rebase

26 Aug 2021

I’d like to take a moment to rebase where I’m at with steno (and keyboards), and provide a little context. At the time of publishing this, the blog website has just gone live, and all prior articles from my steno journal have been imported and reformatted.

First things first: I have not done much practice with steno in 2021. I have done quite a bit of practice building mechanical (qwerty) keyboards though. I’ve also headed off into the weeds with some raspberry-Pi-based projects that I can’t talk about yet.

A brief inventory of my keyboards:

• I use an Ergodox EZ every day at work. I keep it in qwerty mode, but in the past I’ve tinkered with putting steno in its firmware.
• I have a Georgi that’s all souped up with symbol and media layers, as well as a dictionary of nav commands.
• I’ve experimented with split boards smaller than the Ergodox (Kailh Choco, pinky3, and Sofle). I really wanted something in a smaller profile, and with rotary encoders. I had a lot of fun building them but in the end the thumb positions actually started causing my first RSI! I also found that I have grown used to the huge number of keys available on the Ergodox.
• I’ve made some forays into the land of 40%, with Daisy, JD40 MkII, and TG4X. This experiment has stalled, as I’m currently waiting on a group buy for the MB-44.
• I’ve thought long and hard about a 4-row 50% keyboard, and then in my research found that others are currently making them so I don’t have to. As of this writing I eagerly await the group buy for the Fruitbar. I expect that once I have a more office-centric job I’ll take the Ergodox there, and at home I’ll use this longboi keyboard.

As far as my steno work goes…it’s been a while since I’ve touched it. I still would love to get back to it, moreso now even due to my new RSI.
Perhaps I’ll write a proper breakdown of how that machine works for me, and why I built the firmware and dictionaries the way I did.