State of the Svalboard, Fall 2024
State of the Svalboard, Fall 2024
More pointing fun, new UI, and lots of experiments!
I'm so happy that Svalboard continues to grow and help people across the globe.
Hit www.svalboard.com/ to buy a full build or a kit 🙃
Join svalboard.com/discord to learn more 🙏
There are now Svalboard Lightly builds and kits in about three dozen countries and most US states – the map just keeps getting more and more colored-in every month and it makes me so happy to be sending these out into the world.
I want to offer a huge thanks to the community for helping to grow this project into what it is today. The clever ideas, firmware contributions and hardware hacks that all of you have built have been instrumental in helping me maintain my motivation to continue with this honestly pretty intense Cottage operation. It takes a huge amount of my time but it also brings me a huge amount of joy.
You all are the funders of this product. No kickstarter, no indiegogo, no big promises and under-delivery, no fancy marketing videos, no corporate overlords, no board, no VC.
Just honest, deeply-considered development from a single maniac, supported by a community of like-minded volunteer maniacs. THANK YOU for making this a reality!
Keybard
Vial has been an amazing tool for this project. it allows instant easy updating of your layout and the fastest possible iteration cycle for trying out new things. That said, it's also a more or less frozen OSS project and the UI is quite dated.
@sixtysixone has jumped in to build a new front-end for Vial-QMK, called Keybard, that allows us to move much more quickly and add a ton of great features that are Svalboard-specific along with general improvements to usability. It’s still in early alpha, but I’m already using it daily and I think it’s just great. It’s WAY faster, generally more reliable with fewer random error popups, and he’s re-thought several core UI elements of Vial in really nice ways that make things way easier to use.
We’ll be redesigning the UX architecture of it a bit over the coming weeks to make it even more awesome and friendlier to first-time users, but it’s legit hard for me to contain my enthusiasm.
You can use Vial and Keybard interchangeably for the most part — but don’t run them both simultaneously, they’ll stomp on each others’ comms.
You can follow along on the alpha version if you like at https://captdeaf.github.io/keybard
Touch
Touch is coming soon as a standard option!
Touchpad order is in for components – just awaiting delivery in a month or so.
This will be offered as an add-on, it’s an easy swap from trackball with all MCUs from v3.0 onwards with the 6-pin “Azo” connector. Older MCUs will need replacing to use these.
The touch device a lovely 43mm etched glass part that fits perfectly in the Lightly interior space, with a customizable riser design in an open Onshape repo that you can tune to whatever orientation you like – a very simple print at your local library or at home if you want to tweak.
The final touchpad implementation will be inertial – flick-to-glide the cursor – and of course we may add additional features like edge or chiral scrolling if people have the appetite to take on those (OSS!) firmware projects
It will also support two-handed uses — one on either side.
Trackball
Trackball has really taken off! I was initially extremely skeptical because my experience with trackballs earlier in my life was not positive. I hated having to click with the same hand I was using the ball with because it required contortion.
But integrating the trackball into the device completely so that opposite hand keys can be used to click has been a revelation for me. Almost every unit sold now includes two trackballs.
One of the best things about features like this growing is that I get more and more demographic data that helps me understand optimal fit.
Originally I was worried I might have to sink the ball into the case to make 44 a standard option – but after putting a ton of energy into making the trackball mount lower profile, and after evaluation with a substantial number of customers: I've come to the conclusion that 44 is a suitable default size for almost everyone.
It feels great and matches the size of the most popular trackball devices, historically.
Another important observation is that the most important thing about trackball fit is actually height rather than size. Getting the ball as close to the phalanges as possible for minimum motion to access it is really what drives comfort.
In CAD cleanup news, I've expanded the trackball design to work with balls all the way up to 55 mm if you can fit them. Only people with enormous hands can do so without extensive case modifications. and for people with smaller hands the width of a 55 mm ball is too much to fitund.
I've alone a bunch of experimentation with BTUs for smoother trackball operation but ultimately set it
aside because I didn't feel that the advantages were worth the trade-offs in bulk and crunchiness. all of these experiments are in the open, public on shape repo at svalboard.com/trackball-repo. I settled on the vcn310 modules you can get very cheaply on AliExpress – they're not the highest quality but they do work, and they're very very small. There are other options out there you can source if you want to hack it up yourself.
But for me, I find that static bearings work great and if you can source G5 grade bearings they're even better. They’re easy to clean, easy to replace if one gets lost, and they can never clog up with gunk like a BTU.
Trackpoint
I've developed a new trackpoint nub geometry that I think is really nice. It's extra tall and has a big cup to give you maximum leverage and reduce the need to put any pressure downwards while moving. This part is available in the public trackpoint repo if you want to print your own.
Wrapping up
As always, there’s a ton of other stuff in the works – hop on svalboard.com/discord to follow along. The community is as warm and welcoming as ever 🤗
Thanks again for your support – tell your OT, your ortho, you friend with RSI – the only way this product grows is by word of mouth and your honest testimony 🙏
Type Lightly!
❤️ Morgan