One Handed Keyboard

A first look at the Maltron 90 series keyboard

Some keys are shifted completely from their traditional locations: the thumbs are given their own little areas containing the arrow keys, tab, space bars - there are two - and the return key. Having to hit backspace with your thumb when you make mistakes certainly takes some getting used to, and you're definitely going to be making mistakes.

The strange layout serves an important purpose: traditional keyboards encourage an unnatural posture, with the elbows pushed inwards and the shoulders hunched. Combined with the repetitive motions used in typing, this can often lead to painful conditions of the wrist, arm, shoulders, and back. The knuckles too can suffer from the minuscule contortions required to hit a particular key. In severe cases, surgery can be requred to correct conditions like carpal tunnel syndrome. The 90 series, Maltron claims, addresses all of these when used properly.

Maltron recommends that those switching to the 90 series use the keyboard for a month, during which time no other type of keyboard should be used. It's good advice, as the layout is strange indeed. When we put a sneak preview of the board on Twitter, reactions ranged from the amused - "is this the new Salvador Dali signature range of keyboards," we were asked - to the horrified - "Kill it! Kill it! Kill it with fire! IT IS MISSHAPEN AND UNUSUAL!" It's certainly an understandable reaction to have: the keyboard is so different to a traditional layout that we found our typing speed and accuracy decimated. As we used the Maltron more, however, it became clear that accuracy issues were the result of years of bad habits becoming ingrained in muscle memory. In particular, the habit of allowing fingers to drift away from the 'home' position results in the wrong fingers firing for a particular letter. If you see any words with 'V' swapped for 'C,' 'S' for 'A' or 'O' for 'P,' now you know why.

It seems unfair to judge the keyboard harshly for this, though. More well-behaved typists who adhere to the rules of touch-typing more stringently will likely have an easier time of things, but everyone will require a long period of adjustment. For those who like a real challenge, Maltron has even developed its own eponymous key layout which swaps QWERTY for QPYCB, ostensibly to reduce the amount of travel the fingertips need to make on average. This extreme layout, plus the option of switching between PC and Mac modes, is selectable via a switch on the base of the keyboard. It's there that we find our first true complaint: the switches are mounted on the PCB, with a hole cut in the keyboard's sizeable plastic casing.

HansOn – One handed keyboard (Productivity) | iPad Apps

The HansOn One Handed Keyboard is the first of its kind, a truly fully functional one handed keyboard for the iPad. Finally be able to use all five fingers to type and still carry the iPad with your free hand.The QWERTY keyboard layout was never designed to be functional as a one handed keyboard system, nor was it designed to work effectively as a typing system for tablet PCs. Once a tablet PC has to be “put down” to be an efficient typing platform, the concept of mobility is mute. One finger typing is not the way of the future for the tablet PC.The patented keyboard design was created based on the ergonomics of the human hand and the keys positions based on the “frequency of letters, symbols and function keys used”. All the letters, numbers and 26 of the most commonly used symbols are on the keyboard without overwhelming the screen. The Letter locations are systematically placed to allow for the most frequently used letters to be typed by the most dominate fingers, the index and middle fingers. The learning curve is low, and you will be typing away at speeds far faster than the typical 1 finger or 2 finger typing while holding the iPad right from the start. Even as a beginner with this new key layout system, all one has to remember is, the most common letters will be near the index and middle finger position, and the vowels are in the middle row in a simple AEIOUY arrangement. Simple, fast, ergonomic and truly mobile.KEYBOARD FEATURES:1.LEFT HAND or RIGHT HAND option.2.COPY ALL and DELETE ALL buttons.3.SIZE CHANGE option (use 2 finger pinch to change size from menu).4.CHANGE ANGLE OF KEYBOARD option (use 2 finger pinch to change angle of the keyboard).5.POSITION CHANGE option (use 1 finger to drag the keyboard to the desired location).6.LEFT and RIGHT arrow keys.7.HIDE KEYBOARD button.(tap screen to make keyboard reappear)8.Functional in both landscape and portrait position.INSTRUCTIONS:1.Adjust keyboard to desired size, angle and position. (Default size and angle are for “average” hand sizes and a relaxed hand position on the screen). Adjust the keyboard angle to allow for a straight hand to wrist position for maximum comfort.2.The Thumb home key is the SPACE key. Rest of the fingers should be spread out comfortably on the middle row from "E" to ".".3.Practice practice practice. Your WPM will increase with more use like any other form of data input systems.The HansOn One Handed Keyboard at its current version, 1.

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