Okay, but why not FN and Shift? I would imagine these two as shoulder buttons would make texting a lot faster. Also, I think Shift is used a lot more than ctrl!

I think I'd go for Fn on the left, with more used FN-modified keys on the right. Shift on the right side then.

Hhmmm... Good point. I was thinking "geek" here, with shortcuts and stuff like that, but you are right, in general shift makes more sense.

What about the 2 trackballs? Can it be included with the controller you selected? Is it actually feasible to use them as I proposed? I have very little knowledge about electronics, sorry. I'm a high level software guy, not used to hardware talk.

Off course! Everything is possible! The I2C connector allows for a lot of different functionality! I'ts just that the trackball are not really small components, so it will make the whole thing quite thick!

Well, there has to be a tradeoff between thickness and ergonomy, because of the already discussed issue that with the Jolla the whole phone is on top and just the keyboard on the bottom. And the shoulder buttons will need some space too.

Edit: Maybe Jolla should release some OH design guidelines before discussing this kind of stuff.

Hi, have you seen this: http://jollatides.com/2013/08/21/jol...s-to-hardware/
AFAIK, the "new design" is still the latest. This was reminded also in the comment of http://jollatides.com/2013/10/21/jol...#comment-11941
In the newest design the main camera seems to be in the middle of the top (when the phone is in portrait orientation).
Well, also I have had difficulties in following what will finally come out from Jolla Ltd, because a large part of the "truth" is based on comments to comments of comments of ... and more or less inofficial videos
Nevertheless, congratulations to Jolla for getting the Millenium Award!

(New here and first post (just because of this thread))

I checked thru the pages and from what I have seen the Motorola photon q has only been mentioned once, that is a keyboard I think have the most potential.

From my own experience the N900 covers almost all of the things I want to be able to do on it. But if it would have been a 5 row layout instead of 3, plus have the Sym button functionality from the N900, it could fit 52 more symbols (2 rows, each 13 buttons, and the Sym symbols on every button. 2*13*2=52).

That means dedicated number keys plus all of the special symbols we sometimes want to use, (or programmers often use) could be there all the time, not hidden away in some submenu. And ofcourse the Esc key on the left side of the number 1 key.

This would be my dream QWERTY for a phone.

dedicated number keys! id punch my grandmother in the face for 4 full rows of keys.

I tought a bit more on how to make the keyboard.

First, I took a look at how other keyboard are done, by looking guides on ifixit. Found interesting things :
The motorola droid 4 has letter printed directly on the rubber : http://www.ifixit.com/Teardown/Motor...eardown/7759/2

The HTC Touch Pro 2 and Samsung Impression uses metal dome for the key contacts :
http://www.ifixit.com/Guide/HTC+Touc...acement/5544/1 & http://www.ifixit.com/Guide/Samsung+...acement/5727/1

But some other like the Motoral Droid 3 makes direct contact to the printed circuit board : http://www.ifixit.com/Teardown/Motor...eardown/6108/2


A lot of phone are only sliding along the phone, like can be seen on the LG Neon II. A metal plate, large enough to avoid one side slides more than the other, is used.There are also some springs, I am not sure if they are here for sliding back the keyboard, or they can work in both positions :
http://www.ifixit.com/Guide/LG+Neon+...cement/11101/2
Same can be seen on the Samsung Rogue, but with 2 separate metal plate, each with two guiding line, and springs that seems to work both way : http://www.ifixit.com/Guide/Samsung+...acement/9032/2


And some are sliding and lifting, like the n950, e7 or HTC Fortress : http://www.ifixit.com/Guide/HTC+Fort...cement/14366/1


I think for the sliding thing, we should keep the horizontal slide which is simpler mechanically. I is quite easy to do, but involves a lot of very small parts, like the spring assembly.

For the keys, I still don't know what is the easier. The metal domes soldered directly on the pcb with a silicon/rubber board on top of it to materialize the keys is probably the way to go.
The other way would be to have a conductive part on the bottom of the rubber that makes the contact on the PCB when pressed, but I don't see how to do that (at home at least, a supplier must be found to do this).
The silicon/rubber itself is doable at home if you have access to a cnc machine, as it is simple to create a mold and then pour the silicon in it, like shown here : http://lcamtuf.coredump.cx/gcnc/ch4/
Then the problem would be to have the letter name on it...

Finally, the backlight involve having a material that conduct light selectively to highlight the keys contour and text, but not the rest... For example black painting a translucent material, but not painting the letters.

If there are people that have experience about these things, I think it is time to show up !

Also, when Jolla will disclose the phone drawings, we will be able to state if it is better to put the battery in the keyboard half and not on the phone half, for the stability, for the height and to avoid losing the battery when sliding the keyboard out...

I still think that the easiest way to go is a cheap resistive touch e-paper screen that presents the keyboard layout, and a layer of transparent keys over that. :-)