Cherry Announces Linux keyboard

Errtu76 writes "ZDnet says Cherry has announced a specially designed Linux keyboard that will be available in the UK, Ireland and Germany later this year. The Cherry CyMotion Master Linux keyboard has the Linux penguin logo, Tux, instead of the Windows start key and features 29 hot keys. The hot keys are configured for the Linux operating system and desktop applications, simplifying actions such as cutting, copying and pasting text, and moving between Web pages. PCworld has a little more info on the keyboard."

An idea...

[ArbiterOne]

Why don't they also include PDF/OO.org copies of the Linux User Guide (mentioned on /. recently and found at http://www.iosn.net/training/end-user-manual/ [iosn.net]) in order to create a real "Linux starter kit"?

Re:Replace the Windows key?

[empaler]

Don't be surprised if keyboard manufactorers have to pay a small fee per shipped unit with the windows key... ... which means, that buying a keyboard with a windows-key is just another way of supporting MS.

Petty? Yeah. But Microsoft can be real bastards.

Auto-sense the OS?

[grunt107]

Why not ship the keyboard with software that detects the OS, and configures 'hot' keys based on said OS?

AFA the 'Windows' key, charge a few pennies more and ship w/iconic keys for all 'major' OS-es.

Or ship with spiffy EOTD (emoticon of the day) that the fashionistas can buy and traded (Pokeyboardmon).

Re:Hot Keys

[tolan-b]

Completely agree. Although I quite like volume keys.

Ctrl-c/v/x work in Linux too. Well in Gnome at least, and KDE iirc.

Let's pray for a G80

[hhnerkopfabbeisser]

Cherry's G80 series of keyboards is considered by many (including me) to provide the best tactile expierience since the old IBM-keyboards with click, but without the weight and noise.

All other cherries I ever tried to type (G81 and G83) gave me the expierience that they wanted to break my fingers...

Use this

[kahei]

I realize I always plug these when an article on keyboards comes up, but... you can have what you want (subject to you writing a few macros for some keys) with one of these:

Kinesis [kinesis-ergo.com]

Customizable... programmable... pedals... and an exciting chunky shape! I use the pedals for ctrl and programming punctuation, though, not caps.

On my purchase list for sure!

[gilesjuk]

However I don't see why keyboards can't just come with different caps that you press onto the keyboard. Customise those Windows and function keys.

Hell, we could even have funny ones like an "any" key :D

Re:Hot Keys

[Threni]

> Although I quite like volume keys.

And while we're designing control surfaces, I'd like:

Cd-player interface (stop, play, next/prev track etc etc).
make that a dvd/cd player interface
a rotary pot (sliders haven't been used on real hardware for 20 years!)

I mean, come on - Fisher Price has been making this stuff for 30 years!

Stickers

[Bocaj]

A lot of keyboards just use permanent stickers for special keys. This way they only have to make one keyboard and then they ship it to mulitple countries. Why not just leave the stickers off the extra keys and supply sets for the user to put them on?

Re:Let's pray for a G80

[Dr. Mojura]

I concur. I found an old G80 series Cherry keyboard here at work a few months ago, and I've been using it ever since. The keys have just the right amount of bounce to them, allowing me to type much quicker than with the one I previously used. The only downsides: the keyboard is European, so there is a " above the 2 key instead of a @, a £ above the 3 instead of a #, and a few other minor key differences. Of course, since the OS thinks it's a US keyboard, if I type a shift-2 I'll get a @ anyways. Only throws me off if I look. Also, the left-side shift key is barely larger than a regular key, so I'll sometimes mistype. But the overall feel of it is so great, that I'm considering getting a PS/2 to USB converter just so I can use one with my mac at home.

Re:Hot Keys

[kfg]

No, it's not just you. The last time I went keyboard shopping I was annoyed that I could no longer buy a keyboard through the common retail outlets that didn't have all sorts of silly keys all over it.

This keyboard seems aimed at the 1337 crowd, not the geek crowd. To attract geeks I'd think what they'd want to do is reintroduce the Model M.

They can put a Tux sticker on one of the keys if it makes them feel better for some reason.

KFG

Don't mind me if I'm wrong

[The-Bus]

This seems like the classic misunderstanding of your market. My cut-and-dry view.

1. Market: People who abhor the Dell keyboards that have 10 buttons for shopping and other keyboards filled with other useless crap.

2. Product: Keyboard filled with useless crap.

A better idea would be one with some fully customizable hot keys but with an emphasis on monitoring -- maybe a keyboard with some LCDs monitoring temperature, disk usage, etc. so precious screen space isn't used. Now that I would consider buying.

Wireless?

[XryanX]

Neither the linked article nor the desktoplinux.com article have said whether or not this keyboard will be wireless.

It seems rather useless to me if it has a wire.

Re:Hot Keys

[Anonymous Coward]

It all depends on the user's working methods. We're migrating our desktops from Suns to Linux and the users (ASIC designers editing code) are very keen to get back the functionality of the extra buttons on the Sun keyboard. They've been using them for years, and it's just one of the little things that would make the migration easier.

$0.02

Re:Buy a keyboard...

[jannic]

If this is a usb keyboard, they could include a storage device with a bootable linux preinstalled.

Then, one of the function keys could be "reboot this machine and install linux immediately".

No more application keys, rather navigation keys

[thomasj]

I would rather like some new navigation keys:

• Let TAB be tabular space and make a new "Next field" key.
• Let ENTER be line break and make a new "Expand selection widget"
• Make an "OK" key to accelerate form/dialog-box submission and a "Cancel" one too
• Make some "Zoom in"/"Zoom out"/"Scroll"/"Pan"/"Bank"/"Tilt"/etc and free the cursor-keys/PgUp/PgDn
• ...
• Write a CUA-addendum with specifics and examples

I don't need a key to open my email client. It opens when I log on.

Bad Idea(tm)

[Brandybuck]

This is a Bad Idea(tm). The notion that keyboards must be OS specific is silly when you think about it. Sure, Redmond and Cupertino promote it, but that doesn't mean it's right.

Platform specific keyboards (Solaris, Mac) might make some sense, but multiple PC-x86 keyboards is loopy. Do I need two keyboards if I dual-boot? Three if I triple-boot? Will there be different Wyse terminals depending on which system you wish to connect to?

Just dump the OS logo and replace it with a generic menu key.

Re:Linux users, this is the keyboard you want...

[AT]

I'm suprised at the amount of bile over here over the placement of the cntl key.

Think about it this way: how often do you combine control with other keys? Most users do this at least a little; users of emacs (and programs that have similar key bindings like bash or anything that uses readline) use them a lot. If you are a touch typist, it's a lot easier to reach ctrl with your pinky if it's beside A rather than below shift. A lot of users get used to the latter but the ctrl-beside-A is really superior -- just look at the motion necessary to reach from the home row -- and its hard to go back once you've switched.

How often do you combine caps lock with other keys? Almost never, I'd guess. In fact, how often do you use caps lock at all (unless you write spam)? I personally map the caps lock key to ctrl on every keyboard I use, giving me two control keys and zero cap lock keys. I never miss it.

Why the bile? Well, trying to use emacs on a keyboard with caps lock beside A gives me shoot pains in my wrists in minutes. I can type all day on a ctrl-beside-A keyboard without any problems at all.

Re:Linux users, this is the keyboard you want...

[mvdwege]

Heh. I was actually aiming for a joke, but still...

When it comes to normal-length variable names, say around 7 characters, I find it quicker to just hit Caps-Lock and type out the full name, instead of taking my fingers from home row to hit a control sequence. Somehow, I can't type Alt-Anything while touch typing.

Mart