Luca Saiu — Small hacks — My APL keyboard from 2006

A language that doesn't affect the way you think about programming, is not worth knowing.
—Alan Perlis

I made myself an APL keyboard back in 2006; you're invited to do the same, it's easy and fun. By the way, APL may not be the best solution to all problems but is a really beautiful language.

No warranty

If you break your keyboard you keep all the pieces.

Ingredients

A keyboard whose keys are detachable. I used a good quality USB keyboard, originally with some particularly stupid national layout (no comfortable way of obtaining braces, tilde and backquote; very annoying when programming in C, C++ and Lisp, just to mention three languages I happen to use a lot), so I "converted" the keyboard layout into US English.
Some sandpaper to brush away the printed text from each key (the sort used for wood is perfect); a scalpel or a cutter also works, but the process is much more fatiguing that way, and needs precision. Of course you should disconnect each key from the keyboard before scratching it (I used a small flat-tip screwdriver as a lever): dust is bad for the keyboard mechanics, and you'll end up with a lot of dust. Also be sure the keys' surface is as smooth and clean as possible before writing. Don't worry if you make errors, deleting with sandpaper is easy.
This is also a good opportunity to scratch away that stupid Windows logo.
Permanent waterproof felt tip pens of at least two different colors, even better if three or four. I used blue, red and green; the smaller the tip size is, the better. Note that my green marker has medium tip size (it was the best I could easily find). This shows up in the result.

Outcome

My keyboard is not perfect in any way, but has a pleasant "hand-made" feel. I'm actually very bad at manual work, so you can probably do better than me.

The slightly rough surface of keys is very pleasant to touch.

See my 2006 APL keyboard gallery.

Luca Saiu
Last modified: 2022-11-09