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    Portable keyboard layout program with Colemak support

    • Started by fmate14
    • 19 Replies:
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    • From: Hungary, Budapest
    • Registered: 21-Oct-2007
    • Posts: 23

    See my program at http://pkl.sourceforge.net/

    state0.png

    I think, to learn Colemak, my program is better than the "on screen keyboard", because... see these images...

    state6.png
    (AltGr keys)

    deadkey3.png
    (When you press a deadkey...)

    Last edited by fmate14 (23-Feb-2008 22:45:09)

    Portable Keyboard Layout with Colemak support
    http://pkl.sourceforge.net/

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    • From: Viken, Norway
    • Registered: 13-Dec-2006
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    I use this on all my USB sticks now and it's incredibly well made. It supports all sorts of accents, deadkeys and Unicode I managed to throw at it, and has made working with other people's computers much easier for me. Heartily recommended!

    Shai, I hope you link/sticky this program.

    Last edited by DreymaR (09-Feb-2008 09:28:23)

    *** Learn Colemak in 2–5 steps with Tarmak! ***
    *** Check out my Big Bag of Keyboard Tricks for Win/Linux/TMK... ***

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    • Shai
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    • Registered: 11-Dec-2005
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    I've added a link on the download page

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    • From: Hungary, Budapest
    • Registered: 21-Oct-2007
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    Thank you, Shai!

    Comment: it requires at least winXP, as I know.

    Portable Keyboard Layout with Colemak support
    http://pkl.sourceforge.net/

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    • Registered: 24-May-2007
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    Does it work on vista already?

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    • From: Hungary, Budapest
    • Registered: 21-Oct-2007
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    rubo77 said:

    Does it work on vista already?

    Yes, I use it on Vista.

    But – thanks the question – if you have administrator privileges, it is recommended to run it as an administrator, because you can not send characters from a normal program (pkl) to an "administrator program".

    Portable Keyboard Layout with Colemak support
    http://pkl.sourceforge.net/

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    • From: Hungary, Budapest
    • Registered: 21-Oct-2007
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    There is a new version with deadkey display support! (See the first post)

    Portable Keyboard Layout with Colemak support
    http://pkl.sourceforge.net/

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    • From: Viken, Norway
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    This looks very nice! Is there a way to get some other colors for the images? (Blue on yellow looks a bit strong on my eye among other things.) And to make the different colors follow my fingering convention (using the left hand for 6 for instance)? I suppose you generate the images in some way, but I could always just edit them manually if I want some small changes.

    Also, you put the layouts out as folders. I don't know how to download a folder short of doing it one file at a time which is slow since there are many files in the one I want. Could you either tell me how to do this conveniently, or preferably upload the layouts as .zip archives, please?

    *** Learn Colemak in 2–5 steps with Tarmak! ***
    *** Check out my Big Bag of Keyboard Tricks for Win/Linux/TMK... ***

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    • From: Hungary, Budapest
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    DreymaR said:

    Is there a way to get some other colors for the images?

    I'm not a grapich designer, I know. In layout.html you can find: ".finger3 { background-color: #cfc; }" where the #cfc == #ccffcc, the hex codes of an rgb color (204, 255, 204); You can rewrite these values... (And if it is better, please, send to me, too)

    DreymaR said:

    And to make the different colors follow my fingering convention

    See the fingers section in the layout.ini (and see colemak_comfort, ddvorak or entikey layouts for example, and the sample.ini of course/)

    DreymaR said:

    I suppose you generate the images in some way, but I could always just edit them manually if I want some small changes.

    Requires: Perl, Firefox, a screen-grabber.
    * Put your ini into the utilities directory in the source
    * Run ini2html.pl
    * Open the layout.html in Firefox
    * Capture the whole page (scroll-capture)
    * Put the captured .png file into the split_png directory
    * Run split_png.pl
    * See the images and NOW (not before this) delete the ini file
    * Enjoy

    DreymaR said:

    ...or preferably upload the layouts as .zip archives, please?

    You can downlad the layouts in zip file, just see the "additional files" in the downlad page. The layouts_0-2.zip is only 1.2Mb and contains the layouts. Or see the "Browse all files" page: https://sourceforge.net/project/showfil … _id=213088

    Last edited by fmate14 (24-Feb-2008 15:25:36)

    Portable Keyboard Layout with Colemak support
    http://pkl.sourceforge.net/

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    • Registered: 12-Jul-2008
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    OK, I want to give this another shot.

    But how to I switch layouts on-the-fly?

    What do I type to switch from Colemak to Hebrew? I installed the Hebrew files.

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    ezuk said:

    But how to I switch layouts on-the-fly?
    What do I type to switch from Colemak to Hebrew? I installed the Hebrew files.

    Dowload the preview version of the PKL v0.3.
    And see the pkl.ini. (Try Left Shift and Right Shift or what you want)

    Portable Keyboard Layout with Colemak support
    http://pkl.sourceforge.net/

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    • From: Hungary, Budapest
    • Registered: 21-Oct-2007
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    Leszek said:

    a sample line which remaps shift key elsewhere?

    PKL supports it, see the "sample.ini" in the layout directory or the ddvorak layout which use BackSpace as right shift and right shift as Enter.

    Portable Keyboard Layout with Colemak support
    http://pkl.sourceforge.net/

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    • From: Viken, Norway
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    Farkas: I thought about some things and made some long posts in the AHK PKL forum. That's still the 'official' PKL forum, isn't it?

    https://www.autohotkey.com/forum/viewtopic.php?p=283399

    *** Learn Colemak in 2–5 steps with Tarmak! ***
    *** Check out my Big Bag of Keyboard Tricks for Win/Linux/TMK... ***

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    • From: Hungary, Budapest
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    Thank you, I will reply there.

    Portable Keyboard Layout with Colemak support
    http://pkl.sourceforge.net/

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    • From: USA
    • Registered: 01-Sep-2010
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    What are the function of following buttons?
    -RCt
    -RW
    -LW
    -LCt

    christmas wine glass charms

    Last edited by winechristmas (08-Sep-2010 03:09:52)
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    Hi WineChristmas! Please bear in mind that the main discussion forums for this application are on the AutoHotkey forums (and I suppose, the sourceforge repository).

    However, I'll answer your simple questions (although a few of those should be fairly obvious if you look at your keyboard!):
    - LCt/RCt = Left/Right Ctrl (Strg if you're German)
    - LW/RW = Left/Right Win (GUI if you're a *nix user)
    - AGr = AltGr (in case anyone wondered; this key is not the same as RAlt but sends LCtrl+RAlt for the 'level 3' chars)

    *** Learn Colemak in 2–5 steps with Tarmak! ***
    *** Check out my Big Bag of Keyboard Tricks for Win/Linux/TMK... ***

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    DreymaR said:

    Hi WineChristmas! Please bear in mind that the main discussion forums for this application are on the AutoHotkey forums (and I suppose, the sourceforge repository).

    However, I'll answer your simple questions (although a few of those should be fairly obvious if you look at your keyboard!):
    - LCt/RCt = Left/Right Ctrl (Strg if you're German)
    - LW/RW = Left/Right Win (GUI if you're a *nix user)
    - AGr = AltGr (in case anyone wondered; this key is not the same as RAlt but sends LCtrl+RAlt for the 'level 3' chars)

    Thanks for the answer.

    Melbourne electricians

    Last edited by winechristmas (29-Sep-2011 01:20:42)
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    • From: Viken, Norway
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    A dead key is a key that waits for another keypress before producing anything. Like an accent key (that most layouts other than the silly US standard one use).

    *** Learn Colemak in 2–5 steps with Tarmak! ***
    *** Check out my Big Bag of Keyboard Tricks for Win/Linux/TMK... ***

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    DreymaR said:

    A dead key is a key that waits for another keypress before producing anything. Like an accent key (that most layouts other than the silly US standard one use).

    In TeX- or groff-related matters, I have found it risky to simply use the term accented letters or even diacritics, even as a simple matter of convenience.  People will protest that the a-umlaut, o-umlaut, a-ring are not accented versions of anything (regardless of how they look from a type-setting point of view), but bona-fide independent letters in their own right. 

    The US keyboard is simply respecting that.

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    ds26gte: You're confusing a glyph with an input method. And the people that protest that the umlaut isn't an accent are confusing typography (which is what a text-producing service does) with linguistics. Of course the umlauted letters are independent glyphs and graphemes representing independent phonemes, but that doesn't reduce the status of the umlaut as an accent. I uphold my judgement, and find it reinforced.

    The US keyboard WINDOWS LAYOUT is simply denying people the possibility to create glyphs necessary for international writing in an easy and integral way independent of application-based crutches. Other OSes using the Compose key alternative to the deadkey approach don't have this problem.

    Last edited by DreymaR (07-Oct-2010 06:50:15)

    *** Learn Colemak in 2–5 steps with Tarmak! ***
    *** Check out my Big Bag of Keyboard Tricks for Win/Linux/TMK... ***

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