[alchemist1e9]

Thank you so much for sharing this!

I’m curious if you have ever looked into the Tap Strap 2? I recently got one and it looks promising with preliminary testing but I haven’t invested much time learning and configuring it yet.

[gtrevorjay]

Wow. Unless I'm thinking of a different device, those were much more expensive the last time I took a look. That's super tempting.

Just giving a preliminary skim of the website, it looks like their alphabet doesn't include meta characters like CTRL, ALT, and WINDOWS? Is there a more advanced mode? When you customize things, is that done on device (just sending keystrokes as a Bluetooth keyboard) or do you need special software on the device you're interacting with? Learning aside. How accurate has it seemed so far?

[patrickkidger]

I have a Tap Strap 2. (Although only as of a couple of weeks ago, so still pretty new to it.)

Answering your questions, split into pros and cons:

## Pros

You can customise the layout, including meta keys like control/alt/windows. I think the "more advanced mode" is basically just designing your own layout.

It's honestly very accurate for a keyboard that is basically just tapping your figures against a table. It definitely misreads the odd input (or perhaps more accurately, it is sufficiently easy for me to waggle my fingers wrong), but it doesn't make so many that I'm really bothered by it.

I had an issue with the firmware on mine when I first got it, and the support team were super responsive. I really appreciated this.

The Android/iOS app is well designed for learning how to use it -- it comes with an excellently pedagogical typing tutor.

If you're curious, I'd definitely recommend giving it a go. IIUC the WPM most folks get with it is about equivalent to to other one-handed-keyboards, ~50 or so. I've found learning it to be pretty easy. (Substantially easier than learning a new layout on a regular keyboard, for some reason.)

It connects as a bluetooth keyboard, no special software required.

## Cons

Customising layouts is unfortunately a bit of a chore, being both tied-to-the-company and requiring additional devices. The layout must first be designed through a webpage on their site, which you need to log in to using your account. Then you need an Android/iOS device to actually connect to the TS2 and push the layout.

## Worth knowing

You have essentially five layers: default, double tap, triple tap, shift, and switch. Shift and switch are pretty similar to layers as you'll find them on most ergomech keyboards. However, the double and triple tap layers work by inputting the key corresponding to that chord on the default layer, then detecting that you're doing a double/triple tap, then inputting backspace, and then inputting the key corresponding to the chord on the double/triple tap layer. So if you'd like to use it for something like vim, then that first input might actually mean something! If that will affect you, then in practice you can't use the double/triple tap layers, and you only have 60% of the real estate to fit your custom layout into. That is just enough to fit basically a whole keyboard -- I've got a custom layout that does this -- but it took me some careful thought for how to cram all those keys into such little space in a logical way.

[gtrevorjay]

Thanks for the details!

The insertion of backspaces is interesting. One of the drawbacks of--say--Ardux is that some layers are accessed by holding down one key and then pressing others. It's adjustable but it means there's a delay when you want to enter characters on such layers as the keyboard has to wait and make sure you're actually holding. Conflicts aside, committing early and then correcting is interesting.

The Twiddler eventually got third party tools, maybe the Tap Strap can.. as well. Being at the mercy of an app service for what is for a large portion of users a medical device is insane.

[gtrevorjay]

Looking at the software, it looks at least as powerful as the Twitter: in-device keybindings, holds, macros, etc. This is super interesting.

[alchemist1e9]

https://github.com/JJJHolscher/tapstrap

https://github.com/TapWithUs/tap-python-sdk

Those might be interesting for you if you haven’t seen them.