A Tale of Six Keyboards

Your keyboard sucks. It's okay, mine sucks too.

I'm not saying they're unusable, but I've been thinking about some of the UI work I did in the 80's and 90's and realized that computer keyboard design has converged on a usable, but still mildly sucktastic norm. I'm going to talk about the standard US 104 key keyboard, but standard keyboards from other countries suck in very similar ways.

Keyboard 1 : PLATO Terminal

So look at this keyboard; it's from a PLATO Computer System terminal from the 1970's. If you look closely, you'll see a few keys that might seem strange to modern sensibilities. I'm quite partial to the EDIT, COPY and ERASE keys. Think about the number of times you hit Control-C each day. In the 1970s we had our own key for common operations, we weren't technologically devolved cretins content to swallow the UX pablum from Cupertino and Redmond!

So you might be wondering why i'm so excited about a fixed-function key. Why not just reprogram one of the function keys on the top of most keyboards and be done with it? I could probably make well-reasoned arguments why certain functions should have their own keys. But it really boils down to the fact that in the thirty-five years I've been messing with computers, I've never once used the CAPS LOCK, SCROLL or PAUSE key and have nearly worn out the ligaments in one of my fingers pressing control and S at the same time (not to mention Control-C, Control-V, Control-Z, etc.) The big problem I have with the modern keyboard is that I think it could be better. PAGE UP and PAGE DOWN are universal on keyboards (well... at least on keyboards that don't have fruit on them.) It's time to give COPY, PASTE, CUT, UNDO, OPEN and SAVE their due.

Keyboard 2 : The Atari 800

So let's skip forward a few years and look at another keyboard. This one's from the Atari 800. If you look on the right side of the keyboard there are keys marked SYSTEM RESET, OPTION, SELECT and START. The user typically used the OPTION and SELECT keys at system start-up to navigate a menu of options and pressed the START key when all the options were correct. This being the 1980's the SYSTEM RESET key was used to rescue the user when the system was unduly horked.

So what do we have so far? The PLATO terminal had function-specific keys for things you did mostly AFTER you logged in and the Atari 800 had keys whose canonical use was to select options prior to launching software. Imagine how many fewer times your mother would call you if, after her PC booted up, PC BIOSes displayed a menu on the screen and lit up LEDs under the few keys that navigated you through the following options:

• START WINDOZE,
• BOOT OFF A THUMB DRIVE (DID YOU KNOW YOU COULD DO THAT?) and
• DO SOMETHING REALLY COMPLICATED THAT YOU SHOULDN'T EVEN THINK ABOUT DOING UNLESS YOU'RE UNDER 19 YEARS OLD OR HAVE BEEN TO COLLEGE.

Keyboard 3 : TRS-80 Model 100

Now here's my favorite keyboard. Believe it or not, I still have one of these things. They last for about three weeks on four AA batteries and take about four seconds to boot up. The TRS-80 Model 100 keyboard is almost a counter example. If you look closely at the keyboard, you can see that it has eight function keys. And you might be thinking to yourself, "Hey! I though you hated function keys!?" And you would be right. I mostly do. This keyboard is the exception to the rule; and here's why. On the Model 100's keyboard is a key marked LABEL. If you press it, the specific function of each of the function keys is displayed on the bottom row of the screen. Some DOS software from the old days used to do this on IBM PCs as well. But all of the built-in software on the Model-100 did it, and that's the cool part.

One thing I would LOVE to see (and may try to hack into various open source browsers) is to have the functions of each of the function keys be displayed if you press the SCROLL key. It's not like anyone is actually using the SCROLL LOCK key.

Keyboard 4 : The Epson QX-10 (VALDOCS)

Moving on, check this out! It's the keyboard for the Epson QX-10 VALDOCS and it is MAGNIFICENT! I still have dreams where me and the QX-10 HASCI keyboard are skipping through fields of fresh wild-flowers together. Look at it! It has an individual key for just about every thing you would want to do: copy things, change font sizes, etc. Sure, the Margin Release button on a word processor is probably a little excessive, but that's the way I roll.

This keyboard also had keys that were supposed to launch different applications like a drawing program and a spreadsheet. This function has been re-introduced in some keyboards recently and this makes me happy.

Okay... two more to go, don't give up on me now...

Keyboard 5 : The Macintosh Portable

Behold the majesty that is the Macintosh Portable. Okay, maybe "majesty" isn't the right word. It had crappy battery life and weighed more than my drunk college roommates I had to carry home from time to time. But it did have one very, very cool feature: you could open the keyboard cover and move the trackball to the other side of the keyboard. This was great for left-handed mousers like myself.

In my dream world, all keyboards would be like this, you could open up the cover and (re)move the numeric keypad. Or replace the numeric keypad with a trackpad. Or a touch screen. Or a couple rows of function keys.

Keyboard 6 : The Google ChromeBook

So sure... it's unlikely we'll see major changes to computer keyboards anytime soon. But I am happy to report one hopeful sign: Google has removed the CAPS LOCK key from their ChromeBook line. It's been replaced by the SEARCH key. Hallelujah!

Thank you for listening to my screed. As you can tell, I'm passionate about the relatively obscure subject of computer keyboards. And to be sure, most modern computer keyboards are just fine. But the next time you start typing, take a moment to consider... they could be better

The 104 Button Mouse

In the old days, geeks used to amuse themselves with arguments over how many buttons a mouse should have. I think we all know the argument: Doug Engelbart's original mouse had one button, therefore all mice forever and ever should have one. Or... the UX wizards at Apple decided one button was correct, therefore we should never have more than one. ever. Heck, even some early OS/2 and WinTel only had one or two buttons. (Yes, there was a era before all mice had three buttons w/ scroll wheels.)

My argument was always that mice should have zero buttons.

If you look at that thing next to your mouse... the thing with all the keys on it... yeah, the keyboard! those aren't enough buttons for you? In the late 80's / early 90's i put together a mockup of a system that used F2 - F5 as Select, Move, Resize and Delete. So instead of worrying about left- or right- clicks or alt- or control- clicks, you just used the mouse as a pointing device, then used the keyboard to specify the operation you wanted to perform on the thing under the mouse pointer.

Just for giggles, I setup a very basic prototype at http://info.meadhbh.org/mousetest.html . If you're hip to a new experience, just click on over and give it a try. To use it, move your mouse around on the screen, pressing various keys creates, moves, resizes and colorizes boxes:

• N - creates a New box
• M - toggles "Move Mode" - hit 'M' again to stop moving the box
• C - cycles through a few colors
• R - toggles "Resize Mode" - hit 'R' again to stop resizing the box

Cheers!

Mining Big Asteroids : Psyche Direct

In which I talk about another idea for mining metals for asteroids...

So a lot of people know I have an interest in space: I've been a lifelong amateur astronomer, I originally studied optics and planetary science in college and I recently had the privilege of helping Skybox Imaging work out some of the kinks in their flight control system. And if you've spent any time with me recently, you know it's hard to get me to stop talking about some of the recent developments in "New Space" (click on that link if you're unfamiliar with the term, it's worth the few minutes it will take.)

Today we heard about the launch Deep Space Industries, the second of two major companies focused on harvesting ice and metals from asteroids. Sure, it sounds like science fiction, and it probably is in the near term. But in the medium and long term, the only reason it sounds like fiction is simply that no one's done it before.

DSI has an interesting idea: instead of sending astronauts or robot miners to the asteroids, they want to bring small asteroids into High Earth Orbit where human beings can have a much easier way of getting to them. Rather than spend six months travelling to your target, a year there and six months back, you spend a couple years tugging a relatively small 5 or 10 meter asteroid here where it only takes a couple days to get to.

Cool stuff.

Planetary Resources, who announced their plan to mine asteroids last year, has a slightly different (perhaps more obvious) plan: just go to a small asteroid and mine it.

Also very cool.

But as cool as both these companies are, they're both planning on doing a lot of prospecting before they start mining operations. Sure... you have to do some prospecting, but both companies are planning on launching constellations of small satellites to search for appropriate candidates before engaging in extraction operations.

This seems a little wasteful to me. Given the time value of money, the sooner you can turn a profit, the better. So why spend several years looking for small asteroids when asteroid 16 Psyche seems to be a large chunk of nickel-iron floating out in space?

If your plan was to scrape metal off 16 Psyche and bring it back to Earth orbit, you would still need to develop the technology for mining in space. And it's unlikely you could make a mining robot without sending at least one prospector craft to get a good look at your mining site. But, instead of spending time looking for a candidate, you would be developing deep space mine-bots.

I call this plan "Psyche Direct" (apologies to Robert Zubrin.)

1. Develop the prospector craft.
2. Send the prospector craft to 16 Psyche.
3. Begin developing mine-bots (bus, power, return craft, etc.)
4. Analyze results from prospector, use them to refine the mine-bots.
5. Send the mine-bot to 16 Psyche.
6. Return to Earth orbit with metals.
7. Profit!

I just wanted to get this idea out there and see if anyone has comments... More to come!