The Alternative Keyboard Commentary

Archive-name: keyboard-commentary

Version: $Revision: 2.6 $ $Date: 93/09/16 21:49:53 $

Copyright 1992,1993 by Dan Wallach

[Current distribution: e-mail and anonymous ftp only]

This document is intended as a companion to the Typing Injuries FAQ, available from the same place you got this document. Often, people ask me for my personal opinions of various devices, so I've endeavored to write some of these opinions in this file. I don't necessarily hold an opinion on every product under the sun, and your own opinions are what really matters. Most vendors have a limited time money-back offer, which you should feel encouraged to exercise.

NOTE: I don't update this file nearly as often as the public FAQ, so some data in here, especially phone numbers or prices, can get out of date. For the latest in undisputable facts, you should be able to get the Typing Injuries FAQ, probably from the same place you got this.

I HAVEN'T REALLY EDITED THIS DOCUMENT SINCE APRIL, 1993. BEWARE!

Information in this commentary has been pieced together from phone conversations, e-mail, and product literature. While I hope it's useful, the information in here is neither comprehensive nor error free. If you find something wrong or missing, please mail me, and I'll update my list. Thanks.

The opinions in here are my own, unless otherwise mentioned, and do not represent the opinions of any organization or vendor.

This commentary, unlike the keyboard FAQ, contains mine (and others') personal opinions and thoughts on these keyboards. These opinions do not represent my employer, anybody else's employer, or any of the vendors.

All phone numbers, unless otherwise mentioned, are U.S.A. phone numbers. All monetary figures, unless otherwise mentioned, are U.S.A. dollars.

Products covered in this commentary:

• The Bat
• DragonDictate
• DataHand
• Comfort Keyboard System
• Kinesis Ergonomic Keyboard
• Maltron
• The Tony! Ergonomic KeySystem
• The Vertical
• The MIKey
• The Wave
• The Minimal Motion Computer Access System
• AccuKey
• Twiddler
• Half-QWERTY
• Microwriter
• Braille 'n Speak

(if you have any useful info about the above companies or products, please mail the info to me. As you'll see below, what I have for them is pretty sparse, at best.)

The Bat

old phone number: 504-336-0033

current phone number: 504-766-8082

Infogrip, Inc.

812 North Blvd.

Baton Rouge, Louisiana 70802, U.S.A.

Ward Bond (main contact)

David Vicknair (did the Unix software) 504-766-1029

Shipping now. Supports: Mac, IBM PC (serial port -- keyboard port going through FCC approval). No other workstations supported, but serial support for Unix with X Windows has been written. PC and Mac are getting all the real attention from the company.

If you buy a unit and ask nicely, they will ship out source to their Unix stuff as-is. It's not a product, it's a convenience. According to Mr. Vicknair, the Unix support generates X synthetic keyboard events, so all that's required for a port to a new machine is tweaking the table of keycodes generated.

[Now that I think of it, you could just hack in the code from xmodmap that knows the current keycode mappings. Basically, modulo some software tweaking, you should be able to get the Bat working on just about any Unix box with X windows, and a serial port. Piece of cake, right?]

Prototypes of "Notetaker", which fits in one hand, are expected in late summer, shipping by the end of the year. It's not really a keyboard for a computer, rather it's a portable notetaking thing -- carry it around and type to it -- it's got non-volatile RAM inside it, and presumably some sort of serial port to communicate.

For the Bat:

$495 (dual set -- each one is a complete keyboard by itself)

$295 (single)

PC version -- one is slaved off the other -- need to specify which is the "master" keyboard. Mac, both are "smart". [Whatever...]

PC serial version doesn't work very well. Most DOS-based things work, Windows stuff doesn't work well. PC native keyboard port in late summer.

Also, apparently the Mac version has problem with control keys used as modifiers -- I'm told it's good for typing text, but difficult for a programmer to use.

Keyboard is modal -- various thumb things going into modal locks (e.g.: numeric mode, lower-case mode, upper-case mode, etc.)

Reference card is "front and back of one page."

DragonDictate-30K (and numerous other Dragon products)

Dragon Systems, Inc.

320 Nevada Street

Newton, MA 02160

Phone: 800-TALK-TYP or 617-965-5200

Fax: 617-527-0372

Shipping: Now.

Price: DragonDictate-30K -- $4995 (end user system)

DragonWriter 1000 -- $1595 / $2495 (end user/developer system)

various other prices for service contracts, site licenses, etc.

Compatibility: 386 (or higher) PC only

(3rd party support for Mac)

Free software support for X windows is also available -- your PC with Dragon hardware talks to your workstation over a serial cable. The program is called a2x, and is available via anonymous ftp:

soda.berkeley.edu:pub/typing-injury/a2x.tar.Z

export.lcs.mit.edu:contrib/a2x.tar.Z (most current)

Dragon Systems sells a number of voice recognition products. Most (if not all) of them seem to run on PC's and compatibles (including PS/2's and other MicroChannel boxes). They sell you a hardware board and software which sits in front of a number of popular word processors and spreadsheets.

Each user `trains' the system to their voice, and there are provisions to correct the system when it makes mistakes, on the fly. Multiple people can use it, but you have to load a different personality file for each person. You still get the use of your normal keyboard, too. On the Dragon-Dictate-30K you need to pause 1/10th sec between words. Dragon claims typical input speeds of 30-40 words per minute. I don't have specs on the DragonWriter 1000.

The DragonDictate-30K can recognize 30,000 words at a time. The DragonWriter 1000 can recognize (you guessed it) 1000 words at a time.

Dragon's technology is also part of the following products (about which I have no other info):

Microsoft Windows Sound System (Voice Pilot)

IBM VoiceType

Voice Navigator II (by Articulate Systems -- for Macintosh)

EMStation (by Lanier Voice Products -- "emergency medical workstation")

[with a2x, public domain software to control X windows, which is design to work with DragonDictate, this system becomes quite amazing. You can configure a2x so you can say "move mouse left... slower... stop" and it will do the right thing. For injuries/handicaps which make keyboard usage out of the question, this sounds like a wonderful solution to the problem. Of course, if you're talking to your computer all day, your office-mates may have other opinions...]

DataHand 602-860-8584

Industrial Innovations, Inc.

10789 North 90th Street

Scottsdale, Arizona 85260-6727, U.S.A.

Mark Roggenbuck (contact)

Supports IBM PC and Macintosh.

Not shipping, but in beta. "Big backlog" -- could take 3 months to get one. Making them "as-needed." Made by hand.

No thought about mass production until next year.

$1000/unit for the pair. The order form they sent me mumbles about ordering a minimum of two units.

Description: two pods -- one for each hand. Fingers hang down into cylinders with switches in them -- five per finger: down, left, right forward, back. Thumbs tweak modes. Normal layout corresponds vaguely to home row on a QWERTY keyboard.

You tilt the whole unit to make it act as a mouse.

They sent me a 12-minute video tape. [It's pretty corny -- mostly footage from CNN. The video seemed to spend half of its time hyping the DataHand, and the other half trying to emphasize that there are now 28.5 million people with typing-related jobs, for which old keyboards are just a bad idea.]

Cliff Lasser has one of these, and really likes it. He's written an extensive review, which you can get via anonymous ftp from soda.berkeley.edu (likely, the same place you got this).

The DataHand is much more expensive than other 'alternative' keyboards, and it's difficult to say whether it's better or worse. There are numerous arguments against the DataHand, often centering on it's difficulty to adapt to different hand sizes. Your mileage may vary, of course.

Comfort Keyboard System 414-253-4131

FAX: 414-253-4177

Health Care Keyboard Company

N61 W15150 Wigwam Drive

Menomonee Falls, Wisconsin 53051 U.S.A.

Theoretical New Address: N82 W15340 Appleton Ave

Jeffrey Szmanda (Vice President -- contact)

Bill Szmanda (the technology guy -- Jeffrey's brother)

Shipping: now (but, maybe only the PC version)

Other computers will also be supported, but customized keycaps won't be available right away. You can still buy the keyboard, and it will still work just fine, you just won't have the cool cloverleaf symbol or whatever right away. [Darn. I'm depressed.]

Basically, if your computer isn't a PC, you should contact the company directly for the most up-to-date information.

Interfaces supported:

• PC
• Mac (?)

Planned future support:

• Decision Data [which, I think, OEM's HP terminals, but I'm not sure]
• IBM 122-key layout [a 3270 thing]
• Unisys UTS-40
• Sun Sparc
• Silicon Graphics (likely, a result of my prodding :-)

Prices start at $590.

The idea is that one keyboard works with everything. You purchase "compatibility modules", a new cord, and possibly new keycaps, and then you can move your one keyboard around among different machines.

[IMHO, an extremely cool idea. If you have some really weird machine, this is the keyboard that you might actually be able to hack into it. I spoke to Rick Parsons, who they've contracted their electronic work to, and asked him about how hard it would be to support Silicon Graphics. After describing the keyboard to him, he said it would basically require some hardware to change voltages and a new ROM. The personality modules are really one module that can be really easily customized. You wouldn't believe how intelligent keyboards need to be...]

It's a three-piece keyboard. The layout resembles the standard 101-key keyboard, except sliced into three section. Each section is on a custom telescoping universal mount. You can rearrange the three sections (have the keypad in the middle if you want). Each section is otherwise normal-shaped (i.e.: you put all three sections flat, and you have what looks like a normal 101-key keyboard). If you see a picture of this and the Tony!, you'll think they look virtually the same. The Comfort is very much more adjustable than the prototype Tony!. In theory, the production Tony! would be even more adjustable. [Everybody knows how much better vaporware is than hardware...]

Also, I asked Jeffrey about his patent vs. Tony(!)'s patent. Jeffrey claims that his patent explicitly references Tony's patent. [I'm no patent attorney, so I can't even begin to interpret this. Jeffrey seems fairly confident that his keyboard will ship without any problems. Good luck!]

Kinesis Ergonomic Keyboard 206-455-9220

206-455-9233 (fax)

Kinesis Corporation

915 118th Ave. SE.

Bellevue, Washington 98005, U.S.A.

Shirley Lunde (VP Marketing)

[Shirley is *extremely* knowledgeable about the issues involved with keyboards. We spoke at length about just about every keyboard on this list. Shirley also had some interesting things to say about chording strategies vs. rearranged "normal" keyboards.]

Shipping: now

Supports PC. Mac and Sun Sparc in the works.

Single unit (low volume) $690. Presumably, cheaper for more.

This keyboard looks really neat. The design goals are to eliminate extraneous movements of your fingers, and to keep your hands in a comfortable position. The layout is more-or-less standard QWERTY, except, instead of the usual Return/Backspace/Shift/etc. locations, they're now on thumb buttons. The more you stare at it, the more it starts to make sense. Your hands are at shoulder width when you're typing, and you're not ever really going to have to pick your hands up. The keyboard has built-in wrist-rests, to which you can attach adhesive wrist pads ($30 for 3 pairs). The "keypad" is done by some sort of modal button which remaps keys for your right hand. Foot pedals are also available. You can have up to two pedals, which are factory set to Shift and Keypad-Toggle.

Any of the keys may be remapped on the keyboard, including the foot pedals.

Kinesis looks rather similar to a PCD-Maltron Ltd's keyboard. The Kinesis looks a good bit simpler, and goes to greater lengths to keep your hands from leaving home row.

I now own a Kinesis. I'm using it with my Sun at work, through a PC and the a2x software by Bob Scheifler. So far, I'm quite happy. My kinesis came with one foot pedal, and one set of wrist pads, too.

At first, I was making quite a few mistakes, but I got used to it fairly quickly. On your normal keyboard, the keys like Q,A,Z are diagonal. On the Kinesis, they're straight up-and-down. The thumb buttons are really neat, once your thumbs get used to the idea. The keyboard comes with a typing tutor program, whichh reports me now typing at 87 words per minute, slightly higher than my norm! However, I slow down significantly on the non alphabet keys. My only complaint is that I keep hitting backspace (left thumb) instead of space (right thumb). I may eventually give up and remap left thumb to space, but I'm getting better at it. So far, I've moved Escape onto my left thumb *and* my foot pedal (can you tell I'm a vi user?). For me, the foot pedal is too slow to use as a shift key, but it's fine for typical vi-levels of Escape usage.

Kinesis has found, in their research, that in about 8 hours, people are generally 75% to 100% of their usual productivity.

If you look at the pictures, you'll see a sea of unused plastic in the middle of the keyboard. My co-workers came up with a number of ideas for this, including a Post-It pad or a pillow (because it was so comfortable it put you to sleep, claimed the fellow). In reality, you'll probably put something listing the keys you've remapped.

Dan sez: check it out.

Maltron (+44) 081 398 3265 (United Kingdom)

PCD-Maltron Limited

15 Orchard Lane, Each Moseley

Surrey KT8 OBN, United Kingdon

Pamela Hobday (and her husband) -- a two person company

U.S. Distributor:

Jim Barrett

Applied Learning Corp.

1376 Glen Hardie Road

Wayne, PA 19087

Phone: 215-688-6866

Compatibility: PC's, Amstrad 1512/1640, BBC B, BBC Master, apparently, Mac versions also available now

Price: 375 pounds

$735 shipped in the U.S.A. (basically, converted price + shipping)

The cost is less for BBC computers, and they have a number of accessories, including carrying cases, switch boxes to use both your normal keyboard and the Maltron, an articulated arm that clamps on to your table, and training 'courses' to help you learn to type on your Maltron.

You can also rent a keyboard for 10 pounds/week + taxes. U.S. price: $120/month, and then $60 off purchase if you want it.

Shipping: Now (in your choice of exotic colors: black or grey :)

Maltron has four main products -- a two-handed keyboard, two one-handed keyboards, and a keyboard designed for handicapped people to control with a mouth-stick.

The key locations are fixed, but quite stylized to conform to your hands. You should really ftp the GIF's to get an idea what they look like. They look weird, but begin to make sense. All but the "mouth / head stick keyboard" can have a more-or-less normal QWERTY layout, or, by flicking a switch, can have a Maltron-proprietary layout designed to distribute the load evenly across both of your hands.

You can also get a "programmer" keyboard which puts the function keys closer to the home row. I'm waiting for more info about this one.

[All in all, this looks like some fairly neat stuff. It's for sale now. The Kinesis keyboard is similar to the Maltron two-handed keyboard. Both are worth consideration.]

The Tony! Ergonomic KeySystem 415-969-8669

Tony Hodges

The Tony! Corporation

2332 Thompson Court

Mountain View, CA 94043, U.S.A.

"Very close to being made, finally." -- Tony Hodges, June 1992.

[Still not shipping, January, 1993]

Tony! will support Mac, PC, IBM 3270, Sun, and DEC [not clear which DEC]. Tony refused to give me any dates, but emphasized that it would be "very soon." "By the fall." "October or November." "This year." He's taking bids from companies that may manufacture it for him, as of late summer, 1992. It's difficult to pin Tony down to specifics, so it's hard to provide any real data.

Pre-production cost: $625 (he wants a commitment now, and will put you in line to buy the keyboard. When it comes it, if it's cheaper, you pay the cheaper price. If it's more expensive, you still pay $625)

The production Tony! should have separately adjustable keys -- height, angle, striking angle, key force, and even key location, including gross adjustments -- you can put any specific key *anywhere*. Tony's example is somebody putting the Return key closer to the middle of the keyboard.

The prototype Tony! that he carries around with him is nothing nearly so fancy. The prototype is hinged in the middle and has a separate keypad. The keys are currently borrowed from a number of other machines (most notably, some of them came from an Apple //c). He came out here and demonstrated it. The whole thing is falling apart at the seams, the spacebar keeps getting stuck, etc. Typing with my thumbs up seems like a good thing, although otherwise, I wasn't too impressed. Other people who have played with it seem to have liked it. Large numbers of people seem to have written letters to Tony saying how much they liked it. To me, he has some great ideas, just very poor execution of them, in his prototype.

My phone conversations with Tony have been really weird. He had me typing in mid air and tweaking my wrist around from the normal position to the "Tony" position, and "proving" to myself that the "Tony" position is better. After all that randomness, I finally got some real information out of him. In order to actually BUY one of these things, he wants me to generate, on official letterhead, some kind of an anecdotal transcript of the previously mentioned random exercises, along with some language that I have an "intent to purchase" his product. Then, once it's real, he'll actually want money, and ship the thing. The letter is something of a line place-holder. I asked Tony if I could ever find a Tony! in my friendly neighborhood ComputerLand or something, and he replied "Never!" He plans on doing direct sales, only, as he's afraid of anybody marking up his prices.

Tony is greatly concerned with his product being made in America, and being environmentally sound in its construction. He's concerned that the people building his keyboard aren't mistreated or forced to work in unsafe or unpleasant conditions. In short, he's very concerned about just about everything except getting the keyboard to market.

Like most other vendors I've called, Tony asked me how I'd heard of him, and I mentioned the earlier post by Christopher Bekins. He was not very happy about the numerous other vendors making split keyboards, seeing as he holds a patent on his keyboard. It's a shame that Tony's more interested in publicly mouthing off at Apple rather than shipping his own product.

Basically, Tony runs around acting like he's the only guy in town with a "new" keyboard, and how he's the only good-old inventor, fighting the evil corporations who want to steal his ideas. If he doesn't get with it, you may never see an actual Tony! on your desk, especially with industry giant Apple getting into the game. Tony thinks that the big guys are conspiring against him. Yeah, whatever. Nobody else seems to be having problems, and they're all small outfits, too. If he does actually ship something, it will probably be pretty good, but I wouldn't hold my breath.

In my humble opinion, you're wasting your time if you want to buy a Tony! keyboard. He's had 6 years, following the award of his patent, but he still never managed to get a product out the door. At this point, he's running around, harassing anybody else who manufactures a keyboard which addresses ergonomic issues, rather than trying to get his ideas into production. His obsession with how the keyboard is made is interfering with his goals of helping people. If you want an alternative keyboard, you have plenty of choices. Wouldn't you rather have a good keyboard today, rather than hype about how wonderful some other keyboard could be, tomorrow?

The MIKey 301-933-1111

Dr. Alan Grant

3208 Woodhollow Drive

Chevy Chase, Maryland 20815, U.S.A.

Not in production. "Should be Available in One Year." -- as of June 1992

Supports: IBM PC ("in one year"), Mac (maybe after that)

Estimated street price: $200

Dr. Grant is an optometrist, and among all the paper he sent me, are two papers he's written, both for Optometry-related journals. The MIKey (MIK == Mnemonic Ikon Keyboard) has two design goals: to be easier for those with typing-related problems, and to be easier to memorize the key layout.

For typing-related comfort, the keyboard is angled up and swept back, so your wrists are closer to a neutral, comfortable position. The angles are not adjustable. Some kind of thumb-operated mouse thing (which, I guess, is supposed to operate like an analog joystick) is under the space bars (yes, one for each hand).

If you're a WordPerfect user, this keyboard might be ideal. The 12 functions keys are arranged in a circle at the far left of the keyboard, with a control, alt, and shift key in the middle. Hitting ctrl-alt-f7 is a fairly simple thing. However, you will have to lift your hands off home-row to use either the function keys or the number pad. The keys are color-coded in some sort of "WordPerfect Color Protocol." The theory here is that you learn where stuff is, faster, and, by not looking at the keyboard so often, you aren't as fatigued. [Of course, if you don't move your eyes off the screen eventually, focusing elsewhere, you'll get eye strain...]

If you're a programmer, this keyboard looks *extremely* unpleasant. Control and Alt and *way* over on the left of the keyboard, inside the ring of function keys. Hitting Control-C, one-handed looks to be very uncomfortable. Hitting it two-handed would require moving both of your hands over to the left side of the keyboard, and then, your right wrist would be totally contorted in the wrong position. If you were going to remap the keyboard, you could put control above shift (currently, the tab key) and Escape above that (currently, print screen).

The Vertical

Contact: Jeffrey Spencer or Stephen Albert, 619-454-0000

P.O. Box 2636

La Jolla, CA 92038, U.S.A.

Supports: no info available, probably PC's

Available: Summer, 1993

Price: $249

The Vertical Keyboard is split in two halves, each pointing straight up. The user can adjust the width of the device, but not the tilt of each section. Side-view mirrors are installed to allow users to see their fingers on the keys. The Vertical also built-in "finger-wheels" for mouse support.

Mirrors? On a keyboard? Hmm... I'd think seriously before looking at this one. Their marketing literature says The Vertical is "The Only Ergonomic Computer Keyboard Designed To Significantly Reduce Repetive Motion Injuries..." [capitalized as such] Excuse me? I think not.

Immediately, I noticed there's nowhere to rest your wrists -- you would have to keep this keyboard very low, nearly on your lap, to use it right. Most adjustable furniture doesn't even get this low.

The major warning bells get set off by their literature. The inventors seem intent on telling you how wonderful they are, how many medical people have endorsed their product, and how their product will work wonders for solving your RSI. Nowhere do they mention simple things like price, availability, or compatibility. They include quotes from a number of people with big names, talking about the problems with normal keyboards, then talk about theirs. None of these big names have endorsed their product.

My advice is much the same as for the Tony!. If it's not shipping, even in limited quantities, and if the vendor is giving off more snake oil than hard data, look elsewhere. Remember, plenty of big-name vendors are getting into the keyboard game.

The Wave (was: 213-) 310-644-6100

FAX: 310-644-6068

Iocomm International Technology

12700 Yukon Avenue

Hawthorne, California 90250, U.S.A.

Iocomm also manufactures SVGA monitors... and a basic standard 101-key keyboard (PC/AT) and 84-key keyboard (PC/XT).

Robin Hunter (contact -- in sales) [Robin made the audacious claim that the Wave works with *everything*. I started off listing lots of random computers, and she backpedaled a little bit and said she'd get back to me with more info. Two weeks later, when I got their marketing literature, Robin threw in a hand-written note saying ``The keyboard will not work with large workstations or terminals. It is definitely not compatible with any systems either non-compatible or non-MsDos.'' -- translated -- it only works with PC's.]

Cost: $99.95 + $15 for a set of cables

Works with: PC only.

The one-piece keyboard has a built-in wrist-rest. It looks *exactly* like a normal 101-key PC keyboard, with two inches of built-in wrist rest. [The wrist-rest doesn't look all that useful...]

The key switch feel is supposed to be very light and crisp. They have all kinds of measurements of it's operating force, total-travel force, etc. It's clear that they've put some large amount of effort into getting the key feel right. They haven't really done anything about the positioning of the hands.

[Basically, it looks like they took a garden-variety PC keyboard, added very nice keys, and made a new plastic case. I have no doubt it's better than most off-the-shelf PC keyboards, but it doesn't come close to most other keyboards here. The enclosed InfoWorld reprint (Vol. 11, Issue 47, Nov. 20, 1989) calls it ``ergonomically optimized for comfortable typing.'' You decide.

Robin kept talking about relief from stress for carpal tunnel sufferers, but it's pretty clear that she isn't very knowledgeable about the problem, or knowledgeable about computers at all, for that matter. If you're not terribly hurt, this keyboard may be fairly effective. Otherwise, you'll probably want to get one of the more expensive ones.]

Paul Rubin bought the Wave. After using it for a while, he has this to say:

I bought one of the "wave" keyboards that was reviewed in the typing injury FAQ. I've only had it open for a few minutes but I don't like it very much. The keys and the whole keyboard have a cheap feel, and the keys have a hard stop at the bottom and an obnoxious sound. The layout is insane--the control key is in the usual losing position below and to the left of all the other keys (instead of having caps lock there), but immediately to the right of "ctrl", to the left of "alt", is a second copy of the backslash/vertical bar key. (This key also appears below the right shift key). The built in palmrest is only about 2" long and slopes downward. I prefer a normal palmrest-free keyboard with a standard foam wrist pad.

The one nice thing is that it does take a bit less force to operate the keys than a typical stiff keyboard needs, but only slightly less than my Northgate Omnikey 102, which remains my favorite keyboard. I think I'm going to send the Wave keyboard back under its 30 day trial offer.

The Minimal Motion Computer Access System 508-263-6437

508-263-6537 (fax)

Equal Access Computer Technology

Dr. Michael Weinreigh

39 Oneida Rd.

Acton, MA 01720, U.S.A.

Cost: InfoGrip-compatible: "a few hundred dollars" + a one-handed Bat For their own system: $300 (DOS software) + "a few hundred dollars"

Getting it: these are custom-made, so an occupational therapist would make moulds/do whatever to make it for you.

Different from ordinary chord keyboards: in a one-handed version, there is exactly one button per finger. In a two-handed version, you get four buttons per finger, and the thumbs don't do anything. You can also get one-handed versions with three thumb buttons -- compatible with the InfoGrip Bat.

They have an amusing system for teaching how to type. Michael expects an experienced user could generate 60 w.p.m, but most people will get up to 30 w.p.m. It's PC software that hangs out on the side of your screen with a cheat sheet, telling you the current button mappings. This should work with most character-based applications.

The real feature of the Minimal Motion system is its configurability -- it is effectively custom-molded, just for you.

The system was designed for handicapped folk with limited movement of their extremities. Michael doesn't guarantee that it would help people with carpal tunnel problems, although it sure would be comfortable.

Currently, it sits on a desk or a wheelchair arm. Michael's interested in a hand-held version, but it isn't there, yet.

Works on a PC under DOS, not Windows. Planning on Macintosh and PC/Windows support. No work has been done on a Unix version, yet. Infogrip is releasing new products which should work better with PC's, and this product should improve along with them.

Currently, no FCC approval. A serial port version is in the works, which would have FCC approval. Michael is also talking to and/or working with InfoGrip, possibly making a compatible product, but at much lower production.

They're also working on demo software that uses the chording patterns on a normal keyboard.

AccuKey

AccuCorp, Inc.

P.O. Box 66

Christiansburg, VA 24073

703-961-3576 (Pete Rosenquist -- Sales)

703-961-2001 (Larry Langley -- President)

Shipping: Now.

Supports: PC, Mac, IBM 3270, Sun Sparc, and some TeleVideo terminals.

Cost: $495 + shipping.

Doesn't use conventional push-keys. Soft rubber keys, which rock forward and backward (each key has three states), make chords for typing keys. Learning time is estimated to be 2-3 hours, for getting started, and maybe two weeks to get used to it.

Currently, the thumbs don't do anything, although a thumb-trackball is in the works.

The company claims it takes about a week of work to support a new computer. They will be happy to adapt their keyboard to your computer, if possible.

The company actually went to great efforts to be intelligent about the chording procedure. With 8 3-state keys, they could potentially support 3^8 (6561) key chords. Instead, they've chosen 64 main chords and worked to maximize the minimum Hamming distance between chords (meaning, it's much harder to make a typo, because there are more significant differences between different chords). I'll actually be getting my hands on one of these soon, so I'll be able to say more, then. For now, I'll have to say they have the right idea. I'll know, soon, whether their implementation of the idea is good, too.

Twiddler 516-474-4405, or 800-638-2352

Handykey

141 Mt. Sinai Ave.

Mt. Sinai, NY 11766

Chris George (President)

Twiddler -- shipping. Full-function keyboard/mouse in-one.

Price: $199.

Works with PC's. Mac version is in the works. Various university folks are working on device drivers for Unix platforms. Chris says he'll get back to me on what works yet... The Twiddler uses a serial port, and need 5 volts from somewhere. Given that, you could probably get it working with most things. They do use the keyboard port on PC's, as well as supporting the PS/2 adapter. You get to keep you original keyboard, too.

Most applications work, and Windows works fine. DESQview has trouble. GEOWorks also has trouble -- mouse works, keyboard doesn't.

The Twiddler is a hand-held thing, a little bigger than a typical mouse. Your hand straps on to the side with your thumb going over the top and your fingers around the front. There are three buttons for each of your four fingers, and six thumb buttons on the back. You chord with the thumb buttons (modes) and fingers (specifics). Most normal keyboard buttons take one or two fingered chords.

The mouse works by holding down the mouse button and tilting the whole thing. It's apparently accurate enough to do handwriting. There's also a way to change the sensitivity for fine/gross movement.

The chording keyboard is pretty easy to learn -- said to take 3 minutes to teach your brain, 2 weeks for your fingers. You only get one thing, but you can use either hand in it. It's ambidextrous. You get your other hand completely free (hold the phone, drink your coffee, etc.).

There was a review in Byte, March 1992, although, Chris says the picture showed the hand in the wrong position on the keyboard [*sigh*], but the picture seems designed more to show you what the thing looks like, rather than how you hold it.

Various Unix folks playing with the Twiddler (according to Chris George):

Mark Eichin (working on Sparc and 386BSD)

Guy Goldstone (Columbia University) (working on Mach386)

grad student for: Prof. Dan Duchamp, 212-854-8115

Mark Eichin says he's doing the work in an intended portable fashion, i.e.: read from the serial port, generate X key events. He intends to copyleft his resulting work.

I haven't managed to get Guy Goldstone on the phone yet.

Half-QWERTY (Canada) 416-749-3124

The Matias Corporation

178 Thistledown Boulevard

Rexdale, Ontario, Canada

M9V 1K1

E-mail: This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it

Supports: Mac and IBM (but, not Windows)

Cost (U.S.): $84.95 ($79.95 + $5 shipping)

(Canada): $90.55 ($79.95 + $5 shipping + $5.60 GST)

(Ontario): $96.95 ($79.95 + $5 shipping + $5.60 GST + $6.40 PST)

First off, this thing is purely software. No hardware at all.

The idea is that you get to use your normal keyboard, but type one-handed. Hold down the space bar, and the keyboard mirrors. Just hit it, and you get a space, instead. They also support some kind of shift-lock, control-lock, etc., if you want it. They sent me a free demo disk, which I'll eventually get around to trying on my roommate's Mac. The software is just an INIT. I have no idea how their PC software works, but, judging by the trouble other vendors are having, I'm sure these folks are no different.

This should offer moderate improvements over using a keyboard with both hands, because you can position yourself and your keyboard optimally for one hand (much like one of the three wedges of the Health Care Keyboard or the Tony).

[Of course, this is a fairly simple concept. There's nothing to stop you from writing this software all by yourself, although they appear to have a patent pending. Alert the LPF!]

Octima (Israel) 972-4-5322844

FAX: (+972) 3 5322970 (but, they've been having troubles with their machine)

Ergoplic Keyboards Ltd.

P.O. Box 31

Kiryat Ono 55100, Israel

(info from Mandy Jaffe-Katz )

A one-handed keyboard.

Microwriter AgendA (U.K.) (+44) 276 692 084

FAX: (+44) 276 691 826

Microwriter Systems plc

M.S.A. House

2 Albany Court

Albany Park

Frimley

Surrey GU15 2XA, United Kingdom

(Info from Carroll Morgan )

These days, they sell a thing called the `AgendA', a personal organiser. With it, you can buy software and a cable for communication with PC's, Mac's and printers; among the facilities offered is use of the AgendA as an alternate keyboard.

Its about 7''x3''x1/2'', and the chorded input comprises 3 thumb keys used-letters-get-simpler-chords. (Thus for example `space' is thumb, `e' is index finger... `j' is thumb-4-5.)

It's black, with a lcd screen of only 4 lines of 20 (7x5) characters taking up the upper left quadrant. The remaining 3/4 of the front face contains the 7 microwriting keys and just under 60 very small buttons for text input and control functions ( new file, find, etc.) The small buttons are for people who don't want to microwrite, or are just beginning --- they are wholly duplicated by the microwriting keys. After getting used to microwriting, you don't use the small keys at all. (It wou ld be nice if they had a version without them.)

These days, after about a year, I can type into it at about 40 words/minute without looking at its keyboard or screen; and I use it mainly as an organiser. When I have enough text to type to make it worth connecting up (to Mac), the appropriate posture seems to be feet up on the desk, in a reclining chair, AgendA in your lap, on your left hand, typing with your right --- very relaxing.

There are slots on the back for extra ROM (utilities and so on), and for RAM cards (for backup). They advertise a BASIC compiler for programming it, but you do your development on a PC I believe, and then download. I don't think there's any development facilities on it proper.

It costs just under 200 pounds, with 128K memory. (By the way, it's -very- good as an organiser; but it is not at all a palm-top computer.)

Braille 'n Speak 301-879-4944

Blazie Engineering

3660 Mill Green Rd.

Street, Md 21154, U.S.A.

(information provided by Doug Martin ) The Braille N Speak actually gives blind users something that sighted people don't have: a computer terminal weighing less than a pound! [well, there are other lightweight chording things available...] The input can be either Braille or ascii data through a serial port; the output is either speech or serial ascii data. Instead of a screen, we have a tiny synthesizer/speaker. Instead of a full keyboard, we have seven keys: six of them (dots 1-6) for Braille, and a space bar. The six Braille keys can form 2**6 or 64 combinations. The space bar is pressed in conjunction with other key combinations (called chords by the manufacturer) to access special functions; e.g. 3-4-5-sp "three four five chord" opens a menu for adjusting pitch and speed of the synthetic speech. F-chord opens the file menu. These must be memorized by the user, although ?-chord opens a help file.

The Braille N Speak uses any of several Braille codes for entering information: Grade I, Grade II, or computer Braille. Basically, letters a-j are combinations of dots 1, 2, 4, and 5. Letters k-t are the same combinations as a-j with dot 3 added. Letters u, v, x, y, and z are like a-e with dots 3 and 6 added. (w is unique because Louis Braille didn't have a w in the French alphabet.)

==== Thanks and gratitude

Thanks go to Chris Bekins for providing the basis for this information.

Thanks to the numerous contributors:

• Doug Martin
• Carroll Morgan
• Mandy Jaffe-Katz
• Wes Hunter
• Paul Schwartz
• H.J. Woltring
• Dan Sorenson
• Chris VanHaren
• Ravi Pandya
• Leonard H. Tower Jr.
• Dan Jacobson
• Jim Cheetham
• Cliff Lasser
• Richard Donkin
• Paul Rubin

and everybody else who I've probably managed to forget.

The opinions in here are my own, unless otherwise mentioned, and do not represent the opinions of any organization or vendor.