Ceci est une ancienne révision du document !
Last month, I expressed my desire to own a reduced ergodox keyboard. It literally just arrived (about 18 hours before writing this article). As such, I’ll be covering my initial impressions of the keyboard, as well as some things I wish I had known when flashing the keyboard for the first time. Specifications • The keyboard was ordered from FalbaTech in Poland, and features the following: • braided, coiled cables (TRRS and micro USB to USB type A) • Bamboo case with tilting legs greetech MX brown switches • RGB underglow • 4 x 1u blue keycaps (in order to reach free shipping threshold) I did not order keycaps with the keyboard itself, as I found a local supplier that offered keycaps more to my liking.
Le mois dernier, j'ai exprimé mon désir de posséder un clavier ergonomique réduit. Il vient tout juste d'arriver (environ 18 heures avant la rédaction de cet article). Je vais donc vous faire part de mes premières impressions sur ce clavier, ainsi que de certains aspects que j'aurais aimé connaître lorsque j'ai flashé pour la première fois sur le clavier.
Caractéristiques techniques - Le clavier a été commandé chez FalbaTech en Pologne, et présente les caractéristiques suivantes : - câbles tressés, spiralés (TRRS et micro USB vers USB type A) - Etui en bambou avec pieds inclinables - Commutateurs bruns greetech MX - Sous-lumière RGB - 4 x 1u touches bleues (pour atteindre le seuil de livraison gratuite)
Je n'ai pas commandé de capuchons de touches avec le clavier lui-même, car j'ai trouvé un fournisseur local qui offrait des capuchons de touches plus à mon goût.
Workmanship The bamboo case is finished nicely, and all the parts appear to be well built and assembled. I ordered the keyboard pre-built because I preferred to use the time it would have taken to solder the keyboard myself for other tasks as this is a relatively busy time of the year. Thus, I have not yet investigated the internals of the device. Software The keyboard uses the QMK firmware, and, therefore, is programmable. Do note, however, that the software layout you’ve selected under Linux will have an effect. In my case, the DE layout that was selected confused me, as what should have been square brackets were instead umlaute. At first,I assumed that the keyboard was using the DE variant of the qmk redox rev1 firmware. So I immediately reflashed the keyboard. Or, at least, I tried to.
Finition
L'étui en bambou a une belle finition, et toutes les pièces semblent bien confectionnées et assemblées. J'ai commandé le clavier pré-construit parce que je préférais utiliser le temps qu'il aurait fallu pour souder le clavier moi-même pour d'autres tâches, car c'est une période de l'année relativement chargée. Je n'ai donc pas encore exploré le fonctionnement interne de l'appareil.
Logiciel
Le clavier utilise le micrologiciel QMK et est donc programmable. Notez, cependant, que la disposition issue de la configuration logicielle que vous avez choisie sous Linux aura un effet. Dans mon cas, la mise en page DE qui a été choisie m'a désorienté, car ce qui aurait dû être entre crochets était au contraire entre accolades. Au début, j'ai supposé que le clavier utilisait la variante DE du firmware qmk redox rev1. Alors j'ai tout de suite remanié le clavier. Ou, du moins, j'ai essayé.
Flashing Firmware My first issue was that the firmware would not compile. Turns out the Arch package “avr-gcc” was version 8.2, which had a bug. Downgrading it to 8.1 fixed this problem, and the bug itself seems to be fixed now, so once the upstream changes are shipped, it should no longer be required. Ubuntu should be unaffected, as it is not a rolling release. Once I was able to compile the firmware, I had some trouble figuring out how to set my keyboard to DFU mode. There should have been a key combination, but that did not appear to work. I also saw the hardware reset buttons on the bottom of the device; however, they did not appear to do anything. After some research, it seemed to be the only option, so I tried again. Which worked. My best guess is that I held the button depressed too long (literally a momentary press is all that is needed). In any case, I had flashed new firmware to the keyboard. Success! Turns out, I now had only one functioning half. Swapping the USB to the other half let it work fine (albeit with the wrong mapping), and the RGB underglow worked for both halves. As such, the cable should be working. I spent another few hours tweaking settings and reading articles, before I thought to change the firmware from I2C to SERIAL connections. After that, the keyboard was working again. Only… the keys were still “wrong”. I wanted a base US layout, as I prefer the location of the keys for programming, but I still need access to umlaute and special characters for day-to-day life. I thought I could just mix layouts in the firmware to achieve this, until I realized that the DE_AE key was the same as the US KC_SCLN key in the header file. Which means, either way, the key would be parsed as either a semi-colon or an ä by the software layout my computer was using. I then checked into assigning direct unicode keys to the layer for the umlaute I wanted, and debated about swapping around a normal DE layout (though I gave up on that idea when I realized it wouldn’t impact shift/altgr combinations. I then stumbled upon the eurkeys layout (‘eu’ in Linux) which was almost exactly what I wanted. Setting my keyboard layout to that then gave me a US layout with all sorts of special characters. Since then, I’ve done very little to my keymap, besides adding media keys to a layer. I will be writing a second article on the firmware at a later date, once I’ve done more.
Verdict I like the keyboard a lot. The tactile keys are still my favourites, and the shape/layout is quite comfortable. It does take some getting used to (I used the keyboard minus a few keycaps to write this article, and it took me only a little longer than usual). Once I get comfortable, and rewire my brain to use a few different fingers for keys (I want to use my left index for c, when I should be using my left middle finger), I should be up to speed in no time. Especially when my keycaps arrive and I can stop using an incomplete old set I had lying around. Was it worth the price? Time will tell. My first reaction is that it seems to tick all the boxes I was hoping for. However, one of the main needs for me was the ability to spread out the halves in order to sit at a more comfortable angle at my desk. If you don’t mind traditional keyboard shapes, then I would probably recommend a programmable 60% keyboard or similar, as they are cheaper and will work better with standard keycap sets (i.e. a Pok3r keyboard). As always, I hope this article is interesting to at least a few readers. Are you a mechanical keyboard fan as well? Then share some stories with me at lswest34+fcm@gmail.com. Similarly, I can be reached with any ideas, comments or suggestions any readers may have at the above email address. Further Reading EurKEY layout: https://eurkey.steffen.bruentjen.eu/layout.html Redox Keyboard: https://github.com/mattdibi/redox-keyboard QMK Firmware: https://qmk.fm/