I’d love to have an ortholinear keyboard mod for the Reform.
I recall that Lukas talked about this in the librelounge podcast interview, that someone already built/prototyped this and shared it with him, but I haven’t been able to find anything on github or gitlab or anywhere else.
Is this documented somewhere?
I’m planning on designing a keyboard mod for my Reform; not ortholinear, but column-staggered instead of row-staggered, based on my Atreus design: https://atreus.technomancy.us
I haven’t started yet tho; was planning on kicking it off once my Reform arrived. But this is a good reminder to order the parts ahead of time.
That is fantastic no know! I just joined this forum after reading your message to express my appreciation. I’m using the Keyboardio version of the Atreus every day and love it. This level of comfort on the MNT Reform would be nothing short of amazing. Given the natural hand positioning with the Atreus layout, the place of the trackball right at the thumbs makes perfect sense.
I’m very much looking forward to learn more about your mod once you get to it.
I’m planning on building a hand-wired Atreus for my Reform too (once I get it; the waiting is brutal). Trying to decide whether to add a dedicated circle key somewhere near the display…
One of my main external keyboards is an Ergodox EZ, which I really enjoy but avoid taking with me outside of the house because it’s a bit bulky. Having something like the Atreus already integrated into the machine would be ideal. Looking forward to hearing more about these mods!
I made my own desktop keyboard using kailh switches (that are also what’s used in the Reform) last year. I’ll probably tweak the the Reform keyboard files to make something similar at some point.
This is something Seb and I have started working on 
I would buy such an Atreus for the mnt reform.
typing this on my new x-bows (https://x-bows.com/) that I’ll take with my mnt reform most of the time until then.
I would love thumb cluster like ergodox . I’ll probably buy this regardless tho
Going for a thumb cluster on the laptop itself would involve milling a whole new case, and likely having to change the batteries as the normal keyboard PCB goes down slightly below the battery PCBs which are in the palm rest already.
I guess that would depend on where the thumbcluster would be placed? If you could do 3 rows with letters it should fit?
any news on this? Designing a new case for the reform with keyboard inspired by the atreus, let me know if you can help
PS: i would like to see how many people are interested so i can organise a few cases being made to take account of this. I am based in Berlin so the logistics of doing this in collaboration with the team here might work out
@minute what do you think would it make sense to work together to do this run at the mill where you make the rest of the reform cases?
any news on this?
When I first announced my intention to build this, I thought that it would just involve designing a keyboard, (easy!) but now that I have my own Reform, I see that the keyboard is integrated with the system controller and OLED, so it’s actually a far bigger task than I imagined.
So even though I much prefer an ergonomic vertical stagger vs a completely ortholinear design, I will probably just end up getting the OLKB board since it’s a big improvement over the stock one.
Just want to put in my extreme support for an ortholinear keyboard with thumb cluster (and a 1u space bar!).
nice to see a few of us willing to do it
i propose we ceate a thread to begin assigning tasks and deadlines
Just came across this. Continuing hardware updates for a computer from 2012:
Mechanical ortholinear keyboard replacement for old thinkpads… most genius of all you can take it apart and put it on either side of your computer to type on a split keyboard, as god intended.
Do you have this in your Reform? Do you have any pictures of that?
I don’t have this in my Reform yet, no. The microcontroler is hard to come by these days…
Maybe I should just order a few now and see when I get them. x)
Would funding help? I would like to contribute 10k USD towards the project of having an open source keyboardio atreus style keyboard for the mnt reform.
Also, would it make sense to try to separate the system controller + oled so it would have a “reform frame” with the oled screen and the circle button, but the rest could be a separate keyboard that could be connected and replaced more easily.
Creating a replaceable keyboard is great, but integrating an important system controller into it seems counter productive.
Also, I am an Atreus user (unmarked keys with kailh pink linear silent switches <3 ) and I just got my reform today. I love it already, but the keyboard layout I don’t love 
