Re: Keyboard Madness!

[nathan@cco.caltech.edu (Nathan Mates)]

In article <3j8u4m$5ef@acme.freenet.columbus.oh.us>,
Dave Althoff <dalloff@freenet.columbus.oh.us> wrote:
>I recently bought a IIgs.  By now, I think that's a well-known fact around
>here.  I'm coming to it from my Mom's ][e...also, I believe, a well-known
>fact.

>Trouble is, as much as I like the GS, I HATE the little chicklet keyboard.
> I'd rather have a nice big full-stroke keyboard that my fingers won't
>slide off of.  In fact, what I'd REALLY like is a genuine ][e keyboard
>adapted for the ADB.

   What you're describing sure ain't the standard GS keyboard.
'Chicklet' refers to keys that aren't even separate pieces of
plastic, but a sheet of rubber over 1mm switches. (Sorta like
certain calculators (not my HP48SX), such as most of my calculator
watches). 

   The area of the keys on the standard GS keyboard is also pretty
much the same as that on a //e, especially in terms of width. Where
the main difference comes from is that the //e keyboard is slanted
so darn much.. the number row of keys is roughly an inch above the
spacebar, if I remember right. Some people (especially if they've
tranied on old manual typewriters) like really sloped keyboards.
I don't. I think the GS keyboard is just fine, but nobody's stopping
you from duct taping a book to one end of the GS keyboard and going
from there :)

   As to 'full stroke' keys, I don't care too much about that.

>But has anyone else noticed the lunacy that has crept into keyboard design?

>How often do you use the CONTROL, ESC, CAPS-LOCK, and backquote keys?  If
>you are like me, you probably use the ESC and CONTROL keys fairly often,
>the CAPS LOCK seldom, and the back-quote almost never.  So why has the ESC
>key migrated to an inaccessible location next to the space bar, putting
>the back-quote up in the ESC corner?

   Uh, with this description, I really think you don't have a standard
GS keyboard. The standard GS keyboard has escape left of 1, and control
left of A. 


>As if that isn't bad enough, now the CAPS LOCK key has tripled in size,
>become non-locking, and joined the home-row...while the CONTROL key has
>shrunk to near-nothingness, and migrated to the old CAPS LOCK location. 
>It isn't just that it is different from the 'classic' layout; this new
>layout makes ABSOLUTELY NO SENSE AT ALL!

    Definitely not the standard GS keyboard. Almost all Apple
Keyboards for some years (GS, Apple Extended, Apple Extended II) had
locking capslock keys, and such. It's only when Apple switched to
these cheap new keyboard designs that capslock didn't click.

   To me, this sounds like the person you bought your GS from bought
a new mac, realized that the new keyboard stank, and sold you that,
keeping the classic GS keyboard. Go bug them... :)

Nathan Mates
-- 
<*> Nathan Mates http://www.ugcs.caltech.edu/~nathan/      <*>
# "When you hear the voice of heaven, go out and start running. No
# matter how far away, set on a journey to be sure. ... No matter
# how far away, I'll be there to meet you." -- Silent Moebius #1