Great to see your idea again. I gave the tutorial a shot and there's something strange. I'm using Chrome and Colemak layout (installed on Windows). I can't make any of the chords with the Colemak layout. I have to switch to Qwerty to be able to follow the instructions and type. Is that intentional?

I'm willing to give it a shot and see how I like it whenever I've got some free time.

There's something I didn't understand, and maybe it's because I only got through the first few steps, but why are you showing different letters on the on-screen keyboard than the one that are typed out when I'm hitting the keys?

Something I've noticed – it's quite hard to be careful about the lifting time of each key at the same time as the pressing time. Typing on a normal keyboard builds the habit of caring only about the pressing timing, so when I need to type something like AT on Chordmak, I end up with the Chord for A and T instead of AT. It, of course, is a matter of training to get used to but is something that slows down the typing compared to the conventional keyboards and requires a very good rhythm, but that's obviously normal, considering the whole idea of Chordmak.

I've gotta say the feeling of typing a few words is like switching to Colemak, when most of the time you don't need to move your fingers from the home row. Now you actually don't move the fingers at all which feels pretty awesome.

Just my first impressions. I wish you good luck. It seems like a great concept which I could see getting popularity.

Edit
Right, I shouldn't talk much before completing the tutorial. I saw what tweaks you've implemented and really like it. It's very easy to learn, I can now type the whole alphabet after just a few minutes and remembered most of the letters. There are a few bugs on the tutorial though:

1. When I want to type THE with holding the three keys it works. But if I want the first letter to be capital I can't use the three keys method. I have to hit "shift" and type the three letters one after another, otherwise I just get Th

2. You say that sometimes it depends which keys you press first when doing these combos, like in when/new. For me it doesn't matter in what order I press them. It sometimes gives me new, sometimes when.

3. I don't know if that's intentional but if it is it's a bit annoying – I can't use backspace most of the time. So when I make a mistake I can't correct it.

Otherwise – What a great job you've done. I'm impressed. And it's so easy to learn. Hell if I do a couple of hours of training, I think I would be typing fluently without thinking.

I did as you said. Went to asetniop.com/ColemakDebug.html and typed (using Colemak) A R S T N E I O and it typed out:
65 a 82 t 83 r 84 78 69 S 73 e 79 i

I hope that helps

Thanks - I'll give these a look - I'm worried the most about the backspace one.

1. Got it - I just needed to update the array for the capitalized version.  Nice catch.  A more sophisticated (i.e. future) version will actually have either one available; if you press the combo you'll initially get a "TH" which will change to a "THE" once you hit the space bar; if you're moving quickly it will happen fast enough that you shouldn't notice it. 

2.  I *might* have fixed that.  This is also a potential hardware issue - some keyboards (the one I'm using included) won't let you press four or more keys or so at a time (the keyboard never sends codes for the subsequent keys).  I wasn't aware that it was potentially an issue with only three keys, but it could be.  If so, unfortunately, there's nothing that can be done about it on the software end for the time being - but that won't be an issue with 3D systems.

Cool, thanks for the details on the backspace - that's helpful to know (it sounds like it's recognizing what you're doing, but crashing out somewhere in the middle while it's processing the command).  I'll play around tonight and see if I can find where it's hanging up.  If anyone notices it happening on a particular slide, please let me know (slide number is in the lower right-hand corner).

The eastern/western version of stenographic codes is, for now, just something that I thought was kind of neat and wanted to share.  I'll probably just add a little note to the tutorial that it might not work for all keyboards.  It's too bad it doesn't - it's one of my favorite things.  Being able to get words like "the" and "good" with just a single action is (I think!) really cool.  You can also add suffixes, like "ing" the same way (though for the keyboard I'm using right now, the same hardware issue comes up).

Absolutely planning on making a version for the LEAP - I'd say it's my highest priority right now.  I'm not sure whether they'll send me an advance unit, but they've got an advance software development program that I'm enrolling in so even without an actual unit to play with I'm hoping to have something ready (or as close to ready as possible) as soon as the first units ship.

Thanks for the heads up on the left/right issue; I've got that fixed.

No problem on adding more letters for shift keys - I'll code it up tonight and include all the bottom row letters including Z and X and the comma and period.  I'll see if I can find and solve the SHIFT issue; the background color of the button is supposed to go back to normal when the shift is done activating.  Shouldn't be a hard issue to solve - thanks for letting me know!

EDIT: Okay, think I've got those shift key issues solved.  Please let me know if the problems persist!

this is great!  i think these layouts may have application for wearable keyers as well (my interest).  i doubt waving fingers in the air will be as effective as a tactile (physical) input device for speed or accuracy.

thanks for the neat browser demos.  could you add a line to *disable the regular backspace key*?  i keep hitting it by accident and the browser takes me back a page.

$(document).keydown(function(e) { if (e.keyCode === 8) { return false; } });

-mike

Hi folks!  I put together a pair of new trainers you can use to practice and test your speed with CHORDMAK - the best that anyone (aside from me) has done with the ASETNIOP version is 41 wpm - think you can beat it?

http://asetniop.com/ipadStopwatchCol-A.html
http://asetniop.com/keyboardStopwatchCol-A.html

By the way, I've added a new feature that makes the backspace repeat simply by holding the appropriate chord (left index and right pinky) for more than a second or so.  Give it a try!

I have!  You can see it in the video below.  I'll hoping to have it working with both hands by the end of the week.

http://youtu.be/fAxZFC3iYGE

Hovering hands for long periods of time would be uncomfortable. I hope the final leap implementation can distinguish between resting state and chord input.

How difficult will it be to edit the layout? I think the special characters in particular are difficult of access.

Making edits to the layout will eventually be a pretty accessible option - we'll probably even include a feature where users can define their own layouts (and skins, of course).  I'm hoping that the new handwriting recognition features will help reduce the need for that, though. 

Ideally, hands won't be hovering - as I mentioned above, they'll be resting/working on a flat surface.  I always figured that tapping eight fingers down would activate/deactivate the keyboard, but I'm sure I'll refine that idea once the LEAP has horizontal capability.

Just a quick update - a non-English version (with access to accented characters and deactivation of the autofill and autocorrect features) of Chordmak is now available.

Hi gdaiain, sorry for my slow reply.  Typically when I'm hitting top speeds I'll use stenography for some of the most common words (the, and, that, of) and sometimes autocomplete for the longer ones after I'm 4 or 5 letters in ("impossible", stuff like that).  Here's a (kind of boring) video demonstrating how things look at 65-70 wpm - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nygdYinzpmk

Here's a link to the original Dvorak tutorial - http://asetniop.com/keyboardTutorialDvo.html

Things have really come a long way as far as the software is concerned, I have added a base keyboard page (http://asetniop.com/keyboard.html) that you can use as a standard text editor. You just need to swich the layout tab to Chordmak (or Chordvak) and you'll also need to switch the keyboard tab over to Colemak. Please report any bugs (or other requests)!  BTW - I wrote this post using the editor, you can copy and paste text from it using the mouse/touchpad controls (you can also copy/cut/paste *within* it using the Ctrl-C, Ctrl-X, Ctrl-V commands, but they're still under construction so they might still be buggy).

Oh, and for the DIY-minded, I've also put together a blog post on how to build your own set of keyboard gloves you can use with ASETNIOP (or Chordmak, or Chordvak) - it's here: http://www.asetniop.com/blog/?p=244