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Comment by ta09876 | Hacker News Reader

True, but unfortunately those extra modifiers are now used up for getting the original keyboard back. If you want to do, e.g. Control-Shift-Arrow to select text, you now have to use even more modifiers. I'm currently using a Razer Anansi which is a full size keyboard with extra modifier keys under the space bar. Combined with AutoHotKey and Caps Lock, I can select text with the keyboard without moving away from home row. E.g. CapsLock + Ctrl(thumb) + Shift(thumb) + L does Control-Shift-RightArrow.

I do wish full size keyboards stopped wasting so much space with the space bar though, the way small keyboards do. That would put more modifier keys in the reach of your thumbs.

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Using programmable keyboards with a firmware like QMK, you can reduce the number of modifiers needed on smaller keyboards.

I use a 30%(33 keys) as my daily driver and I very rarely need 3+ button combos even though my arrow keys are in a seperate layer.

For example: My "A" and "O" key acts as shift when held. My "Z" key switches to the layer where "h;,." are arrow keys and adds "CMD" as a modifier. So to select left I do "Z + A + H". I use colemak so A is right above Z.

There are other tricks I do for reducing layer switches. On almost every keyboard "." and "," are next to each other but they are never used together in any human or programming language. "/" is not used that often so it doesn't make much sense to have it in the main layer of a small keyboard. So I made my "," key to output a "/" if pressed immediately after "." for typing "./". I have some other keys that act different if pressed after a certain key.

Japanese keyboards have a tiny spacebar and a couple extra modifier keys for writing Japanese Characters. I have a Japanese ThinkPad external keyboard that I ordered for using the extra thumb keys, but I haven't started using it yet.

> If you want to do, e.g. Control-Shift-Arrow to select text, you now have to use even more modifiers.

Or you're using Vim where just hitting v is all it takes.

I definitely wouldn't use an even smaller board than 40%, though - that is basically the lower limit for me where I can still map all keys to positions I'm comfortable with. Lower than that and I'd need to start using multiple modifiers at once for some symbols.

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