Yeah I want this.

I acquired a keyboard for a language I’m learning and was disappointed that I couldn’t physically switch my hands between keyboards to use the other’s layout. I thought the computer would be smarter, mais non.

▲ netsharc 7 hours ago | parent | next [-]

Huh, an idea would be physical buttons that a program listens to, and when you hit the key, the program sends a message to the OS to switch the keyboard layout to a particular one. So an Elgato Stream Deck or Razer Stream Controller.

So you'd have a button for each keyboard layout, and you'd just have to form the habit of smashing the key for e.g. Russian before typing a message in Russian.

For a more complicated solution, I suppose it'd be possible to detect which USB device sent a signal, and use this to detect which keyboard you're using. Maybe there'd need to be a workaround, like hitting Caps Lock on and off so the app has time to react and change the OS keyboard layout, before you type.

	▲	notpushkin 2 hours ago \| parent [-]
		I’ve mapped Caps Lock to EN and Shift + Caps Lock to RU. Really stopped thinking about “what keyboard layout is on rn”, just subconsciously press Caps every time I start typing something in English. Pretty easy to replicate with Karabiner on macOS (and on Linux it’s supported out of the box). If you really want a dedicated keyboard though yeah, would be a bit harder but might be possible to do something with Karabiner as well. The device_if condition might work here: https://karabiner-elements.pqrs.org/docs/json/complex-modifi... Edit: this might work but I haven’t tried: `{ "manipulators": [ { "type": "basic", "from": { "any": "key_code", "modifiers": { "optional": ["any"] } }, "to": [ { "select_input_source": { "language": "^ja$" } }, { "from_event": true } ], "conditions": [ { "type": "device_if", "identifiers": [{ "vendor_id": 1111, "product_id": 2222 }] } ] } ] }`

▲ Deathmax 4 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

autokbisw solved the per-physical keyboard layout problem for me, switching between the Macbook's layout, a US keyboard, and a UK keyboard.

▲ 7 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

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