WP43 Alternative key layout --> C43

[Jaymos]

I will complete the latest two changes ( f&g[Σ+] and CLR/UNDO ) before Friday. I’ll give time for suggestions until Thursday.

inautilus,

Below the changes in orange.

Clipboard11.png (157.49 KiB) Viewed 3618 times

[keithdalby]

This has been discussed now since 22nd July, and has earned 700 posts. That's a tremendous amount of time to be talking about a keyboard layout for a calculator where around half of the functions are yet to be coded.

I'm not being critical, I think it's wonderful that you want to branch off the project like this, and you are all far more skillful at designing than I am. I am sure you are all far more skillful at coding too. Shouldn't that be a priority? Until the coding is done, the 43c cannot be released, either in its vanilla keyboard layout or this alternative one.

To me, it looks like when I ask a Year 9 (13-14 year old) school pupil to do some work on a computer and rather than word processing, they spend the lesson fiddling with the fonts and layouts for the title.

Not my project, you do whatever you want. Sorry for being rude.

[Jaymos]

Your opinion is noted.

My opinion below:

I think that the most important response to your post is that I make this calculator for myself, not for anyone else.

The most important points following that, are:
1. My unmodified DM42 can be already used now.
2. I care zero for the Classic style key layout. I don’t own a Classic key layout calculator anymore and I don’t want to own a brand new one made out of my DM42.
3. I don’t like some 43S options such as some menus, angle modes and display options and I changed that.
4. I cannot even try to help Martin code the core. He is a programmer. I am not.

The questions that I ask here on this list are not whether I should do it, but how it would suit others and how I can make it better. I get great ideas from the others on this list and it does seem like this way and design might be useful to at least a few. The 700+ messages on this list and the support I have by private messages for 43C are voluntary and definitely not forced by anyone else, that is there is interest. Everyone working on this does so because we see an end compatible with our needs. About the 700 figure: you should add the time and messages on the original 43S news list if you really want the stats, i.e. from before I was asked to start a separate thread. That could be another 50 or 100 messages or so.

Either way, it took us 6 months+ to get to this stage including hundreds of changes to 43S. Those changes include much, much more than “fonts and layouts for the title” and comprise keyboard layout changes, shift operation changes, function key operation changes, long press keys, double tap keys, menu changes, complex entry changes, stack operation changes, defaults changes, ui changes, display mode changes, simulator operation changes, template development and yes, of course also 2nd grade font changes too, both on the key template and on the simulator. All in all a lot of work by enthusiastic people with little talk about the devil in the detail thereof.

Work done is work completed, and that work does not have to be done when the 43S is finally ready to ship.

Do yourself a favour and follow the various keyboard discussions from even the original US based mailing list. And on the Swissmicros forum. It isn’t new. I just did something to stop talking about it and solve it: Open source - just stop arguing and fix it.

To be clear, the 43S project will NOT, let me rephrase slooowly, NEVER, accommodate the operators on the right side: Walter is very clear on that. So for those who want operators there, that is the only reason the 43S project is a still born baby for them. However great he makes the 43S spec, that ship is going nowhere for those wanting the new style keyboard.

However, the 43C as it is NOW, already enables the 43S engine to run on an unmodified DM42 and the current state is already useful enough for my day to day heavy current electrical engineering. I stopped carrying any other calculator with me (where I previously always had another in my bag). Yes it is incomplete still, but useful already and the last thing I want in a project meeting is homemade DM42 modified keys with paper stickers. That, strangely, is counter productive.

43S is a remarkable project with remarkable people working it. But it has the operators on the wrong side and someone has to change that

[Walter]

Hmmh. Just from the reaction observed through my binoculars I'd say @keithdalby: One shot, one direct hit amidships.

[Jaymos]

Hmmh. Just from the reaction observed through my binoculars I'd say @keithdalby: One shot, one direct hit amidships.

Not following your response.

Not sure why either of you would want to have a ‘shot’ or even ‘hit amidships’.

Sounds pretty aggressive to try sink a ship.

[Walter]

Please see https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/metaphor for my phrasing but don't exaggerate interpretation. Certainly, I don't want to sink a ship.

[Dani R.]

I must repeat myself.

Jaco has written it a few times, and I like to repeat it. Without WP43S there is no WP43C.
Maybe there was some right criticism:

That's exactly what I don't care of: variations on vapourware.
Can't we wait to see the WP43 materialize before pimping it up?

On a calculator the performance is an important point. I notice with the PGM files of WP43S and WP43C a blatant performance deterioration compared to the DM42/Free42.

That's marketing, isn't it? Jaco, do you have relatives in the USA?

The concept paper of the WP43S changes continuously, so I can't and won't contribute to the two projects. Here I work according to the pleasure principle. When I see something that can be improved I do a POC (explanations about POC above in the thread). That is, if I feel like it. I have no obligations and no pressure at all to implement anything.

It is clear to me that Over_score has not yet looked for performance improvements. The best way to get an impression of the WP43S/C is on the DM42 hardware. And there the lack of performance is noticeable.


And I don't have to sit in every thread as the last poster to increase my post-counter.

The point of performance has improved noticeably in WP43S, but that was it from my side for now.

Alas, I'm afraid there are still a lot of functions to be coded - some 50% I'd guess. We're still open to supporters and collaborators (sounds like labor quite rightly), so whoever has the necessary capabilities and spare time to dedicate to this project (and looks for eternal fame in the community ) shall feel free to apply for these tasks. ([:-) ((Ducks and covers to be not slain by the sheer amount of applications))

I'm not being critical, I think it's wonderful that you want to branch off the project like this, and you are all far more skillful at designing than I am. I am sure you are all far more skillful at coding too. Shouldn't that be a priority? Until the coding is done, the 43c cannot be released, either in its vanilla keyboard layout or this alternative one.

@keithdalby, perhaps you now realize that it is complicated to work with the WP43S team. Or at least with parts of it.

I feel similar to Jaco, for daily use the WP43C is sufficiently mature for me.

If I would really miss % or Delta%, I would have implemented these functions long ago. But from old habits I prefer to calculate percentages by hand. Statistics do not interest me (on a calculator). There was a time when I wrote dozens of programs on the HP-41C for my needs. Those days are over. I do not need the programmability of the WP43S. I have no application for it anymore.

It is (unfortunately?) just the way it is, the WP43C can already be operated very well with the DM42 hardware without keyboard overlay. Of the not implemented functions I can't think of any at the moment, which I miss painfully.

Your call to code the missing functions of the WP43S is going nowhere, a stronger cooperation is obviously not desired.

[akaTB]

So I am forced to repeat myself, too.

[Walter]

Alas, I'm afraid there are still a lot of functions to be coded - some 50% I'd guess. We're still open to supporters and collaborators (sounds like labor quite rightly), so whoever has the necessary capabilities and spare time to dedicate to this project (and looks for eternal fame in the community ) shall feel free to apply for these tasks. ([:-) ((Ducks and covers to be not slain by the sheer amount of applications))

I'm not being critical, I think it's wonderful that you want to branch off the project like this, and you are all far more skillful at designing than I am. I am sure you are all far more skillful at coding too. Shouldn't that be a priority? Until the coding is done, the 43c cannot be released, either in its vanilla keyboard layout or this alternative one.

@keithdalby, perhaps you now realize that it is complicated to work with the WP43S team. Or at least with parts of it.

@Dani R.: I can't follow your reasoning - actually, I can't see any reasoning in this part of your post at all. If you see it, please explain (feel free to use your mother tongue, maybe easier to find out what you meant).

[Dani R.]

@Dani R.: I can't follow your reasoning - actually, I can't see any reasoning in this part of your post at all.

Well, if it's really the case that you didn't understand me, it's possible that misunderstandings occur again and again.

In my nature I am rather the cynic, but I can also express myself sarcastically if necessary. But I rarely do this, especially I try to avoid sarcasm and cynicism in written form. But this must be the reason why I recognize sarcasm and cynicism where there is none.

You express yourself in metaphors. Probably my mind is too small to understand this.

I am tired for every small change I see in WP43S to feed it into the communication channels in such a way that it is your idea in the end and only then can it be introduced for WP43S. That's why I don't do this anymore.

I see your funny interjections as an attack on the WP43C team and as an attempt to portray them as useful idiots. That is demotivating.

I acknowledge that there may be misunderstandings. So let's bury the hatchet and find out where and how we can work together.