However, I remember trying to map capslock to control on windows a few years back. It involved becoming an administrator and entering an opaque hexadecimal key into the registry.
Simply popping off the key is probably easier.
Oh, on linux it boils down to "setxkbmap -option ctrl:nocaps", which doesn't require root...
One of them Ergodox EZ ~$350 https://ergodox-ez.com/
However, 350$ seems like a lot of money for a problem that should really be solvable at no cost in software...
Another problem is games. I use dvorak and all games use qwerty bindings so you need either to remap keys for each game or start game with QWERTY layout. If you forgot to start it with qwerty you need to restart the game, which is was really frustrating for me. It's even more problematical with online games like League of legends and etc.
I see no problem for this feature to be present on even cheapest keyboards. I picked ergodox just for an examle.
In the context of the article we're talking about a highly specialized office environment, where bios/live boot environments etc. do not happen often. There, a software solution is useful and cheap.
In the more general case, and for those people that do not mind carrying their own keyboard everywhere, you are right. Especially since a keyboard that expensive probably lasts for a long enough time...
And this software is called "Excel". This should really be solved in software called "Excel". As in: remove functionality from F1
if the view doesn't get obstructed and you could simply tap F1 a second time (or Esc) and instantly be back to what you were doing, i think the UX problem would be solved.
in firefox, i sometimes hit F12 on accident -- but i can just tap it again to close the dev tools, even if it hasn't finished loading. that's decent UX.
The only proper and decent UX in this case is to remove the source of the error. You do that by removing the binding of F1
this is the problem. and it breaks the user's flow because it obscures the work area and can't be instantly dismissed.
there's nothing wrong with putting relatively uncommon actions next to common actions on the keyboard as long as the actions don't break the user's flow.
This. Yet you propose to keep the action that breaks the user flow even if it's often triggered by mistake ;)
I propose to remove the action that breaks the user flow.
https://superuser.com/questions/291018/consume-keystroke-in-...
https://superuser.com/questions/413384/how-to-remap-control-...