it shows how different postures and usage patterns can lead to different outcomes. I’m still interested in ergonomic keyboards, though, and I might try one again in the future.
I am curious how/if you were formally taught how to type, and whether you hit the keys with sharp and abrupt movements. Of those whom I've seen develop RSI, a common trend I've noticed is they type very "discretely", with a very noticeable pause between each keypress, and use a lot more force than necessary. They were also taught that that was the "correct" way to type, adhere strictly to a sub-optimal fingering pattern, and type relatively slowly too. RSI seems to be caused by the sort of excessively rigid and intense finger movements that I've seen from these formally-taught typists.
The more generic trend could be people who perfectly hit the same keys the same way again and again.
I've seen it with people religiously sticking to an optimal typing method which limits their hand movement to an extreme. They were crazy fast but RSI was a common subject of discussion, regardless of posture or hardware quality.
We had the same issue with gaming controllers, some with guitar learning etc. There's a limit on how much we're able to repeat the same movement again and again, it depended on what movement and who did it, but the only ones who didn't get any RSI simply avoided extreme repetitions.
And buffs. Sometimes building more and more muscles solve the issues entirely, if that's what you're into.
Agreed. I had wrist pain when I played a lot of WoW - rogue, especially outlaw, is not kind to the hands.
I solved it in a couple of ways:
1. Quit wow
2. Rock climbing. Get stronger, especially forearm and finger strength. I can't emphasize enough how much this helps over even carpal tunnel braces or whatever. The biggest single thing that stopped wrist pain.
Not op, but had a very similar story. Got crippling RSI to welcome me into my 30s. Couldn’t work for several months and ended up getting a Glove80 because I needed to make a living.
This definitely does not describe me. I typed around 100wpm, sometimes quite loud, often times quite a button mash, and frequently not lifting my fingers quickly after each press. Didn’t have any notion of “correct” typing
I was not taught to formally type and learned pretty much exclusively from playing PC games. Primarily wold of Warcraft.
I did not "touch type" in the traditional sense of correct form and using the home row, but I didn't need to look at the keyboard. I typed around 120wpm like this though at the time. I have not and probably never will get back to this speed typing on the Kinesis. I'm closer to just 90-100wpm with stricter typing technique. But usually try not to type as fast as I can anymore anyway. I still to this day type faster with my crap form on a laptop keyboard if I swap to it for a bit even though I rarely do anymore.
My typing form was honestly atrocious. If I were to describe it I covered over wasd with my left hand as if I was gaming, and pinky was only ever really used for modifier keys and shifting. I only used left shift, never right. My right hand I used index finger for spacebar and moved my entire hand to the spacebar between every word. I didn't even realize I did this until I sat and analyzed my typing form maybe a year ago to compare to correct touch typing.
It actually took me quite a while to learn to type on a split keyboard since I basically had to learn to type correctly from scratch.
Having been extensively on computers for the past 25 years and I have never experienced the whole keyboard-/mouse-pain thing even in the slightest on myself. I know many collegues who did tho.
I wonder whether this has to do with me being a bass and guitar player. Playing an instrument where you essentially press down thick steel wires with your finger tips with full force, while your fingers are in odd angled ("unhealthy") positions for hours certainly does something to your motoric system.
I know anecdotal evidence with n=1 is useless, but the idea that motion is important to reduce body pains isn't exactly new or unresearched. A whole family of ergonomic chairs have evolved about that very idea. I know multiple people whose only solution to excruciating back pain was simply to exercise and build muscles in the back, and they tried every ergonomic chair in the book. The only thing that really helped was excercise.
Since I don't have RSI take all that with a grain of salt, but maybe trying with those guitar-finger-strength-trainers for a month isn't that big of an investment?
Sadly I actually stopped playing guitar because of my issues after having played for almost 20 years.
I'd played guitar since I was 12 years old and probably averaged at least an hour a day basically the entire time even into adulthood. Played obviously a hell of a lot more when I was a teenager though.i also was competing in powerlifting and used my grip and fingers for all sorts of stuff.
I had surgery on both elbows and am told I may need to on my hands/wrists since the issue is a combination of nerve issues and wrist issues.
For some users they’re fine, but terrible for hypervisors, remote desktops or systems you don’t own (it’s far easier to sneak a keyboard into some places than a software solution). A hardware solution was far better for my usecase, obviously ymmv,though.
I have a Kinesis advantage pro. I bought it 11 years ago (in 2 months). When you look at it over the time it’ll last.. it gets easier to swallow. It also solved a lot of issues for me.
In that time, I’ve had 3 desks, 5 computer chairs, and 7 computers.
The way I thought about it was that I would gladly pay $500 to have a reduction in RSI symptoms, let alone prevent them beforehand. Not to mention the potential loss of enjoyment & employment from pain during computer use.
And as such, I'm an extremely satisfied Advantage 360 Pro user. The Adv 360 + a mouse side-grade massively reduced pains in my hands/wrists to the point where I don't notice any issues 99% of the time, even with heavy (7+ hour) computer use and quite a lot of FPS gaming.
Though note that there are several keyboards with split layouts + tenting (the two most important aspects for relief) that cost a fraction of the Adv 360; $200-300 of the price tag is for features, build quality, it being pre-built, and ease of programmability.
Totally agree that it is worth the investment and who knows, maybe I will even get one one day. But I’m definitely getting some sticker shock regardless haha
I've definitely spent way more than $500 over the several models of keyboards, albeit the ASP was more like $200 or so.
My view on it is, a good keyboard will get several years of use out of it, the average yearly price isn't really that much. Second, it's something I'm touching several hours most days of my life. I'm using a keyboard more than I wear shoes personally (I do prefer the barefoot life, so I'm a bit odd there). I'm touching it more than my couch or my dining chairs or other things in my home. Isn't it worthwhile that it's comfortable and exactly what I want from it?
I agree with your list except for ortholinear. I firmly believe that row stagger (that you find on regular keyboards) are bad but you should have column stagger (to match the different lengths of your fingers).
Anyone else suffering with this, I would highly recommend an app that forces you to stop typing for a few seconds every other couple of minutes, like AntiRSI. Hugely annoying but helped me where many keyboards did not
> proponents of mechanical keyboards say you need fewer keys than a regular keyboard, for _reasons_
That's a bit of a generalization. Mechanical keyboards like the Hyper7 exist that have enough for even the most key-hungry typist. If you want an ergonomic mechanical keyboard with many keys there are also some of those out there, like the Kinesis line or the Glove80. That said, one thing people mean by ‘ergonomic’ is ‘less stretching’, and by geometry more keys = more stretching, which is why there's significant overlap between the ergonomic keyboard crowd and the few-keys crowd. When I first got an Ergodox I too thought I would struggle with few keys, but over time I found I prefer to have the keys in a comfortable position with a layer modifier than to have them off in Narnia where I have to shift my whole wrist to reach them.
(Because subcultures are subdivided recursively, the _gaming_ mechanical keyboard subcrowd also often like small keyboards, for reasons I don't really know but are presumably quite different from the reasons the ergonomic mechanical keyboard subcrowd have.)
My parents sent me to years of piano lessons before I ever touched a computer keyboard, and my typing reflects it. I don't move my wrist. I move my entire hand. This drove my high school typing teacher nuts, but I was the fastest in class by a wide margin so he didn't push back too hard.
I've tried traditional home-row typing but I just can't do it. And after all these years, my wrists still don't hurt at all. I can't prove that there's a connection, but I strongly suspect it.
I think it's how it should be done. You just executed the task intuitively, without any preconceived instruction as to the "best" way to do things.
Most of the time, those selling the best way to do stuff have a rigid way of thinking/operating and seem to have rules for everything in life and they think it applies to everyone the same, even though we are clearly all different.
Very often it's actually counterproductive and doesn't get you much better performance, touch typing is one of those things.
It's a rigid theory made to form human robots that would spend all day typing stuff from other peoples (basically secretaries, re-copying stuff or typing dictated material). It focuses on typing speed at the expense of everything else.
And is completely pointless because the speed difference between a touch typist and a self taught typist is completely negligible for 99% of tasks.
Pianists are very (like 60%) susceptible to RSI, especially if they have small hands [1] (= lots of stretching motions). I think it's a tradeoff — moving your forearm around spares your wrists, but puts more strain on your elbows. I wouldn't be surprised if it's better overall, though, just because it involves a wider variety of movements.
Anecdotally, I have large hands (or at least long fingers) and early piano lessons, and as a self-taught chaos typist on QWERTY I struggled with RSI at a relatively young age until I switched to more traditional touch-typing on Dvorak.
I have small hands. I found myself sitting next to a chaplain once, and he started conversation with "your hands are small. You'd never be able to play piano." I was playing Beethoven in recitals at 8, TYVM! I ended that chat pretty quickly.
I'm a mech keyboard enthusiast and an ansi 104 full size ride-or-die
> (Because subcultures are subdivided recursively, the _gaming_ mechanical keyboard subcrowd also often like small keyboards, for reasons I don't really know but are presumably quite different from the reasons the ergonomic mechanical keyboard subcrowd have.)
The explanation I've always heard for TKL for gamers is that removing the numpad leaves more room for the vigorous, professional mousing they have to do (I'm skeptical)
You're skeptical that some people need to use the mouse a lot? Or you're skeptical that bringing the mouse closer to the mouse hand's typing position / closer to the body improves comfort?
I found that when, e.g., using Photoshop, a keyboard without a number pad was a nontrivial improvement.
Many popular games are physically and mentally demanding. You do need "vigorous, professional mousing" for any kind of shooter or RTS, on top of actual thinking and reacting.
Playing in teams requires you to type to coordinate with teammates. The language floats from cryptic to hectic: all sorts of acronyms, jargon, combining text with "body language", etc. Regardless, typing with both hands is still faster.
I just like how everything aligns on my desk better (in terms of comfort) with a TKL board. And I was never a numpad user anyway. Maybe if I was typing numbers into spreadsheets all day I would have a different opinion on the necessity of the numpad
That makes sense! I'm a split keyboard user and for mouse-and-keyboard style games I used to move the right half of my keyboard out of the way of the mouse.
> proponents of mechanical keyboards say you need fewer keys than a regular keyboard, for _reasons_
Well "reasons" is quite obviously travel distance and thus time. If your fingers are always on, or nearby, the resting position (home row) then you go faster and don't stretch in repeated weird (ergonomically speaking) ways.
This though comes at a BIG cost, namely layers and other tricks to make "far" thing stay "close", which is cognitive. You have to remember where things are and how to activate them. Until it comes second nature because you drilled for so long then it might not be worth it for most.
I like smaller keyboards (80% or less) in both gaming and professional work because it lets me keep my hands and shoulders in a more natural position when I’m using the mouse.
A person with broader shoulders would probably have a different experience, but a full keyboard makes me feel like my mouse is either too close to the keyboard or too far to rest my shoulder.
There are plenty of folks in the community who land somewhere in the middle, too. 60%/65% are all pretty popular and don't go off the deep end in cutting down keys. I'm personally partial to the HHKB layout, which is like 60% with inspiration from boards associated with the original Mac and with old UNIX boxes.
I got a 75% Keychron a few years ago. Really like it, but I've been considering finding a more portable 65%. The Keychron is great but it's pretty heavy so it's annoying to carry around. Any suggestions?
Can’t recommend anything personally since my boards are mostly group but one-offs (other than the HHKBs), but I think Keychron has low profile mechanical 65% boards if that’s of interest.
It's changed since now Ive got the ZSA Voyager and put my trackball mouse in the center, over all, it is still a small set up. But prior to, I did 60/65% keyboards. A lot of it for me was just a spacing issue. Full size keyboards are nice, but take up a lot of room with a mouse and then wanting to also use a notebook at my desk for notes and designing.
Long time MS Natural Ergonomic 4000 user. My search continues for an 80% split keyboard, where the important programming keys haven't been repositioned or worse, moved to a secondary layer (like braces/parenthesis, pipe/backslash, question mark/slash).
I do like the idea of thumb keys, but would probably need them as duplicates to the more traditional positions. I got a Keyboardio 100 which is absolutely beautiful, but 60% with layers for those above important keys just was too freaking hard.
You're right regarding 65%. The extra 15% is the arrow keys, Page up/down, home, end and delete keys. Found I often hit these one handed while the other hand is on the mouse, so a secondary layer that would require two hands to activate would be problematic.
There's neuroplasticity and there's picking your battles. :-)
I had some RSI at the start of corona from too much home office + gaming, what actually helped was getting a trackball (Kensington Slimblade Pro) for $work tasks.
Tried a Moonlander and hated it. My hands don't work with ortholinear. And I hated having to learn layers and layouts.
Besides I have a real job and I use a proper IDE so I need my F keys, I like to use the Home/End/Page Up+Down keys, I learned to use the numpad efficiently, etc.
I think most of what is told and sold in ergonomics is snake oil. I don't believe ortholinear is any good for it, and minimizing movement also seems really questionable to me.
I'm working with comfortable 30-40 wpm and am still one of the most prolific and productive engineers at $work, typing speed is not important for many jobs.
I would like to continue be able to use regular keyboards efficiently and with little annoyance. Too often I'm traveling and stuck with the laptop keyboard.
I have to accommodate Linux ($work), Windows (gaming), Mac (personal projects, open uni). That's already challenging enough to get these have similar shortcuts. I use a keychron K5 pro that supports all OSs. I can work efficiently in all situations, with all OSs, with just a single screen.
Having a more specialized keyboard (or otherwise setup, like relying too heavily on multi-monitors), wouid overall surely be detrimental, during the times I could not use it.
What I've learned to avoid pain:
Wrists should be straight. For me, a slim keyboard helps to achieve that, flat on the table.
Hands should have some room apart, open chest. Small keyboards are bad for that, you'll want a 100% one, or a split.
Do some lifting, have some muscles. Try a trackball, you might love it. Switch how you are sitting. The best sitting position is the next one. Get up to think, go for breaks. Don't overly specialize into some local/global optimum that is a moving target over your lifetime. Use defaults. Mostly boring setup with some minor personal tweaks can go a long way.
Context: I've been daily driving an Ergodox since 2019.
> And I hated having to learn layers and layouts. Besides I have a real job and I use a proper IDE so I need my F keys, I like to use the Home/End/Page Up+Down keys, I learned to use the numpad efficiently, etc.
Personally, I find that a layer key is little different from a standard modifier key such as Cmd, Alt, etc. Yep, it's one more thing to learn, but IMHO it's worth learning: on macOS, you can use Cmd+arrow to move around text pretty much the same way H/E/Pu/Pd works, but with Mod+arrow, you can just transfer this muscle memory to other systems.
I agree with the lack of F-keys, this is a stupid trend that caught early on, and now no designer seems to be willing to challenge it. I have a different reason though (I prefer Cmd+R or similar to Recompile/Run/etc), and it's games. This is my StarCraft 2 layout: <https://www.keyboard-layout-editor.com/#/gists/8b8dcd36c0abc...>
SC2 is insanely demanding on your raw mechanics, and adding a layer is unquestionably a Bad Idea. For many commands (production, upgrades, some spells), modal input is hardcoded into the engine.
The layout I built is much more optimized than standard hotkeys, but the lack of F-keys is brutal and hindering (esp. for Zerg). Regardless, I've improved A LOT with this layout - which makes me think, how you make it work for you is more important than the shape of it.
> I'm working with comfortable 30-40 wpm and am still one of the most prolific and productive engineers at $work, typing speed is not important for many jobs.
The design goal was never to increase speed (that's mostly mechanics), but to allow a more comfortable posture.
> I would like to continue be able to use regular keyboards efficiently and with little annoyance. Too often I'm traveling and stuck with the laptop keyboard.
Again subjective, but I have zero problems switching between ortholinear and staggered.
> Use defaults.
Disagree (: most defaults suck. Best case, they're opinionated but thoughtful. A consensus is a compromise - always questionable. Worst: "we're now just stuck with it". These all suck, because they're someone else's opinion. And it's in your right to disagree.
I too have a moonlander but imo the biggest gain from most mechs isnt how they can tent but being ortholinear in nature reducing some of the more awkward directional movements of a staggered keyboard. Honestly my biggest gripe with the moonlander is its too many keys, a 40% is more than enough, less can be more in many ways.
My datahand is probably my favorite keyboard though for reducing movement while avoiding too much repetition. If it ever bites the dust beyond repair I'd absolutely move to a diy svalboard build or whatever similar alternative is it's contemporary.
Don't have a moonlander but I actually did this with my advantage 360 pro. I did not remove the switches but I made them no-ops. The whole left-most and right-most columns of the keyboard are completely unused for me.
If you travel with the keyboard a lot maybe its an issue since its extra weight/space, but if not I don't see it really hurting much.
OPs experience working their way up the keyboard stack is very similar to my own. I settled on the Dygma Raise. I now own one of the Raise and Raise 2.
Yes, they are a lot of money. I don’t have time to game any more, and they clearly focus mainly on gamers. But if you’re a software / IT person your wrists are your livelihood, so for goodness sakes invest in them. There is no silver bullet and you will probably have to try a number of possible solutions if you suffer from wrist and forearm pain when working, but do not ignore it and take your workplace ergonomics seriously.
For younger engineers, learn to minimise your “travel” and learning editor shortcuts, terminal shortcuts and similar so that you can be smoothly productive with constantly shifting from mouse to keyboard and back again. And take regular breaks! Get up and walk around. If you are WFH get out for walk at lunch.
In general, care for your body so that you may write code into your 80s.
All I want is a quality split mechanical keyboard with Function keys. I use an IDE all day, I don't want to pull quadruple buckies every time I debug.
The Matias Ergo Pro is almost perfect, but I had two of them and they both failed within one year. I had one of each switch type (low force and regular) - both were missing some button presses and repeating other button presses.
You got a lot of exotic suggestions, I'll give one closer to normal: Perixx Periboard 535. Split (though non-adjustable), low profile mechanical switches with three options, three tilting levels, wired or wireless, with or without numpad. And has function keys. Also quite cheap.
I got the wired option with tactile brown switches and numpad, and I've been happy with this. I was looking for a replacement for MS Sculpt and didn't want one of the wild models, this finally ticked all the boxes.
Seconded. They're pretty good and I've found them a decent replacement for the MS Ergonomic 4000 keyboards that I used to use. Full size keyboard with keys in the normal places, reverse tilt, manageable F lock, and a cable to connect it to your computer.
I've got one with clicky blue switches, which is fun to type on but a bit loud, and one with silent red switches, which is pleasant to use but the key activation is perhaps a bit too light. I sometimes find myself pressing the keys when I thought I was just hovering my fingers.
The folding stands are a weak point. The MS 4000/Sculpt sort of design, whereby the riser is a solid piece of plastic that the keyboard rests on, is much better.
I like the stands. I need two different levels of tilt, full negative for the sitting position and the mid level for standing. It's really easy to switch between the levels so it fits well my use case.
I got one on Amazon for a little over retail and it’s a solid keyboard. I had a knockoff 65 before and you can definitely tell the difference in quality. I believe Microcenter has them in stock if you’re in the Bay.
I couldn't quite go for the 60%, but I have friends with the UHK60 and I really liked it as a keyboard.
I popped for the 80 as soon as the shipping times caught up to real time. It's a fantastic keyboard. I haven't gotten any of the clusters for it yet, but I'm very happy with my purchase.
I agree, they’re darn near perfect, but they always end up with repeated characters or “key chatter”. It’s such a shame, I’ve basically resigned myself to buying a new one ever year or two, but I hate the waste.
Kinesis Freestyle Pro? I've got the non mechanical version (mechanical wasn't available when I purchased) and it's held up for many years. It's a great keyboard IMO.
The Freestyle Pro is almost a good keyboard. The Esc and function keys are all offset to the left by one key compared to a standard layout, which drove me nuts. I have a Freestyle Edge RGB now, which I like much better. (Though I replaced the wrist rests with some from Goldtouch.)
Depending upon the cost and how much they mean to you there are a couple of options.
One is to replace the switches. If they're hot swappable then it's easy. If they're not, it's hard -- but easy if you're willing to spend money on a desoldering iron. Depending upon your feelings here, I would consider it maintenance to keep it going if you love it -- particularly if you use it to prevent RSI.
A quick look shows matias does sell replacement switches -- which is usually the thing to go. Springs, crud, etc end up in the switches. Sometimes you can tear them apart to fix them, sometimes it's easier to toss them and replace them.
The typical desoldering tool for keyboards is something like this:
I meant that I am looking for a keyboard, not for a keyboard hobby.
Hahaha who am I kidding? Of course I have a keyboard hobby! I have a practical museum of various split and mechanical keyboards. But I don't want to be soldering them any more.
There's a certain trend to repairing existing electronics and keeping electronics waste out of landfills, right to repair and what not -- and that's the spirit I was talking about.
Even hot swap switches prevent more landfill waste as it makes it easy for people to replace bad switches. And if you want a reliable keyboard in the future, that's what you'll need, other wise it will just be more e-waste.
Owning 20 cars and maintaining them is a hobby. Owning 1 car and maintaining it is not -- it's life.
As much as i like the idea of these split keyboards that are more ergonomic, I can’t get over the idea of missing keys and having to use chords or new combinations of hotkeys. I use nearly every key of my 104 key keyboard. Literally pause/break and scroll lock are the only ones I don’t use; and I’ve remapped those to be volume controls. If anything, i’d like even more keys for macros and dedicated shortcuts.
But so many keyboards cut that number down so drastically. I use home, end, delete, page up/down, all the time not to mention the number pad as a whole, and all the Fkeys.
One of the nice things about QMK is the ability to get secondary functions on double / triple tap and press and hold combinations. I also couldn't get comfortable with big chording combos, so for example a lot of the keys in my thumb cluster do double duty.
1) My space key is right CTRL when held down.
2) I have two keys for "<RET>", one on each thumb cluster, one is Alt when held down, the other is left CTRL.
3) Page up and down have their own keys on one of those clusters because I no longer needed them for the modifiers, and so page up and down are also home and end if they're held down.
4) Auto shift is on, and I've tuned to to eliminate most of the accidental shifts while keeping it relatively quick to type CONSTANT_VALUES (I actually still have shift keys in the usual positions but on the ergodox I have it feels like a big stretch to hit them and type so I use the auto-shift most of the time, but I do admit this is the convenience function I have the most love/hate relationship with)
5) The shift keys themselves give me open parentheses (left shift) and close parentheses (right shift) when double tapped.
The only chording I have to do these days (that isn't normal keyboard shortcuts) is I have a dedicated key to switch to a layer for FN keys when held down. And the reality is I could (and should) probably map the number keys to be FN keys when double tapped since I don't think I ever hold an FN key down.
This[1] isn't my most current layout (missing the home/end on the pageup/down buttons) but it's pretty much what I've landed on after about a year of using one of these. And realistically there are unused keys there I could remap still. The CTRL where the capslock key would be is never used in favor of the thumb cluster versions, the left and right CTRL keys on the tops of the two thumb clusters are leftovers from older layouts and unused right now. I've never used the "Meh" key or the "'" and "Capslock" keys in the lower left. The "Command-enter" and "[" and "]" keys in the lower right are another leftover from an older layout that are also unused now. So lots of room to play around still.
Not saying you should definitely switch, there are still some things that I'm not 100% happy with (those inner symbol keys are a stretch sometimes and depending on what code I'm writing feel like I could move them around) and getting used to the ortholinear layout is a whole thing on its own. But if it's something that interests you, maybe that layout can help you find a good starting point.
So a) that seems like a nightmare to me no matter what keyboard I'm on, but b) if you have frequently-used shortcuts that are a pita to get to, you can put them on a layer where you just use them.
Like, I legitimately don't know anymore how you take a screenshot on MacOS, but I know that I hit the modifier key and then this one other key, and that takes a screenshot. Also don't know what you press to move from virtual screen to virtual screen, but mod-m and mod-comma go left and right for me. And in a browser, mod-s and mod-f do ctrl-shift-tab and ctrl-tab.
It's a terrible idea to do this for rarely-used shortcuts, as you'll never remember them; but for ones you use frequently, it's better-than-native, because you can put them on convenient keys that are easy to hit, rather than whatever contortions you'd need to do to hit Ctrl-Shift-F12.
I have a Moonlander and I genuinely don’t understand why so many split keyboards do this.
“Here’s a really nice split keyboard. But we’ve removed everything except the alphanumerics”
Whhhyyyy.
“Oh but it’s programmable. And you can have layers. And you can have macros”
Cool. I actually didn’t want any of that. I just wanted a single row of function keys. My Moonlander can somehow make space for a “meh” key, a “caps word” key, 3 keys in 2 variations for “change layer” but a play/pause/ volume keys are simply out of the question.
I completely agree. Moonlander would be perfect with a F key row and dedicated modifier keys. The purists will sneer, but they could always take off the keycaps and switches if they want to show off how minimal they are.
I don't spend all my time in vim, my job is mostly emails and docs now. Muscle memory decays for all the fancy chords/layers/macros/etc and I don't have infinite time to spend tweaking keyboard layouts.
I added a numeric layer where my left thumb activates the layer key and the numbers are arranged like a numpad on my right half. The dedicated number keys at the top row are now f keys. Highly recommend
That's an interesting idea. But it makes other key combinations quadruple buckies. For instance, in JetBrains IDEs Ctrl-Shift-4 sets bookmark number 4.
You don't need infinite time, you just need to do it until you get all your personal needs covered.
Personally I have an advantage 360 pro. The only function keys I actually use with frequency are F12 and F2, used for shortcuts in editors. I just put F12 and F2 on thumb keys. Problem solved.
Some people go all in on layers, but I actually use minimal layers at all. I can do everything I need with just the base layer from how I have it setup. I only have a second layer setup that allows using VIM-like navigation (i.e. up, down, left, right, page-down, page-up etc) from the home row in my browser. But technically I also have those on the base layer just in the normal positions.
I actually had a similar mindset, I do not want to have to create tons of layers and combinations, so I optimized my layout around just the base layout but added a layer just for convenience later on.
These kinds of keyboards are programmable, function keys can be added to a custom layer, just as any other keys. The entire point is to make it so you don't constantly have to be reaching for keys, to bring them closer to your fingers (which can stay relatively still).
More than just one function layer at that. When customized sufficiently you can do far more, with less movement of the hands. Different actions on hold, tap dance as well as macros all really help minimize strain.
With QMK you can essentially program your keyboard to behave exactly how you want it to. This can be as simple as creating layers or getting into combos and tap dances and more advanced features. It is actually pretty fun when you get the hang of it.
It makes perfect sense to customize the primary interface to computers.
I used to customise my car, my keyboard, even my fountain pens. Now, I just want to use them. I bought a car that's quick enough to pass lumbering trucks on tight roads (Tesla Model 3), I bought a pen that fits my hand and writes comfortably (Jinhao A10 EF), and I'd love a keyboard like the Matias Ergo Pro that I don't need to replace every year.
Not sure where you're getting the idea that you need to replace the keyboard every year. And you only really have to customize the keyboard for a short while until it covers your personal needs.
It took me maybe 1 week total after getting used to the keyboard to set it up in a way that worked for me personally, and the keyboard has already lasted a year and still works like new, and looks like new, and many people have had the same ergo-keyboard for years on end.
I like you did not like the idea of having to finnick with it all the time, but in reality those are just the enthusiasts. I set it up in a couple weeks and ever since then I've probably only messed with it a few times more just to try something out of curiosity.
Some of us don't program that much anymore but because we're older, the ergonomic aspects of something like Moonlander are important. Ortholinear and split keyboard for me. But I still want to be able to hop into a terminal or IDE once in a while, without having to spend a bunch of time customizing keyboard shortcuts/layouts. So it's painful to be missing all those keys.
I love my moonlander so much, I bought a second one for work. Both were secondhand, so the sticker shock wasn't quite so bad. Though, I did end up spending some of that savings on custom, coiled cables. A coworker, after seeing my setup, also ended buying two.
I agree with the author. It's a tool, and if your job requires a lot of computer use, it is worth it to invest in a tool that can not only help prevent RSI, but also make you much more productive.
I switched to a Colemak-dh layout at the same time, and it was a huge adjustment. I'm not sure it was really worth it yet. It is hard to catch up to 30+ years of QWERTY muscle memory, though. Key layout aside, the ortholinear arrangement has absolutely been worth it. It feels much more comfortable, especially with the tenting set up.
ZSA's layout editor and customer support also deserve a shoutout. Can't recommend it enough.
I don’t have a moonlander but I did get one of their ergodox keyboards after noticing an increase in pain myself. I tried using it in querty and my experience was unless you type with proper hand position and finger movements (and possibly not even then) querty on an orthinear was even more painful than on a regular keyboard. I tried colemak for a while but something about the layout didn’t feel comfortable still. I landed on using “middlemak” [1] which at least for me has been much more comfortable. It preserves a decent bit of qwerty placement to help with muscle memory, but I’ve also found that only using it on the ergodox keyboard and keeping qwerty on all of my “normal” keyboards has also helped the muscle memory a lot.
QWERTY with "proper" hand placement isn't too bad, but I've been typing like this since I was 4 years old and have never tried another layout, so I might just be missing out. Still, it took me more than a year to really get used to the Ergodox... I shudder to think how long a new layout would take to get used to!
I like my moonlander. Feels great and now that I'm used to ortholinear, I can't go back. The ZSA layout editor is awesome. I just wish it had more keys so that I could have an F row and dedicated keys for modifiers. Yes I can use the various features to get them and yes I know it'll be allegedly faster once I train myself. But I'm a busy middle aged man now. I float back and forth between Windows (home), Mac (work), and Linux (Steam deck) and having to keep all the keyboard shortcuts straight on top of having blank keycaps for modifiers makes my head hurt.
I briefly looked for labeled keycaps that let the light shine through but couldn't find any.
Where did you get your coiled cables? I bought one from Aliexpress. It took a month to arrive and then didn't work.
I use long press on the number keys for function keys (F11 and F12 on the inner columns) and I'm pretty happy with that setup.
I got my cables on etsy. There are tons of US-based makers who have large selections of colors, connectors, etc. I got my connectors cerakoted and they're really nice. It's pricey though.
> here are my thoughts on ... you should literally buy any mechanical keyboard ... with programmable firmware
Funnily enough, the Moonlander was not this for me. It's programmable, but the round-trip time for programming meant that I didn't modify it often, and only modified it in significant ways, which meant I'd then forget key combinations immediately. This was particularly prevalent for anything where you have to tune responsiveness/movement/timing.
I switched from a Moonlander to a UHK, and the programming time is ~instant. You click flash and in 1-2 seconds it's done. For the Moonlander you have to download the firmware, find the file, drag and drop onto the flashing tool, and wait 10+ seconds. It's amazing how much of a difference that made for me.
So yes, get a keyboard with programmable keys, but not all are created equal, find one that lets you have a very tight feedback loop and you'll be so much happier.
> I switched from a Moonlander to a UHK, and the programming time is ~instant. You click flash and in 1-2 seconds it's done. For the Moonlander you have to download the firmware, find the file, drag and drop onto the flashing tool, and wait 10+ seconds. It's amazing how much of a difference that made for me.
Actually I point out you can use webusb to flash it (if you use Chrome) further down ...
That must be a new feature? This didn't exist when I got my UHK, and was why I ended up selling my Moonlander.
How long does the flash take? Having it in Chrome is a great step forward, but if it still takes 10-20s to flash that would still prevent the sort of feedback loop that I found so transformational.
Seconds. I mean, something on the order of that, anyway. Fast enough to iterate but I mean it's still the weakest link in the iteration chain of course.
Not sure if the author is reading these comments but if you like the Moonlander but don’t like how the thumb cluster is tied to the tenting angle, I strongly recommend their ZSA tenting solution. It makes the whole thing a lot sturdier but more importantly it lets you adjust the tenting angle independently from the thumb cluster angle. You can also probably find used ones online.
I know you mention it already in the article but it is really worth trying out. You even get more tenting angles that would previously be impossible without it. And it just makes the whole thing a lot sturdier.
For anyone curious about this, the tenting solution is available here[0].
I wrote about it in my review of the Moonlander[1]. In short, in addition to much more stable angle adjustment, you get an additional 46 degrees of adjustment (11 degrees with the tent legs vs 57 degrees with the platform kit.)
It does tend to slide around a bit on a smooth desk, but I solved that with some rubber matting glued to the bottom.
Good to know, thanks! Now that I 3d print (apropos hobbies with infinite depth...) I would probably just CAD design and print my own instead, but I've come to accept the limitations, such as it is, of the moonlander's tenting design.
I bought a moonlander in 2020 after work gave us a work from home credit when we transitioned to remote for Covid. I tried it but couldn’t get into it and it sat collecting dust for years.
In 2024 I dove back into splits with a kinesis freestyle 2. I loved it as it felt more natural as it’s a basic keyboard just split.
After I got used to that I was able to migrate to the moonlander pretty easily. I just had to spend the time to sent it up properly for programming.
Now I own 2, each with the platform addon, which solves many of the issues with tenting as you no longer have to pivot the thumb cluster. It is expensive though.
Both keyboards also have shrimp switches to make typing pretty quiet.
This combined with a ball mouse have solved my RSI that developed a few years ago entirely.
I like my Moonlander, but if you want to see a real scam of a keyboard try buying (please don't) one of "WORK LOUDER"'s keyboards like the Nomad E. $350-500, gimmicks you'll never use, non-open-source firmware, cheap build quality, no refunds.
After getting shoulder bursitis two years ago--although the direct cause was sports, not desk habits--I dove into the world of split ergo keyboards. I did get one (a Kyria v3) and learned to type on it at an acceptable speed--although still significantly slower than my speed on a regular keyboard.
Wanting to optimize my layout, I did research into my typing behavior and logged my keystrokes (and storing these logs as securely as I would a password). Analysis did give me notable insights (e.g. by far my most used keys are arrow keys, for selecting text), but my main conclusion was that even during a regular full day of programming preferring my keyboard over my mouse (tiling window manager, hotkeys, browser extension to virtually click on elements using keys), I don't actually type that much, and if I do, it is in bursts, never more than 20 seconds or so.
Although I find typing on a split fun and comfortable, I went back to a regular keyboard because the hit in productivity is not worth it for me. The experiment did teach me how to improve my ergonomics. I optimized my desk height and bought a very flat and less wide keyboard, with the completely unused numpad section chopped off ("TKL") so if I do grab my mouse there is less travel.
I have had bad cubital tunnel in the past, enough so that I was learning to become ambidextrous to stop using my left hand. A surgery helped tremendously in my case, but I’m still prone to flare ups if I overuse my pinky.
An Ergodox EZ has been a lifesaver, I’ve reprogrammed it so I don’t need to use my left pinky anything other than letter keys (goodbye left shift, you’ve pained me for too long). I fully agree with the articles advice; pair a good programmable keyboard with physical activity to keep the hands working long term.
Be warned though: the more customized your keyboard the harder it is type when using a laptop or friends keyboard.
I'm using Ergodox for 9 years and still can touch type fluently on laptop keyboard. However, I never do heavy programming tasks on the laptop, only messaging, notes and small fixes.
I think the more customized your Ergodox layout is the easier it is for the brain to treat 2 different keyboards as 2 different input devices.
I solved my RSI with rest, a vertical mouse, and ZSA Moonlanders. I eventually bought one for home use and one for work use with great performance for the past four years. I can’t imagine going back, especially after replacing the key switches to quieter variants.
The split keyboard opens up the middle of my desk to fit an adjustable stand (Parblo and ElevationLab work well). So I can write and draw by hand if I want.
I love my Ergodox EZ except that I haven't flashed it for years and I'm not totally sure what all the keys did on all the layers. Still worth it, somehow!!
Another vote for the Glove 80: I used the Kinesis Advantage 2 for 10 years (after a few initial signs of finger pain developing), then tried the new 360; and recently got the glove 80 so I could easily travel with it and fell in love with the keyboard.
It definitely doesn't feel as solid as the Kinesis or ergodox (which I used intermittently as well) but is the most comfortable keyboard I've used, the LEDs are actually useful (for showing battery life and bluetooth connections), and there are enough keys (including function keys); I don't like having to reason about layers at all, I want to be able to smoothly transition to my laptop's keyboard in a pinch).
There are still key combos that I could tap out with lightning speed on my old keyboard that I still struggle to type as fast: C-M-- (negative argument) followed by another key, such as C-M-k, is one such example.
I wish I had more keys, yet ironically I have empty keys I do not use at all on the keyboard.
Stick those sequences on those empty keys as macros. Or assign one of those empty keys to control-meta.
Just got the ZSA Voyager a couple months ago and love it. It goes with me to and from work. For me, the biggest draw is just the more natural sitting position, I've found that I love having my trackball mouse in the center between the two halves along with a cup of coffee.
I struggled with the Moonlander although it is a wonderful keyboard.
I mapped it to a Colemak layout varient when I first got it. I was constantly discovering key combos that didn't quite work for whatever reason and made tweaks to the layout or the shortcuts in various editors. Forever tying my brain in knots learning and relearning mappings and combos. Then I'd frequently jump on other peoples computers/laptops to help out with small things and have to switch back to the old mode of thinking.
It ended up being a productivity sink rather than a boon. I don't know whether I would have crossed some inflection point if I had persevered, but there was always this fixed cost of tweaking shortcuts when using new software that was more burdensome than with a plain qwerty keyboard.
Maybe I was too ambitious and should have avoided the Colemak-esque layout, but I haven't managed to summon the stamina to give it a fair go again. I still use one half of it for gaming though. It's really sweet for that.
I found I couldn't get colemak to work for me. Like you said, too many key combos that just felt awkward. I wound up using a layout[1] called "middlemak" that feels much more comfortable to me, and preserves a lot of qwerty hand if not actual key positions, which helped in the initial switch. Took me a few months to get up to a relatively normal typing speed and a year in (of maybe 2-4 days of use a week depending on whether I'm working from the road or not) and I still have to look at my keys about 50% of the time, but it's improving and since I only customized this one keyboard, it doesn't seem to have broken my muscle memory for a standard qwerty keyboard.
I'd say it's definitely the colemak change. They keyboard by itself takes some getting used to, a new layout on top would be overwhelming.
I kept mine pretty close to a standard qwerty - the only customizations are where I put the "\|", backspace, dash and a few other keys, along with what to do with all the thumb keys. Even with these relatively minor changes, it still took me about a week to recover my WPM, and I had to use their touch typing software to practice for an hour or two. Making only a few changes also makes it seamless to switch to laptop keyboards, etc.
This matches my experience exactly. I use a standard QWERTY setup on the moonlander, with only changes being the thumb clusters and changing caps lock to backspace. After a few days of practicing, it feels natural and seamless to switch back and forth.
I got a moonlander for programming. The defaulting tenting is indeed a lame joke, so I got the platform, which is made out of steel(!). It's heavy, but rock solid and stable. I mapped commonly used Fn-key combos on the number rows as long press i.e. cmd-Fn-4 is a long press on 4. The web UI makes this dead simple to setup and customize. That said, I read from the guy who build the Svalboard to put the keyboard on a tray below the desk. I actually did that and, man, that was a revelation. I have one of those motorized desks with adjustable height, and with the tray the Moonlander is now roughly on the same level as the arm rest from the chair. It reduced the tension in my shoulders noticeably. It's a vastly improved typing experience.
Had been looking at these for some time. A few days of pain where I couldn’t type much and the threat tariffs turning on at the end of the month, this was early August, caused me to pull the trigger on a Voyager, ZSA’s low profile keyboard.
Couldn’t be happier. I’ve used QMK, even writing some C for a board, and limited key keyboards before and their software really does make it a lot simpler to configure. It’s also really nice to have leds indexable per key so you can color code things when you’re learning.
They cost a lot more now for those in the US[0] but I’d still recommend them. My pain hasn’t come back and honestly even at +20% that’s worth it.
I bought a ZSA Moonlander a few years ago and it went a bit like this:
1. Unpack and immediately set up a Colemak-DH layout. Customize the layout twice a day for 4 months. This is PAINFUL, slow and unproductive.
2. Got comfortable with Colemak and stopped doing any typing exercises. Still tweaking my layout.
3. Didn’t know where to position my mouse, so I got an Apple Trackpad 2 that sits beautifully between the two halves. Works great on Linux. Keep the mouse around for gaming.
4. Finally productive. I make minor changes to my layout every 6 months. Colemak is ingrained in my muscle memory. It’s just so comfortable.
And don’t worry about forgetting how to type QWERTY; the secret to retain muscle memory is that an ortholinear split keyboard is sufficiently different from a regular one that it’s like learning a completely new instrument. Hard at first, but it would be hard even if the layout was familiar; might as well then switch to something better than QWERTY.
I love my split keyboard now. Games are a bit annoying but I can easily switch to my gaming-QWERTY-hybrid layout (QWERTY on the left hand, colemak w/ tweaks on the right). Specialist tools like Blender might need minor rebinding to find comfort.
When I type on a regular laptop, I find shift+numbers for symbols to be hilariously unergonomic compared to my symbol layer, I don’t know how the hell people cope doing Rust or Haskell or even Lisp.
So I have a WASD ISO full keyboard with Cherry Blue keys that I did custom MacOS keytops for that is starting to lose both keytop prints and the keys are starting to occasionally misfire.
How hard is it to find a full 101/104 mechanical keyboard, with cherry blue, ISO layout (ie big upside-down Enter/Return) with customizable keytops that are in en-US and have the MacOS keytops (L: control/option/command, R: command/option/fn) and the appropriate MacOS function key tops?
All of the ISO that I could find have one or another of the EU layouts, which I don't need or want.
Keychron? I realise their prebuilt variants may have ISO layouts only for the various EU market segments, but they all run QMK so you could reflash with en-US keymap. They come with a set of replacement Mac/Win keycaps already, and have a physical switch to flip between the two variants.
Then reshuffle the physical keycaps to match your layout.
(Disclosure: I have two of their ISO keyboards: Q10 and Q11. Both require a wrist support, they are thick.)
The keychron K10 max seems closest to what I want and has the keytops I want (with a bit of rearranging). The UK keytops are the closest to what I want,
I already use Karabiner to swap a few things, so that's probably the closest.
Just need to be able to get blue switches, I WFH and there's no one around to be bothered by the clicking.
Considering I started "typing" on an ASR-33, and then an original IBM PC, I want the clicks :)
Given the website, is worth noting that keyboards like this can avoid the infamous Emacs pinky. I've got the keys two rows below the homerow bound to the modifiers right alt, super, alt, control, and shift. And reversed on the other hand. This makes any modifier shortcuts very ergonomic -- one hand 'chords' the modifiers and the other hits the non-modifier key.
This may or may not change your perspective on keyboards. Assuming Covid never happened:
- How many hours a day do you spend driving?
- How much do you/did you spend on your car?
- Did you purchase the cheapest car that just filled the need you had (aesthetics, comfort, etc. are therefore off the table, "gets N people to N places")? If not, why not?
- How many hours a day do you spend typing?
- How much did you spend on your keyboard?
If you haven't tried a good mechanical keyboard see if you know someone who has one and spend some time using it.
Switched early to a left-handed 65% keyboard setup—Keychron K7 Max QM7 on the left, Trackpad Pro and MX Master 3S on the right. Feels quick, natural, and fixes what Apple’s keyboards never did.
Oddly, switching to a custom Lisp Machine-inspired keyboard has been better for hand/wrist pain than my Ergodox or the Kinesis Advantage I used before. It's a staggered key, non-split, flat QWERTY keyboard. I think maybe they're just good keyswitches? Here's the keyboard: https://jfloren.net/b/2024/10/23/0
My main keyboard has been a 34-key split Ferris. I usually have either a trackpad between the halves if I’m using a Mac or an ergonomic Logitech if on my Linux desktop. Not having to move my hands at all while being able to reach any keys/characters I need has been a welcomed change, worth remapping my brain.
Agreed. It quickly becomes "awkward" to go back to using a numpad once you get used to ALWAYS being one key hold/press away from it. I can type numbers as easily as I can type capitals, ditto with every symbol, and my function keys.
Hell I've even worked on a couple of revision on "gaming" layers. Namely for FPS or older roguelikes.
I hate how hard it is to find a split space(feels mandatory now that i'm used to it) 40% with wireless and QMK/Zia/etc. The EPOMAKER-TH40 SHOULD be perfect, but turns out they put out a breaking patch or something and it's not ACTUALLY programmable anymore. I need something like this for 2 setups at homes.
I went around on a couple of things and landed on the split 4x5 Chiri CE for my everyday workhorse since it's easy to carry.
Of note, while that board seems to be out of stock and isn't for everyone i cannot recommend keeb.io enough. They've done a fantastic job of keeping my board running after I had some ESD ruin it once or twice, and have never charged me as it was still under warranty.
With how hit or miss a lot of this niche keyboard stuff is, it's really really nice to find people who stand by their product and can turn things around. I get its got to be a miserable market so I don't demand it, and I'm extremely happy when I do see it.
I had rapidly worsening RSI, thought my career as a developer was ending. Switching to VIM completely solved it. Not to take away from what fancy keyboards can do for you, but if you were already contemplating VIM then this would be a great (additional) reason to try it.
I use a $20 keyboard/mousepad combo. But with the open source Kanata keyboard software, it's more powerful and configurable than QMK. It's brilliant. Not for everybody, but even the author in the article said 80% of the value add, is QMK.
I have two moonlanders but wound up giving up because I just couldn't adapt to it. And when writing code, finding the symbols like {, =, }, and other common coding ones was just too difficult to retain muscle memory. I tried many layouts, I tried to make my own, and at the end of the day it was just too different. I wish I had a better experience.
Muscle memory is exactly what it sounds like, you need more repetition. If you are becoming frustrated, you can try to reduce your cognitive load. ZSA has an app for all platforms called "Keymapp". It's primarily used for flashing firmware but shows the key assignments in real time. I use only 1 monitor but I've repurposed my laptop screen to always display keymapp so I can see which key/layer has the symbol I am looking for when I don't have the mental capacity to remember.
The default layers are pretty good, but I found programming the keys/layers to what made sense to me to be more beneficial. I use the heat map to see which keys get the most milage and program layers around that. Then I only program a few new keys at a time and get a feel for things. My words-per-minute went down initially but now it is back.
I have been tweaking my layout for about a month and am close to being happy with it. I've set myself a milestone that when I don't make any tweaks for 6 months I will buy custom keycaps that have my exact symbols/layers on each key.
I didn't like the default layouts for symbols either and wound up building this layout[1] (there have been a few minor tweaks since but nothing substantial). The parens as double taps on the shift keys is the big one for me for writing code. The other brackets on the inside are convenient enough to use but not occupying "prime" space, and I have "auto-shift" enabled so a top on "[" give that character, but holding it down (for > 160ms) gives "{" (and same for all the other keys and their respective shifted versions. And in case it isn't clear what's going on in the thumb clusters, the two enter keys and the space key do their respective actions on tap, and do Left CTRL, ALT or Right CTRL respectively when held down. Might be a place to start if you wanted to try again.
Also on the "muscle memory" thing, I decided early on to not try to modify any other keyboards in my life. Just the ergodox get the middlemak and super custom layout. I found that preserves muscle memory for laptop built in keyboards and using other people's and allows my brain to form a completely separate set of muscle memory that kicks in on the ergodox and neither seem to conflict with each other. Works for my brain, might work for you too.
- Learn their default layout first, then iterate on your personal preferences. I similarly tried a bunch at first, but realized switching layouts constantly was making it impossible to build up the new muscle memory.
- Spend time practicing away from important coding tasks (e.g. gaming, writing, a side project, a one-off script, etc.). Being able to learn in a forgiving environment, outside of deadlines, gives you the space to allow mistakes and time to correct them
It's still mechanical, it's still split, it's still QMK programmable, it's got hotswap sockets so you can try different switches... but it's also an extremely normal staggered layout with function keys and everything.
I think it's worth trying the ortho 'n' layers approach, because it has real wins to it; but if you've tried it and don't like it, this is one step closer to normalcy, while still keeping many of the wins.
I've mapped paired symbols to the same finger on opposite hands, so ()[]{}<>/\'" are mirrored, and then also I've got numbers and symbols corresponding as well so the 123... pad on my right is a !@#... pad on my left. It gets me pretty far, but not everything has a mate so I occasionally have a brain fart moment and suddenly I'm hunting for | even though I have years worth of muscle memory on this layout.
So I guess I'd say: design to lean on familiar structures as much as you can and then just commit to using it a lot and don't give yourself too hard of a time when it gets wierd. Whatever you come up with will surely beat the pain associated with having your right on of pinky in charge of 50% of the symbols plus enter.
How long did you spend trying to adjust? it takes some time. I consistently made typos for about 2 months and then it quickly became very natural to type. My only advice here is to slog through the typos for a couple months. Our brains are flexible enough to adapt.
The thing I don’t like about keyboards this is that I still have to use a mouse and these keyboards don’t really address that. If I mounted on the arms of my desk, it’s even harder to get to the mouse. Maybe a few people can get away with just them all day, but I can’t.
It's a pretty big departure from traditional keyboards, but there are a bunch of dactyl variants which have a trackball in the thumb cluster. I'm not sure how practical this really is, having never used one, but it's conceptually nifty.
I switched from a Moonlander to a UHK, and I have the trackball module for it. Life changing. I don't use a mouse anymore and instead have a trackball right under my thumb.
100% agree. I have almost never travelled with my Advantage2 or 360 when I still had them. But the Glove80 is so light that it’s easy to carry with me.
The Advantage helped me a lot, but the Glove80 is the only keyboard I’ve truly loved using. The key well is insanely well-designed and even though the tenting is a bit of work to set up, it is really tailored to my preferred angle.
MoErgo is also expanding the Choc keyboard space with really nice silent switches (Cherry/Plum Blossom) and keycaps.
I mentioned in my comment not liking how flimsy is felt. It is very light and that can be a plus but when I tried traveling with it with tenting setup, often the rods became loose, it formed an awkward shape so didn't fit in the carrying case they provided in the first place, would not sit well in my backpack, and often times I'm not sure why but keys would pop out.
Resetting the tenting up everytime I travel/go somewhere with it is not really convenient at all, so its not really a decent option.
I don't often travel with the 360, but when I do, I just lower it to the lowest level and its never had an issue except for the obvious bulkiness.
Another issue is because its so light, it would often shift around on my desk while typing, and I've seen others complain about this as well. Maybe its just an issue of how hard you type, or how much friction your desk provides.
If I could get a mix between a 360 with the shape of the glove 80's keywell and key setup, but with the sturdiness of the 360 I'd buy it no questions asked.
I dislike the tenting and often lose them so I just put something under the keyboard halves to tilt them. Later I want to get their mounting kit and just use these tiny pocket tripods I have (can't find the name but they have no rod), or find a good way to put magsafe rings on them to use with other sturdy mini tripods I have.
- buy a custom build - have industrial build quality;
- barely any movement - good blood flow;
- avoid rolling - type fast;
- concave keyboards - tenting;
- fewer keys - minimal;
- uniformly shaped keys - touch typing feedback;
- keep hands on the keyboard - move pointer precisely;
- custom layout - conventional shortcuts.
This is ridiculous. I no longer take this field seriously. I get it, we get bored and need a new toy sometimes. Some indeed acquired a medical condition and need medical equipment to type now.
I noticed when I exercise I can sit comfortably on a firm basic stool, and when I don't I become a princess on a pea.
How about we start with the basics? Good posture, correct hand positions, monitor at the right level, exercise, nutrition. Then an IBM Model M would suffice.
This actually exists in every field to some extent.
Humans get bored and at some point, we need to make complicated answers/explications/justifications to stuff that are actually very simple.
Saying, just practice, pay attention and measure/test progress doesn't cut it for many; especially since some don't want to come to the realization that they'll probably never get better because of their own limitations.
This is why there are always people selling "solutions" that are mostly snake oil, the promise is always that it'll get better, faster, stronger, whatever.
One area that is ripe with those sorts of things is weight loss. It is an extremely simple problem, just eat less calories than you consume and you'll be good. But since humans are faillible and sometimes have hard time making progress, you get all kinds of protocols/tools and whatnot that only achieve the same goal but in a roundabout way.
If people believe in them, sometimes it helps (most of the time not). This is the exact same with keyboards, the problem is not at all with the keyboard, it's all lack of physical activity and bad posture. But saying: just take breaks, do calisthenics (or swimming or any full body workout sport really) and it will get better doesn't satisfy many. Those who want a "quick fix" they can buy are disappointed and those who want to sell a "solution" can't push their snake oil that would make them money (they often are believers themselves, so it doesn't matter if it doesn't really make a difference).
Not to be a Debbie Downer, but even if you use all of the correct postures, correct movement, and everything is done correctly, you can still end up with issues if you just do the same thing over and over.
It's relatively agreed upon nowadays that there actually is no "correct posture". The issue is primarily exacerbated by being in the same posture all of the time, doing the same movements all the time, and especially so in positions that aren't so natural for our body - and typing is not a natural movement/position for the wrists.
I developed issues despite always standing or sitting on a supposed ergonomic char, moving my hands a lot while typing, working out and exercising consistently, etc.
Until I started having issues I probably would have also been in the same camp that "oh this is ridiculous". Now I take anyone with chronic pain much more seriously.
Having gone down the rabbit hole of concave keyboards from Kinesis advantage to iterations of self printed dactyl manifolds I ended up at Svalboard too.
Combined with adjustable carrier arms it has enabled me to continue working even post recent shoulder surgery.
Yes it’s an obscene amount of money but it works and enables me to continue earning a living in front of a screen.
Steno is 100% the way to go to avoid and heal RSI. Infinitely more ergonomic. It also erases much of the difference between Emacs and VIM (assuming you use repeat and 1up). Yes, it has to be learned. But you already learned Emacs or VIM, so clearly you're not afraid to invest a little now for a big return later (e.g. no RSI). It's also fun.
I love my moonlander. I bought it on release and it is best computer accessory I know of.
I extensively customized the software. My favourite is controlling cursor with keyboard, I have one hand mode, etc.
One note — when I purchased the Moonlander their "The Platform" wasn't available. I bought it couple month ago and it improved experience even more.
I've found just switching between differently shaped keyboards regularly was enough to cure my RSI. I don't have anything fancy: a Unicomp Model M at work and a Microsoft Natural at home.
I've been using a 42-key corne for 5 years and I can't imagine using a regular keyboard. The way I sit is now different: my arms are spread apart instead of crowding in front of me. This alone helps me pay more attention to the work I'm doing because I'm not hunching over. It took a few months for the layout to sink in, but the ability to customize the layout was insanely helpful and now the way I interface with a computer is exactly how I think it ought to be. The entire thing was $90 with a 3d printed case that's still holding strong. I tented it with some jenga blocks and it's flawless. I almost never look at the thing.
The Moonlander is way too large IMO. A 42 key layout is about perfect and requires ~zero wrist movement.
The corne has three thumb buttons on each side, but it's effectively five thumb buttons on each side because two can be pressed at the same time. So your layout can be [Mod1] [Layer] [Mod2] and you can easily use [Mod1]/[Mod2] with anything on [Layer]. And when you press [Mod1], a thumb key on the other hand becomes [Mod2]. So you basically get to use every possible combo. I have five mod keys this way: Shift, Ctrl, Alt, Super and Hyper. And multiple layer keys.
Thumbs are one of your stronger fingers. In contrast the pinky is by far the weakest but we have dedicated it to almost every modifier and outlying key. I currently use an Elora from SplitKB so I can't speak to the Moonlanders thumb cluster, but if you find one you like it's a massive difference in how much usage you can get out of your thumbs while typing.
I have used ergo keyboards with thumb clusters for several years now. After a while, even though switching to a split ergo keyboard alleviated wrist pains, I developed thumb discomfort.
In the end I solved it by only frequently using the resting key of each thumb (space and backspace). And using the other thumb keys for infrequent things. I use homerow mods to have all modifiers in the alpha block.
if you find one you like it's a massive difference in how much usage you can get out of your thumbs while typing
Until they start to hurt. It can take a few years (just like wrist pains). Be careful!
The Elora I use follows the circular thumb cluster format so I have three keys per thumb that can be used with little movement the rest are for rarely used layer switches and such. One of those three is for often used layers.
I have homerow mods configured but still need to work on using them more. Unfortunately a lot of what's best for typing conflicts with what's best for gaming. Almost every example split layout puts space on the right half and I move it to the left. Still need shift and control on pinky holds. And the Elora has an exaggerated pinky stagger but swapped to WQSD makes an almost perfect diamond, but at the expense of the old Q now being A is below instead of above and Z is really far away.
For me the biggest benefit of thumb keys isn't finger strength, it's the fact that the thumb is separated from the rest of the hand. It's really easy to hit a thumb key while hitting any other key on the "main" part of the keyboard. Whereas on a traditional keyboard, typing something like shift-T or ctrl-R requires stretching out your hand.
In my experience (having also had thumb discomfort on ergo boards) thumb clusters can be great, but you have to make sure to avoid too much thumb movement.
When I first got a keyboard with a thumb cluster that had 6 keys I was originally a bit overzealous and had a bunch of relatively frequently used keys assigned to them. I actually ended up developing a little bit of what I think was some tendonitis in my thumbs when I first started using it quite a bit.
Ever since then, I primarily only use two of the keys of each thumb clusters with frequency, and they both require very little movement to reach (the two large keys on a kinesis 360). The others that require a little bit more extending of the thumb are more infrequently used keys that don't ring all the time.
I started having RSI issues 2 years ago, what a way to welcome me to my 30s. It was excruciatingly painful just getting through a workday even with plenty of breaks. I didn't care for building my own keyboard I literally just wanted something to help me not be in pain no matter how weird it looked.
I've ended up on a Kinesis advantage 360 pro after spending thousands of dollars on keyboards because I needed something that allowed me to type for more than 5 minutes at a time without pain.
The things I think are key for people with persistent issues:
- programmable keys
- tenting
- concavity (rules out most keyboards)
- thumb clusters
- ortholinear
I know some go without the concavity but I just cannot go back. Its so much more comfortable on my hands.
Programmable keys are probably the most important though, primarily so you can pick which stretches and awkward movements to completely remove and no longer have to do.
For example I've entirely removed the need to ever stretch my pinkies and ring fingers on both hands. It destroys my hands having to do so on a normal keyboard and so many normal shortcuts require excessive pinky finger movement.
I honestly think anybody who plans on using a keyboard for the rest of their life should invest in a high quality keyboard even if it's expensive. I would not be able to continue working today without having done so.
Runner up is the glove 80, but the only thing is I don't like how flimsy it feels in my hands compared to how solid the kinesis feels.
As an FYI, I had a similar issue and tried a whole lot of things, including different mechanical keyboards, with which I had a variety of successes and failures.
But ultimately what REALLY helped was going to physiotherapy and identifying muscle groups in my back that were weak, causing me to sit weird and support my arms with muscles in my shoulders that weren't designed for that. And because all of this is connected in weird ways, the pain I was feeling in my wrists originated way back in over-stressing those shoulder muscles.
After a few weeks of an exercise program designed to target those muscles, all my RSI pains aren't just reduced, which was the sum total of the results I got from different mechanical keyboards, they were GONE. Plus, I had the added benefit of naturally sitting and walking "better" and feeling better about it.
So if you've tried different mechanical keyboards with only limited degrees of success (or have a fave keyboard you don't want to have to switch from), consider an exercise program designed to improve your posture! It is literally the single biggest thing I've done in the past year to make me feel significantly better, and not just in the case of the RSI!
I have a similar story. Bought a Kinesis advantage II at the time and it provided at best some solace. Started lifting weights and all pain was completely gone within two weeks.
Not saying it will work for others but it’s at least worth trying.
PS I ended up sticking with the kinesis, now on a 360 pro. Hands down the best keyboard I’ve ever seen or used. I recommend both deadlifts and kinesis :)
Lifting weights cured a lot of my wrist pain. Then I started training jiujitsu, now I have full body pain all the time.
Unfortunately I was probably what most people would think is a model person in terms of activity. I used a standing desk or sitting with no backrest to maintain upright posture - I exercised all the time, did yoga with my wife, competed in powerlifting, did plenty of walking/cardio, rucking etc. I played guitar regularly and had since I was like 12 and had bouldering as a hobby so finger strength didn't seem to be an issue.
I did physical therapy for months and the issue basically came down to my nerves being the issue. I was diagnosed with Cubital Tunnel Syndrome in both elbows and also a torn TFCC tear in one hand causing pressure on the ulnar nerve in my wrists when the wrist was flexed even a little or in what was called ulnar deviation (wrist extended outwards/away from your body). I was told the most likely cause was as simple as the way I slept - with my elbows bent and potentially exacerbated due to excessive heavy gripping combined with my bone structure in my elbow simply not being very kind on me.
I've since recovered from the elbow surgeries and they are evaluating wrist surgery as well, I still sometimes have issues with my fingers going numb in the wrong position - but trust me, I went to all kinds of doctors trying to figure this out since practically every hobby I had required using my hands/fingers. Unfortunately it just seems like I was unlucky. But having keyboards that allow my hands to be in more natural positions at the very least has allowed me to continue working.
Hey I have cubital tunnel and also have an ulnar deviation in my left arm. Have you tried ergos with low profile keyboards? ZSA also makes a model called the Voyager, which is the best keyboard that I’ve ever had. Might be worth checking out. Like you with the Kinesis, the Voyager has been able to keep me in the game.
I wonder if anyone who's switched to an ergonomic setup has found that it stops working as well over time. Because I have long suspected that the real problems (in many cases) come down to weak muscles. But these ergonomic setups are likely to weaken them even more over a long enough period of time given that they try to avoid all of the strain.
Programmers are far more likely to have hyper-mobility than the general population, it makes it far more difficult / impossible to maintain good posture. If they don’t strength train they’ll end up rather weak regardless. So my general recommendation is to reduce injuries by being as ergonomic as possible while also hitting the gym. I use a reclining chair because I can’t avoid slouching no matter how ergonomic the chair is and it works for me. I also take Performance Enhancing Drugs (PEDs), hgh peptides and test cypionate. If you’ve seen what happens to people like myself with severe hEDS you’d understand why. Most programmers are not as severe but tend to have some form of ‘benign’ generalized hyper mobility.
Citation needed
I have somewhat similar experience. I had wrist pain for years, using a wrist support and topical pain gel. MRI and other tests were inconclusive, it wasn't any of the typical problems.
A physiotherapist said the problem is not the wrists but that the pain comes from higher up in the arms. I started going to the gym, and like for you, the issues are just gone now. I haven't worn the wrist support since.
A person in good health with good form can type with reasonable (not ideal) comfort on a standard keyboard on any height table (within reason), but:
(0) Try to feel in your body what kind of static load is on your muscles and joints. Ideally you want your body parts to be in neutral relaxed positions. It's not always possible to completely avoid static load, so try to take routine breaks, change positions, etc.
(1) At all costs avoid having nontrivial wrist extension or flexion (wrists bent upward or downward) while doing repetitive finger motions. Your hands need to be coming straight out of your forearms. The tendons that flex and extend the fingers need to pass through the wrists, and a bent wrist leaves them moving in a weak and uncomfortable part of their range of motion. My understanding is that most keyboard-related RSI comes from wrist extension or flexion.
(2) You should try to get your arms to be supported as much as possible passively from the shoulders. When sitting or standing, the upper arms should be hanging loosely at your sides with back reasonably straight and head up. The keyboard needs to be close enough to the torso for this to be possible. If your elbows are not close to your body, but are forward or out to the side, try to change your position. Being in a position where the weight of the arms is supported by the arm muscles causes fatigue and encourages compromising other joint positions in uncomfortable or damaging ways to relieve the strain. While actively typing the hands do not need to be supported by any kind of surface: let the palms "float" above the keyboard. Use the palm rest for resting, not typing.
(3) For a single-piece flat keyboard, I find it is most comfortable for the plane of the keyboard to be parallel to the forearms. The appropriate front/back tilt of the keyboard is therefore dependent on the relative height of the keyboard and the torso: if the table is high relative to the chair, the keyboard needs to be tilted up at the far side; if the keyboard is on your lap, on a low under-desk keyboard tray, or on a belly-height standing desk, then the keyboard needs to be flat or even tilted down at the far side. The major reason that old typewriters had an aggressive tilt to them was because desks are historically the right height for handwriting (i.e. tall).
(4) I find it helps a lot on a one-piece keyboard to keep the wrists with little to no ulnar deviation (turn toward the outside). It also helps to try to pronate them less (i.e. leave them turned so that the pinkies are a bit below the pointer fingers, instead of rotating them all the way flat). Split ergonomic keyboards eliminate the need to make some of these compromises by allowing the hands to be separated and allowing the sides to be "tented" (so the wrists can be less pronated) and positioned/oriented to eliminate ulnar deviation.
(5) Try not to have too sharp an impact on each keystroke. Ideally use only the necessary force for each key press to register, and try to avoid slamming your fingers down hard through the bottom of the keystroke. A keyboard with better switches can help a lot here, with reliable actuation halfway through the keystroke and tactile/auditory feedback at the actuation point. Key switches that don't reliably actuate unless smashed are the worst.
That is exactly my experience, although a bit earlier.
I landed on a Kinesis Advantage 2, at the time as the 360 wasn't even announced yet.
Spent entirely too much money on other ones. There's a reason the Kinesis Advantage line has been around for decades. It really is a just a great ergonomic shape without many compromises. And mine has held up 7 years now with no issues.
Anyone looking for pain relief should really try the Advantage 2 or 360. If the 360 Pro is too expensive don't shy away from considering a used Kinesis Advantage 2. Don't get an Advantage 1 as they have compatibility issues with newer machines.
If cost is a concern, and you are an employee, please ask if work will pay. Also ask if they have a similar keyboard lying unused in a cupboard.
I'll buy a €450 keyboard for any employee that asks for one. It's easily justified compared to the loss of productivity from RSI or similar.
For those with more time than money, you can build an open-source Advantage 360 clone for around $100 USD:
- https://github.com/wizarddata/Ergo-S-1
I'm not the creator, but I do have a repo with a purchase list that shows what stuff to buy from AliExpress:
- https://github.com/arcanemachine/Ergo-S-1-Extras
It takes about 10 hours to put together. You'll also need some nerd tools: access to a 3D printer, soldering iron, etc.
There are some great 3D printing services out there for those who don’t have access to a 3D printer locally. You can upload the CAD file and get an instant quote.
Runner up is the glove 80, but the only thing is I don't like how flimsy it feels in my hands compared to how solid the kinesis feels.
Glove80 has a better key well and thumb cluster for most people though. I have made a detailed comparison here:
https://danieldk.eu/MoErgo-Glove80-Review
Also agree with the sibling commenters. In order, get:
- Help from an expert/exercise/do very regular breaks.
- A properly adjustable chair.
- A height-adjustable desk (get an electronic one, it's the only one you will ever tune properly, other desks are too much effort).
- Only then an ergo keyboard.
An ergo keyboard is worthless if you do not get the basics right (diagnose the issues, letting the blood flow, having a good posture). I am in some ergo keyboard Discords and it happens far too often that people by an ergo keyboard, but do not even have a setup where they can have a good posture.
I used kinesis advantage for 15 years, switched to a glove80 for the past 2, but recently went back to kinesis with an advantage2. The glove80 is very nice, but my hands are big enough that the kinesis thumb cluster works better for me and the cherry mx brown switches are much more satisfying than the low profile chocs.
So ymmv, but for those with larger hands, it may make sense to try a kinesis.
Have you tried any of the splitkb keyboards? If so, how do they compare to the kinesis adv 2?
I fairly recently got a Glove 80, still not entirely used to the thing but I can certainly tell my wrists are a lot happier. Was also looking at the Advantage 360, but with shipping it's nearly twice as expensive where I live so it was hard to motivate.
Before that I was using a Keychron Q11, which is a split keyboard with a regular staggered layout. That helped my shoulders feel better, I have a pretty broad frame and regular keyboards put me in a kinda t-rex position, but my left wrist in particular was killing me since I couldn't type a fair few keys on the left side, c, x, z, and q, without constantly adjusting my hand position.
Must say that the Glove 80 is growing on me as one heck of a comfortable experience. No idea how durable it is, it's certainly a light keyboard, though at the same time I'm not sure how well that actually conveys build quality. Like would the solder joints really have been more resistant to drops and impacts if it had a steel plate in the bottom like the Kinesis does?
I got RSI using a touchpad, which then transferred to using a normal mouse. I couldn’t do anything with a mouse for longer than a few minutes. I completely fixed it with a DXT Mouse 2 (and later 3).
My normal (mechanical) keyboard doesn’t give me any issues, as long as it’s narrow enough (75% layout or less) that I can keep my mouse close enough to the center of my body that I don’t have to rotate my shoulder outwards too much.
My natural resting position on my keyboard is with both arms coming in diagonally without bending at the wrists. I do a lot of work on the terminal, including programming, so I’m using it quite intensively and I never feel any strain.
I tried to get used to a split orthogonal keyboard, but I couldn’t use it for extended periods without getting RSI like symptoms. Would I have persisted, I might have gotten used to it. Or maybe it just wasn’t the right one for me.
Anyway, this is not to counter any of the things you said, because I basically followed the same path with my mouse, but it shows how different postures and usage patterns can lead to different outcomes. I’m still interested in ergonomic keyboards, though, and I might try one again in the future.
I am curious how/if you were formally taught how to type, and whether you hit the keys with sharp and abrupt movements. Of those whom I've seen develop RSI, a common trend I've noticed is they type very "discretely", with a very noticeable pause between each keypress, and use a lot more force than necessary. They were also taught that that was the "correct" way to type, adhere strictly to a sub-optimal fingering pattern, and type relatively slowly too. RSI seems to be caused by the sort of excessively rigid and intense finger movements that I've seen from these formally-taught typists.
The more generic trend could be people who perfectly hit the same keys the same way again and again.
I've seen it with people religiously sticking to an optimal typing method which limits their hand movement to an extreme. They were crazy fast but RSI was a common subject of discussion, regardless of posture or hardware quality.
We had the same issue with gaming controllers, some with guitar learning etc. There's a limit on how much we're able to repeat the same movement again and again, it depended on what movement and who did it, but the only ones who didn't get any RSI simply avoided extreme repetitions.
And buffs. Sometimes building more and more muscles solve the issues entirely, if that's what you're into.
Agreed. I had wrist pain when I played a lot of WoW - rogue, especially outlaw, is not kind to the hands.
I solved it in a couple of ways:
1. Quit wow
2. Rock climbing. Get stronger, especially forearm and finger strength. I can't emphasize enough how much this helps over even carpal tunnel braces or whatever. The biggest single thing that stopped wrist pain.
Not op, but had a very similar story. Got crippling RSI to welcome me into my 30s. Couldn’t work for several months and ended up getting a Glove80 because I needed to make a living.
This definitely does not describe me. I typed around 100wpm, sometimes quite loud, often times quite a button mash, and frequently not lifting my fingers quickly after each press. Didn’t have any notion of “correct” typing
I was not taught to formally type and learned pretty much exclusively from playing PC games. Primarily wold of Warcraft.
I did not "touch type" in the traditional sense of correct form and using the home row, but I didn't need to look at the keyboard. I typed around 120wpm like this though at the time. I have not and probably never will get back to this speed typing on the Kinesis. I'm closer to just 90-100wpm with stricter typing technique. But usually try not to type as fast as I can anymore anyway. I still to this day type faster with my crap form on a laptop keyboard if I swap to it for a bit even though I rarely do anymore.
My typing form was honestly atrocious. If I were to describe it I covered over wasd with my left hand as if I was gaming, and pinky was only ever really used for modifier keys and shifting. I only used left shift, never right. My right hand I used index finger for spacebar and moved my entire hand to the spacebar between every word. I didn't even realize I did this until I sat and analyzed my typing form maybe a year ago to compare to correct touch typing.
It actually took me quite a while to learn to type on a split keyboard since I basically had to learn to type correctly from scratch.
Glove80 might not survive a drop on the floor but I've used mine full time for over a year and it still feels like new.
You nailed it, I have the same criteria. I ended up with a Cyboard Imprint but the Advantage 360 seems excellent as well.
I have had ctrl and caps lock swapped for a long time. The default layout sucks for today's needs.
Having been extensively on computers for the past 25 years and I have never experienced the whole keyboard-/mouse-pain thing even in the slightest on myself. I know many collegues who did tho.
I wonder whether this has to do with me being a bass and guitar player. Playing an instrument where you essentially press down thick steel wires with your finger tips with full force, while your fingers are in odd angled ("unhealthy") positions for hours certainly does something to your motoric system.
I know anecdotal evidence with n=1 is useless, but the idea that motion is important to reduce body pains isn't exactly new or unresearched. A whole family of ergonomic chairs have evolved about that very idea. I know multiple people whose only solution to excruciating back pain was simply to exercise and build muscles in the back, and they tried every ergonomic chair in the book. The only thing that really helped was excercise.
Since I don't have RSI take all that with a grain of salt, but maybe trying with those guitar-finger-strength-trainers for a month isn't that big of an investment?
Sadly I actually stopped playing guitar because of my issues after having played for almost 20 years.
I'd played guitar since I was 12 years old and probably averaged at least an hour a day basically the entire time even into adulthood. Played obviously a hell of a lot more when I was a teenager though.i also was competing in powerlifting and used my grip and fingers for all sorts of stuff.
I had surgery on both elbows and am told I may need to on my hands/wrists since the issue is a combination of nerve issues and wrist issues.
Similar experience (no rsi, 35, shit tier typing technique, bassist + pianist), same theory. Go get them fingers jacked!
These look great and I don’t doubt it’s worth the investment, but holy hell $500 is a tough price tag to accept.
You can get pretty far with software-only tweaks to your existing keyboard instead.
I've settled on keyd[1], after using XKB and interception-tools for a while.
[1]: https://github.com/rvaiya/keyd
For some users they’re fine, but terrible for hypervisors, remote desktops or systems you don’t own (it’s far easier to sneak a keyboard into some places than a software solution). A hardware solution was far better for my usecase, obviously ymmv,though.
I have a Kinesis advantage pro. I bought it 11 years ago (in 2 months). When you look at it over the time it’ll last.. it gets easier to swallow. It also solved a lot of issues for me.
In that time, I’ve had 3 desks, 5 computer chairs, and 7 computers.
The way I thought about it was that I would gladly pay $500 to have a reduction in RSI symptoms, let alone prevent them beforehand. Not to mention the potential loss of enjoyment & employment from pain during computer use.
And as such, I'm an extremely satisfied Advantage 360 Pro user. The Adv 360 + a mouse side-grade massively reduced pains in my hands/wrists to the point where I don't notice any issues 99% of the time, even with heavy (7+ hour) computer use and quite a lot of FPS gaming.
Though note that there are several keyboards with split layouts + tenting (the two most important aspects for relief) that cost a fraction of the Adv 360; $200-300 of the price tag is for features, build quality, it being pre-built, and ease of programmability.
Yeah, as a medical expense it’s quite the bargain
Totally agree that it is worth the investment and who knows, maybe I will even get one one day. But I’m definitely getting some sticker shock regardless haha
I got sticker shock when I first bought an Apple Magic Keyboard with Numeric Keypad.
It is, even in the USA, $129, compared to the $20 or so I'd otherwise expect to pay when buying a computer for a new employee.
Here in Denmark the RRP is 1699DKK = $267 = €227. (Still $215 without the VAT.)
Cheaper than medical bills regardless of what country you’re in.
I just got a corne split keyboard from China for a fraction of the cost. The guy who runs the webshop seemed like a legit enthusiast. $40
Are we talking about a keyboard kit or pre-built? 40$ seems quite cheap even for china.
I've definitely spent way more than $500 over the several models of keyboards, albeit the ASP was more like $200 or so.
My view on it is, a good keyboard will get several years of use out of it, the average yearly price isn't really that much. Second, it's something I'm touching several hours most days of my life. I'm using a keyboard more than I wear shoes personally (I do prefer the barefoot life, so I'm a bit odd there). I'm touching it more than my couch or my dining chairs or other things in my home. Isn't it worthwhile that it's comfortable and exactly what I want from it?
I agree with your list except for ortholinear. I firmly believe that row stagger (that you find on regular keyboards) are bad but you should have column stagger (to match the different lengths of your fingers).
Anyone else suffering with this, I would highly recommend an app that forces you to stop typing for a few seconds every other couple of minutes, like AntiRSI. Hugely annoying but helped me where many keyboards did not
> proponents of mechanical keyboards say you need fewer keys than a regular keyboard, for _reasons_
That's a bit of a generalization. Mechanical keyboards like the Hyper7 exist that have enough for even the most key-hungry typist. If you want an ergonomic mechanical keyboard with many keys there are also some of those out there, like the Kinesis line or the Glove80. That said, one thing people mean by ‘ergonomic’ is ‘less stretching’, and by geometry more keys = more stretching, which is why there's significant overlap between the ergonomic keyboard crowd and the few-keys crowd. When I first got an Ergodox I too thought I would struggle with few keys, but over time I found I prefer to have the keys in a comfortable position with a layer modifier than to have them off in Narnia where I have to shift my whole wrist to reach them.
(Because subcultures are subdivided recursively, the _gaming_ mechanical keyboard subcrowd also often like small keyboards, for reasons I don't really know but are presumably quite different from the reasons the ergonomic mechanical keyboard subcrowd have.)
My parents sent me to years of piano lessons before I ever touched a computer keyboard, and my typing reflects it. I don't move my wrist. I move my entire hand. This drove my high school typing teacher nuts, but I was the fastest in class by a wide margin so he didn't push back too hard.
I've tried traditional home-row typing but I just can't do it. And after all these years, my wrists still don't hurt at all. I can't prove that there's a connection, but I strongly suspect it.
I think it's how it should be done. You just executed the task intuitively, without any preconceived instruction as to the "best" way to do things.
Most of the time, those selling the best way to do stuff have a rigid way of thinking/operating and seem to have rules for everything in life and they think it applies to everyone the same, even though we are clearly all different.
Very often it's actually counterproductive and doesn't get you much better performance, touch typing is one of those things. It's a rigid theory made to form human robots that would spend all day typing stuff from other peoples (basically secretaries, re-copying stuff or typing dictated material). It focuses on typing speed at the expense of everything else. And is completely pointless because the speed difference between a touch typist and a self taught typist is completely negligible for 99% of tasks.
Pianists are very (like 60%) susceptible to RSI, especially if they have small hands [1] (= lots of stretching motions). I think it's a tradeoff — moving your forearm around spares your wrists, but puts more strain on your elbows. I wouldn't be surprised if it's better overall, though, just because it involves a wider variety of movements.
[1]: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/12611474/
Anecdotally, I have large hands (or at least long fingers) and early piano lessons, and as a self-taught chaos typist on QWERTY I struggled with RSI at a relatively young age until I switched to more traditional touch-typing on Dvorak.
I have small hands. I found myself sitting next to a chaplain once, and he started conversation with "your hands are small. You'd never be able to play piano." I was playing Beethoven in recitals at 8, TYVM! I ended that chat pretty quickly.
You may just be lucky :)
> This drove my high school typing teacher nuts [...]
I think that's typical for over-achievers.
I'm a mech keyboard enthusiast and an ansi 104 full size ride-or-die
> (Because subcultures are subdivided recursively, the _gaming_ mechanical keyboard subcrowd also often like small keyboards, for reasons I don't really know but are presumably quite different from the reasons the ergonomic mechanical keyboard subcrowd have.)
The explanation I've always heard for TKL for gamers is that removing the numpad leaves more room for the vigorous, professional mousing they have to do (I'm skeptical)
You're skeptical that some people need to use the mouse a lot? Or you're skeptical that bringing the mouse closer to the mouse hand's typing position / closer to the body improves comfort?
I found that when, e.g., using Photoshop, a keyboard without a number pad was a nontrivial improvement.
Many popular games are physically and mentally demanding. You do need "vigorous, professional mousing" for any kind of shooter or RTS, on top of actual thinking and reacting.
Playing in teams requires you to type to coordinate with teammates. The language floats from cryptic to hectic: all sorts of acronyms, jargon, combining text with "body language", etc. Regardless, typing with both hands is still faster.
You can also buy a detachable numpad.
I just like how everything aligns on my desk better (in terms of comfort) with a TKL board. And I was never a numpad user anyway. Maybe if I was typing numbers into spreadsheets all day I would have a different opinion on the necessity of the numpad
That makes sense! I'm a split keyboard user and for mouse-and-keyboard style games I used to move the right half of my keyboard out of the way of the mouse.
> proponents of mechanical keyboards say you need fewer keys than a regular keyboard, for _reasons_
Well "reasons" is quite obviously travel distance and thus time. If your fingers are always on, or nearby, the resting position (home row) then you go faster and don't stretch in repeated weird (ergonomically speaking) ways.
This though comes at a BIG cost, namely layers and other tricks to make "far" thing stay "close", which is cognitive. You have to remember where things are and how to activate them. Until it comes second nature because you drilled for so long then it might not be worth it for most.
The "reasons" are not arbitrary.
I like smaller keyboards (80% or less) in both gaming and professional work because it lets me keep my hands and shoulders in a more natural position when I’m using the mouse.
A person with broader shoulders would probably have a different experience, but a full keyboard makes me feel like my mouse is either too close to the keyboard or too far to rest my shoulder.
There are plenty of folks in the community who land somewhere in the middle, too. 60%/65% are all pretty popular and don't go off the deep end in cutting down keys. I'm personally partial to the HHKB layout, which is like 60% with inspiration from boards associated with the original Mac and with old UNIX boxes.
I got a 75% Keychron a few years ago. Really like it, but I've been considering finding a more portable 65%. The Keychron is great but it's pretty heavy so it's annoying to carry around. Any suggestions?
Can’t recommend anything personally since my boards are mostly group but one-offs (other than the HHKBs), but I think Keychron has low profile mechanical 65% boards if that’s of interest.
It's changed since now Ive got the ZSA Voyager and put my trackball mouse in the center, over all, it is still a small set up. But prior to, I did 60/65% keyboards. A lot of it for me was just a spacing issue. Full size keyboards are nice, but take up a lot of room with a mouse and then wanting to also use a notebook at my desk for notes and designing.
Long time MS Natural Ergonomic 4000 user. My search continues for an 80% split keyboard, where the important programming keys haven't been repositioned or worse, moved to a secondary layer (like braces/parenthesis, pipe/backslash, question mark/slash).
I do like the idea of thumb keys, but would probably need them as duplicates to the more traditional positions. I got a Keyboardio 100 which is absolutely beautiful, but 60% with layers for those above important keys just was too freaking hard.
I'm very confused about an 80% that allegedly moves ANY keys other than navigation, numpad, or f-keys. Any 65% will meet your requirements.
As for <60%: use that neuroplasticity. Stave off dementia. You can do it.
You're right regarding 65%. The extra 15% is the arrow keys, Page up/down, home, end and delete keys. Found I often hit these one handed while the other hand is on the mouse, so a secondary layer that would require two hands to activate would be problematic.
There's neuroplasticity and there's picking your battles. :-)
I had some RSI at the start of corona from too much home office + gaming, what actually helped was getting a trackball (Kensington Slimblade Pro) for $work tasks.
Tried a Moonlander and hated it. My hands don't work with ortholinear. And I hated having to learn layers and layouts. Besides I have a real job and I use a proper IDE so I need my F keys, I like to use the Home/End/Page Up+Down keys, I learned to use the numpad efficiently, etc. I think most of what is told and sold in ergonomics is snake oil. I don't believe ortholinear is any good for it, and minimizing movement also seems really questionable to me. I'm working with comfortable 30-40 wpm and am still one of the most prolific and productive engineers at $work, typing speed is not important for many jobs.
I would like to continue be able to use regular keyboards efficiently and with little annoyance. Too often I'm traveling and stuck with the laptop keyboard. I have to accommodate Linux ($work), Windows (gaming), Mac (personal projects, open uni). That's already challenging enough to get these have similar shortcuts. I use a keychron K5 pro that supports all OSs. I can work efficiently in all situations, with all OSs, with just a single screen. Having a more specialized keyboard (or otherwise setup, like relying too heavily on multi-monitors), wouid overall surely be detrimental, during the times I could not use it.
What I've learned to avoid pain: Wrists should be straight. For me, a slim keyboard helps to achieve that, flat on the table. Hands should have some room apart, open chest. Small keyboards are bad for that, you'll want a 100% one, or a split. Do some lifting, have some muscles. Try a trackball, you might love it. Switch how you are sitting. The best sitting position is the next one. Get up to think, go for breaks. Don't overly specialize into some local/global optimum that is a moving target over your lifetime. Use defaults. Mostly boring setup with some minor personal tweaks can go a long way.
Context: I've been daily driving an Ergodox since 2019.
> And I hated having to learn layers and layouts. Besides I have a real job and I use a proper IDE so I need my F keys, I like to use the Home/End/Page Up+Down keys, I learned to use the numpad efficiently, etc.
Personally, I find that a layer key is little different from a standard modifier key such as Cmd, Alt, etc. Yep, it's one more thing to learn, but IMHO it's worth learning: on macOS, you can use Cmd+arrow to move around text pretty much the same way H/E/Pu/Pd works, but with Mod+arrow, you can just transfer this muscle memory to other systems.
I agree with the lack of F-keys, this is a stupid trend that caught early on, and now no designer seems to be willing to challenge it. I have a different reason though (I prefer Cmd+R or similar to Recompile/Run/etc), and it's games. This is my StarCraft 2 layout: <https://www.keyboard-layout-editor.com/#/gists/8b8dcd36c0abc...>
SC2 is insanely demanding on your raw mechanics, and adding a layer is unquestionably a Bad Idea. For many commands (production, upgrades, some spells), modal input is hardcoded into the engine.
The layout I built is much more optimized than standard hotkeys, but the lack of F-keys is brutal and hindering (esp. for Zerg). Regardless, I've improved A LOT with this layout - which makes me think, how you make it work for you is more important than the shape of it.
> I'm working with comfortable 30-40 wpm and am still one of the most prolific and productive engineers at $work, typing speed is not important for many jobs.
The design goal was never to increase speed (that's mostly mechanics), but to allow a more comfortable posture.
> I would like to continue be able to use regular keyboards efficiently and with little annoyance. Too often I'm traveling and stuck with the laptop keyboard.
Again subjective, but I have zero problems switching between ortholinear and staggered.
> Use defaults.
Disagree (: most defaults suck. Best case, they're opinionated but thoughtful. A consensus is a compromise - always questionable. Worst: "we're now just stuck with it". These all suck, because they're someone else's opinion. And it's in your right to disagree.
I too have a moonlander but imo the biggest gain from most mechs isnt how they can tent but being ortholinear in nature reducing some of the more awkward directional movements of a staggered keyboard. Honestly my biggest gripe with the moonlander is its too many keys, a 40% is more than enough, less can be more in many ways.
My datahand is probably my favorite keyboard though for reducing movement while avoiding too much repetition. If it ever bites the dust beyond repair I'd absolutely move to a diy svalboard build or whatever similar alternative is it's contemporary.
> Honestly my biggest gripe with the moonlander is its too many keys
Can't you just program it such that you do not use the keys you find unnecessary? Perhaps even remove the switches?
Don't have a moonlander but I actually did this with my advantage 360 pro. I did not remove the switches but I made them no-ops. The whole left-most and right-most columns of the keyboard are completely unused for me.
If you travel with the keyboard a lot maybe its an issue since its extra weight/space, but if not I don't see it really hurting much.
OPs experience working their way up the keyboard stack is very similar to my own. I settled on the Dygma Raise. I now own one of the Raise and Raise 2.
Yes, they are a lot of money. I don’t have time to game any more, and they clearly focus mainly on gamers. But if you’re a software / IT person your wrists are your livelihood, so for goodness sakes invest in them. There is no silver bullet and you will probably have to try a number of possible solutions if you suffer from wrist and forearm pain when working, but do not ignore it and take your workplace ergonomics seriously.
For younger engineers, learn to minimise your “travel” and learning editor shortcuts, terminal shortcuts and similar so that you can be smoothly productive with constantly shifting from mouse to keyboard and back again. And take regular breaks! Get up and walk around. If you are WFH get out for walk at lunch.
In general, care for your body so that you may write code into your 80s.
If only this had the F key row. Why is "fewer keys" the first decision that every fancy keyboard designer starts with :/
Because the fancy keyboards all support layers, and one key ergonomic principle is to avoid unnecessary finger travel ;)
Default layers on the Dygma Raise 2: https://dygma.com/pages/first-time-using-the-dygma-raise-2
Modifier keys are the main thing that’s causing me RSI in the first place.
All I want is a quality split mechanical keyboard with Function keys. I use an IDE all day, I don't want to pull quadruple buckies every time I debug.
The Matias Ergo Pro is almost perfect, but I had two of them and they both failed within one year. I had one of each switch type (low force and regular) - both were missing some button presses and repeating other button presses.
You got a lot of exotic suggestions, I'll give one closer to normal: Perixx Periboard 535. Split (though non-adjustable), low profile mechanical switches with three options, three tilting levels, wired or wireless, with or without numpad. And has function keys. Also quite cheap.
I got the wired option with tactile brown switches and numpad, and I've been happy with this. I was looking for a replacement for MS Sculpt and didn't want one of the wild models, this finally ticked all the boxes.
https://perixx.com/products/periboard-535
DE: https://www.amazon.de/dp/B0BZZJH9W2
US: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0BLT4HDPR
Seconded. They're pretty good and I've found them a decent replacement for the MS Ergonomic 4000 keyboards that I used to use. Full size keyboard with keys in the normal places, reverse tilt, manageable F lock, and a cable to connect it to your computer.
I've got one with clicky blue switches, which is fun to type on but a bit loud, and one with silent red switches, which is pleasant to use but the key activation is perhaps a bit too light. I sometimes find myself pressing the keys when I thought I was just hovering my fingers.
The folding stands are a weak point. The MS 4000/Sculpt sort of design, whereby the riser is a solid piece of plastic that the keyboard rests on, is much better.
I like the stands. I need two different levels of tilt, full negative for the sitting position and the mid level for standing. It's really easy to switch between the levels so it fits well my use case.
That does look pretty good. Thank you!
Not sure if it's been mentioned, but keychron make split keyboards:
https://www.keychron.com/collections/split-keyboards
I'm not sure if they're in stock, but it's a lovely keyboard with dead simple programmability.
I got one on Amazon for a little over retail and it’s a solid keyboard. I had a knockoff 65 before and you can definitely tell the difference in quality. I believe Microcenter has them in stock if you’re in the Bay.
Looks like a good choice, thank you!
You might try the UHK 80: https://ultimatehackingkeyboard.com/uhk80
I have the UHK 60 and I really like it, except as you mentioned no function keys.
The software is pretty good, includes a little DSL and you can do pretty much anything you want.
I couldn't quite go for the 60%, but I have friends with the UHK60 and I really liked it as a keyboard.
I popped for the 80 as soon as the shipping times caught up to real time. It's a fantastic keyboard. I haven't gotten any of the clusters for it yet, but I'm very happy with my purchase.
Looks great, thank you!
I agree, they’re darn near perfect, but they always end up with repeated characters or “key chatter”. It’s such a shame, I’ve basically resigned myself to buying a new one ever year or two, but I hate the waste.
Kinesis Freestyle Pro? I've got the non mechanical version (mechanical wasn't available when I purchased) and it's held up for many years. It's a great keyboard IMO.
The Freestyle Pro is almost a good keyboard. The Esc and function keys are all offset to the left by one key compared to a standard layout, which drove me nuts. I have a Freestyle Edge RGB now, which I like much better. (Though I replaced the wrist rests with some from Goldtouch.)
I really like my Kinesis Freestyle Edge with the tenting kit. I’ve been using it for around 2 years and no complaints.
Thank you, I'll take a look.
Depending upon the cost and how much they mean to you there are a couple of options.
One is to replace the switches. If they're hot swappable then it's easy. If they're not, it's hard -- but easy if you're willing to spend money on a desoldering iron. Depending upon your feelings here, I would consider it maintenance to keep it going if you love it -- particularly if you use it to prevent RSI.
A quick look shows matias does sell replacement switches -- which is usually the thing to go. Springs, crud, etc end up in the switches. Sometimes you can tear them apart to fix them, sometimes it's easier to toss them and replace them.
The typical desoldering tool for keyboards is something like this:
https://www.amazon.com/ENGINEER-Engineer-Solder-Suction-SS-0...
They also have things like this that are maybe more functional than trying to do it two handed:
https://www.amazon.com/zycllycx-Electric-Automatic-Desolderi...
But the hakko is the gold standard here. If you have keyboards you absolutely love but are soldered, this is the way to go.
https://www.amazon.com/Hakko-FR-301-Portable-Desoldering-Too...
I meant that I am looking for a keyboard, not for a keyboard hobby.
Hahaha who am I kidding? Of course I have a keyboard hobby! I have a practical museum of various split and mechanical keyboards. But I don't want to be soldering them any more.
I think the trick these days is find a layout you like with hot swappable cherry mx switches that have a qmx/via style configurator.
Then you can configure the buttons however you want.
Or you know... go build your own. It's fun. I built my own keypad and learned a bunch of stuff.
I get that you're trying to be helpful, but I meant that I am looking for a keyboard. Not for a keyboard hobby.
There's a certain trend to repairing existing electronics and keeping electronics waste out of landfills, right to repair and what not -- and that's the spirit I was talking about.
Even hot swap switches prevent more landfill waste as it makes it easy for people to replace bad switches. And if you want a reliable keyboard in the future, that's what you'll need, other wise it will just be more e-waste.
Owning 20 cars and maintaining them is a hobby. Owning 1 car and maintaining it is not -- it's life.
Oh, I've soldered my share of keyboards. But only in repairs, not in actually building one from scratch.
Something tells me that you’re not looking for a keyboard hobby.
I find one modifier plus a home-row key to be much more comfortable than reaching several rows up for an F-key.
The author's whole point here is that QMK (or ZMK, which I use) lets you customize it to exactly your own needs!
But then many keyboard shortcuts require four keys to be depressed all at once.
Just for an example off the top of my head, in JetBrains IDEs the shortcut for hiding all tools is Ctrl-Shift-F12.
As much as i like the idea of these split keyboards that are more ergonomic, I can’t get over the idea of missing keys and having to use chords or new combinations of hotkeys. I use nearly every key of my 104 key keyboard. Literally pause/break and scroll lock are the only ones I don’t use; and I’ve remapped those to be volume controls. If anything, i’d like even more keys for macros and dedicated shortcuts.
But so many keyboards cut that number down so drastically. I use home, end, delete, page up/down, all the time not to mention the number pad as a whole, and all the Fkeys.
One of the nice things about QMK is the ability to get secondary functions on double / triple tap and press and hold combinations. I also couldn't get comfortable with big chording combos, so for example a lot of the keys in my thumb cluster do double duty.
1) My space key is right CTRL when held down.
2) I have two keys for "<RET>", one on each thumb cluster, one is Alt when held down, the other is left CTRL.
3) Page up and down have their own keys on one of those clusters because I no longer needed them for the modifiers, and so page up and down are also home and end if they're held down.
4) Auto shift is on, and I've tuned to to eliminate most of the accidental shifts while keeping it relatively quick to type CONSTANT_VALUES (I actually still have shift keys in the usual positions but on the ergodox I have it feels like a big stretch to hit them and type so I use the auto-shift most of the time, but I do admit this is the convenience function I have the most love/hate relationship with)
5) The shift keys themselves give me open parentheses (left shift) and close parentheses (right shift) when double tapped.
The only chording I have to do these days (that isn't normal keyboard shortcuts) is I have a dedicated key to switch to a layer for FN keys when held down. And the reality is I could (and should) probably map the number keys to be FN keys when double tapped since I don't think I ever hold an FN key down.
This[1] isn't my most current layout (missing the home/end on the pageup/down buttons) but it's pretty much what I've landed on after about a year of using one of these. And realistically there are unused keys there I could remap still. The CTRL where the capslock key would be is never used in favor of the thumb cluster versions, the left and right CTRL keys on the tops of the two thumb clusters are leftovers from older layouts and unused right now. I've never used the "Meh" key or the "'" and "Capslock" keys in the lower left. The "Command-enter" and "[" and "]" keys in the lower right are another leftover from an older layout that are also unused now. So lots of room to play around still.
Not saying you should definitely switch, there are still some things that I'm not 100% happy with (those inner symbol keys are a stretch sometimes and depending on what code I'm writing feel like I could move them around) and getting used to the ortholinear layout is a whole thing on its own. But if it's something that interests you, maybe that layout can help you find a good starting point.
[1]: https://configure.zsa.io/ergodox-ez-st/layouts/wzKWq/latest/...
So a) that seems like a nightmare to me no matter what keyboard I'm on, but b) if you have frequently-used shortcuts that are a pita to get to, you can put them on a layer where you just use them.
Like, I legitimately don't know anymore how you take a screenshot on MacOS, but I know that I hit the modifier key and then this one other key, and that takes a screenshot. Also don't know what you press to move from virtual screen to virtual screen, but mod-m and mod-comma go left and right for me. And in a browser, mod-s and mod-f do ctrl-shift-tab and ctrl-tab.
It's a terrible idea to do this for rarely-used shortcuts, as you'll never remember them; but for ones you use frequently, it's better-than-native, because you can put them on convenient keys that are easy to hit, rather than whatever contortions you'd need to do to hit Ctrl-Shift-F12.
you can make that a macro and assign it to a combo key set.
I have a Moonlander and I genuinely don’t understand why so many split keyboards do this.
“Here’s a really nice split keyboard. But we’ve removed everything except the alphanumerics”
Whhhyyyy.
“Oh but it’s programmable. And you can have layers. And you can have macros”
Cool. I actually didn’t want any of that. I just wanted a single row of function keys. My Moonlander can somehow make space for a “meh” key, a “caps word” key, 3 keys in 2 variations for “change layer” but a play/pause/ volume keys are simply out of the question.
I completely agree. Moonlander would be perfect with a F key row and dedicated modifier keys. The purists will sneer, but they could always take off the keycaps and switches if they want to show off how minimal they are.
I don't spend all my time in vim, my job is mostly emails and docs now. Muscle memory decays for all the fancy chords/layers/macros/etc and I don't have infinite time to spend tweaking keyboard layouts.
I added a numeric layer where my left thumb activates the layer key and the numbers are arranged like a numpad on my right half. The dedicated number keys at the top row are now f keys. Highly recommend
That's an interesting idea. But it makes other key combinations quadruple buckies. For instance, in JetBrains IDEs Ctrl-Shift-4 sets bookmark number 4.
Interesting idea. Thanks
You don't need infinite time, you just need to do it until you get all your personal needs covered.
Personally I have an advantage 360 pro. The only function keys I actually use with frequency are F12 and F2, used for shortcuts in editors. I just put F12 and F2 on thumb keys. Problem solved.
Some people go all in on layers, but I actually use minimal layers at all. I can do everything I need with just the base layer from how I have it setup. I only have a second layer setup that allows using VIM-like navigation (i.e. up, down, left, right, page-down, page-up etc) from the home row in my browser. But technically I also have those on the base layer just in the normal positions.
I actually had a similar mindset, I do not want to have to create tons of layers and combinations, so I optimized my layout around just the base layout but added a layer just for convenience later on.
Onions have layers. Cakes have layers. Ogres have layers. I do not want layers on my keyboard.
I love my Dygma Defy: https://dygma.com/products/dygma-defy
Thanks, but the Defy lacks Function keys.
These kinds of keyboards are programmable, function keys can be added to a custom layer, just as any other keys. The entire point is to make it so you don't constantly have to be reaching for keys, to bring them closer to your fingers (which can stay relatively still).
You can get a QMK keyboard and create a function key layer.
More than just one function layer at that. When customized sufficiently you can do far more, with less movement of the hands. Different actions on hold, tap dance as well as macros all really help minimize strain.
I was excited when I realized that combos and tap dance work together!
That sounds a lot more like a keyboard hobby, than a keyboard.
It is! If you want a keyboard that you never think about, a programmable wacky layout keyboard is not for you.
But if you use your keyboard a lot, keyboard hobbyism can be rewarding to a certain point.
With QMK you can essentially program your keyboard to behave exactly how you want it to. This can be as simple as creating layers or getting into combos and tap dances and more advanced features. It is actually pretty fun when you get the hang of it.
It makes perfect sense to customize the primary interface to computers.
It's very basic customization of a tool you use all day for your job. This is a strange attitude to me coming from a programmer.
I used to customise my car, my keyboard, even my fountain pens. Now, I just want to use them. I bought a car that's quick enough to pass lumbering trucks on tight roads (Tesla Model 3), I bought a pen that fits my hand and writes comfortably (Jinhao A10 EF), and I'd love a keyboard like the Matias Ergo Pro that I don't need to replace every year.
Not sure where you're getting the idea that you need to replace the keyboard every year. And you only really have to customize the keyboard for a short while until it covers your personal needs.
It took me maybe 1 week total after getting used to the keyboard to set it up in a way that worked for me personally, and the keyboard has already lasted a year and still works like new, and looks like new, and many people have had the same ergo-keyboard for years on end.
I like you did not like the idea of having to finnick with it all the time, but in reality those are just the enthusiasts. I set it up in a couple weeks and ever since then I've probably only messed with it a few times more just to try something out of curiosity.
Some of us don't program that much anymore but because we're older, the ergonomic aspects of something like Moonlander are important. Ortholinear and split keyboard for me. But I still want to be able to hop into a terminal or IDE once in a while, without having to spend a bunch of time customizing keyboard shortcuts/layouts. So it's painful to be missing all those keys.
I love my moonlander so much, I bought a second one for work. Both were secondhand, so the sticker shock wasn't quite so bad. Though, I did end up spending some of that savings on custom, coiled cables. A coworker, after seeing my setup, also ended buying two.
I agree with the author. It's a tool, and if your job requires a lot of computer use, it is worth it to invest in a tool that can not only help prevent RSI, but also make you much more productive.
I switched to a Colemak-dh layout at the same time, and it was a huge adjustment. I'm not sure it was really worth it yet. It is hard to catch up to 30+ years of QWERTY muscle memory, though. Key layout aside, the ortholinear arrangement has absolutely been worth it. It feels much more comfortable, especially with the tenting set up.
ZSA's layout editor and customer support also deserve a shoutout. Can't recommend it enough.
I don’t have a moonlander but I did get one of their ergodox keyboards after noticing an increase in pain myself. I tried using it in querty and my experience was unless you type with proper hand position and finger movements (and possibly not even then) querty on an orthinear was even more painful than on a regular keyboard. I tried colemak for a while but something about the layout didn’t feel comfortable still. I landed on using “middlemak” [1] which at least for me has been much more comfortable. It preserves a decent bit of qwerty placement to help with muscle memory, but I’ve also found that only using it on the ergodox keyboard and keeping qwerty on all of my “normal” keyboards has also helped the muscle memory a lot.
[1]: https://www.reddit.com/r/Middlemak/wiki/index/
QWERTY with "proper" hand placement isn't too bad, but I've been typing like this since I was 4 years old and have never tried another layout, so I might just be missing out. Still, it took me more than a year to really get used to the Ergodox... I shudder to think how long a new layout would take to get used to!
I like my moonlander. Feels great and now that I'm used to ortholinear, I can't go back. The ZSA layout editor is awesome. I just wish it had more keys so that I could have an F row and dedicated keys for modifiers. Yes I can use the various features to get them and yes I know it'll be allegedly faster once I train myself. But I'm a busy middle aged man now. I float back and forth between Windows (home), Mac (work), and Linux (Steam deck) and having to keep all the keyboard shortcuts straight on top of having blank keycaps for modifiers makes my head hurt.
I briefly looked for labeled keycaps that let the light shine through but couldn't find any.
Where did you get your coiled cables? I bought one from Aliexpress. It took a month to arrive and then didn't work.
I use long press on the number keys for function keys (F11 and F12 on the inner columns) and I'm pretty happy with that setup.
I got my cables on etsy. There are tons of US-based makers who have large selections of colors, connectors, etc. I got my connectors cerakoted and they're really nice. It's pricey though.
ZSA's support is great too. I've reached out twice for something I thought was a bug and both times the response was a swift, polite, confident:
> we thought of your case and built you a toggle for it, try setting [thing] and let us know if that helps
It helped
Oh, there's even an Emacs' package to configure your programmable keyboard with elisp! [1]
Full disclosure: I've made that!
[1] https://github.com/mihaiolteanu/mugur
> here are my thoughts on ... you should literally buy any mechanical keyboard ... with programmable firmware
Funnily enough, the Moonlander was not this for me. It's programmable, but the round-trip time for programming meant that I didn't modify it often, and only modified it in significant ways, which meant I'd then forget key combinations immediately. This was particularly prevalent for anything where you have to tune responsiveness/movement/timing.
I switched from a Moonlander to a UHK, and the programming time is ~instant. You click flash and in 1-2 seconds it's done. For the Moonlander you have to download the firmware, find the file, drag and drop onto the flashing tool, and wait 10+ seconds. It's amazing how much of a difference that made for me.
So yes, get a keyboard with programmable keys, but not all are created equal, find one that lets you have a very tight feedback loop and you'll be so much happier.
> I switched from a Moonlander to a UHK, and the programming time is ~instant. You click flash and in 1-2 seconds it's done. For the Moonlander you have to download the firmware, find the file, drag and drop onto the flashing tool, and wait 10+ seconds. It's amazing how much of a difference that made for me.
Actually I point out you can use webusb to flash it (if you use Chrome) further down ...
That must be a new feature? This didn't exist when I got my UHK, and was why I ended up selling my Moonlander.
How long does the flash take? Having it in Chrome is a great step forward, but if it still takes 10-20s to flash that would still prevent the sort of feedback loop that I found so transformational.
Seconds. I mean, something on the order of that, anyway. Fast enough to iterate but I mean it's still the weakest link in the iteration chain of course.
Yeah, unfortunately I have to agree with you. It's just enough friction in flashing that I rarely do it.
Not sure if the author is reading these comments but if you like the Moonlander but don’t like how the thumb cluster is tied to the tenting angle, I strongly recommend their ZSA tenting solution. It makes the whole thing a lot sturdier but more importantly it lets you adjust the tenting angle independently from the thumb cluster angle. You can also probably find used ones online.
I know you mention it already in the article but it is really worth trying out. You even get more tenting angles that would previously be impossible without it. And it just makes the whole thing a lot sturdier.
For anyone curious about this, the tenting solution is available here[0].
I wrote about it in my review of the Moonlander[1]. In short, in addition to much more stable angle adjustment, you get an additional 46 degrees of adjustment (11 degrees with the tent legs vs 57 degrees with the platform kit.)
It does tend to slide around a bit on a smooth desk, but I solved that with some rubber matting glued to the bottom.
0 - https://www.zsa.io/moonlander/platform
1 - https://marcusb.org/posts/2025/08/two-years-with-the-zsa-moo...
Good to know, thanks! Now that I 3d print (apropos hobbies with infinite depth...) I would probably just CAD design and print my own instead, but I've come to accept the limitations, such as it is, of the moonlander's tenting design.
I bought a moonlander in 2020 after work gave us a work from home credit when we transitioned to remote for Covid. I tried it but couldn’t get into it and it sat collecting dust for years. In 2024 I dove back into splits with a kinesis freestyle 2. I loved it as it felt more natural as it’s a basic keyboard just split.
After I got used to that I was able to migrate to the moonlander pretty easily. I just had to spend the time to sent it up properly for programming.
Now I own 2, each with the platform addon, which solves many of the issues with tenting as you no longer have to pivot the thumb cluster. It is expensive though.
Both keyboards also have shrimp switches to make typing pretty quiet.
This combined with a ball mouse have solved my RSI that developed a few years ago entirely.
I like my Moonlander, but if you want to see a real scam of a keyboard try buying (please don't) one of "WORK LOUDER"'s keyboards like the Nomad E. $350-500, gimmicks you'll never use, non-open-source firmware, cheap build quality, no refunds.
After getting shoulder bursitis two years ago--although the direct cause was sports, not desk habits--I dove into the world of split ergo keyboards. I did get one (a Kyria v3) and learned to type on it at an acceptable speed--although still significantly slower than my speed on a regular keyboard.
Wanting to optimize my layout, I did research into my typing behavior and logged my keystrokes (and storing these logs as securely as I would a password). Analysis did give me notable insights (e.g. by far my most used keys are arrow keys, for selecting text), but my main conclusion was that even during a regular full day of programming preferring my keyboard over my mouse (tiling window manager, hotkeys, browser extension to virtually click on elements using keys), I don't actually type that much, and if I do, it is in bursts, never more than 20 seconds or so.
Although I find typing on a split fun and comfortable, I went back to a regular keyboard because the hit in productivity is not worth it for me. The experiment did teach me how to improve my ergonomics. I optimized my desk height and bought a very flat and less wide keyboard, with the completely unused numpad section chopped off ("TKL") so if I do grab my mouse there is less travel.
I have had bad cubital tunnel in the past, enough so that I was learning to become ambidextrous to stop using my left hand. A surgery helped tremendously in my case, but I’m still prone to flare ups if I overuse my pinky.
An Ergodox EZ has been a lifesaver, I’ve reprogrammed it so I don’t need to use my left pinky anything other than letter keys (goodbye left shift, you’ve pained me for too long). I fully agree with the articles advice; pair a good programmable keyboard with physical activity to keep the hands working long term.
Be warned though: the more customized your keyboard the harder it is type when using a laptop or friends keyboard.
I'm using Ergodox for 9 years and still can touch type fluently on laptop keyboard. However, I never do heavy programming tasks on the laptop, only messaging, notes and small fixes.
I think the more customized your Ergodox layout is the easier it is for the brain to treat 2 different keyboards as 2 different input devices.
I solved my RSI with rest, a vertical mouse, and ZSA Moonlanders. I eventually bought one for home use and one for work use with great performance for the past four years. I can’t imagine going back, especially after replacing the key switches to quieter variants.
The split keyboard opens up the middle of my desk to fit an adjustable stand (Parblo and ElevationLab work well). So I can write and draw by hand if I want.
I love my Ergodox EZ except that I haven't flashed it for years and I'm not totally sure what all the keys did on all the layers. Still worth it, somehow!!
Another vote for the Glove 80: I used the Kinesis Advantage 2 for 10 years (after a few initial signs of finger pain developing), then tried the new 360; and recently got the glove 80 so I could easily travel with it and fell in love with the keyboard.
It definitely doesn't feel as solid as the Kinesis or ergodox (which I used intermittently as well) but is the most comfortable keyboard I've used, the LEDs are actually useful (for showing battery life and bluetooth connections), and there are enough keys (including function keys); I don't like having to reason about layers at all, I want to be able to smoothly transition to my laptop's keyboard in a pinch).
There are still key combos that I could tap out with lightning speed on my old keyboard that I still struggle to type as fast: C-M-- (negative argument) followed by another key, such as C-M-k, is one such example.
I wish I had more keys, yet ironically I have empty keys I do not use at all on the keyboard.
Stick those sequences on those empty keys as macros. Or assign one of those empty keys to control-meta.
Just got the ZSA Voyager a couple months ago and love it. It goes with me to and from work. For me, the biggest draw is just the more natural sitting position, I've found that I love having my trackball mouse in the center between the two halves along with a cup of coffee.
I struggled with the Moonlander although it is a wonderful keyboard.
I mapped it to a Colemak layout varient when I first got it. I was constantly discovering key combos that didn't quite work for whatever reason and made tweaks to the layout or the shortcuts in various editors. Forever tying my brain in knots learning and relearning mappings and combos. Then I'd frequently jump on other peoples computers/laptops to help out with small things and have to switch back to the old mode of thinking.
It ended up being a productivity sink rather than a boon. I don't know whether I would have crossed some inflection point if I had persevered, but there was always this fixed cost of tweaking shortcuts when using new software that was more burdensome than with a plain qwerty keyboard.
Maybe I was too ambitious and should have avoided the Colemak-esque layout, but I haven't managed to summon the stamina to give it a fair go again. I still use one half of it for gaming though. It's really sweet for that.
I found I couldn't get colemak to work for me. Like you said, too many key combos that just felt awkward. I wound up using a layout[1] called "middlemak" that feels much more comfortable to me, and preserves a lot of qwerty hand if not actual key positions, which helped in the initial switch. Took me a few months to get up to a relatively normal typing speed and a year in (of maybe 2-4 days of use a week depending on whether I'm working from the road or not) and I still have to look at my keys about 50% of the time, but it's improving and since I only customized this one keyboard, it doesn't seem to have broken my muscle memory for a standard qwerty keyboard.
[1]: https://configure.zsa.io/ergodox-ez-st/layouts/wzKWq/latest/...
I'd say it's definitely the colemak change. They keyboard by itself takes some getting used to, a new layout on top would be overwhelming.
I kept mine pretty close to a standard qwerty - the only customizations are where I put the "\|", backspace, dash and a few other keys, along with what to do with all the thumb keys. Even with these relatively minor changes, it still took me about a week to recover my WPM, and I had to use their touch typing software to practice for an hour or two. Making only a few changes also makes it seamless to switch to laptop keyboards, etc.
This matches my experience exactly. I use a standard QWERTY setup on the moonlander, with only changes being the thumb clusters and changing caps lock to backspace. After a few days of practicing, it feels natural and seamless to switch back and forth.
I got a moonlander for programming. The defaulting tenting is indeed a lame joke, so I got the platform, which is made out of steel(!). It's heavy, but rock solid and stable. I mapped commonly used Fn-key combos on the number rows as long press i.e. cmd-Fn-4 is a long press on 4. The web UI makes this dead simple to setup and customize. That said, I read from the guy who build the Svalboard to put the keyboard on a tray below the desk. I actually did that and, man, that was a revelation. I have one of those motorized desks with adjustable height, and with the tray the Moonlander is now roughly on the same level as the arm rest from the chair. It reduced the tension in my shoulders noticeably. It's a vastly improved typing experience.
Had been looking at these for some time. A few days of pain where I couldn’t type much and the threat tariffs turning on at the end of the month, this was early August, caused me to pull the trigger on a Voyager, ZSA’s low profile keyboard.
Couldn’t be happier. I’ve used QMK, even writing some C for a board, and limited key keyboards before and their software really does make it a lot simpler to configure. It’s also really nice to have leds indexable per key so you can color code things when you’re learning.
They cost a lot more now for those in the US[0] but I’d still recommend them. My pain hasn’t come back and honestly even at +20% that’s worth it.
0: https://www.reddit.com/r/zsaVoyager/comments/1n9en4b/us_tari...
I bought a ZSA Moonlander a few years ago and it went a bit like this:
1. Unpack and immediately set up a Colemak-DH layout. Customize the layout twice a day for 4 months. This is PAINFUL, slow and unproductive.
2. Got comfortable with Colemak and stopped doing any typing exercises. Still tweaking my layout.
3. Didn’t know where to position my mouse, so I got an Apple Trackpad 2 that sits beautifully between the two halves. Works great on Linux. Keep the mouse around for gaming.
4. Finally productive. I make minor changes to my layout every 6 months. Colemak is ingrained in my muscle memory. It’s just so comfortable.
And don’t worry about forgetting how to type QWERTY; the secret to retain muscle memory is that an ortholinear split keyboard is sufficiently different from a regular one that it’s like learning a completely new instrument. Hard at first, but it would be hard even if the layout was familiar; might as well then switch to something better than QWERTY.
I love my split keyboard now. Games are a bit annoying but I can easily switch to my gaming-QWERTY-hybrid layout (QWERTY on the left hand, colemak w/ tweaks on the right). Specialist tools like Blender might need minor rebinding to find comfort.
When I type on a regular laptop, I find shift+numbers for symbols to be hilariously unergonomic compared to my symbol layer, I don’t know how the hell people cope doing Rust or Haskell or even Lisp.
So I have a WASD ISO full keyboard with Cherry Blue keys that I did custom MacOS keytops for that is starting to lose both keytop prints and the keys are starting to occasionally misfire.
How hard is it to find a full 101/104 mechanical keyboard, with cherry blue, ISO layout (ie big upside-down Enter/Return) with customizable keytops that are in en-US and have the MacOS keytops (L: control/option/command, R: command/option/fn) and the appropriate MacOS function key tops?
All of the ISO that I could find have one or another of the EU layouts, which I don't need or want.
That might be hard to find, but pretty easy to configure. Take any ISO keyboard you like, buy custom keycaps for the keys you want to look different.
Keychron? I realise their prebuilt variants may have ISO layouts only for the various EU market segments, but they all run QMK so you could reflash with en-US keymap. They come with a set of replacement Mac/Win keycaps already, and have a physical switch to flip between the two variants.
Then reshuffle the physical keycaps to match your layout.
(Disclosure: I have two of their ISO keyboards: Q10 and Q11. Both require a wrist support, they are thick.)
The keychron K10 max seems closest to what I want and has the keytops I want (with a bit of rearranging). The UK keytops are the closest to what I want,
I already use Karabiner to swap a few things, so that's probably the closest.
Just need to be able to get blue switches, I WFH and there's no one around to be bothered by the clicking.
Considering I started "typing" on an ASR-33, and then an original IBM PC, I want the clicks :)
I got the smaller K7 gen2 with their now-discontinued clicky blues and love it; really like the very light activation force.
Pretty sure the switches are hot swappable.
There are also many more types than just regular cherry mx blue nowadays if you want clicky.
My advice would be to buy some clicky switch samples from somewhere like this; https://mechbox.co.uk/collections/switches-singles
I put together https://aposymbiont.github.io/split-keyboards/ a while ago to help decide between ergonomic keyboards.
However, it's not become a hobby, and I'm satisfied with the keyboards I bought in 2019 and have no plans to replace them.
If anyone is interested in taking over the site, I'm willing to transfer the repository, which should mean GitHub make an HTTP redirect.
There’s too much filler in this writing. And can’t find a photo of the specific mentioned keyboard?
Given the website, is worth noting that keyboards like this can avoid the infamous Emacs pinky. I've got the keys two rows below the homerow bound to the modifiers right alt, super, alt, control, and shift. And reversed on the other hand. This makes any modifier shortcuts very ergonomic -- one hand 'chords' the modifiers and the other hits the non-modifier key.
Kinda off topic for this discussion, but has anyone found a 8 key macro keyboard that doesn't wear out after a few months?
It seems to be the usb plug failing that does it.
This may or may not change your perspective on keyboards. Assuming Covid never happened:
- How many hours a day do you spend driving?
- How much do you/did you spend on your car?
- Did you purchase the cheapest car that just filled the need you had (aesthetics, comfort, etc. are therefore off the table, "gets N people to N places")? If not, why not?
- How many hours a day do you spend typing?
- How much did you spend on your keyboard?
If you haven't tried a good mechanical keyboard see if you know someone who has one and spend some time using it.
Switched early to a left-handed 65% keyboard setup—Keychron K7 Max QM7 on the left, Trackpad Pro and MX Master 3S on the right. Feels quick, natural, and fixes what Apple’s keyboards never did.
Oddly, switching to a custom Lisp Machine-inspired keyboard has been better for hand/wrist pain than my Ergodox or the Kinesis Advantage I used before. It's a staggered key, non-split, flat QWERTY keyboard. I think maybe they're just good keyswitches? Here's the keyboard: https://jfloren.net/b/2024/10/23/0
My main keyboard has been a 34-key split Ferris. I usually have either a trackpad between the halves if I’m using a Mac or an ergonomic Logitech if on my Linux desktop. Not having to move my hands at all while being able to reach any keys/characters I need has been a welcomed change, worth remapping my brain.
https://arjtala.github.io/2022/09/17/ferris-compact.html
Agreed. It quickly becomes "awkward" to go back to using a numpad once you get used to ALWAYS being one key hold/press away from it. I can type numbers as easily as I can type capitals, ditto with every symbol, and my function keys.
Hell I've even worked on a couple of revision on "gaming" layers. Namely for FPS or older roguelikes.
I hate how hard it is to find a split space(feels mandatory now that i'm used to it) 40% with wireless and QMK/Zia/etc. The EPOMAKER-TH40 SHOULD be perfect, but turns out they put out a breaking patch or something and it's not ACTUALLY programmable anymore. I need something like this for 2 setups at homes.
I went around on a couple of things and landed on the split 4x5 Chiri CE for my everyday workhorse since it's easy to carry.
https://keeb.io/products/chiri-ce-keyboard-kit?variant=41088...
Of note, while that board seems to be out of stock and isn't for everyone i cannot recommend keeb.io enough. They've done a fantastic job of keeping my board running after I had some ESD ruin it once or twice, and have never charged me as it was still under warranty.
With how hit or miss a lot of this niche keyboard stuff is, it's really really nice to find people who stand by their product and can turn things around. I get its got to be a miserable market so I don't demand it, and I'm extremely happy when I do see it.
I had rapidly worsening RSI, thought my career as a developer was ending. Switching to VIM completely solved it. Not to take away from what fancy keyboards can do for you, but if you were already contemplating VIM then this would be a great (additional) reason to try it.
I use a $20 keyboard/mousepad combo. But with the open source Kanata keyboard software, it's more powerful and configurable than QMK. It's brilliant. Not for everybody, but even the author in the article said 80% of the value add, is QMK.
I have two moonlanders but wound up giving up because I just couldn't adapt to it. And when writing code, finding the symbols like {, =, }, and other common coding ones was just too difficult to retain muscle memory. I tried many layouts, I tried to make my own, and at the end of the day it was just too different. I wish I had a better experience.
Any recommendations?
Muscle memory is exactly what it sounds like, you need more repetition. If you are becoming frustrated, you can try to reduce your cognitive load. ZSA has an app for all platforms called "Keymapp". It's primarily used for flashing firmware but shows the key assignments in real time. I use only 1 monitor but I've repurposed my laptop screen to always display keymapp so I can see which key/layer has the symbol I am looking for when I don't have the mental capacity to remember.
The default layers are pretty good, but I found programming the keys/layers to what made sense to me to be more beneficial. I use the heat map to see which keys get the most milage and program layers around that. Then I only program a few new keys at a time and get a feel for things. My words-per-minute went down initially but now it is back.
I have been tweaking my layout for about a month and am close to being happy with it. I've set myself a milestone that when I don't make any tweaks for 6 months I will buy custom keycaps that have my exact symbols/layers on each key.
I didn't like the default layouts for symbols either and wound up building this layout[1] (there have been a few minor tweaks since but nothing substantial). The parens as double taps on the shift keys is the big one for me for writing code. The other brackets on the inside are convenient enough to use but not occupying "prime" space, and I have "auto-shift" enabled so a top on "[" give that character, but holding it down (for > 160ms) gives "{" (and same for all the other keys and their respective shifted versions. And in case it isn't clear what's going on in the thumb clusters, the two enter keys and the space key do their respective actions on tap, and do Left CTRL, ALT or Right CTRL respectively when held down. Might be a place to start if you wanted to try again.
Also on the "muscle memory" thing, I decided early on to not try to modify any other keyboards in my life. Just the ergodox get the middlemak and super custom layout. I found that preserves muscle memory for laptop built in keyboards and using other people's and allows my brain to form a completely separate set of muscle memory that kicks in on the ergodox and neither seem to conflict with each other. Works for my brain, might work for you too.
[1]: https://configure.zsa.io/ergodox-ez-st/layouts/wzKWq/latest/...
- Learn their default layout first, then iterate on your personal preferences. I similarly tried a bunch at first, but realized switching layouts constantly was making it impossible to build up the new muscle memory.
- Spend time practicing away from important coding tasks (e.g. gaming, writing, a side project, a one-off script, etc.). Being able to learn in a forgiving environment, outside of deadlines, gives you the space to allow mistakes and time to correct them
Try something like a Sinc: https://keeb.io/products/sinc-rev-4-split-staggered-75-keybo...
It's still mechanical, it's still split, it's still QMK programmable, it's got hotswap sockets so you can try different switches... but it's also an extremely normal staggered layout with function keys and everything.
I think it's worth trying the ortho 'n' layers approach, because it has real wins to it; but if you've tried it and don't like it, this is one step closer to normalcy, while still keeping many of the wins.
I've mapped paired symbols to the same finger on opposite hands, so ()[]{}<>/\'" are mirrored, and then also I've got numbers and symbols corresponding as well so the 123... pad on my right is a !@#... pad on my left. It gets me pretty far, but not everything has a mate so I occasionally have a brain fart moment and suddenly I'm hunting for | even though I have years worth of muscle memory on this layout.
So I guess I'd say: design to lean on familiar structures as much as you can and then just commit to using it a lot and don't give yourself too hard of a time when it gets wierd. Whatever you come up with will surely beat the pain associated with having your right on of pinky in charge of 50% of the symbols plus enter.
How long did you spend trying to adjust? it takes some time. I consistently made typos for about 2 months and then it quickly became very natural to type. My only advice here is to slog through the typos for a couple months. Our brains are flexible enough to adapt.
Yes, you simply need more practice.
Keyboards, layouts etc won't matter as you'll have the same difficulties you're feeling now, no matter what you choose.
Practice and patience, that is the cure.
The thing I don’t like about keyboards this is that I still have to use a mouse and these keyboards don’t really address that. If I mounted on the arms of my desk, it’s even harder to get to the mouse. Maybe a few people can get away with just them all day, but I can’t.
It's a pretty big departure from traditional keyboards, but there are a bunch of dactyl variants which have a trackball in the thumb cluster. I'm not sure how practical this really is, having never used one, but it's conceptually nifty.
I switched from a Moonlander to a UHK, and I have the trackball module for it. Life changing. I don't use a mouse anymore and instead have a trackball right under my thumb.
Wow. UHK has Trackball, Trackpoint or Trackpad options and you can click with the left thumb while moving with the right. That’s incredible! Thanks!
Maybe someday I can afford this, but I miss the IBM Thinkpad Trackpoint.
I love my Glove80 with Pro Red chocs. Kinesis Advantage for 15 years before that one.
Another commenter complained that it feels insubstantial. However its light weight is much preferred for travel. It's fine.
100% agree. I have almost never travelled with my Advantage2 or 360 when I still had them. But the Glove80 is so light that it’s easy to carry with me.
The Advantage helped me a lot, but the Glove80 is the only keyboard I’ve truly loved using. The key well is insanely well-designed and even though the tenting is a bit of work to set up, it is really tailored to my preferred angle.
MoErgo is also expanding the Choc keyboard space with really nice silent switches (Cherry/Plum Blossom) and keycaps.
I mentioned in my comment not liking how flimsy is felt. It is very light and that can be a plus but when I tried traveling with it with tenting setup, often the rods became loose, it formed an awkward shape so didn't fit in the carrying case they provided in the first place, would not sit well in my backpack, and often times I'm not sure why but keys would pop out.
Resetting the tenting up everytime I travel/go somewhere with it is not really convenient at all, so its not really a decent option.
I don't often travel with the 360, but when I do, I just lower it to the lowest level and its never had an issue except for the obvious bulkiness.
Another issue is because its so light, it would often shift around on my desk while typing, and I've seen others complain about this as well. Maybe its just an issue of how hard you type, or how much friction your desk provides.
If I could get a mix between a 360 with the shape of the glove 80's keywell and key setup, but with the sturdiness of the 360 I'd buy it no questions asked.
I dislike the tenting and often lose them so I just put something under the keyboard halves to tilt them. Later I want to get their mounting kit and just use these tiny pocket tripods I have (can't find the name but they have no rod), or find a good way to put magsafe rings on them to use with other sturdy mini tripods I have.
Glove80++
The whole area is full of contradictions:
- mechanical keys - reduced movement;
- buy a custom build - have industrial build quality;
- barely any movement - good blood flow;
- avoid rolling - type fast;
- concave keyboards - tenting;
- fewer keys - minimal;
- uniformly shaped keys - touch typing feedback;
- keep hands on the keyboard - move pointer precisely;
- custom layout - conventional shortcuts.
This is ridiculous. I no longer take this field seriously. I get it, we get bored and need a new toy sometimes. Some indeed acquired a medical condition and need medical equipment to type now.
I noticed when I exercise I can sit comfortably on a firm basic stool, and when I don't I become a princess on a pea.
How about we start with the basics? Good posture, correct hand positions, monitor at the right level, exercise, nutrition. Then an IBM Model M would suffice.
This actually exists in every field to some extent.
Humans get bored and at some point, we need to make complicated answers/explications/justifications to stuff that are actually very simple.
Saying, just practice, pay attention and measure/test progress doesn't cut it for many; especially since some don't want to come to the realization that they'll probably never get better because of their own limitations.
This is why there are always people selling "solutions" that are mostly snake oil, the promise is always that it'll get better, faster, stronger, whatever.
One area that is ripe with those sorts of things is weight loss. It is an extremely simple problem, just eat less calories than you consume and you'll be good. But since humans are faillible and sometimes have hard time making progress, you get all kinds of protocols/tools and whatnot that only achieve the same goal but in a roundabout way.
If people believe in them, sometimes it helps (most of the time not). This is the exact same with keyboards, the problem is not at all with the keyboard, it's all lack of physical activity and bad posture. But saying: just take breaks, do calisthenics (or swimming or any full body workout sport really) and it will get better doesn't satisfy many. Those who want a "quick fix" they can buy are disappointed and those who want to sell a "solution" can't push their snake oil that would make them money (they often are believers themselves, so it doesn't matter if it doesn't really make a difference).
Not to be a Debbie Downer, but even if you use all of the correct postures, correct movement, and everything is done correctly, you can still end up with issues if you just do the same thing over and over.
It's relatively agreed upon nowadays that there actually is no "correct posture". The issue is primarily exacerbated by being in the same posture all of the time, doing the same movements all the time, and especially so in positions that aren't so natural for our body - and typing is not a natural movement/position for the wrists.
I developed issues despite always standing or sitting on a supposed ergonomic char, moving my hands a lot while typing, working out and exercising consistently, etc.
Until I started having issues I probably would have also been in the same camp that "oh this is ridiculous". Now I take anyone with chronic pain much more seriously.
I owned a Moonlander before and found that the keyboard layout didn’t matter much to my productivity.
I have a Microsoft sculpt at work, and a macbook. The macbook keyboard has been great IME.
If you have serious RSI I strongly suggest Svalboard.
https://svalboard.com/
Having gone down the rabbit hole of concave keyboards from Kinesis advantage to iterations of self printed dactyl manifolds I ended up at Svalboard too.
Combined with adjustable carrier arms it has enabled me to continue working even post recent shoulder surgery.
Yes it’s an obscene amount of money but it works and enables me to continue earning a living in front of a screen.
Steno is 100% the way to go to avoid and heal RSI. Infinitely more ergonomic. It also erases much of the difference between Emacs and VIM (assuming you use repeat and 1up). Yes, it has to be learned. But you already learned Emacs or VIM, so clearly you're not afraid to invest a little now for a big return later (e.g. no RSI). It's also fun.
I love my moonlander. I bought it on release and it is best computer accessory I know of. I extensively customized the software. My favourite is controlling cursor with keyboard, I have one hand mode, etc.
One note — when I purchased the Moonlander their "The Platform" wasn't available. I bought it couple month ago and it improved experience even more.
Have a Glove80 on the way.
I've found just switching between differently shaped keyboards regularly was enough to cure my RSI. I don't have anything fancy: a Unicomp Model M at work and a Microsoft Natural at home.
I've been using a 42-key corne for 5 years and I can't imagine using a regular keyboard. The way I sit is now different: my arms are spread apart instead of crowding in front of me. This alone helps me pay more attention to the work I'm doing because I'm not hunching over. It took a few months for the layout to sink in, but the ability to customize the layout was insanely helpful and now the way I interface with a computer is exactly how I think it ought to be. The entire thing was $90 with a 3d printed case that's still holding strong. I tented it with some jenga blocks and it's flawless. I almost never look at the thing.
The Moonlander is way too large IMO. A 42 key layout is about perfect and requires ~zero wrist movement.
The corne has three thumb buttons on each side, but it's effectively five thumb buttons on each side because two can be pressed at the same time. So your layout can be [Mod1] [Layer] [Mod2] and you can easily use [Mod1]/[Mod2] with anything on [Layer]. And when you press [Mod1], a thumb key on the other hand becomes [Mod2]. So you basically get to use every possible combo. I have five mod keys this way: Shift, Ctrl, Alt, Super and Hyper. And multiple layer keys.
Those thumbs are doing a lot of work. Can't imagine that being ergonomic.
Thumbs are one of your stronger fingers. In contrast the pinky is by far the weakest but we have dedicated it to almost every modifier and outlying key. I currently use an Elora from SplitKB so I can't speak to the Moonlanders thumb cluster, but if you find one you like it's a massive difference in how much usage you can get out of your thumbs while typing.
Thumbs can get overuse injuries: https://getreuer.info/posts/keyboards/thumb-ergo/index.html
I have used ergo keyboards with thumb clusters for several years now. After a while, even though switching to a split ergo keyboard alleviated wrist pains, I developed thumb discomfort.
In the end I solved it by only frequently using the resting key of each thumb (space and backspace). And using the other thumb keys for infrequent things. I use homerow mods to have all modifiers in the alpha block.
if you find one you like it's a massive difference in how much usage you can get out of your thumbs while typing
Until they start to hurt. It can take a few years (just like wrist pains). Be careful!
The Elora I use follows the circular thumb cluster format so I have three keys per thumb that can be used with little movement the rest are for rarely used layer switches and such. One of those three is for often used layers.
I have homerow mods configured but still need to work on using them more. Unfortunately a lot of what's best for typing conflicts with what's best for gaming. Almost every example split layout puts space on the right half and I move it to the left. Still need shift and control on pinky holds. And the Elora has an exaggerated pinky stagger but swapped to WQSD makes an almost perfect diamond, but at the expense of the old Q now being A is below instead of above and Z is really far away.
For me the biggest benefit of thumb keys isn't finger strength, it's the fact that the thumb is separated from the rest of the hand. It's really easy to hit a thumb key while hitting any other key on the "main" part of the keyboard. Whereas on a traditional keyboard, typing something like shift-T or ctrl-R requires stretching out your hand.
It's really easy to hit a thumb key while hitting any other key on the "main" part of the keyboard.
Mirrored home row mods are even much nicer (IMO).
Thumbs are also less agile than all the other fingers, so having it move around a lot is not great.
Also, RSI on your thumb (especially with smartphone usage) is very common.
So yes, you should probably have the most frequent keys on your thumbs but only very few (I'd say 1-2).
Not sure why people are downvoting this. This is a serious concern and quite a lot some people using thumb clusters develop thumb discomfort or pain: https://getreuer.info/posts/keyboards/thumb-ergo/index.html
In my experience (having also had thumb discomfort on ergo boards) thumb clusters can be great, but you have to make sure to avoid too much thumb movement.
When I first got a keyboard with a thumb cluster that had 6 keys I was originally a bit overzealous and had a bunch of relatively frequently used keys assigned to them. I actually ended up developing a little bit of what I think was some tendonitis in my thumbs when I first started using it quite a bit.
Ever since then, I primarily only use two of the keys of each thumb clusters with frequency, and they both require very little movement to reach (the two large keys on a kinesis 360). The others that require a little bit more extending of the thumb are more infrequently used keys that don't ring all the time.