【IC】GMK X

April 1, 2020 IC, 键帽, GMK 本文总阅读量次

类型: IC
作者: depletedvespene
发布时间: 2020-04-01 01:16:26
更新时间: 2020-04-01 01:25:33
原链接: https://geekhack.org/index.php?topic=105414.0

Interest Check - GMK X

INTRODUCTION
This is the interest check for the keycap set GMK X.
Rationale: some say Hell is other people; I say Hell is other people touching my keyboard: they smudge it with their skin oils (at best) and make a mess of it. I figured I needed my keyboard to say “Look but don’t touch, and even better, don’t look at all!”. I first thought of replacing its keycaps with blanks, as some touch typists do, but that doesn’t go far enough: the keyboard should not just look empty, but be outright hostile to the sight (yet not to the touch; more on this later).
After some thoughts, some experiments and some thought experiments, I arrived at the inescapable logical conclusion, one that I want to share with you all, so you can also protect your keyboards from other people.
GMK X
This is the full GMK X set:

Main features of note:

All alpha keys contain a single letter X.
All modifier keys contain a single X mark.
The colorway is cream and pebble with black legends; it was chosen because of its strong blend-into-the-office-background property: given that a keyboard can’t be hidden away, the next best thing is a “hide in plain sight” strategy, and cream and pebble is marvelous in this regard.
This colorway is easily obtained with GMK’s stock colors: L9 for the alpha keys, U9 for the modifiers, and CR for all legends.
Row profile is 0-1-2-3-4-5: the keyboard should be hostile to the sight, not to the touch.
Given that all alphas will share the same legend, and so will all mods, maximum layout compatibility can be attained with minimal keycap duplication. Since this isn’t made immediately clear from the above image, the following cheat sheet shows the same full set, but with non-X-ed legends. Note how quite a few modifier keys cover several roles with ease:

PLANNED KITS
It’s undeniably tempting to offer the above set as a single, monolithic unit, so everyone will pay the same amount of money and get the same number of keycaps (fair is fair, right?). However, the realities of keycap set making need to be acknowledged; with this in mind, GMK X will be split into several kits:
Base kit:

This is the base kit (128 keys); it covers everything from a tenkeyless down to a 60% (and several, but not all, 40% physical layouts). Note that modifier keys sport the “all icons” style.
Text modifiers kit:

The text modifiers kit (70 keys) contains the same modifier keys present in the base kit, but with text legends, for those who like this style better (and for those weirdos who like icon legends on the alpha block, and text legends on the bottom row and the navigation cluster).
Numpad kit:

This kit (44 keys) contains the keys required for numpads of all kinds, including split key variations, six-row layouts, and “operators are mods” and “operators are alphas” visual approaches. All modifier keys are present in both icon and text styles.
Space bars kit:

This kit contains the usual set of split space bars + 6U space bars. Depending on how the round 2 for the GMK OG Spacekeys group buy goes, I might cut this one out from this interest check - it would be improper to hurt another group buy that actually complements well with this. The addition of 3U and 4.75U space bars remains under discussion.
Icon extended functions kit:

Eight alpha-colored top row icon mods, to complement the base kit, plus ten mod-colored icon mods, for the leftside EF block (for the older gits) or macro block (for the young whippersnappers).
I’m keeping this kit separate from the text mods analog kit for now, but I am not unwilling to fuse them into one single kit; it will depend on the interest check’s participants’ opinions and GMK’s price quotes.
Text extended functions kit:

Eight alpha-colored top row text mods, to complement the base kit, plus ten mod-colored text mods, for the leftside EF block (for the older gits) or macro block (for the young whippersnappers).
I’m keeping this kit separate from the icon mods analog kit for now, but I am not unwilling to fuse them into one single kit; it will depend on the interest check’s participants’ opinions and GMK’s price quotes.
Icon 40% kit:

Icon modifiers for 40% keyboards. Note how there are two 1.5U keys in R3, but only one in R1, R2 and R4; this is because they already exist in the base kit (I’m considering, however, duplicating them anyway, to diminish the dependence on the base kit).
I would highly prefer to keep this kit and the text mods version separate, but GMK’s price quotes might force merging them.
Text 40% kit:

Text modifiers for 40% keyboards. Note how there are two 1.5U keys in each row; this is because the base kit does not provide them.
I would highly prefer to keep this kit and the icon mods version separate, but GMK’s price quotes might force merging them.
RENDERS
Here are a few renders of GMK X:

QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS
I’m sure you’ll have quite a few questions, so let’s cover some of them right away:
Q:* Ne numpad in base kit avail?
A:* I would certainly prefer so, but the base kit is rather large already. The feasibility of merging the numpad kit into the base will depend on GMK’s price quotes.
Q:* Ne Ergo avail?
A:* Ergodox keyboards are hostile enough as it is. To add this keycap set would be overkill, in my opinion.
Nevertheless, I’ll run a poll to determine if the 40% kits should be expanded anyway into a combined 40%/ergo kit.
Q:* Ne text mods in base kit avail?
A:* As initially designed, it’s icon modifier keys in the base kit, text modifier keys in an extra kit. I’ll run a poll to see if this should be reversed or kept as is now.
If I could have it my way, I’d offer an “alphas only” kit, and both versions of the “mods only” kit separately, but my intuition suggests that GMK’s price quotes will be a dream-shattering factor.
Q:* Ne accents avail?
A:* Accents are visually attractive and make the keyboard more pleasing to look at. GMK X is for the keyboard that doesn’t want to be looked at.
Q:* Ne UK ISO avail?
A:* Actually, the English (UK) national layout IS fully supported! Just replace the seven alphas on the left side of the following diagram with the seven alphas on the right side.
Q:* Ne centered icon mods avail?
A:* Hostility is one thing, bad taste is another one. Shame on you!
Q:* Ne icon+text mods avail?
A:* Don’t come and tell me this:

looks prim and proper. What’s next? XXX legends?
Q:* Ne numpad sublegends avail?
A:* See above.
Q:* Ne Hiragana avail?
A:* I actually asked a friend of mine who is a professional Japanese-English translator. According to her opinion, the Latin letter X has the same connotation of “error” or “forbidden” that it has for us Westerners. Therefore, weeb sublegends are unnecessary (and see above, too).
Q:* Ne Hangul avail?
A:* I have a strong suspicion that once I get to talk to a Korean about it, I’ll get the same answer. But even if I get a surprising reply, see above about sublegends - that will surely be a stronger argument. In short: quite probably no.
Q:* Ne alternate 1-1-2-3-4-4 profile keys avail?
A:* 2017 called; it wants its outdated row profile back.
Q:* Ne BAE avail?
A:* Hostile to the sight, not to the touch. No BAE. Shame on you!
Q:* Ne stepped ISO Enter avail?
A:* I certainly want it to be added (why should Caps Lock be the only privileged key?), but ultimately the decision will be made after seeing GMK’s price quotes for the new mold that will be required. If it can be added, it will, but rest easy knowing it WON’T replace the non-stepped ISO Enter key.
Q:* Ne total compat avail?
A:* These kits maximize compatibility, but some constraints can’t really be escaped from; as much as we’d all like it to be otherwise, it’s not really feasible to add total compatibility for all layouts. What does this mean?
Ne Wang-style Delete avail.
Ne 2.0U R0 Esc avail.
Ne thin ISO Enter avail.
Ne HHKB-ISO Enter avail (or “low thin ISO Enter”, as is known in Canada).
Ne offset-keeb modifiers avail (even though some are already present in the base kit).
Ne 9U space bar avail (I know, I know, this one hurts the most!).
Q:* Ne WoB avail?
A:* L9/CR+U9/CR is the chosen colorway for this interest check. It IS true, however, that black keyboards are better served with a different colorway; CR/WS1 and N9/U9 are strong contenders… but let’s get it on with cream and pebble first and worry about dark colorways later.
Q:* Ne custom colorway avail?
A:* Using custom colors would hike the price up excessively, in addition to the fact that most of the keys already require new molds to be crafted. Fortunately, the available stock colors provide a perfect fit for the intended job.
Q:* Ne novelties avail?
A:* No velties. What is wrong with you?
Q:* Ne ISO Enter novelty avail?
A:* Okay, fine. Just this one:
Q:* Ne vim arrows avail?
A:* Sure thing. This will not look corny at all:

Also, it’s vi arrows. Kids these days…
Q:* Ne artisan avail?
A:* Something to be avoided, definitely. But…
I must confess that I can’t help the feeling that a cross-relief Cross of Burgundy keycap, with the knots and all, would be amazing… but then I’d have to make the cross red instead of black, and that would require a white keycap instead of a pebble one, and then the whole thing gets thrown off.
Perhaps a separate interest check for it. It ought to be a hit among Spaniards, but who else could possibly want this…?
Q:* Ne deskmat avail?
A:* Not for now. We’re working on it and may or may not have news on this particular issue.
Q:* Ne custom cable avail?
A:* There’s plenty of unassuming beige USB cables available on Amazon and elsehere, so I don’t think custom cables are necessary (in fact, they would be overall detrimental).
PENDING WORK
Ask 40% users for their input. I’m sure I’ve missed something in their kit!
Ask ergo users for their input. Will they want ergo support added, in spite of everything?
Run polls to determine whatever changes the interested parties want.
Decide on said changes.
Finalize kits.
Find vendors.
Vend.
SIGNATURE BANNER
If you want to support and help publicize GMK X, please use this banner in your signature:

CREDITS AND ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
I would like to thank eskimojo and Abec13 for their inestimable effort and feedback.
I would like to thank Oblotzky for his renders.
Finally, I would like to thank my parents, my son, my niece and my second cousin for failing to institutionalize me.
FINAL WORDS
I’d like to take a moment to thank you for reading this interest check, so:
Thank you for reading this interest check.*