Haha totally understand!

It’s not for everyone but you do get used to it surprisingly fast.

I first got into 40s because I wanted more free desk space and then I moved to a 35%. My friend always said my 35 didn’t have enough keys so I designed this layout as a joke but enough people liked it that I decided to actually make it.

In my default layout, QAZ are mapped to Esc, Tab, Shift and I use the keys on the right for macros.

Does this mean you won’t be joining the GB?

Thank you!

It’s my daily driver. I was using the original prototype up until this one was delivered. Same layout, just a slightly different case design.

Haha you are correct, I have used it with QAZ on the right side.

My friend always says my Vault 35 doesn’t have enough keys so I made this layout on Keyboard Layout Editor as a joke and then he said I should make it a real keyboard and then I posted it on the 40s discord and they said I should make it a real keyboard and next thing I knew I was making 3d printed prototypes and shopping for manufacturers.

It’s very ergonomic, I swear.

This is a really good read, thanks for sharing it! I'm currently in the process of deciding how to move forward with the sale of the keyboard I designed so this is all really relevant information for me.

Here it is! (Sorry I’m guessing imgur wasn’t really what you had in mind when you said not a centralized platform)

Honestly it was a joke that got out of hand

Oh yeah I can upload it to imgur or something

Well said

Haha it was at my wife's family cottage for decades and we tried to sell it in a garage sale but nobody wanted it so it's been sitting in our basement for several years. I had a SNES and N64 hooked up to it for a while but didn't play them much so now it's back in the basement.

Also getting a screenshot of a typing test on it was kind of a huge pain and I probably did it in the most convoluted way possible. But in the end I was super happy with how the shot turned out, especially since a friend of mine made this insanely cool video out of it.

In a good way or a bad way?

I'm almost always on Mac so I don't need Ctrl much but it is in a layer when I do need it.

It’s honestly really useful having the three keys off to the right. You can just map them to macros or something.

I write JavaScript on the tiny ones so I have to type a lot of () and {} and stuff. It took me a little while to get used to.

Also I have them mapped so that QAZ are Esc, Tab, Shift. So all letters are accounted for on layer 0.

That, my friend, is the keymap of the future.

I haven't tried home row mods, but I really should. I use a Mac most of the time, so most of the stuff I would do with F keys is just mapped to media controls on the third layer. I've barely even used any of the QAZ boards on Windows since I pretty much only use W for gaming.