IME, to use git effectively, and make sense of the man-pages, you have to know a lot of the internals of how git works. I found it helpful to read “Git from the bottom up” when I had to start using it professionally: https://jwiegley.github.io/git-from-the-bottom-up/

With the right key mapping the hex grid naturally leads to hand rotation and column stagger. It also takes “1u distance from home” literally because there are no diagonal keys for the index fingers and pinkies that are 1.4u away. It allows keys to rotate in 60° steps rather than 90° steps. That allows for some interesting ways to exploit tilted key cap profiles.

I may ask the opposite: why squares? That’s just as arbitrary, if you think about it. I learned typing on a mechanical typewriter that had round keys.

I wrote a SW a while ago that does an automated optimization of keyboard layouts for a given body of text. It only optimizes the base layer. Since I did this with small/custom keyboards in mind, it only considers the core 3x10 keys. You’d still need to create other layers for numbers, symbols, etc. Even with all the automation, it’s still hard to make a good layout. It depends a lot on the text you use to train it, and on the set of criteria you’re trying to optimize (heat map, rolls, same-finger bigrams, hand alternation, minimal finger movement, etc.). It also generates many layouts, so choosing one can be daunting. I added a ranking system that should make it easier.

The project is dormant at the moment. I never quite got to the point where I was ready to commit to actually learning one of the auto-generated layouts. I want to pick it up again at some point, write some documentation and make an “optimal” layout for my Mantis keyboard. The code is on github: https://github.com/fxkuehl/kuehlmak

I don’t work for PCBWay. They liked the design and reached out to offer to support the project in return for some favourable mentions.

I fell into this rabbit hole when looking into all the options available when ordering an Ergodox EZ. I discovered the Iris keyboard and really liked its compact shape. I ended up not placing the order for that Ergodox and built myself an Iris v4 instead.

Iris turned out to be a good way to ease myself into the world of DIY split ergo boards. It’s affordable, easy to assemble and has enough keys to ease the transition from full sized keyboards. It’s a good starting point for experimenting with layers and other features that eventually may lead you to 40% or smaller layouts.