Introduction

It’s almost two months now since I’ve been using the Planck EZ keyboard as my daily driver. It is high time to share my thought on this keyboard. If you don’t want to read further, the bottom line is simple. This keyboard is fantastic and worth the price.

Let’s dig into the key features of this neat little keyboard that make it fun and convenient to use.

The layout

The first thing that amazes everyone is the Planck keyboard’s layout. Not only does it lack most of the keys that other keyboards have, but also it is ortholinear. In other words, the keys are not staggered but form a regular grid. There are no studies that confirm the ortholinear layout is better from an ergonomic point of view. However, after my two months with Planck, I’m sure that typing on this kind of keyboard is much easier. The keys are just where you expect them to be. It is especially visible when I’m touch typing. My typing accuracy increased.

Since the keyboard is 60% smaller than the regular keyboard, the “missing” keys must be accessible through layers. When typing, I use three of them. The base layer contains the regular QWERTY layout. The raise layer provides me mostly with the number keys and the function keys. The lower layer gives me access to all the required symbols, used mostly to write code. At first, I thought that using layers might be a cumbersome experience. However, after a couple of days, switching between them became natural, easy, and fast. The base layer is the default one. The right thumb activates the “raise” layer, while the left thumb switches to the lower layer. The keys to switch layers are conveniently located on both sides of this little space bar. As a result, layer management is almost seamless.

The compactness of the keyboard makes literally all keys to be just one key away from the nearest finger at all times. With layers, there is no need to stretch the fingers or move the hands to reach for the number row or the symbols. When I type, no matter if it is prose or code, my hands barely move. After eight hours of work, this makes a huge difference. My hands are more relaxed and hurt a little bit less than with the regular keyboards.

I have defined some other layers. However, they are not used for editing text. They are mostly used for controlling the window manager, the keyboard, the system, and the mouse. As a result, I’ve got all the functionalities I need to operate my computer at the tips of my fingers almost all the time.

The habits

The Planck keyboard improved my typing habits. When I realized I will need to re-learn how to type on this new, exotic layout, I decided to improve my touch typing skill. I completed a couple of online exercises. I also decided to treat each situation when I typed a letter with a wrong finger as an error and redo it. I sacrificed the speed of typing for accuracy and correctness. It paid off faster than I expected. After two weeks I was making significantly fewer mistakes than at the beginning of my Planck adventure. Furthermore, my typing speed was slowly going back to the level of switching the keyboards.

I must admit, I find touch typing on the ortholinear keyboard perceivably easier than with the traditional, staggered layout. The keys that are below or above the home row are just where I expect them. I don’t need to move my palms slightly up and down and I hit the right key without a hassle. As a result, my typing technique is much better than in the pre-Planck era.

Finally, Planck allows using the side of the palms as the additional two fingers. Since the keyboard does not have any bezels and the keys are aligned with the edges of the board, the bottom left and bottom right keys can be hit with the sides of the palms. I configured the right bottom key to trigger the mouse control layer, while the right bottom one is the left Alt key I use for some actions in WeeChat.

The configuration

The Planck keyboard is powered with Quantum Mechanical Keyboard firmware. There are graphical configurators available. However, I decided to write my keymap in C language. After all, both configurators output C code that is compiled to the binary format. Compiling and flashing the firmware is simple on OpenBSD. Furthermore, I can easily version and backup my keymap using git repository. The QMK documentation is very comprehensive. As a result, writing code for a custom layout is pretty easy and pleasant, even though this is pretty low-level coding.

Mouse controls

I fell in love with ThinkPad’s trackpoints. This was the ultimate enabler to ditch the mouse completely. With trackpoint, I was able to operate the mouse cursor without leaving the home row. When I got accustomed to the trackpoint, it was a game-changer for me. However, the trackpoints are not popular as far as laptops are concerned. Excluding ThinkPads, there are only a couple of models that have this feature. At work, I managed to get the Dell laptop with trackpoint. The experience was decent, but it was far from what ThinkPads offer. This leads me to the conclusion, that I might not be able to use trackpoint at one point in time, when the popularity of this solution will perish.

Fortunately, Planck and QMK saved me from this fate. The firmware offers mouse emulation. The idea is simple. You control the mouse cursor with the specific keys on the keyboard. Also, the mouse wheel and buttons are mapped. This might seem counter-productive at first, as the mouse seems to offer much more precise movements than pressing a key to move the pointer in a given direction. Furthermore, controlling the movement speed with the keyboard is a little more cumbersome than moving the mouse or placing the finger on the touchpad. However, QMK offers several different modes regarding cursor acceleration. At first, I used the kinetic mode. This way my cursor started to move slowly just after I pressed the movement key, then it accelerated with a quadratic curve with time. Unfortunately, this seemed to decrease productivity a lot. When I wanted to move the pointer from one side of the screen to the other, I needed to wait a significant amount of time for the cursor to gain speed. At one point, I came across with this video by Ben Vallack and adopted the idea of using the constant mode with three predefined speed levels, activated when a specific key is held. To be frank, this really did the trick for me. I am able to quickly change the movement speed to a specific situation. With some training, the muscle memory makes the mouse movement really seamless. Even applications like Miro are pretty easy to work with. Sure, I would probably be not able to perform serious photo editing with the Planck mouse keys. However, this is the use case that does not apply to me at all. Thus, the mouse control from the keyboard is fulfilling my all needs.

AutoShift

The last feature I would to cover is a real killer. The AutoShift is by far the most significant enhancement to my typing of all time. The idea is really simple. If I press the key for a short period of time, the regular keycode is sent from the board. However, if I press the key a little longer, the keycode combined with Shift is sent instead. At first, it might seem to hurt the typing speed. However, with proper calibration and some training, typing the capital letters becomes natural and seamless. I got used to typing without reaching to the Shift quickly. Actually, I moved the key to the bottom row, in a place when it is not that easily accessible, I did not remove it entirely, since I was not sure if I will need it or not. However, for all those days I did not need to reach for it at all, so I will probably find a better use for the position it occupies.

The only drawback to AutoShift is typing passwords or any other masked input. When the visual feedback allows you to see if the capital letter was sent, using AutoShift is easy. However, when you don’t see what the computer registered, it might lead to mistyping passwords. When I started using this feature, I managed to lock the PIN for my YubiKey three times before my muscle memory started filling in the passwords properly.

Caveats and improvements

There are drawbacks to everything, and Planck is not an exception. The most significant disadvantage is the fact, that when you start typing on this board on a daily basis, you will not be able to use any other keyboard without pain. One day, I needed to type something on the keyboard of my ThinkPad X240 and the Planck was not around. I couldn’t. The keys did not feel right. The positions of the keys seemed wrong. Instead of typing a couple of words, I decided to search for the board. This means, that I’m not able to use any computer without pain and I need to carry the Planck around if I need to. However, the keyboard is really small and fits in my backpack. Furthermore, this might be a good reason for not using the computers when I really don’t need to.

The package that contained the board was of high quality. The Planck EZ does not feel cheap. It is a solid piece of work. Also, the accessories attached are neat and useful. The only thing that bothered me, was the USB cable. It is all well-made. However, the plug is straight. This might not seem like a big deal. However, it prevented me from placing the keyboard very close to the laptop without bending the cable in an unnatural way. This made me invest around $8 in an elbow USB cable. As a result, I can save a lot of space on the desk by placing the keyboard just in front of the laptop I use. I think that offering a bent cable would greatly resonate with the advertised compactness of the keyboard.

Conclusion

The Planck EZ is a great piece of hardware. It is beautiful and solid. It is compact and powerful. It sounds and feels great. It made me improve my typing habits and made me type faster. Not for a moment, I did not regret spending money on this board. And I am not going to get back to the classic keyboard anymore.