I've been on the lookout for a partial keyboard for my left hand for gaming;

Recently, I started trying to play Helldivers 2 online with some family members but find on my mechanical keyboard that I get hand cramp very quickly, most of the keys needed are in bottom-left of the keyboard and I have big hands, and my keys take a lot more pressure than is ideal for gaming.

I bought a Razer Tartarus Pro but found it was basically useless on Linux.

Does anyone here have any suggestions of something that I could use? I tried to use a controller to see if that would help, but no matter what I did I couldn't get any controller (PS5, XBox One S, Switch Pro) to actual provide input to the game under Proton despite working fine in other games.

I'm playing on Steam/Proton on CachyOS.

I tried an ergonomic keyboard with just 3x10 keys (or rather since it was a split keybaord, 2x3x5). I found that I am unwilling to spend the time to learn how to use it, type special characters, numbers, etc. Especially since most of my training time would need to take place during work, where I didn't want to take that huge initial efficiency hit. In the end, I chose a ZSA Moonlander and I'm super happy with it, even though it might have too many keys for enthusiasts ;)

That being said, I do have a soft spot for handheld hacker keyboards like this. It reminds me of the cyber future we all dreamed of when we were younger, when tech was still cool and exciting. Very cool project!

Maybe record a short video with the hand typing in the foreground and a screen in the background. To give an idea of the typing effort and speed.

Bravo! Apparently they are known as keyers.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Keyer#Computer_interface_keyer...

Edit: Circa 1980 when I was young and impressionable, my father's buddy had a WriteHander and since then I have loved this kind of thing.

http://ibnteo.klava.org/keyboard/writehander

This is peak hacker. I love this. I love that it's COTS components, I love that the contoured bit is clay. An efficient build.

Dude, this is so cool! I've had something like this floating around my cluttered headspace for ages, and it always sort of floats to the surface during the rare times when I do some light sysadmin work via Termux on my phone.

Another thing that jumps to mind is the minichord[1], a nominally open-source synth/instrument.

I just love seeing these little devices people can come up with given the proliferation of the necessary devboards and tools. Nice project.

As I hate tapping on glass, mistyping non-stop, I’m always evaluating options. This is an awesome project and a great write up, but we want more! :) Please consider published a video so we might see it in action (also showing the build process would be appreciated).

Totally rad.

Now you just need and Oculus and you can turn yourself into Johnny Mnemonic.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UzRjtvMQds4&t=63s

Very cool! Azeron makes these but not as hand-held (might be of interest for them?), and much more keys. Because they have so many keys, you can do some easy chording and what not, allowing you to completely replace a keyboard with one. Which is great for people who only have one arm/hand, including war veterans.

They have a 60 days return policy which I find very generous. They're based in Latvia. Some parts are 3D printed. Their website [1].

I mention them since I happen to own a Cyro, which is an outlier to their portfolio: a vertical _mouse_ with a lot of buttons. The only decent one I'm aware of, and the choice is very limited in that space. I'm happy, though I'd love to have it wireless. I tried modding it with USB2BT but ran into some issues, YMMV.

[1] https://www.azeron.eu

For folks who are interested in the UX design of chorded layouts, Artsey and Ardux (https://ardux.io) might be of interest. Artsey is a specific 2x4 one-handed chorded layout (of which Ardux is now a more robust implementation, with optional variations for slightly larger numbers of keys) that borrows a lot from colemak. I'm a big fan.

I particularly appreciate the simplicity of a 2x4 layout — OP's device rocks, but I worry about the ergonomics of thumb movement.

Cute. I use a Bluehand (https://taoofmac.com/space/blog/2023/08/08/1230) and have often thought it would be nice to not have to set it down someplace...

Great to see someone trying to innovate. It's surprising humans haven't come up with a better input method than an old school keyboard. Who would have thought that a typewriter from 1874 would still be so visible on a modern Macbook!

Surely, there has to be a better way.

I want something like this so that I can get rid of the computer workstation and instead use a 8k+8k VR headset on battery

I would love to see a video of this in action.

I had a similar idea when apple vision pro came out, to be able to code while laying on a couch or bed fully relaxed, but never got to doing it. Neat!

Haven't read comments yet but I just now excitedly `lightbulbed a MAFIK ][', that seems simple and completes the `other side': a tactile terminal, seems obvious, so I apologize if this is redundant. Billions of free recycled tiny motors tipped w/ eccentric cellphone vibrators at different freqs, if audible some other silent buzzer/solinoid/..piezo(flat form factor..input also?!), smaller earbud's speaker elements, per finger contact. Variable freq each buzzer may also equal entire space of chording combos. Serves deaf/blind equally well.

I had vague ideas, a few years ago, of integrating a keyboard into the handlebar of a recumbent tricycle (it would need to not interfere with braking, but there’s a fair bit of leeway left for useful design). Modelling clay had indeed not occurred to me! Nor had I realised how chorded keyboards could hook directly to GPIO pins. If I’d seen this back then, I probably would have gone ahead and prototyped something right away. Alas for this vision (though not alas in general!), I got married instead and my long-distance cycling days are behind me. But I’m still rather tempted to play with this, it looks fun and surprisingly straightforward, even if I can’t immediately see a good practical purpose in my life. Just last week I happened to see a box of epoxy modelling clay and wondered what it would be like to use… though I suspect it might harden too quickly for this.

I’m not sure about drinking tea with an 18650 unprotected strapped to your hand like that. The battery should at least have a holder

This is super cool, Specially for VRs and Augmented Ray-bans. I still prefer a mechanical keyboard to type stuff.

The most mind blowing part of this is using modelling clay (I’m assuming the stuff that hardens to like foam texture).

What sort of typing speed do you reach with it?

This looks less aggressive than the one that covers your fist

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Eklg7CKs57A&t=172s

I always wanted dual gloves like this so I could essentially tap on my legs while sitting down.

This is fantastic, I've been looking for something like this for over a year so I can type while going for a walk on the treadmill.

Check out this design: https://patents.google.com/patent/US20030179178A1/en

ohh so basically an ESP32 can be a keyboard… can _two_ ESP32s be two hands of a single keyboard?

I really want something like this to pair with my iPad Pro when working in design tools (Affinity, Procreate, whatever). Apple Pencil in one hand, accessible keyboard shortcuts in the other.

My solution was to stick a tiny cheap macro keyboard on the back of the iPad... but I don't love the ergonomics.

Awesome work, well done.

Cool! Did you consider using more compact keys and caps?

- cost function for layouts?! awesome

- play doh

- IMU would be incredible

- less key version is good idea

great job showing this, inspiring!

I want this not for typing all the letters and numbers, but just the keyboard shortcuts to play Empire Earth V4 VR

- until that fantasy materializes maybe enough typing for an Age of Empires type game without being stuck at a full keyboard,

something like this maybe the perfect in-between ps4 controller and full keyboard for many things.

That’s some true hacker device!

Very nice work. Might not hurt to throw in a few more pictures that illustrate the steps in the build process.

Nice work! I'm happy to see that some folks are still interested in wearable computing.

The Twiddler gives me hand cramps, so I might give this one a shot. (It's low on the pile, however.)

You should look into thermoplastic like InstaMorph instead of clay.

love the design, it would be crazy if this becomes a thing!

Yeah that brings new definition to pebkac...

Bending fingers so much during use is bad for your tendons and ligaments.

Just don’t go introducing yourself as a one handed typist.

I want a pen shaped gyroscopic mouse to use while watching/interacting with stuff through AR glasses, just needs to point click, right click & two buttons for custom keystrokes

There was a product very similar to this in the late 1980s. My uncle invested in the company. But it flopped. I am sorry I cannot remember the name. I do remember skilled typists could use it at least as fast as 2 hand traditional typing.

omg i luv u

awesome

Add this to the list of “18650 cells being incorrectly used as removable batteries”. At this point the sale of those battery holders should be banned…

Not a new thing. Twiddler is on version 4. https://www.mytwiddler.com/