Design the QWERTZ layout

[Waxberry 638]

We heard you! QWERTZ layout is under the plan!

 

What is your preferred places to place the additional German letters? What will be your ideal German QWERTZ layout?

 

Please tell us, and we will try to deliver it same time with QWERTY. :)

[Keyahnig 80]

Can you write umlauts ("ö", "ä" and "ü") easily on the qwerty layout? And the same with "é", "à" and "è".

[EskeRahn 5,459]

Shift the A-Z letters 'back' left, to allow for the national chars. See the black print on DIN keyboard here as a god stating point

 

[EskeRahn 5,459]

...Actual Scandic user could live with this QWERTZ-DIN-layout-print!! We just have to ignore the 'swapped' Z/Y print, and that the Å-key says Ü

Ö and Ä wil be perfect for Sweden and Finland, and good for Noway (Ø=Ö and Æ=Ä - same sounds, different symbols). And acceptable for Denmark (ÆØ swapped compared to Norway)

 

IDEA: Combine the QWERTZ and scandic layout by printing YZÅ on the German ZYÜ with a different colour. This would make it almost Perfect for Sweden and Finland, and OK for Norway/Denmark.

 

maki.jouni made a nice sketch for how it should look for Finland here And it is clear that this is quite close to the DIN version if the QWERTZ

[Keyahnig 80]

I use the Swiss layout which is quite similar to QWERTZ.

I think EskeRahn's solution might be the perfect compromise for all German speaking and Scandinavian people.

And if it could get shipped on the same date like the QWERTY version would be perfect.

[Doktor Oswaldo 904]

I think this is not that important at all. I think it is important to know how we could change the layout software-side.

After 3 weeks it does not matter at all what is printed on the keyboard you won't need to look. But it is important to have YOUR layout!

 

So the real question is, will there be any software support (without rooting) to change the keymaps as you please?

 

[Wheeljack 212]

When shifting everything to the left, don't forget to move the nubs on F and J to the lest as well, not just the printed on letters. ;)

I'm all for EskeRahn's layout.

[elvissteinjr 359]

The QWERTZ layout again, huh? I actually had done some layouts in the past for the moto mod a good while ago which were supposed to actually and up on the hardware.

 

One issue we have though, is the lack of guidelines when designing the layout.

For example, am I allowed to have third level modifiers?

I'm assuming the yellow pointing arrow is like FN for accessing the yellow printed characters. If that's the case, what happens with Shift on non-letter keys?

When I did the moto mod layouts, I was told the characters on it have to match up with an existing Android keymapping. I found that odd, but does this restriction apply here?

 

Here's my simple first take, typical German QWERTZ with minimal deviation.

This one uses FN as third level and puts the number row symbols behind shift instead.

Or as image if for some reason you can't see everything properly on that site:

 

Here is a Keyboard Layout Editor template with the QWERTY layout as seen on the photos. I might've gotten one or two symbols wrong there as there doesn't seem to be a super clear photo of the keyboard anywhere. Something without tilt or blur would be cool to look at.

 

Feel free to use the Keyboard Layout Editor links as a base for your own suggestions on the layout. I think it's a convenient way to go about this.

[EskeRahn 5,459]

Cool elvissteinjr, much easier to quickly make suggestions :)

 

PS: I believe you swapped Ä and Ö usually (AFAIK) on German keyboards is ....JKLÖÄ i.e like this

[elvissteinjr 359]

I did indeed. And that while typing on one, great job me.

Thankfully it's easy to fix, so it should rather look a bit more like this of course.

[EskeRahn 5,459]

If you edit your 'old' comment with an updated picture/link, i can remove our replies, to avoid confusing other readers. :)

 

BTW there is an odd BUG in the forum, so if you edit a comment multiple times within a relatively short time span (an hour?), it gets caught in the spam-filter, assuming you as a spammer, posting the same again (it fails to see that it was edits....).

[elvissteinjr 359]

Let's say I would if I could. Pretty sure there was an edit button when I did the original post, but it's nowhere to be found on either post now.

This forum sure is peculiar. Nevertheless, I think most of us will manage to read up on the incremental updates on each layout.

 

Since I'm posting already:

I'm sure the layout I posted can be easily expanded to cover more countries that use a form of QWERTZ in their keyboards. However, I lack the experience to properly pick and place required characters. Wikipedia isn't a great source for what's actually on the keyboards in practice it seems. My layout is pretty much what's listed there as "T1 according to DIN 2137-1:2012-06", but the "T2 according to DIN 2137-1:2012-06" is what you first see when looking up the German layout... something I've yet to encounter in the wild, but apparently does exist.

 

It also remains the question who the target for this layout is. German users are likely to be the primary target, but there are of course a bunch of other QWERTZ countries, some of which's layouts don't look like they can be accomodated for without conflicting with other QWERTZ layouts. This certainly needs input from the respective users I suppose.

[EskeRahn 5,459]

Ah, yes you are right, sorry, there is a limited time for edit. (which makes a lot of sense).

 

And indeed let us hope other users chip in. I have no idea of the distribution of interest/preorders cross the globe. (nor on what layouts they prefer)

[cairy 0]

Would love to have the option to pre-order qwertz

[dreamflasher 120]

With the scandinavic addition: layout

 

And I personally always would have hoped to see all greek letters on the keyboard (great for maths!): layout

[EskeRahn 5,459]

Nice DreamFlasher (though if the Scandinavian is to be printed we would like to have "Z/Y" and "Y/Z" also, as we use QWERTY as a base).

(And perhaps Psi would me more natural to put on the national key right of P rather than on Y, and Omega on O not W? like this )

[dreamflasher 120]

I agree, nice, I love it! :)

[OliverTypes 152]

Nice! :)

[Slion 1,201]

Now I'm jealous I want my AZERTY!

[TeZtdevice 296]

My favourite layouts:

 

No.1 (just QWERTZ with sound symbols)

 

No.2 (just QWERTZ)

[Waxberry 638]

Thanks for the ideas.

 

What we think the best is adding German keys and swap Y and Z.

 

If you notice from our QWERTY layout, some symbols were placed on the left, to make the letters in the middle to be reachable with both thumb. Just copying a PC layout will shift the main letters too close to left and make it harder for the right thumb.

 

How about:

- Moving some of the symbols to the secondary keys of letters, and add German letters to the previous symbol keys

- Or, adding German letters as the secondary key on top of letters

 

What do you think?

[Waxberry 638]

Also what are the additional keys? I can see ä, ö, ü being added and ß

 

Is the "Mu" key (on top of M in @TeZtdevice image) needed as well?

[EskeRahn 5,459]

IMHO the right-shift of the A-Z should be limited to languages with no national letters, that is the US/UK layout only (AFAIK)

Even the Canadian QWERTY layouts would expect national letters between L and Enter.

So for all other layouts keep the A-Z in their standard positions, and use the keys to the right for national letters.

[elvissteinjr 359]

µ is present on German QWERTZ keyboards, but it's not a critical symbol. You use it as much as you'd do in English. There's also the degree symbol °, which is handy from time to time but also not a deal breaker if missing, I suppose.

But the € symbol is something expected to be there, I'd say.

 

Though I'd personally wish for a more adapted special characters layout. It's the number one thing of confusion when unexpectedly presented with a QWERTY layout.

 

Regardless of that, for the placement of just the new characters, here are my recommendations:

Ä - FN A

Ö - FN O

Ü - FN U

ß - FN S

€ - FN E

 

These are straight forward and put onto letters which are related to the symbols in some way. These letters are happen to be free in the QWERTY layout.

 

If we were to go about adding ° and µ as well, I'd suggest putting µ on FN M like it is on German QWERTZ and move @ to FN Q (also German QWERTZ) and use the freed up spot for ° .

 

One can go great lengths about keyboard layouts, heh. I'd say if we get told the limits we can work with them. Overall I'd be happy with anything at this point, but since we got the chance, I might as well try to get the best out of it.

[TeZtdevice 296]

Additional symbols: "mute" (no. 4) , "quieter" (no. 5), "louder" (no. 6)

"Mu" is not needed, imo.

I will create a new example.