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Colemak For Windows with Capslock to Backspace

  • Started by vaskozl
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  • From: Malmö, Sweden
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DreymaR said:

.. it's a horrible idea to piggyback on another language just to get its icon

But you said it was ingenious at the time...

meatich said:

I guess I will go on digging my old HD to find the Corsican version, but, really, it would be nice if you could leave it here, so that people could have a choice :) Thanks!

People have mentioned their spell checked was forced to Corsican which I am not too sure about (for instance Swedish people have no trouble writing English with Nordic layouts). Sadly the icon is coupled to the "language" (as if everybody switches keyboard settings to match the language they are writing) rather than the layout we can't do much.

Also newer versions of windows now use 3 letters "COS" which no longer make sense for Colemak :/ So I removed it to avoid confusion.

If you *really* want that Co icon, like DreymaR suggested, you can use MSKLC (last release form 11 years ago...) to recreate it in a few minutes.

Posted without the aid of a rodent.

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vaskozl said:

But you said it was ingenious at the time...

I am a horrible, faithless person. Can you forgive me? *cries*

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Thank you vaskozl! Great work.

DreymaR said:

I hope Shai can make it "official".

I agree! This should be the recommended version at https://colemak.com/Windows . Mapping caps lock to backspace is consistent with Colemak on other platforms. This installer is preferable to registry mapping because it's simpler to install, does not affect other layouts, and importantly has no lasting effect when you uninstall.

It's not immediately obvious how to uninstall the registry mapping and I'm concerned it could leave users with a sour taste - "Colemak broke my caps lock key and it's still broken after I uninstalled it"

Last edited by colonel-panic (15-Jan-2021 21:16:44)
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Registry mapping may be too much, indeed. A MSKLC layout with the trick of swapping the key codes for Caps and Back will work well. Using the Co locale to get a Co layout icon however, as mentioned, is a bad idea for the reasons mentioned above.

Personally, I strongly prefer leaving the Caps key alone in the KLC layout and instead using it as an Extend modifier with EPKL. That's a lot more powerful and elegant. You can also map the Caps key to Back, to Back-or-Extend or even more advanced mappings using EPKL.

Last edited by DreymaR (16-Jan-2021 19:19:03)

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Hello!

I just discovered Colemak and started learning it and that's how I came upon this thread. Great work @vaskozl!

However, the changed locations of Ctrl and Win key shortcuts were something I'm not ready (nor willing!) to give up yet. So, I made a new layout which switches the keyboard to QWERTY when the Ctrl or Win keys are held - it also forgoes the hacky Co locale ;). Check it out!

Or you can download it directly:
    - Colemak-QWERTY-Ctrl w/ Normal Caps Lock: Download
    - Colemak-QWERTY-Ctrl w/ Caps Lock as Backspace: Download

N.B. Both of these are installed as separate layouts in case you wanna install both and switch between them easily!


Cheers,

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Are these layouts made using MSKLC, or what? Your links are to two .exe files, it'd be nice if you could tell more about them.

*** Learn Colemak in 2–5 steps with Tarmak! ***
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DreymaR said:

Are these layouts made using MSKLC, or what? Your links are to two .exe files, it'd be nice if you could tell more about them.

Hey DreymaR,

Yes they were made using MSKLC. Read more about it in the github page: https://github.com/AWosaibi/Colemak-QWERTY-Ctrl

Cheers,

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Hi @vaskozl !

The link https://skozl.com/s/colemak-caps.zip has been dead for some time and it's still being linked through from Colemak.com, and is the dependency in the chocolatey package manager.

Any chance we're able to get a reupload?

Cheers!

vaskozl said:

Some time ago I fell upon this thread, which showed how you can "hack" MKLC to change CapsLock into Backspace with only the layout itself. This allows you to install full Colemak without having to remap the registry and best of all, if you switch back to Qwerty (some one else using your computer?) you get CapsLock back. Since no one uploaded any layouts and new users might not be sure of how to do this, I compiled 2 versions of colemak and made them available for download.

The ctrl + capslock and shift + capslock acts exactly like ctrl + backspace and shift + backspace. As of now I have had no issues with this layout.

Download: Direct

Enjoy!

Edit: Remove CO version due to language settings in newer windows.

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vaskozl said:

Download: Direct

Hello,
The link appears to be broken, does anyone have a mirror?
Many Thanks,
Andrew.

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If you really want this instead of something better, make one yourself. Use Henri's guide, there's a link to it in EPKL.

I don't think I've seen Vaskozl around in a while.

Last edited by DreymaR (01-Nov-2021 10:45:33)

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DreymaR said:

If you really want this instead of something better, make one yourself. Use Henri's guide, there's a link to it in EPKL.

I don't think I've seen Vaskozl around in a while.

Hi, very happy to have something better - what's the recommendation?
Have been using this for a year and it's been good, now I'm really missing the caps lock backspace!
If there's something that works in Remote Desktop that'd be brilliant

Last edited by BFXMP (01-Nov-2021 23:05:41)
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baobaozi said:

Hi @vaskozl !

The link https://skozl.com/s/colemak-caps.zip has been dead for some time and it's still being linked through from Colemak.com, and is the dependency in the chocolatey package manager.

Any chance we're able to get a reupload?

Cheers!

vaskozl said:

Some time ago I fell upon this thread, which showed how you can "hack" MKLC to change CapsLock into Backspace with only the layout itself. This allows you to install full Colemak without having to remap the registry and best of all, if you switch back to Qwerty (some one else using your computer?) you get CapsLock back. Since no one uploaded any layouts and new users might not be sure of how to do this, I compiled 2 versions of colemak and made them available for download.

The ctrl + capslock and shift + capslock acts exactly like ctrl + backspace and shift + backspace. As of now I have had no issues with this layout.

Download: Direct

Enjoy!

Edit: Remove CO version due to language settings in newer windows.

Hey - I found it on the wayback machine
https://web.archive.org/web/20201112015 … k-caps.zip

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Haha yeah I used that too, according to the one windows user that tried the zip file from wayback, it doesn't work? I'm not sure though, if they're doing something wrong or what.

Edit: Okay yup, they hadn't restarted, it works!

Hey - I found it on the wayback machine
https://web.archive.org/web/20201112015 … k-caps.zip

Last edited by baobaozi (01-Nov-2021 23:45:07)
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BFXMP said:

Hi, very happy to have something better - what's the recommendation?

My recommendation would be to use the Caps key for an Extend layer! You can read all about Extend in the BigBag, follow the link below.

If nevertheless you're set on using MSKLC, there's a file in the EPKL repository for getting Colemak-eD. With that you get lots of symbols that the standard layout don't have. Just if you're interested. The EPKL program has the same symbols and much much more. Again, see the BigBag for descriptions.

The Colemak-CAWS-eD MSKLC file doesn't have Caps-to-Back since I recommend using the key for Extend instead, as mentioned. But it's possible to do that too.

EPKL should work in remote desktop if the settings are right, I hope...

Last edited by DreymaR (02-Nov-2021 12:41:21)

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