this post was submitted on 10 Aug 2023
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Asklemmy

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[โ€“] [email protected] 33 points 1 year ago (6 children)

It wouldn't be everybody's cup of tea, but purely from a "not enough of even their target audience knows about it," I'd have to say the CharaChorder One.

CharaChorder makes chorded input keyboards to increase typing speeds (chorded input is when you press a couple of keys simultaneously, and it autofills a whole word mapped to that key combo - great for long-but-common words).

The CharaChorder One version (as opposed to CharaChorder Lite) actually has a completely different format, and almost resembles an arcade machine's controls if every finger on each hand gets one or two joysticks to control. This obviously nets it a steep learning curve, which is probably a major reason it hasn't picked up steam, but it's great for normal issues like carpral tunnel, or accessibility issues where you have limited hand movement. It also has an ambidextrous mode where you can set all the normal keys to one side of the keyboard, which is, again, great for accessibility, but also if you want to have your free hand on a mouse or... something..... else.......

[โ€“] [email protected] 8 points 1 year ago

It also has an ambidextrous mode where you can set all the normal keys to one side of the keyboard, which is, again, great for accessibility, but also if you want to have your free hand on a mouse or... something..... else.......

Yes! I have been looking for a solution to use my joystick in this scenario! TY kind lemming!

๐Ÿ•น๏ธ

[โ€“] [email protected] 7 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

I honestly can't see anyone but an insignificant fraction of the general population ever using this.

There are only a few people who would benefit from taking the time to learn a how to use this contraption and even fewer who would bother.

[โ€“] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

Which is why I said it's not everybody's cup of tea. The only people who would want it are people with accessibility issues who can't/don't want to use speech-to-text, and techies really interested in increasing word output. The problem is, even among that demographic, it's barely known.

[โ€“] [email protected] 4 points 1 year ago (1 children)

This sounds a bit like how stenographers type

[โ€“] [email protected] 4 points 1 year ago

The chording part is actually fully inspired by stenographers!

[โ€“] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago

Sounds interesting but has absolutely no use in my daily life. It reminds me of a stenographer keyboard in a lot of ways, like how certain letters are typed by pressing a combination of two other letters.

For anyone curious, here's the product page for the CharaCorder One

[โ€“] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

that is so cool! I'd love to try typing with it. I doubt I would want to commit to it though.

[โ€“] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago

I have the CharaChorder One, the Lite, and the 'X'. The Lite is a bit problematic with having to move your hands into awkward configurations to chord. This made me realize that in order to use it, get the CharaChorder One and take the learning plunge. No more moving your hands to other keys as the One switches are 4 directional.

It took about 2 weeks with an hour or so nightly practice, but it was worth it to learn it. Chording has still been another learning process on top of the already mentioned. Overall, a time and cost investment in my health to scale back carpal tunnel and it has helped with the amount that I type. You really have to commit to a niche keyboard, but it saves on your hands and can shortcut typing. I found it a worthwhile move for my purposes, but YMMV.