Thumb Term

A few thoughts on this one:

• This is the 2nd draft of the printed case.  It's getting pretty close.  I've moved things around a little to fit stuff in and make wiring work.
• Wire management is going to be rough w/ the keyboard.  I originally wired it using solid copper network cable wires (fer years back), but they're kinda bulky and stiff,  I'll probably swap all the wire between circuit boards and up to the Pico controller with 28awg wire wrap wire and might need a couple spots for zip ties to hold stuff in place.
• I've started marking any spots where I've made an adjustment in the cad model during assembly so I don't forget what's been changed.  So you'll see little marks on a few things.
• The four 5-way switches on the back are very bold. I might need to shorten them a mm or two.
• I'll debate adding a few screws to hold the case together.  tbd...

This is from a few years ago, but it was a fun project, so here are some photos from building this thumb keyboard.  First thing was trying some buttons to see what felt good.  Best (subjective) feel were the top left surface mount buttons, and then probably the translucent clicker at bottom right. The clicker would be easier to mount but...

It turns out that if you space out header pins every 3rd hole on some perfboard, they perfectly fit the surface mount buttons, and by orienting the buttons diagonally, they can be soldered in one at a time without blocking each others pins from soldering.

And the longer ends of  the pins sticking through the back of the board are perfect for soldering diodes and wires to.

I've been brainstorming this for a while since making the "Chonky Pocket" that did not fit in my pocket.  I've been trying not to buy parts and use what I have around, but splurged on the $30 display for this and that got things rolling.  The keyboard is from a previous project "Paper Pi" and it was hard to use without some buttons on the back to reduce dependency on just my two thumbs for typing.  So this build adds some rear facing input via 5-way switches.

Cad work has been underway for about a week and I have a first print to test-fit stuff.  I'm going to move the battery to the green spot between the keyboard halves and chop off the bottom of the case to make it smaller.  I think having a scroll wheel in the middle won't be very useful with all of the 5-way switches on the back.