[Ziddy Makes] describes this cute little guy as a biblically-accurate keyboard. For the unfamiliar, that’s a reference to biblically-accurate angels, which have wings (and sometimes eyes) all over the place. They’re usually pretty scary to behold. Don’t say I didn’t warn you.

But this? This is the opposite of scary. Sure, there are keys everywhere. But it’s just so darn adorable. You know what? It’s those keycaps.

This 16-key macro cube uses a Pro Micro and a system of PH2 5p ribbon cables to connect the four four-key sisterboards to the main board. A 3D-printed base holds all the boards in place. Out of all the switches in the world, [Ziddy] chose Otemu Blues. Clack!

Although it may take some getting used to, this seems like it would be a fun way to input macros. I can see the case for putting some rubber feet on the bottom, otherwise it might scoot around on the desk. That might be cute, but only the first couple of times, you know?

Lexicon Has A Handy Words Layer

[Ewen] wrote in to tell me about Lexicon, a keyboard he designed while reading Marcin Wichary’s most excellent Shift Happens. One idea spawned by the book was a keyboard aimed at writing prose faster and more easily. The result is an input device that marries a stenography-light concept with the BASIC shortcut-having ZX Spectrum.

The key is in those three Space bars. They each produce Space when pressed briefly, but when long-pressed bring up a different layer — Symbols, Function, and Words. “Symbols” refers to the various awesome Unicode symbols that come out of that layer, including neat typographical marks. “Function” comprises the Function keys plus extras.

Thanks to the special Words layer, the user can quickly input common words such as ‘and’, ‘said’, and ‘she’. So how in the world would the user remember how to do all of that? Well, it’s actually pretty easy. There is one word per key, and they are married up alphabetically. So ‘a’ is for ‘and’, ‘s’ is for ‘said’ and ‘x’ is for ‘she’. Each number key gets you that word spelled out — 1 delivers ‘one’ and 2 gives you ‘two’, and so on.

But [Ewen] didn’t stop there. There’s a whole subset of words that are accessible by combining the Words key with two alpha keys, such as ‘SM’ for ‘some’. Users can easily combine shortcuts to produce longer words, like ‘SM1’ for ‘someone’.

Under the hood of this 65% keyboard, you’ll find an RP2040 running the QMK firmware. Although the Lexicon is not open-source, there’s nothing stopping you from taking this idea and running with it in another language. If you want to get a hold of one, check out [Ewen]’s Etsy for kits and completed boards.

The Centerfold: Keep On Truckin’

Man, this setup is fire! Don’t recognize the color scheme? It’s those hues from the Toyota Racing Development (TRD) days of the 1980s. The keyboard is a Keychron K8 Pro, and [FarmersOnlyJim] custom-dyed those MOA-profile keycaps. The neat part is that [Jim] offers their dye process right there in the comments. Come for the color scheme, and stay for the bunny tax in the gallery.

Do you rock a sweet set of peripherals on a screamin’ desk pad? Send me a picture along with your handle and all the gory details, and you could be featured here!

Historical Clackers: Espionage Via IBM Selectric II

So your girl caught this video by [Retro Tech or Die] and then picked up a Selectric II a few days later for about $5 with the coupon savings. It’s all gummed up inside, and I’ll have to address that on my own as my local shop no longer deals with Selectrics.

Anyway, back to the video. We’ve covered this topic before, but it’s been a long time, and this is a nice refresher. The Selectric was a revolutionary typing machine, and the correcting Selectric II a little bit more so. Because of this, government and other offices purchased them in large quantities.

At the height of US-Russian tensions, the Soviets saw an opportunity for espionage in these electromechanical marvels and planted bugs in the Selectric IIs inside the United States embassy in Moscow. It’s surprisingly easy to get inside a Selectric II, and it only took the spies about 30 minutes to open and bug each machine.

Selectric IIs were in use at the embassy from 1982 until 1984 when the bugs were discovered. For more than a year, the Soviets were able to read documents of all sensitivity levels even before officials had laid eyes on them. A tiny sensing device picked up the keystrokes and transmitted them to antennas hidden in the walls. These signals were relayed to a nearby listening station and decoded using probability tables.

These bugs were so small that they could only be detected by x-rays. Housed inside a metal bar of the typewriter, they used magnet meters to detect the disturbances as letters were typed. The transmitted signals were disguised inside television broadcast frequencies.

Because of the way the Selectric II is designed internally, the Soviets were only able to get the alphanumeric characters. They could not capture Shift, Space, Backspace, or Tab. Furthermore, they were compressing six bits of information down to four, which made probability tables pretty much the only option.

It’s a fascinating story for sure. And I’ll let you know how it works out with my Selectric II.

ICYMI: This Lovely Wooden Keyboard

It’s not often that we describe things as stunning, especially keyboards, which tend to be plastic-based rectangular life forms. But then there’s this wooden keyboard from Hacoa via [ProcessX].

Watch as the beautiful wood is routed out, and stay for the delicate and tedious process that produces each finished keycap.

I must admit that I was a little disappointed (or maybe caught off-guard) to see the lovely wooden keycaps being overlaid on plastic ones, but as one commenter pointed out, the stresses of wood grain running through an MX-style keycap stem would be pretty high.

Speaking of the keycaps, they are finished off with laser-engraved legends which will surely never wear out, but are bound to get, let’s say, seasoned over time. As much as I’d like to know how it feels to type on a wooden keyboard, this kind of project seems incredibly far out of reach. But we’ve certainly seen wooden keyboards before. Yes we have. Even macro pads.

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Got a hot tip that has like, anything to do with keyboards? Help me out by sending in a link or two. Don’t want all the Hackaday scribes to see it? Feel free to email me directly.