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Ask HN: Drumset form-factor for alternative keyboard?

4 points by coderatlarge ↗ HN
I'm looking for a keyboard that I can use sort of like a drumset: I put the device on my desk, it's perhaps the size of a large keyboard tray but curved upward, I hold drumsticks and bang away at big labeled key buttons/targets. Modifier keys with pedals at feet and/or elbows. I haven't been able to find anything like this online.

If no such thing exists, I wonder how you would build it easily/cheaply. What is the simplest way to build a "software keyboard" on ubuntu? (my preferred OS). There are a lot of resources online, but it all seems to get rather esoteric quickly for a problem that appears to be relatively straightforward from the outside.

My motivation is RSI; I've tried many things including kinesis and friends, alternative layouts, various form-factors, etc. Most things work for me a bit for a bit, others not at all.

13 comments

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al_borland
You could probably make something like a xylophone, with some kind of sensor or switch for each bar. Originally while reading I was thinking of something like a steel drum, but a xylophone would probably be easier to wire up for a prototype, as each bar could be its own thing and there would be less noise to try and filter out in software.

Or maybe an easier way to see if you’d even like something like this before building is to get a keyboard with very short travel and low force needed, and some rubber tipped drum sticks (or mallets) and try drumming on an actual keyboard.

You could also try speech to text. I seem to remember seeing VS Code added it not long ago as part of Copilot. I haven’t tried it at all or even looked to see how it works. I just saw the release notes.

coderatlarge
thanks for the thoughts; I've tried speech to text in the past and it was awkward and inaccurate for coding; maybe things have improved since then though.

interestingly xylophone-like images are the first thing that gemini draws when I try to describe what I have in mind. It's been difficult to get the system to generate an image of what I'm thinking of :)

GianFabien
There are example Arduino programs that emulate a keyboard and/or mouse connected via USB.

Starting with that, you could wire up a variety of sensors, switches, etc and emit emulated keystrokes and mouse movements.

For inspiration take a look at microWriter, chording keyboards.

solardev
Would maybe Whisper speech recognition be a simpler setup?

Or here's a giant keyboard: https://www.whiteclouds.com/blog/giant-computer-keyboard-pro...

DIY version: https://hackaday.com/2022/08/27/giant-keyboard-is-just-our-t...

For a software keyboard, I think the usual term is "onscreen keyboard" and most operating systems have one built-in somewhere. You can probably configure Autohotkey to function similarly.

The Xbox Adaptive Controller might be a source of inspiration: https://www.xbox.com/en-US/accessories/controllers/xbox-adap...

If you can't map everything to a button directly, maybe using different modes/chords in combination with an on-screen keyboard could work? It would likely be a lot slower than regular typing though.

Have you already tried different ergonomic keyboards, such as softer switches, split layouts, curved or vertical layouts, etc.?

coderatlarge
Wow the giant keyboard is making me consider alternatives. Maybe I could make a large mat to put on the desk that I could tap with a fist or open palm, switching strain to the full arm instead of just the wrist.

To your point about speech recognition and alternative keyboards: I’ve tried a bunch of things over the years, including split, curved, chorded etc. It might be time to re-revisit all of that in case things have changed. With every wave of the problem, motivation changes so even if the device wasn’t ideal at a previous time it might be acceptable now.

coderatlarge
Woah the Xbox adaptive controller is pretty interesting as well. Sort of a remapping hub for other devices.
marshmellman
You might look into MIDI devices, since there are programs to convert MIDI events to keystrokes.

For hardware, this seems kind of like what you’re looking for: https://www.sweetwater.com/store/detail/SamplePadPro--alesis.... There’s plenty of MIDI foot pedals as well. I don’t know about using the foot pedals as “modifiers” but I assume it’s possible.

coderatlarge
Thanks! The pads are very much like I was thinking. Maybe I could tilt a unit like this on a desk. At this price point it might get expensive to build up a keyboard , but something to think about.

I don’t know anything about MIDI though I’ve heard the term before. I’ll look it up.

highhedgehog
Yeah I think MIDI is your best option. Essentially you have to have a piezo connected to the surface your hitting, than I guess I would investigate linking it to an Arduino that recognizes and processes the hits and transforms it in MIDI data
coderatlarge
Thanks - it seems there are some electronic drumset products for sale with about 8 targets on them that could be good candidate starting points.
simon_acca
Something could be hacked together with this perhaps https://jouemusic.com/en

It is not big but it is meant as a computer input device that can be struck with drumsticks

coderatlarge
Yes makes sense - I was thinking bigger but I think the point of these seems to be that if you have one sensitive surface (trackpad or touchpad like) then you can overlay a bunch of targets / keys on it. That may be the easiest way to get started with something that can be re configured with iteration.