Mindwalk 26: Torture For Profit

This stuff is pretty radical.

Tim Reynolds at Hilton Garden

Show Details for Tim Reynolds: 2006-02-16

UI Patterns and Techniques

I spotted J. Tidwell’s book at Borders today. I’d like to read it.

talked to a human

Yesterday, I struggled to try and order a SmartBoard from DataDesk. Couldn’t reach anybody on the phone and their voice mail kept bouncing me back to the phone menu.

So, I found out that they sell via ebay, and I ordered one that way: smartboard on ebay.

During that process I asked for the shipping cost. Later I found that the page itself says $12 for shipping. I went ahead and paid via paypal. Then I went back and sent another note saying that I wanted the Mac/USB version.

So, I never got any email back from them confirming/answering/whatever. For kicks, I just called on the phone to see if anybody would answer today.

Spoke to a guy at ext 100 who guessed who I was after I said I’d purchased on ebay. He confirmed that my board went out today.

So, my conclusion is that this is a pretty small outfit. They may not have time to respond to email/questions/answer the phone, but once they get an order they ship it quickly.

here we go again

Well, I’m going to give this one more shot. I’ve been trying to find The Perfect Keyboard for quite a while.

Most recently I got a deck keyboard but found that the keys didn’t really have any tactile feedback.

I also tried this keyboard with alps keyswitches. I practically put it right back in the box right after taking it out and trying it for a minute. I was not satisfied with the touch of the keyboard, and the quality did not seem high.

I’ve had a kinesis usb for quite a while and I adjusted to the different layout long ago. The biggest problem I have with this one is I’ve never been able to get back up to my regular typing speed with it. The bottom row with the arrow keys and special characters (~{[]}) always messes me up. I have trouble getting my fingers onto the right keys consistently.

Recently I used a microsoft “ergo” keyboard and I think I prefer that basic layout over the Kinesis. But the tactile feedback is just not good enough, and after using the Kinesis I can appreciate that arranging the keys in a more sensible way is the right thing to do.

Also the tactile feedback on the Kinesis is not great. Barely there. I turned on the audible click, but it just isn’t the same.