2025-03-23 16:24 UTC
Replies (8)
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@kenshirriff@oldbytes.space 2025-03-23 16:25
Engelbart's software ran on a large Scientific Data Systems (SDS) 940 computer. Microwave links and modems connected the computer to the demo, 30 miles away. To get into computing, Xerox later bought SDS, spending $8 billion (current dollars) on a disastrous acquisition.
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@johnefrancis@cosocial.ca 2025-03-23 16:36
@kenshirriff maybe Englebart was a piano player?
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@fozztexx@mastodon.fozztexx.com 2025-03-23 16:58
@kenshirriff Oh it's a chorded keyboard. I was thinking it was used like one of those macro pads all the streamers use and each key was a context sensitive shortcut.
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@stuartmarks@mastodon.social 2025-03-23 17:31
@kenshirriff Interesting, thanks, I had heard of a keyset but I never knew how it worked. I can see how five chorded keys would be difficult to learn. Seems like it would be more useful as function keys (as you noted) or as modifier keys, rather like buttons on a Wacom tablet or Emacs control/shift/meta/super/hyper modifiers.
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@tychi@merveilles.town 2025-03-23 21:13
@kenshirriff i’ve looked at the keyset many times at the CHM i’ve been turning the five buttons on the guitar hero guitar into a real instrument, so i think a lot about how i imagined the keyset would work i honestly didn’t envision a 1:1 mapping with binary, that’s like qwerty being abcdef i thought it would have been arranged by frequency of letters to ease of use, for example, vowels being the single key mappings, like: 10000 - a 01000 - e 00100 - i 00010 - o 00001 - u anyways, thanks for sharing, i appreciate the deep dive
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@_hic_haec_hoc@fosstodon.org 2025-03-23 21:41
@kenshirriff it works completely differently but the idea reminds me of the Michela Machine, a chorded keyboard that has been used since 1880 to transcribe speeches in the Italian Senate https://www.senatoragazzi.it/media/materiali/eng_michela_impaginazione_1.pdf https://github.com/openstenoproject/plover/issues/780
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@wikkit@mastodon.social 2025-03-24 16:59
@kenshirriff Interesting that he just chorded in binary order, rather than putting more common letters on easier chords.
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@speaktrap@pol.social 2025-04-05 16:17
@kenshirriff kinda weird trumpet fingering chart