My name is Henning, and I live in the Düsseldorf area in Germany. I work as a DevOps / site reliability engineer for one of the German car manufacturers. Currently, our team is providing a “Platform as a service” using Cloud Foundry for internal folks to use. It’s a really reliable system, driven by an undervalued component called BOSH that coordinates a plethora of things, including so-called “resurrection” of failing components. Good for happy users and calm sailing for the operator team. However, it’s also a highly distributed system, and that's good for a lot of interesting challenges from an operational perspective.

When not writing code, I enjoy mountain biking or snapping an image here and there with my good old DSLR camera. You can also find my wife and me continuously improving all sorts of things around the house for our wonderful chief demanding officers, our cats.

Here’s Senior CDO Mr. Boo, who regularly checks up on us but loves his box under the bench on the front stoop.

The box has a heated floor, and even in 0° C (32° F) he loves to stay out there and watch the street. Known through the neighborhood, with several established kibble sources.

There’s CDO Ms. Kayra...

...as well as CDO Ms. Lizzy.

Sometimes the choices of places to hang out in are “snug”...

...but most of the time, they’re comfy.

They’re all solid candidates for the Olympic sleeping and snuggling team.

As you can tell by the paw prints on the window panes behind the two whirlwinds, they’re also a reliable source of entropy. But a really cute and fun one :-)

What hardware do you use?

Three laptops and a server machine, as well as pretty much anything that keeps up and that I got my hands on in the last three decades in the IT sphere. Other than that, there are a few Raspberry Pis providing some services and tools I use. Up until recently I used boring, vanilla keyboards mostly made by a well-known manufacturer from Switzerland.

The main part is a 30-year-old desk with custom additions on each side. Sturdy thing that does the job and that survived moving several times. Basically divided in three “sections” to work.

Let’s start with the landing spot of my first Moonlander. Machine on the right is provided by my employer. It’s an HP laptop with a 20-core Intel i9 processor and 64 GB RAM and a 1-TB SSD. Solid, powerful machine that works very well.

The 38″ screen is also provided by my employer. The screen to the right of the big one is an old Dell 24″.

The laptop below the big screen is my personal primary laptop. It’s a Lenovo with a 16-core Intel i9 with 64 GB RAM. Decent machine as well; well suited for everything I’ve thrown at it so far. Primary spot for the majority of work. Currently I’m working completely remote, so there’s a Blue Yeti microphone and a Razer Kiyo webcam that work well for me.

Boards in the background are part of the kitty skyway system. Most rooms provide facilities that allow feline oversight of the human inhabitants of the house. Yes, of course there’s also a canopy bed.

The center of the desk is the landing site of the Moonlander 2. In the middle are three screens that are connected to a server machine via network cables. The folks of EZCOO make really awesome devices that allow an HDMI signal to be transmitted over a standard CAT LAN cable. Those boxes make it possible for me to have those screens about 25 meters away from the server they are connected to. Only pain point: A dedicated network cable is required for every device.

The box is a Supermicro mainboard-based machine with two Xeon processors with ten cores each and 512 GB RAM. Eight years old, and I hope to be able to run that thing a few more years. Machine is used in sort of a hybrid approach as virtualization server and workstation at the same time. It happily runs a basic workload of 20 VMs/LXC containers provided by Proxmox. The box has an NVIDIA card with the tiny amount of 8GB graphics RAM. The PCI slot of the graphics card is forwarded into a VM which allows me to use a VM as a workstation and still have hardware accelerated graphics. It limits local AI explorations to 4-bit quantized models only, but overall this setup enables the use of virtual machines that just feel like a physical box. I really enjoy this setup because it’s very flexible and allows quick and easy testing of all sorts of scenarios. The box has 2 TB SATA storage and 2 TB of SSD storage. Favorite file system is ZFS, which distributes the data across the physical disks of the machine in pairs of RAID mirror devices. VM workload and ZFS storage amount to a base workload of about 20% CPU usage and about 386 GB used RAM. Despite the occasional spike in IOWAIT, enough resources are left to be able to tinker with new ideas and tools.

However, looking at today's hardware prices, energy costs and environmental aspects, I doubt I’ll go that route again. Ever since Raspberry Pis with AES capabilities, SSD storage support, and up to 16 GB RAM became available, they’ve become an interesting option for running local services in a much more resource-friendly manner.

On the left is an old Lenovo laptop with an Intel core i7 with 16 GB RAM. Used for monitoring and as a test box, plus the HDMI output can be hooked up to TV set. Really handy when working on changes on my wife’s website. Open a bunch of various browsers, make them autorefresh, make some changes to the code, and just quickly look over your shoulder to see the changes. Quick and easy workflow that works well for me. Handy as well when chasing issues.

Having several screens to display logs and statistics is a huge time-saver.

For networking infrastructure I like Mikrotik devices, as they offer features that are simply not available anywhere else at their price point. Professional-level features that they offer were available in switches starting at around $25,000 not long ago. Great for learning about networking topics and separating your traffic.

As I currently work 100% remote, I require a stable Internet connection. In order to be independent of all other “toys,” I make life easy for myself and run a BSD-based OPNSense appliance that provides internet and a bunch of other security services. It lives on top of my 19″ rack, which also contains all other network switches.

To complete the picture, there’s a rented hardware box at Hetzner used to run my wife’s website and our mail infrastructure.

And what software?

Where to start? So many fantastic tools available nowadays! Wherever possible I prefer to use Linux and open-source software.

Currently, mostly Debian and Ubuntu. Preferred desktop is Gnome, preferred shell is ZSH. For terminal management I use tmux in combination with Oh My Zsh. The theme is powerlevel10k.

On two machines I have migrated to use starship as my prompt. I rely on Atuin to synchronize shell history between machines. I use AutoKey to automate things within the desktop session. Not to forget all those great system-level tools like Unbound. Utilizing the idea of block lists at the DNS level is a neat way to increase your security and privacy. I use BIND to run a hidden primary DNS to manage external resources on the web. I use Quad9 as reliable, safe upstream DNS resolvers.

To keep an overview of the security status of my boxes, I use Wazuh.

I use FreeIPA as my identity management platform and rely on Proxmox for virtualization. I use a few LXC containers, but mostly use QEMU VMs. I use Terraform/OpenTofu for building infrastructure and Ansible for provisioning of the infrastructure. For monitoring I use Elasticsearch, OpenSearch, Prometheus, and Grafana, which are running on a Raspberry Pi-based K3s Kubernetes cluster.

For development, I rely heavily on IDEs made by JetBrains, with the awesome VI plugin enabled. If not using an IDE, I rely on Vim/gVIM, but I also like Kate and more recent options like Zed. A veteran like the Eclipse IDE still provides a good solution as well.

Over the last few years, a number of technologies became part of my tech stack when working on different projects.

First, there’s Perl, Bash, Python, Java, Golang, Rust, and the various containers technologies like LXC/ LXD, Docker, or Podman. When working with Java, I enjoy utilizing the Spring Boot framework. I use that combo to run my wife’s website so that she can edit the content of the pages herself. I use a self-hosted GitLab instance to build things.

I write notes using XWiki and anytype. “Office” documents are edited using LibreOffice. Depending on the complexity of the document, I still like to use LaTeX. TeXstudio or Eclipse with the TeXlipse plugin are handy when editing LaTex documents.

I use Audacity for editing audio tracks, Clementine to access my music library, and MiniDLNA to stream media. For image-related work I use Darktable and GIMP.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

As this is my first adventure into the world of customizable, mechanical keyboards I tried to keep things as simple as possible. I stuck with the switches and default printed keycaps recommended by ZSA. I use the EurKEY European keyboard layout for the Desktop session. That layout enables German umlaut characters to be used.

I kept changes on Layer0 as few as possible at first. As I was used to a QUERTZ layout, I kept Y and Z where they were and swapped the keycaps. The momentary layer switch to Layer1 was kept where it was.

Layer1 was modified quite a bit, and I moved symbols around, depending on how things felt the first few weeks when writing code. Getting used to the number pad was less of a challenge. However, I have to admit that typing the 0 using the index finger while holding down the momentary layer switch with the pinky finger of the right hand still needs a moment to think about.

I found an example of a layout that defined a VI layer that put the arrow keys on the H, J, K, and L keys. I copied that idea, extended it a bit. I activate it with a momentary layer switch when holding down the F key on layer 0. A tap on the key in far-right upper corner executes :wq! Enter, realizing an Esc key for leaving the VI session without changes. Tapping the lowest key of the right thumb cluster executes :wg Enter, closing the current VI session with saving the file. Esc remained Escape on Layer0, but I added a hold action that executes F11. Ctrl-Tab was added on the second key from the left on the lowest row for easy switching between tabs in browsers or the last edited files in my IDE. Undo/Redo are assigned to the key right next to that. It executes Strg+Z when tapped and Strg+Shift+Z when double-tapped.

As my current job requires a lot of copying and pasting commands or output of commands to and from the terminal, documentation, or a support thread in Mattermost, I wanted a better solution for Ctrl+C and Ctrl+Shift+C in terminal windows.

First I used different key actions on the same key. I assigned the following sequence to the C key: “When tapped C”, “When held Ctrl+Shift+C”, “When double-tapped Ctrl+C”. But using a double tap to copy and paste in pretty much every app and then using the hold action when being inside a terminal window was not a good flow.

I really wanted to be able to test the smart layers feature because I wanted to use this to solve the issue outlined above. By providing the Kontroll API, ZSA enables the use of smart layers on Linux with just a tad of glue code required.

After hooking into the required events on Gnome, I was able to retrieve the name of the window that has focus. Using that information, one can switch the layer using the Kontroll API. I copied Layer0 and left all keys the same as on Layer0 but swapped the operation on the keys C and V. I settled for a tap-and-hold action to trigger the copy/ paste operation.

In every window, tapping and holding C executes Strg+C. Switching the window focus to a Gnome terminal window activates Layer1, and tapping and holding C executes Strg+Shift+c. This is so convenient—I really like the idea of smart layers.

After reading about Combos I created a combo called ‘home_path’ on the keys . -.

This combo prints ~/ more quickly than switching to the symbol layer to type the tilde and typing the slash afterwards. I use that combo often in shell sessions when I want to access files inside my home directory like ~/.config/.... It’s useful as well while using the Dolphin file manager. The combination of Strg+L puts the focus in the address bar, enter ~/ via the combo and hit Fnter to get back to your home directory.

I use another combo on keys i o, called ls_curr_dir that creates la and presses the Enter key. la is a shell alias for ls -lA I define via my shell configuration. A bit silly, but the combo is still faster than typing la Enter.

Still, this all feels just like having started to explore all the capabilities of customizable keyboards. Overall I’m really happy with my choice of the Moonlander keyboard as well as the outstanding support provided by ZSA, answering any questions swiftly and competently in no time. Recently I took the Moonlander on a business trip and was also really satisfied with the sturdy, solid platform. Just take everything out of the neoprene sleeve, unfold it and enjoy your usual tenting position in no time.

What would be your dream setup?

Self-ordering cables would be very much appreciated. Being able to keep my current setup, but somehow “motorize” the desk and make it height adjustable would be great. If dreaming includes winning the lottery, I would probably go for an extended setup like those the stock exchange guys have. Second row of monitors above the first, all nicely held by those fancy VESA holders.

I would replace my server with an AMD Ryzen-based system and add an NVIDIA Blackwell card.

Keyboard-wise I would keep things like they are right now. If I ever have to go back to a hybrid work situation, I would probably consider adding ZSA’s more recent Voyager.

Keycaps that have elevated marks like the F and J key but have just a horizontal line like the outer rows of the Moonlander would be helpful. I would replace my Tab key with the one with the elevated mark. Going off the rails completely: Keycaps that are actually tiny little screens that could display whatever the user wanted would be an interesting development.

I'm thinking about replacing the standard cables with a set made by KingCables, maybe something like this pre-made set. Maybe I could integrate the separate USB cable I use for my YubiKey into a custom cable setup. As I get nowhere nowadays without my YubiKey, it's really handy to have it right up on the right half of the Moonlander.

My name is Woodson Miles. I’m the manager of the DevOps team for a defense contractor in Colorado. My team is responsible for writing the software that packages application code and delivers it into production environments. My daily responsibilities include writing code, reviewing merge requests, and setting a vision and pattern for the rest of my team.

Outside of work, I look after my two children and rabbit, play video games, and post to a Christian apologetics Substack. My one-year-old and three-year-old are so happy when the weather is nice that they spend most of their time in the back yard. I share an office with Walter, my Holland Lop rabbit, who spends most of the day between my feet, begging for pets.

Yes, Walter is litterbox trained. Rabbits are the third most popular pet in the United States after cats and dogs. Keeping rabbits in cages is a holdover from when they were mostly treated as game, but they're generally much happier when not in a cage. Their digestive system works differently, closer to a cow than a cat or a dog. It’s constantly running, which means that maybe 20% of his pellets end up outside of the litter box because he can’t control it. But his droppings are very clean. Rabbit scat is a cold fertilizer, which means it doesn’t contain dangerous bacteria that would require a composting period before it could safely be applied to plants.

My wife, Sarah, runs a local nonprofit, A Daughter’s Journey, which hosts an annual father-daughter dinner and dance in Colorado Springs. I help Sarah with her event by writing the software that manages their seating charts. I volunteered for the task expecting a simple script to suffice for the problem, but finished the year with a program that deals with natural language processing, bin packing optimization, and graph theory, which is more algorithmically sophisticated than anything I’ve ever made for work, haha!

I enjoy playing video games made by FromSoftware, the makers of Dark Souls and Elden Ring. When I want to get away from the keyboard, my wife and I will play Go, the world’s oldest continuous cultural tradition.

Sarah and I host church at our home. It’s a cozy, intimate environment that has proven a good fit for those who have difficulty finding a place in conventional church settings, such as myself. Our church has attracted thoughtful, eccentric people who are not afraid to ask challenging questions about Christianity. My Substack allows me to respond to those questions with the careful research that such questions deserve.

The church format is very informal. There is no pastor, though several members are ordained in different traditions. We are more like peers exchanging notes than teachers and students. We share a meal, sit in the living room, have tea, and anyone is welcome to share a religious topic or question, of whatever nature: therapeutic, hermeneutic, philosophical, apologetic, etc. We discuss as a group, drawing from the Biblical and extra-Biblical sources each knows best.

A common criticism I receive is that this sounds more like a Bible study than a church. I can understand where this comes from. I in no way disparage institutional churches. They play an important role. But those who would reduce my church to Bible study are at risk of doing the same to the first-century church, which also met in one another’s homes and shared meals. Our church is Christian, but it is regularly attended by atheists, agnostics, and Buddhists who would like to learn about Jesus, but do not feel comfortable in a conventional church setting.

What hardware do you use?

I have a custom-built desktop, an ultrawide monitor, a VariDesk desk converter, and of course my Voyager keyboard and Navigator. The VariDesk allows me to stand or sit. I prefer the VariDesk’s mechanical springs to the slower electric motor you see in similar setups. I’m at my computer for usually ten hours a day, so slight variations in posture make a big difference.

My Voyager and Navigator play a similar ergonomic role by reducing the strain on my shoulder caused by flexing out my arm to move my mouse. I used to have debilitating shoulder pain, but that has gradually gotten better thanks to this setup and daily back exercises over the last seven years.

Because I share my office with my rabbit, I have to be fastidious with my cable management so that he doesn’t nibble a cord.

The plants in my office, in addition to being pleasant to look at, regulate the temperature of the room and clean the air.

And what software?

My software setup prioritizes speed, style, and ergonomics, but has a significant learning curve. I run Omarchy, an omakase distribution based on Arch Linux and the tiling window manager Hyprland. It’s a stylish, keyboard-first, developer-focused operating system that embraces Linux rather than trying to copy Windows or Apple. I code with Neovim, a fast, lightweight, and mouseless text editor.

I colocate my configurations with GNU Stow, which allows me to easily version control my setup with Git and transfer them to other computers. One of the great joys of working in Linux is discovering that many of our problems have been solved long ago by simple Linux/GNU tools. Stow is one of those diamonds in the rough.

“There’s a minor meme among devotees of Unix and its modern-day derivatives that ‘Unix is an IDE,’ meaning that the tools available to developers on the terminal cover the major features in cutting-edge desktop IDEs with some ease.” —Arabesque

Omarchy also comes with OpenCode installed, which is convenient for integrating large language models into my workflow. Finally, Arch is a great choice for gaming because Steam, the most popular PC gaming platform, built their operating system on Arch. Hyprland uses Wayland, a newer display server protocol than the old X11, which does cause hiccups with many games. But I have found that with AI, these problems are easy to troubleshoot in a few minutes. And Hyprland’s style is worth that trade-off.

My dictation app, Voxtype, also came as part of the Omarchy stack and is available from a keyboard shortcut. It’s far from perfect, but it uses AI to guess based on context. It even adds punctuation. It’s best suited for natural language. I use it for email, texts, and messaging. It’s really helped ease the transition to a new keyboard layout.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

My Voyager has the neutral dot keycaps, which is great for my alternate layout based on Canary. Canary moves more common letters to the home row, among other improvements. I use home-row mods, which allows me to treat the home row as modifier keys when held down. That reduces strain from chording. The numpad layer makes typing numbers so much faster. I also really love the caps WORD utility.

Changing from QWERTY has taken a lot of practice, but I figured if I was going to expend the effort of learning a new layout at all, I might as well go all out.

What would be your dream setup?

For the most part, I have my dream setup right now, haha! If I had to change something, maybe I would switch out my IKEA desk for something nicer, and with more space for the many books that I have stacked up. This last year I have taken the plunge into the hardware and software that I always wanted, but was too intimidated by the time and learning they would require. Now that I’ve made that jump, every day, just by going about my usual business, I get to learn a little bit more about how Linux works under the hood, and I get incrementally faster at typing on my keyboard, slowly approaching my QWERTY speed. Until then, Voxtype is my best friend.

I’m Andrii Serhiienko, and I live in Stockholm, Sweden. I work full-time as a software engineer. Historically, backend is my home: Java, REST APIs, web services, algorithm development, debugging, performance optimization, Perl, C, C++, shell. In recent years, I have also become very comfortable with the frontend: JavaScript, TypeScript, various frameworks.

Years ago, I spent years as a network engineer at ISPs, working with BGP, OSPF, Fibre Channel, and DOCSIS, and building network tools and firmware in Erlang, LISP, and C.

I’ve started a few startups over the years. None have taken off yet, but I keep trying. I believe I'll get there.

Outside of work, I explore languages and technologies. I wrote two books on WebRTC (both published by Packt). Right now, I’m very interested in symbolic logic and AI, reading everything I can find on the subject.

I buy books faster than I can read them, and the wish list grows at rocket speed. I usually have a few going at once—history, history of philosophy, history of AI at the moment. I listen to classical music and buy records on Presto Music.

I lift weights regularly (bench press is the king). I ran three times a week for about a year, but dropped it. Never felt that wave of happiness after a run that people always talk about.

I have an electric guitar I haven’t mastered yet, though I still hold out hope. Same with drawing—I keep making attempts.

And I’m learning Latin at an easy pace. More curiosity than commitment so far, but I might get serious about it—the Loeb library is already in my wish list.

What hardware do you use?

At work, I’m on an HP corporate laptop. At home, my daily driver is a MacBook Pro Max M1. I also have a Lenovo T460 running Linux as a second personal machine. Then there are a MacBook Pro A1278 and a MacBook Pro A1706—both unsupported now by macOS, but I gave them a second life with Ubuntu. I tried NetBSD and FreeBSD on both, but Ubuntu works better on that hardware.

My home display is an ASUS VG27A. At work, it’s probably some Dell—I don’t even remember. Desks are from IKEA. Swedish practical, nothing fancy. The office chair at work is the typical nameless corporate thing; at home I use a Dowinx gaming chair.

For audio, Jabra Evolve2 65 for meetings and Anker soundcore Q30 for music or “sit in silence and focus.”

Before the Voyager, I used an Apple Magic Keyboard for a few years—the best keys I’ve ever worked with. I also tried several split keyboards—the Ultimate Hacking Keyboard, the MoErgo Glove80, a couple of others. Nothing worked more than a few days. The ZSA Voyager is the one that actually hooked me.

And what software?

I work across many languages, so I jump between editors. IntelliJ IDEA for Java. VS Code for C, Perl, C++, JavaScript, and TypeScript. Emacs for LISP. Vim for quick hacks on remote servers. When I’m working remotely, tmux keeps everything sane.

For terminals, I use iTerm2 on the Mac, Kitty in Linux, PuTTY on the corporate Windows laptop.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

I have the standard Voyager with silent switches. Right now I’m on the default layout—haven’t customized. My approach is to get used to a tool and really feel it before I start customizing. I’m still in that stage. For now it’s about building the muscle memory and figuring out how the same layout works across all the software I run on my Mac, since the Voyager lives at my home desk with the M1.

What would be your dream setup?

A Philips Evnia 49-inch QD-OLED SuperWide. I would swap the IKEA desk for something height-adjustable with more surface area. Upgrade the Dowinx to a proper ergonomic chair. And the big move: a Framework laptop, so I can migrate fully to Linux as my primary system while keeping the M1 around for AI and LLM experiments.

My name’s Ben. I’m a senior product manager who’s worked across a variety of industries in the tech landscape.

I grew up in Seattle, Washington, where I made some of my fondest childhood memories jumping on our backyard trampoline with my two younger brothers.

We would spend most afternoons and evenings playing the games that we invented together. When we weren’t on the trampoline, we were huddled around our GameBoys, PlayStation, GameCube, or Xbox playing games like Crash Bandicoot, Super Smash Brothers, and Halo.

In K-8 school, I was a straight-A student who had fun inventing games with my friends at recess. Some of those games became fairly popular, and a few even landed me in the principal’s office (it wasn’t my fault, I promise!) 😁

Professionally, I’ve built a career in Product Management, which basically involves designing and building software that makes people’s lives easier. I’ve enjoyed this role for +5 years and hope to for many more, because I love how dynamic Product Management is – you get to make big decisions every day that change the course of a company while getting to know and work with nearly everyone. In fact, I enjoy it so much that I often write and share short thought pieces on LinkedIn, where I’ve somehow built a following of +2K.

Outside of work, I love playing and building video games.

There’s a surprising amount of skill overlap between Product Management and Game Development. You have to come up with something worth playing, anticipate what might be hard about building it, write the code & arrange the moving parts until they match your vision, then have people play it and see how it lands with them. It’s a complex, dynamic process that requires curiosity, ingenuity, persistence, and passion.

My brother Sam and I began creating video games in early 2026. We entered 2 game jam competitions and were blown away when we placed 15th out of 50 in our first jam, and 5th out of 50 entries in our second.

We spun up our own game studio that we named Double Bounce Games as an homage to the days we spent inventing games on our trampoline together.

While our approach to game development is still taking shape, we enjoy centering our games around unique mechanics, interesting physics, and environments that feel simple but alive.

As we learn and grow, we’re particularly excited to explore building:

Couch co-op games like Ultimate Chicken Horse, Boomerang Fu, and Overcooked. Creating digital adventures that people can enjoy in-person with the people they love.

Multitasking games that my partner will love - she’s obsessed with cute, high-octane multitasking games like Cooking Mama.

And strategy games. I’m fascinated by games like 2048. They demonstrate that with the right idea, even the simplest of games can be worth playing over & over again. Erez’s own recommendation of Cribbage with Grandpas also fits this well.

I’ve wanted to create games for over a decade, but – funnily enough – ZSA is partly to blame for why I didn’t start sooner.

After I bought a Desktop PC in 2021 to begin learning Game Development, I became obsessed with which keyboard to use. As someone with a longstanding interest in both ergonomics and human-computer interaction, my eyes lit up when I found ZSA’s Moonlander keyboard.

Cut to 3 months later, and not only had I ordered it - I had built 10 custom layers in Oryx while reteaching myself to type from the ground up, switching from QWERTY to Colemak so I could type pain-free for the rest of my life.

This was quite the ordeal for a few reasons.

Switching from a traditional keyboard to a split ergonomic keyboard is not as easy as it looks — and it probably doesn’t look very easy to begin with. Every bad typing habit instantly reveals itself.

If you’ve spent 20 years using your left hand to hit the Y key - guess what: that key now lives 12 inches away on the other side of your keyboard. There’s no spacebar, no dedicated backspace key; your numbers row is split in two. I decided to take it a step further and switch keyboard layouts from QWERTY to Colemak, which requires 220% less finger movement and lets you type 35x more words without lifting a finger – but also requires you to move most of the keys around.

Learning a new layout² was a humbling, frustrating experience. I felt stupid and frustrated, witnessing the muscle memory that had served me well for 10-20 years repeatedly failing to adapt. That said, I’m glad I stuck with it because the payoff was worth it.

A similar side-project of mine is invisible iOS. Essentially, I wanted my phone to serve as a dumbphone that can still do smart things when I need it to. I built an invisible homepage that omits icons and text by placing each app where it intuitively feels right. By removing the visuals, I removed its allure to help me reclaim attention. This can be taken a step further with a grayscale-mode shortcut.

Outside of work and game development, I enjoy photography, audiobooks, biking, bonsai, cooking, drawing, TV, and spending time with my partner Riah and our dog Max.

What hardware do you use?

I lean towards minimalism, so my gear list isn’t too extensive. Too much visual clutter tends to clutter my mind, so I keep it clean.

My PC is a Lenovo Legion Tower 7i with Windows 11, 48 GB RAM, RTX 3060, and an Intel i7-10700K CPU. I use a ProtoArc Ergonomic Mouse with a white ZSA Moonlander with the ZSA Platform tent kit.

For a monitor, I use a Dell gaming model + a Hue Play Gradient Lightstrip for backlight. I somehow came to own 35+ Hue Lights, they’re spendy but worth it. My speakers are Pebble v3s.

It all sits on a Fully Jarvis Standing Desk. I sit on a Steelcase Leap v2 chair, bought refurbished from BTOD.

I use an iPhone Pro with a set of Airpods Pro 3. I bring these everywhere: their noise-cancellation is life changing.

And then there’s all the hardware beyond the desk. I consistently sleep better on my four-inch futon from Futon Beds from Japan than I have in 6+ years of sleeping on a high-end Purple mattress. Got hooked on my apartment’s communal Peloton bike & bought my own off of Facebook. Never found it so easy to break a sweat. My Sunny Bay heat pad is great for muscle tension or warming up in cold weather.

Special thanks to my little 16-year-old WarmWave space heater, which has kept my feet roasty-toasty through high school, college, and beyond.

And what software?

For game development, I use Unity. Then there’s Notion for notetaking which has absolutely incredible voice note & summarization functionality. FigJam for mind-mapping and collaboration, and Claude to help me code and troubleshoot.

I like Libby & Libro.fm for audiobooks, to support local libraries and bookstores. Qobuz is my favorite for music, with better discoverability than Spotify. It also pays artists more fairly.

My browser is Brave, which makes YouTube ad-free automatically, plus has better data privacy than Chrome.

I use Philips Hue for light customization and Wallpaper Engine for animated wallpapers. Dark Reader & f.lux save my eyes.

For stretching, I use Down Dog yoga. Then there’s Robinhood for investments, high-APY savings account, and 3% cash back on everything . 1Password keeps my accounts safe.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

I designed my keyboard around minimizing finger movement, because I wanted my hands to last for a long time. After +6 years of working a desk job, I experienced near-constant tension and fatigue in my hands from typing all day. After switching to the Moonlander and Colemak, that pain disappeared entirely, and has never resurfaced in the 4 years since.

A little bit more about my custom layout:

Space & Shift both live where your thumb rests. Backspace is right next to your pinky. The keys that your fingers naturally rest on let you activate various keyboard layers for Browser Navigation, Symbols, Arrow Keys, Numbers, and Mouse Navigation.

Most of these layers offer unique, in-depth functionality. For example, the Arrow Key layer lets you navigate character-by-character, word-by-word, to the start or end of a line, or to the beginning or end of a document or text field. By combining this with Shift, you can rapidly navigate, highlight and edit text with minimal effort.

Additionally, with this layout you rarely have to hold more than one key to get things done. Common keyboard shortcuts like Select All, Cut/Copy/Paste, and Find activate when you briefly hold down particular keys. Functions like Screenshot, Undo/Redo, and Dictate have their own dedicated buttons on the keys traditionally used for a Numbers row.

For a full walkthrough, check out this guided Layout Tour.

If you’re interested in using this layout but still use QWERTY, you can and easily rearrange the letters back to QWERTY in Oryx. If you use a Mac, I’ve built in MacOS-specific layers to support its unique functionality and key combinations.

What would be your dream setup?

One of my passions is to build technology that works for people, and not the other way around.

My moonshot idea - something I’d love to help build - is a combination of eye-tracking software and wearables that make the computer mouse almost obsolete for day-to-day tasks: where you look, your cursor goes. To click or scroll, tap or slide your thumb along on the outside of your index finger. I’d love to see something like this come to fruition in the next 5-10 years, and I’m so curious how it would feel to use it.

As for today’s dreams, I thought I could use this interview to connect people with incredible things. I sometimes find things that strike me as such brilliant masterpieces that I need to shout about them from the rooftops. Please note that items marked “caution” may include sensitive or triggering content.

Watch

• Haikyuu,
• Survivor: Pearl Islands
• Avatar: The Last Airbender,
• Attack on Titan (caution),
• Frieren: Beyond Journey’s End
• Bridgerton (caution), and
• Steven Universe.

Read

• Tao Te Ching, Lao Tzu (Brian Browne Walker translation);
• Braiding Sweetgrass, Robin Wall Kimmerer;
• Children of Time (caution), Adrian Tchaikovsky; and
• Us Against You (caution), Fredrik Backman.

Listen to

• Invisibilia, NPR (podcast).

Play

• Super Smash Bros. Melee,
• Hollow Knight,
• Zelda: Breath of the Wild,
• Call of Duty: Warzone (caution),
• Skyrim,
• Undertale, and
• Super Mario Odyssey.

Eat/Drink:

• Masubuchi-en Sencha (green tea),
• Delice de Bourgogne (brie) + Rosemary Croccantini crackers + Divina Chili Fig spread (charcuterie), and
• The Best Chocolate Cake by Broma Bakery (a recipe worth learning how to bake for).

Visit

• Blue Lagoon, Iceland;
• Chivit Thamma Da, Chiang Rai, Thailand;
• The Enchantments, Alpine Lakes Wilderness, Washington State, USA; and
• Portland Japanese Garden, Portland, Oregon, USA.

I’m a programmer located in Drammen, Norway. For work, I'm a senior software developer at Cognite, where I work on auth and related things. At home, I play the guitar, cook, make drinks, and write code for various personal projects, some of which end up as blog posts.

During covid I, like many others, attempted to learn how to make bread, and like many others, I didn’t succeed. Instead, I pivoted to pizza, and for a few years I made pizza every single Friday for me and my wife. Lately I've started again, so today was Pizza Friday.

I make the dough the evening before, shape it into two balls, and put them in the fridge overnight. The exact ratios of flour/water/salt/yeast are tuned to our apartment and oven because the temperature and humidity and local flour all play a role in how the dough turns out; any off-the-shelf recipe will need some tuning to your situation. The short story is more salt than you think, less yeast than you think, and it should be a little sticky. Oh, and oil is optional. I like to keep toppings very simple and recently I've made a lot of margheritas: just tomato sauce and mozzarella, and maybe a homegrown leaf or two of basil. Putting oregano in the sauce is my latest change, and it’s made a big difference.

I also like to read, and have a long backlog of books to get to; somehow, I often end up in front of the computer instead.

I’ve been programming for 15 years, depending on how you count, and have an MSc and half of a PhD in CS. Well, I spent years in a PhD program, and they don’t give out half-degrees.

I’ve been interested in machines my entire life and I think I knew from an early age that I wanted to work with computers, even if I didn’t exactly know what that meant. But now I do! And I don’t think I've ever looked back.

I like the glow from the monitor, pressing the buttons, hearing the clicky sounds of the switches, and seeing my code appear on the screen, totally not correct and with a bunch of bugs. But, like, it’s basically the right idea, yeah?

I also play the guitar, and have a blue Strandberg Boden RESQ:D—an ergonomic guitar—on which I play mostly metal or hard rock, but dabble in jazz and other genres. I’m not in a band or playing concerts; it’s just me and my guitar in the bedroom, playing with a headset on.

What hardware do you use?

My first abnormal keyboard was the Microsoft SideWinder X6. This keyboard was neat because the numpad was detachable, so you could put it on the left side of the keyboard, or remove it altogether. This made it a little more comfortable to play video games, since the distance between WASD on the left and the mouse on the right got smaller.

Around 2013, I bought Das Keyboard with Cherry MX Blues. I dug up some old emails, and apparently I had attempted to get Browns but those went out of stock right after I placed the order. Instead of waiting, I emailed the shop and asked to switch to Blues instead.

It had blank keycaps, which was really cool, and I really liked the feel of it even though my flatmates didn’t enjoy the sound it made. I put in O-rings, which helped a little.

In 2015 I got a Ducky Mini with MX Browns. This is the one with the thick and rounded metal frame and purple backlighting. It was my first smaller keyboard, and while I did miss the lack of separate arrow keys at first, it grew on me.

Around 2017, a friend sold me his ErgoDox EZ Glow. White case, white keycaps, MX Blue. Big, loud, very cool. Clearly, this moved me to the upper echelons of keyboard society. I still remember the struggle of typing on it the first few weeks, and after every time I adjusted the layout slightly.

At the same time, programmer friends and I bought the Evoluent VerticalMouse 4. We were, as the kids would (maybe) say today, ergomaxxing.

One thing that I really like about the ErgoDox is that it’s columnar. The standard staggered columns layout never made sense to me, so when the ZSA Planck EZ Glow came out in 2019 I looked into my crystal ball and saw that my future had a small, ortholinear keyboard made by the same creators of my favorite keyboard to date. I got it with Kailh Coppers, and life was good.

At some point, I switched out the Evoulent for a Logitech MX Vertical so that I could have a wireless mouse.

Life got busy for a while and I kept this setup for some years, occasionally switching back and forth between the ErgoDox and the Planck. I got a MacBook for work, which I mostly used without an external keyboard. For a while I also used the laptop at home, which actually fits rather well with my two-year cadence of switching keyboards.

But in the fall of 2025 I wanted something new, and that something was the ZSA Voyager, with Kailh Choc Browns and blank (dotted really) keycaps. I originally bought it to use with my laptop in the office, but now that it’s become a part of my home setup I don’t want to take it away! So this is my current setup: Voyager and “that Logitech mouse.”

I also had to cut an old palm rest in half to have it fit the split keyboard better. It looks stupid, but if it works, how stupid can it really be?

In terms of other hardware: I currently have a HÅG Capisco 8107, one of those funny-looking ergonomic chairs; it’s great. It feels like a really dynamic chair, one that’s not meant to be fitted and for you to sit in the same position, but rather one you're climbing, almost like you're in a jungle gym or something. I like to move around when I sit, so I can sit with one leg underneath the other, or have the chair at a 45-degree angle, leaning on the armrest on one side, or turn it around completely and have the back rest support my chest, or sit completely straight. If I had a standing desk I think the chair would also work at an almost standing height, where you bend your knees a little, like a leaning bench.

My phys. ed. teacher in middle school was really into good posture (needless to say, age-12 me was not), and one thing he said that really stuck with me was that “the best posture is the next.” We're dynamic creatures meant to move around, so it makes sense that our furniture allows for, or even encourages, this.

My computer is a self-built desktop, mostly with parts from 2017 or so. My desk is from Ikea, I have a single 27” 4K monitor, a speaker set from Argon, and a wireless Sony headset.

Oh, and I got a Playdate last year! It’s fun! When you buy it you get access to 24 games, two at a time for 12 weeks. I played a bunch around last Christmas, but admittedly haven’t played all that much since then. In fact, I don’t think I've even tried the last 12 out of the 24 games I have, but now that another holiday is coming up I might find some time to do so.

And what software?

I'm in the terminal a lot, where I use Ghostty and Neovim. Outside the terminal I use Zed as my other editor, and Firefox with Vimium as my browser; this makes keyboard-based navigation kind of okay.

I guess I use a bunch of other software too—Telegram, Signal, 1Password, Steam, Spotify, Slack, a bunch of the built-in macOS apps, and so on, but that’s more or less it.

My home computer runs Linux (I use Arch BTW), and human-facing software for Linux is ... lacking. Certainly software with a “product” polish. I don’t think this is due to a lack of trying, but the Linux ecosystem has been very fragmented since forever, which makes it very difficult to create products that work well “on Linux,” because that means so many different things.

Lately, I’ve been on an LLM-assisted programming kick, and this has significantly expanded the scope of my personal software projects. It also means that a lot of the necessary but tedious things that come with creating software can be automated away, which is great. I have mixed feelings around LLMs due to energy usage, copyright, power centralization, and probably more reasons, but they have made it so extremely easy to build small and personal things.

I’ve replaced my program launcher (think Raycast). Actually, Raycast has a lot of stuff, so it’s not a fair comparison, but it’s something similar to the subsets of Raycast that I would have used. Maybe it even has things that Raycast doesn’t, I’m not sure. It has application search, a “high school level” calculator, an emoji picker, clipboard manager, Bluetooth connections, disk usage visualization, a simple to-do list, a timer, a train schedule search, and a few other things. It can control monitor brightness, too, and it shows hex-colors. Basically, it has a bunch of random things that I otherwise need a separate application or a separate website for, but it’s all in one place. I haven’t done any polish to it at all, and it’s a little janky—for instance when I connect to my BT headset, the text doesn’t go from “disconnected” to “connected.” This would be bad if it was a paid product, but this software is just for me, and I don’t really care: The headset already makes a sound when it connects, so I know if it works.

I’m now in the process of writing my own GUI library to replace the framework I used in that launcher, partially because the startup time was a little slow, and partially because, hey, it’s fun!

I’ve also written a few web apps and other programs that I use. I have a “contacts” app to track addresses, phone numbers, and birthdays of friends and family, a custom RSS reader where I subscribe to around 150 feeds, and a Markdown storage thing where I can easily store and sync small notes with my other devices. Developed by me, for me. This was more or less inspired by Maggie Appleton’s talk “Home-cooked Software and Barefoot Programmers,” which is really great.

I’m also hacking on a personal finance web app so that it’s easier to get control over the finances. Nothing groundbreaking here either, it’s double-entry and account-based, but it’s by me, for me.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

Base layout has always been QWERTY, although I quickly started using the British layout instead of the Norwegian layout when programming.

The physical layout is the same for the two, but some keys differ because the Norwegian alphabet has three extra letters, æ, ø, and å, which all have their own key. Writing { or [ in a standard Norwegian layout requires either Ctrl+Alt+7/8 (three keys, so too many) or AltGr+7/8 (which makes your right hand do a “DJ spin”). Clearly not very ergonomic.

I don’t remember my ErgoDox EZ layout, and can’t find any trace of it online, but I do have my Planck layouts. Since the Planck is so space-constrained I tried for years to make hold-modifiers on the home row work, but it never felt right. It’s difficult to get the delay short enough that you can easily press it but long enough to avoid accidental presses, and accidentally sending modifiers while you're pressing a bunch of other keys can be very dangerous in certain programs.

My proudest invention with the Planck was placing _ to the left of the spacebar, because this makes typing out variables in_snake_case a breeze. Another is to place opening braces ( or [ or { on the right without having a key in the same layer for the corresponding closer. My editor inserts the closer automatically, so there’s rarely a need to type it in manually.

The keycaps on the Planck are a mix of my ErgoDox Ez keycaps and the keycaps that it came with. At some point I used a no-name brand set, but switched back to these ones at some point last year. I was really happy with how it looks, even if the difference in profile of the caps feel a little weird.

When I changed to the Voyager I decided to place all modifiers on the thumb clusters as hold actions, instead of placing them on the lower side of the keyboard or on hold on normal keys. This has worked great for me.

The only hiccup is combinations that require pressing a key with the modifier on the same key: I currently cannot press Alt+Enter because I get Alt by holding Enter.

I’ve had to insert a second minus key on another layer so that I can press Ctrl+-, which turned out to be very important to zoom out in various apps. One of these days I’ll sit down and fix this too.

The ( [ { keys did make it over, but with a twist: The closing variant is now on hold for that key. Single press to (, long press for ). Similarly, /, |, and \ share a button as press, hold, and double-tap. Visually it makes sense, even if it makes writing // a little annoying. I also use a similar pattern for quotes: single press for ', shift+' for ", as is normal, and long-press for `.

What would be your dream setup?

A separate computer room with a standing desk is on my shortlist. Apart from that, I don’t think I have a lot of new things that I want. A fingerprint reader, maybe? So that I don’t have to type in my passwords so often. I can only type “hunter2” so many times in a day. Maybe a trackpad to replace my mouse, or a good camera-and-microphone setup for online calls.

I don’t know, I’m really happy with my current setup. If you never stop adding things you always end up with too much, you know?

I’m a game developer at Studio Folly in Melbourne, Australia. My main role is developing our new projects and supporting our current releases. We recently released Dogpile on Steam, a deck-building game where you merge increasingly bigger dogs. I’ve worked at a fair few studios in Melbourne and Brisbane in engineering roles.

I’m pretty lazy, so I’m constantly trying to find a smoother, simpler way to do a task. This especially applies to anything with a computer, where little bumps in workflows get hit over and over again. Somehow I've dodged any real RSI, but moving from keyboard to mouse to keyboard has always caused shoulder strain that sticks for way too long... WFH magnified this and made me delve into ergo setups. However I'm also very keen to keep things minimal, so I'm not going to be building the treadmill desk any time soon.

I use my work setup for music production as well, recording live instruments and making beats. Split keyboards and QMK are a godsend for music workflows, surprisingly!

I’m also a community activist as part of Victorian Socialists. The advantages afforded working in tech—wages, WFH, stability—are pretty excessive compared to most of the world’s workers, so I reckon we have a duty to give some of that back through standing for workers’ rights.

What hardware do you use?

My main computer is a MacBook M3. Couldn’t go back to Win if you forced me. The ease of development is pretty addictive; I only really started shell scripting since hopping on this baby, and that alone has improved my work drastically.

It comes with the other advantage of having NO GAMES, which means very little chance of distraction. A serious disadvantage is the keyboard and those damn sharp edges... which of course brings us to...

…ZSA Voyager, a pretty excellent KB in many departments, the form factor and build quality especially. I have the Navigator module, which I’m still training myself to use over a mouse. The board itself is top-notch. The Navigator position isn’t the best in relation to the home row, but I'm keen to try future modules to see if they fit better (come on, trackpad).

I previously used the Moonlander and have built a few split KBs—Lily, Iris—and the Voyager definitely rises above with the key count, the excellent make and profile. And the sick-ass li’l magnet feet.

My Logitech MX Master 3 is used only under duress. If you are reading this, help me, I am a hostage to a piece of plastic with an optical sensor. I would love to move totally to a trackball or pad setup and I feel I'm pretty close, but a lot of 3D software still works miles better with a mouse. Not to mention, you know, developing PC games.

Love my Espresso Pro Monitor, and I reckon it ties so well with the Voyager ethos. A simple portable display with great visual quality and pass-through power, plus it’s lightweight. It’s also a touchscreen, but you can ignore that part (it's not so good). Don't get upsold on the pen.

Rounding out the hardware is the Omnidesk standing desk and a couple of cheapo AOC monitors... honestly trying to trim down to just the Mac, Espresso and keyboard, somehow levitating in the air. I think the Voyager will be the one to fill the keyboard slot, I’ve just got to track down the levitating desk... let me check Ikea again.

Also here’s my Sledgehammer Games dev Xbox controller from back in the day, beaten to hell but still working hard.

And what software?

I use Rider as an IDE. It’s pretty great as a middle path between the softcore and hardcore VS apps. I primarily use the Unity game engine, although our studio has released native browser games too.

Honourable mentions to iTerm2—a fantastic terminal replacement—and the Godot game engine, which is definitely building towards a great alternative to Unity and Unreal.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

I haven’t gone too wild on the Voyager setup, kept it to Oryx so far. My Moonlander setups are in some dank QMK repo, hacked to bits and perform like that one Malcolm in the Middle bit.

For mouse keys I use a layer-change key instead of the Navigator’s auto layer change, but I’m thinking of switching back with some smarter transparent key planning. I have the mouse keys on the bottom row of the left board, with the trackball used with my right index. I’ve used a far-left key as Enter since the Moonlander, and it helps heaps with quick commands.

Because I’m still habitually using my mouse, most of my setup is on the left board. My alternative to “keyboard only” has been “left keyboard, right mouse” and that goes pretty well... but I reckon it’s a bit unfair to lefty, who ends up doing 90% of the work. Could still be an option! Hey ZSA, make a left-hand-only keyboard, 52 keys splayed out like a crime scene.

I like to think I foreshadowed the Voyager by jamming a Ploopy trackball into my Moonlander back in the day, much better having the real deal now!

What would be your dream setup?

I probably think about Ben Vallack’s Pants Keyboard every month or so. I think getting as close to a natural standing stance as possible is my dream, at least while we are in this middle period before the computers are in our brains. Then we can just write terrible code lying in the park!

To that end I’m pretty keen to get a smaller desk and remove the big gamer monitors. Anything I can do with the beefcake setup, I could do with the Mac, Espresso, and Voyager, on a tiny desk, with as few wires as possible.

Hello, my name is Zach Zambuto, and I am a software engineer based in New England USA. I currently work for a consulting firm where I specialize in building and shipping new modern software products for clients. It’s a great environment for me because I love working with multiple teams and building things. I’ve shipped several web and mobile apps during my time there and have utilized so many different technologies from AWS, TypeScript, React, Angular, and more!

Outside of work, I love experimenting with new technologies. For a while now I’ve been learning game development using the Unity game engine, and it’s been a blast. I think it would be really cool to one day sell a game, but I have a lot to learn! I’ve also been experimenting with Linux. Recently I switched from Windows to Kubuntu for good. It’s been very easy to game on so far!

When someone can drag me away from my computer, I love to play in-person games. On average I’ll play Magic: The Gathering with friends one or two times per week. It’s a great way to get together in person and have some solid entertainment for a few hours.

For as long as I can remember, I have loved cooking. It’s a good break from solving technical problems, but it also scratches that itch to make things. I’ll share a few pictures of things I’ve made I’m pretty proud of.

And finally, I love to travel. I’ve been to dozens of countries and all over my country. Last summer my girlfriend and I spent a week in Italy, half of which was in the Amalfi coast.

One of my favorite places I’ve visited in the United States is Zion National Park in Utah; there’s something so tranquil about the quiet over there and the surrounding deserts. I also really loved being in Ireland—probably because one of my favorite things is a full Irish breakfast, and probably because I’m ¼ Irish.

What hardware do you use?

I cycle between four machines throughout the week for work, leisure, and hobby. At some point I want a more powerful Linux laptop and maybe a home lab for more hobbies.

My gaming and game dev rig has Nvidia Geforce RTX 3060ti, 11th Gen Intel i5-11400F, and 16 GB RAM (I forgot the brand). My work machine is a 2021 16” MacBook Pro, and my personal one is a 2019 16” MacBook Pro. A Dell Latitude 5420 serves as my experimental device.

Then there are my peripherals. My main monitor is a Gigabyte G34WQC A, and my secondary monitor is an ASUS MG278.

My mic is an Audio-Technica condenser microphone, and I also use a Razer BlackShark V2 headset. I use a ZSA Moonlander, a Logitech wireless G502 mouse, and a Wacom drawing tablet.

And what software?

As I’ve said previously, I’ve used Windows extensively for game development but have since switched completely over to Kubuntu. And for work I’m mainly on macOS. I think every developer should have access to all operating systems to do their job effectively. At some point I do want to try more Linux distributions on my experimental laptop.

I’d been using Visual Studio Code for a long time as my IDE of choice. I found myself trying to master keyboard shortcuts and started playing around with Vim motions in VSCode. Unfortunately, at the time I was using this really compact keyboard and I started getting weird forearm pain, so I had to stop for a while. And that’s when I ended up getting my Moonlander, which has enabled me to start using Vim again. I’m in the process of learning Vim and using Neovim as a code editor. It’s so cool to customize and a lot faster to program with. The plan now is to eventually switch over from VSCode and use Neovim full-time. For Neovim and any work that needs to be done in the terminal, I have been utilizing iTerm2 on my Macs and ZSH for my shell.

I’ve always been more of a front-end engineer even though I do full stack, and I think it’s because I can do some design stuff. Anytime I have some idea of app or graphic, I’ll use Figma to get the ideas out of my head. Last year I used it to design a mobile game that all my friends played during New Year’s Eve.

For game development stuff I use Blender for models, Audacity for sound recording, and Krita for any drawing-related stuff that needs to be done.

Honorable mentions go to GitHub, Spotify, Firefox, Proton VPN/Mail, Signal, Matrix (Element), ManaBox (For MTG), and Steam.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

I’ve been caught at a very transitional stage from keyboard to OS to new code editors! For that reason I’m mostly on the default layout until I really lock in on a good workflow, given all these new tools. I did find it really useful, though, adding a layer for mouse and arrow key control. You can very precisely move around windows and never take your hands off the keyboard.

The ultimate goal, and frankly the reason I got this keyboard, is because I want to be able to be a mouseless developer.

What would be your dream setup?

So far my setup has become closer and closer to what I’ve always wanted. It’s evolved from a flimsy pong table with one monitor to a solid butcher block with professional monitors. I think I definitely need some caster wheels on the standing desk to make modifying it easier. It’s also getting to the point where some of my devices will need to be retired soon. I want a more powerful laptop to replace my 2019 MacBook and eventually a more powerful gaming / game dev workstation. I would also love a home lab so I can do lots of experiments and fully de-Google.

I’m pretty happy with how far my workspace has come and I’m happy that the Moonlander is now a part of it :)

I'm Louis Sundrønning. The first thing I usually tell people when they ask me who I am, is that I’m a jack of all trades, and specifically of the arts. If you name an art, there is little chance that I do not, or have not partaken in it at some point (exceptions apply of course). I do visual arts: digital and paper, painting occasionally, animation, sewing, and sculpting. I play a few instruments, sing, read, and write. I dabble in programming electronics, and woodworking, gardening, cooking and baking, play and make games, I’ve done some theatre, improv, dance… I’m sure I’ve missed something. I tend to learn a bit faster than the average person, so I don’t have too much trouble adopting new tools and hobbies, and I enjoy learning new things more than I enjoy perfecting any one thing.

Professionally, I'm a freelance graphic designer, 3D generalist, and animator, although most of my clients want websites, so the other projects are few and far between. I like to work with just one client at a time if I can, so my clients usually get my undivided attention during projects. And my own website is thoroughly neglected and out-of-date.

I’m currently working on a game development project with some friends on the side, with the ambition of making "Oarlock" one of Norway’s top gaming studios in the future. But we are just starting out, so it’s hard to tell at this point in time whether or not we could be successful. It is a very fun team though: loud, supportive, passionate, terrible humor, and a shared love for learning. I work mainly on the characters and animation, and we’re getting close to having our very first simple “tech demo” ready to test.

I have way too many hobbies, so I always find it difficult to say what exactly it is that I do in my free time. It varies a lot on a month-to-month basis. I tend to take on learning projects, like touch-typing, learning Japanese and Turkish, or trying new crafts. I’m not particularly good at finishing my personal projects, but the process seems to bring me more joy than the finishing of things.

As of March, I am playing around with creating a sort of scheduling system to keep track of time, basically showing me what I was planning to do during this time (work, study, eat) with some suggestions of what specifically to do. There are of course a lot of apps that do something like it, but none of them work exactly as I want so… Here I am, building it from the ground up just for fun…

I have a bit of a renovation project going on right now as well, since I recently moved into my family home’s first floor, which we are turning into an apartment. My floors, other than my office, bedroom and bathroom, are currently just cement, and we still have a wall to move where the kitchen will be. But the work has slowed down a bit during winter. So I have a beautiful, nearly finished office and bedroom, but the living room and kitchen are very much naked and in need of walls and flooring.

What hardware do you use?

I built my computer inside a Fractal Design North case, and I actually designed my entire office around the case’s design: black details, grey tapestry, and walnut wood aesthetics. I bought the PC parts about three or four years ago now, I think, so it still works great, although I could use a new graphics card. Luckily though, I am all set on RAM, considering the current price hikes.

For my peripherals, I’ve settled on a Dygma Defy and a Razer Basilisk mouse as my main drivers, because they both seem to fit my hands quite well. The Defy was simply the first split keyboard I bought, and I’ve grown quite fond of it. The mouse has been more of a trial-and-error situation. I tried out various different types over the last ten years, and the Basilisk was the only one which didn’t cause any pain, so I’ve settled on it, and upgraded my last Basilisk to the newer version when it stopped functioning.

For now I still keep my old traditional keyboard at hand, because I continually find new signs or accents that I have forgotten to add to my layout because I rarely use them.

I use three screens. The main one is a gaming screen with relatively good color accuracy, the second is my old gaming screen, and the third is a large Huion drawing tablet. I find the multitude of screens incredibly useful for graphic work even if I’m sure some people might find that it is entirely unnecessary. The main program goes on the main screen, references on the other, and emails or other reference information/searches on the last, unless I’m drawing on it. I also have mics and lights set up for filming and music, for some occasional video and audio work.

I guess my setup in general might be a bit overkill, but considering I spend 90% of my day in my office, it feels very much worth it. And my computer runs smooth like butter under almost all circumstances, except rendering.

I have a PlayStation and a Switch for some specific games, but they get much less use than my computer.

My desk is a bit of a DIY situation too. The tables and the shelves are actually Ikea kitchen counters, which were much cheaper than any kind of normal tabletop I could have bought in that size, and the legs are electrically adjustable sit-stand legs. I like to have plenty of desk space, so the tables are huge, but I can slot one under the other so that it takes up only 70 cm of depth when I want more space in the room—for example, when I want to use my treadmill.

I originally ordered a custom Hillside 48 keyboard kit a year ago as a potential travelling keyboard. I had to solder it and rework some code in order to make it work, but I made some mistake which I haven’t taken the time to fix after I moved, so it is only partially put together. Which is why I bought a Voyager instead last year, since I needed something for weekly meetings immediately. So I use the Voyager, a Basilisk Mobile, and a Huion Kamvas 13 as my travelling setup with a small laptop, all three of which I am pretty happy with, as portable versions of my normal setup.

And what software?

It kind of depends on the task.

In my design work, I usually do my sketching on paper or in Clip Studio Paint, out of habit mainly since I used to animate in it, and I use a combination of either Adobe’s InDesign, Illustrator, and Photoshop or Affinity’s Designer, Publisher, and Photo, depending on my needs for the project. Affinity is a one-off purchase with some of the same capabilities as Adobe’s products, but it is sometimes not quite enough when I need to do specific things.

For web design I create my designs in Figma or on paper, depending on the scope and budget of the project, and then I generally build them with WordPress, using a few addons I find useful. Bricks Builder, Meta Box, and HappyFiles are the main ones that allow me to simplify the administration of the website for my clients, and make the websites more expandable without requiring my help. I like to give my clients autonomy of their websites once our projects are complete.

For video and 3D I usually use a combination of PureRef for inspiration boards, Blender for 3D and animation, DaVinci Resolve for editing, and Adobe After Effects for motion graphics. Any hand-drawn animation or animatics I usually do in Clip Studio.

I use eM Client to keep track of various email accounts, make use of Windows PowerToys for its many convenient functions, and sometimes use Toggl track to keep track of my work hours when needed for some jobs.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

I actually decided to evolve from my three-finger hunt-and-peck typing and teach myself touch-typing just over a year ago, which ended up being an adventure and a half. I was originally just going to learn QWERTY on a normal keyboard, but after only a few days I started having terrible pain in the forearms/fingers. So I did some research and ended up deviating to standard Colemak and ordering a Dygma Defy, which I still use as my main driver.

My layout has changed a bit, though. I still use Colemak, but I’ve made some changes to the layers, with some keys changing function depending on whether they are pressed once, held down, or double tapped. And some layers I’ve made specifically for different uses. For example I have two Colemak layouts, one for typing (with fewer functions and less lag) and one for work (with super keys, which can lag a bit), and then I have one displaced QWERTY layout for gaming, where the WASD keys are moved to where the ESDF keys would usually be, allowing me to not shift my fingers from their comfortable positions. I use the keyboard's key colors to let myself know which layout I’m currently on. But my layout is still evolving as I adopt some of the new functions the software offers, and discover different needs for different programs. For example, I recently switched my A key on my work layout with a custom super key which does A, Shift, Alt-Shift, or Ctrl-Shift depending on whether I tap it, hold it, tap then hold, or double tap and hold—which I only use in Blender, where the functions matter more than the keys being really fast.

I also just added a numpad row, although I haven’t fully tested it for convenience yet.

I use the original keycaps, but with the shifted QWERTY layout, so that I can look at what I’m hitting when I’m gaming. When writing I simply go in blind.

On my Voyager I use a slightly different setup, since it has fewer keys and thumb keys, and I don’t have a gaming layer. I had to move my Shift, Ctrl, Space, and Enter keys a bit, sort of moving them to where they would be on a normal keyboard instead of matching my Dygma keyboard. This is actually what convinced me to create the super keys on the Defy, since it was pretty convenient for shortcuts on programs I’ve used for many years. My fingers remember how to do it better.

I also had to make up something for æ, ø, and å in Norwegian, and for accents in French, since the Voyager doesn’t have the extra center keys, so I’m using the simultaneous tapping of two keys for those. For example A+e = æ, a+o = å and o+e = ø. I don’t like using double-tap keys, since they slow me down on words with double letters; for example, “Haakon” would turn into “Håkon” by accident.

I’m still having a bit of a hard time adjusting to the lack of extra thumb keys. I could probably live with just three, but when I only have two, it affects my normal typing just a bit too much, the main issue being that my Backspace and Enter are no longer where I expect them to be, and I fully lose my Delete key. It’s completely fine for nonwriting use, though.

What would be your dream setup?

Honestly I’m getting pretty close to my dream setup.

My chair is definitely due for an upgrade. The fabric is ripped in all the seams from overuse, since I like to use things until they break. I didn’t throw out my previous chair until it literally snapped in two. I’d like something a bit ergonomic and better-suited to the way I sit, which is a bit nonstandard, or suited to partially sitting for quick breaks when standing at my desk, and to changing positions a lot. I can’t seem to sit in the same position for very long. Maybe one of those chairs that are made to sit cross-legged.

It would be fun to install a green screen for more video shenanigans too, but I need to finish the office first, and get the clutter out of the room. There’s a lot of stuff in my office that belongs in the still-nonexistent living room, like my instruments and some furniture.

For my travelling setup, I’d like to find a keyboard which better reflects my Defy’s layout, so that I won’t need to switch up the way I write at home versus when travelling. The Defy could technically be used when I travel, but it’s a bit too big with the built-in pads and big keys. But the same layout, with the same thumb keys, flat keys, no wrist rests, and preferably the same software would have been ideal. In a perfect world, Dygma would release a smaller, more portable version of the Defy.

I’d also like to find a way to place the keyboard on top of the laptop. Maybe a 3D printed flat stand of some kind. Having the split keyboard beside or in front of the laptop isn’t very space-friendly. Although, in an even more ideal world, a laptop with a built-in ergonomic keyboard, along the lines of this, would have been the absolute best travelling setup.

I’m Martin, a freelance software consultant based in Košice, Slovakia. I run my own one-person company and work primarily with TypeScript, Go, and Elixir—mostly on web platforms and backend systems. Outside of client work, I maintain Hive Pal, an open-source beekeeping app with a small but growing community of users.

I keep six beehives, which I inherited as a passion from my late father—it’s equal parts meditative and chaotic. Beekeeping is a nice hobby. My dad was a beekeeper and one day I read The History of Bees by Maja Lunde, which deals with father-son relationships, and I decided to start helping him with the bees. He then gave me some hives of my own, and when he passed away a year ago I took over.

I ferment things: kefir, sauerkraut, sourdough. The funny thing about kefir is my daughter Emma has loved it since she was one year old, so I have to sometimes keep it hidden from her. It took me a while to get a decent kefir going, but I found the key is, just like for most things in life, consistency: Just feed the same amount at the same time and it will turn out fine.

We have a large garden with fruit trees, berries, and vegetables in the summer—the greenhouse helps stretch the season a bit. In the garden we have several trees, some freshly planted and some older. Peach, pear, cherry, sea buckthorn, walnuts, I love them all the same. The most unusual is maybe the service/sorb tree (Sorbus domestica), whych had fruit for the first time last year.

I run five times a week and I’m currently training for a marathon. I also have a 3D printer and a cold plunge barrel out there, which tells you something about the kind of person I am. I play guitar and piano, read (and listen to) a lot of Terry Pratchett, and then there's my daughter Emma, who gets bedtime stories featuring a rotating cast of characters she's very opinionated about.

What hardware do you use?

My main machine is a desktop running a Ryzen 9 with 32 cores and 64GB RAM—it handles everything from client work to running local services without breaking a sweat. I have three monitors.

The keyboard is a Moonlander, heavily customized—it’s really the center of gravity for how I interact with everything. I've spent an embarrassing amount of time on the layout and I regret nothing.

For the home lab I have a Lenovo System x3550 as the main workhorse, plus a handful of Odroids and Raspberry Pis scattered around for various tasks. It started as a hobby and slowly became infrastructure I actually rely on.

And a Prusa Core One for 3D printing, which gets used for everything from hive components to random household fixes. I bought the Core One very recently and am pretty happy. Once you have a 3D printer, you find that every problem usually has a 3D-printed solution. :D

And what software?

I used Arch Linux for 15 years, with a couple of years’ break where I used macOS. But after I got a desktop and laptop, I was looking for ways to have them in sync. Long story short, I discovered NixOS. The learning curve is steep, and there were dozens of times when I thought I was giving up, but eventually it clicked, and I'm quite happy. The nice thing about it is that my laptop and my desktop are in sync: The installed apps, settings, desktop environment, everything lives in a single config that is committed to GitHub. If my computer blows up, I can be up and running the same thing on a different machine in about 30 minutes, which is pretty cool.

Everything runs NixOS—desktop, home lab, all of it. Having the entire system configuration as code is one of those things that feels like overhead until you've had to rebuild a machine and it just works.

For the desktop environment I use Hyprland with Noctalia Shell. Terminal is kitty, multiplexer is Zellij, editor is Neovim with AstroNvim. Browser is Firefox. It's a very keyboard-driven workflow, which pairs well with the Moonlander.

The home lab runs a bunch of self-hosted services: Vaultwarden for passwords, Immich for photos, Jellyfin for media, Syncthing for file sync across devices, and Home Assistant for home automation. The list keeps growing—it's a blessing and a curse.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

My daily driver is the Moonlander, and I also use a Corne when I want something more portable. Both run custom layouts.

I’m on QWERTY—I’ve thought about switching to something like Colemak but keep putting it off, mostly because of Neovim muscle memory. Maybe someday.

The layout has a dedicated symbol layer, a number layer, and—most importantly—a dedicated layer for tetr.io. Priorities.

What would be your dream setup?

Honestly, I’m pretty close to it already. There was a period where I was constantly tweaking—new layout experiments, restructuring my NixOS config, swapping things around—but that's settled down a lot. I’ve landed somewhere that just works, and I don't feel the urge to change things for the sake of it anymore.

The one thing I’ve been eyeing is more RAM—64GB is plenty for most things, but there's always a voice in the back of my head saying “what if more.” Current prices have been a convincing counterargument though.

I’m Petra, and I’ve spent the last 21 years helping build the digital world at Google. I’ve seen the internet evolve from the inside—starting with the foundational days of Search, moving into the scale of Gmail, and currently building Google Wallet APIs.

But I’ve never been “just” an engineer. I’ve always needed a creative outlet that has a physical or business-driven result. I ran a professional photography business, which taught me to see light and composition with the same precision I apply to a code review. I also built an Amazon FBA business, navigating the logistics and market dynamics of physical goods.

Lately, my obsession has shifted to the earth. I’m deep into landscape design, specifically the challenge of creating tranquil, structured outdoor spaces around my home.

There is a fascinating parallel between designing a Japanese garden and designing a high-traffic API: Both require a deep understanding of flow, constraints, and the beauty of minimalism.

What hardware do you use?

My workspace is a study in “purist productivity.” I use a white ErgoDox EZ, which stands out beautifully against my rough sawn wood desk. It’s paired with a MacBook Pro, but the real stars are the screens.

At the office, I have two large monitors that allow me to keep my documentation, code, and terminal all visible at once. At home, I go even bigger—two massive panels. I’m also a bit of a networking nerd; my home is hardwired with over 48 Cat6 plenum-rated cables for ultimate PoE setup, and I am currently designing my dream server rack.

And what software?

My digital life is lived in Chrome and a terminal shell. Because I’ve been at Google for over two decades, I almost exclusively use a proprietary toolset. Outside of that, I keep it simple—if it can’t be done in a browser or a shell, I probably don’t need it.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

I’m a “mirrored” user: I have one ErgoDox EZ at home and another at my office desk. There’s no context-switching for my muscle memory; I want the same tactile experience regardless of where I am.

Interestingly, I don't use custom keycaps or fancy configurations. I use the stock setup with Cherry MX Brown switches. I like the tactile feedback without the distracting noise of a clicky switch.

The biggest benefit of the ErgoDox for me—aside from the ergonomics—is actually the social security. Because it’s a split keyboard with a unique form factor, it acts as a natural barrier. My child won't touch it, and my coworkers wouldn't dream of trying to type a quick message on it. It’s a “Petra-only” input device, and I love that exclusivity.

What would be your dream setup?

Honestly? I’m living it, but I’d just like to “scale” the environment. My dream setup would be a minimalist, Brutalist-inspired home office with floor-to-ceiling glass looking out over my Japanese garden.

My name is Enes Tasbasi. I am a senior software engineer currently working at a large U.S.-based bank. I have been programming since I was 16 years old and I am mostly self-taught. I started my career during college by doing some freelance gigs before getting full-time work and then working at a start-up before joining my current company.

As a kid, when people asked me what I wanted to do when I grew up. I told them that I wanted to be a pilot. After getting full-time work as a programmer, I was able to turn this dream into reality by getting my private pilot license. My favorite memories flying so far have been flying to the Oshkosh AirVenture air show in Wisconsin and flying along the Hudson River in New York City and circling around the Statue of Liberty.

I am currently working on my instrument rating to become a better pilot.

What hardware do you use?

I use a MacBook Pro for work and personal life and own a Windows laptop for gaming.

I have a secondary monitor that isn't as big as I would like because of desk space. I also own a Meta Quest 3 VR set that I purchased to see if I could use it for flight training with the X-Plane flight simulator.

It's an extremely cool technology, but the resolution isn't high enough to see small text, so I haven't been able to use it that much. I tried to do some coding in the VR set, but ran into the same issue with the resolution.

I purchased a ZSA Moonlander keyboard spontaneously around three years ago. At the time, I was working full-time while attending college after work, thus spent the whole day typing. At the end of one day, I randomly did five minutes of research and came across the ZSA Moonlander and purchased it.

I found the keyboard customization for the Moonlander to be excellent. I was glad that I didn't have to download some app on each device that I connect the keyboard to and go through an annoying login process.

Unfortunately, after two years, I started having issues with the right side of the Moonlander, which I suspected had to do with the TRRS port. I tried to fix the issue, but couldn't get it to work.

I considered getting a replacement for the right side or switching to a Voyager keyboard. I was a bit skeptical of having fewer keys on the keyboard and wasn't sure if I could fit my Moonlander layouts into the Voyager, but I decided to give it a try. This time I also ordered without the letter keycaps just for the coolness factor : P.

I am happy that the Voyager is smaller and has fewer keys. It took me a while to get the layout right, but I have been using it daily since I got it and I am very happy with the purchase.

And what software?

I love optimizing the way I work with software. I have spent a lot of time figuring out what works best for me, and here is a summary of my favorite apps.

Obsidian is my go-to for note-taking. This is the best change I have made to my setup in the past year. I use it both for personal life and for work. It stores notes in Markdown, so you are not vendor-locked. I sync my notes to GitHub and Google Drive to prevent any data loss. Throughout my professional career, I have learned that it's best to keep notes for everything, including any issues I work on, any learnings, and meetings. If you ask me what I did this day last year, I can tell you exactly what I did.

Contexts is for app-switching. I use a MacBook because it makes development easier and the hardware is sleek, but I really hate the way window management works. I used to create multiple desktops, but didn't like that there wasn't an easy way to switch between them. Contexts solved this problem for me. It has multiple ways of navigating applications, but the approach I use is to bind certain characters with the option key, so when I press Option + 1, it will open chrome. I use Option + O for Obsidian, you get the idea. I am surprised Contexts isn't more popular.

I use Clipboard helper Maccy to store multiple items. It's disappointing that operating systems don't natively support this functionality. Maccy is a very simple app that allows you to access multiple copied items instead of just the last one.

With Homerow, I use the keyboard to press any key in the screen. This is similar to Vimium, but for the whole operating system. It allows you to press any button using your keyboard.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

For the Moonlander, I went through a couple iterations for the layout, updating it every couple of months. This was the final version of my Moonlander.

There are two things I want to call out.

1. The "Words" layer—This is the best addition to the keyboard I ever made. I searched the most popular words in English and substrings such as "ion", "ed", "ing". This didn't improve my typing speed by much, but it meant I could reduce the keystrokes I had to make on average. I also added some programming words that are commonly used, such as "if" and "else".

2. Backspace macros—I set up macros so that when I pressed a number from 2-5 and the backspace at the same time, it would delete that number of characters. This also made typing easier by reducing the amount of keystrokes I had to do.

This is my current layout with the Voyager. The "Words" layer is almost the same as the Moonlander, but "Digits" layer allows me to use the home row for digits instead of having to reach out to the top row.

One issue that I had trouble with while migrating the Moonlander layout to the Voyager is the multifunction keys, such as Z (Z on tap, Ctrl on hold). I realized that when I use popular letters such as V as a multifunction key, I end up mistyping a lot, so I had to switch to using Z, X, comma, and dot as the multifunction keys.

What would be your dream setup?

I would like to have a bigger desk that can also stand up. I would also like two extra-wide monitors to make sure no buggy code escapes my eyesight 👀.

My name is Eric Luna. I’m a software engineer based in Argentina, currently working mostly in Python and TypeScript, building backend systems, automation workflows, and occasionally frontend interfaces. Most of my professional work revolves around building tools that make complex systems easier to operate—things like automation pipelines, data processing flows, APIs, and internal platforms. Lately I’ve also been spending a lot of time exploring how large language models can augment software workflows, from generating content to automating tasks that used to take hours.

What I really enjoy about programming is that it sits at the intersection of creativity and precision. You get to build things that didn’t exist before, but you also have to respect the strict logic of the machine. That tension—between invention and constraint—is endlessly fascinating to me.

Outside of work, my life splits into several very different worlds.

The first is family life. I’m married and have kids, and a lot of my time is spent in the rhythms of family: playing with my son, planning trips, or just trying to slow down enough to enjoy ordinary moments together.

The second is what I would call intentional living. I’m very into journaling, analog planning systems, and thinking about how to live more deliberately. I keep multiple notebooks and use a bullet journal–style system to track projects, ideas, and daily reflections. I like the friction of paper—it forces you to slow down and think.

The third is building things for fun. I’m constantly experimenting with side projects. Some are tools for developers, some are experiments with AI, and others are ideas that sit somewhere between software and creativity.

And finally, I have a small obsession with coffee.

My setup is fairly simple but very ritualized. I grind my beans just before brewing with a Baratza Encore, which has been extremely reliable and does exactly what I need without fuss. For brewing, I usually use a French press with a 1:15 coffee-to-water ratio. It produces a cup that feels full and comforting, especially in the morning.

My coffee routine is very consistent: two cups a day.

The first one comes about 30 minutes after waking up, once the house has settled a bit and the morning chaos of getting kids ready begins to slow down. The second one is right after lunch, mostly as a defensive measure against the powerful gravitational pull of the Argentine siesta.

On days when I want something stronger, I switch to a Moka pot, which produces a more intense, almost espresso-like cup.

Coffee, for me, is less about caffeine and more about marking moments in the day. It’s a small pause before returning to work.

What hardware do you use?

My main computer is a MacBook Pro with Apple Silicon. I’ve been using Macs for development for a long time, and the recent generation of Apple Silicon machines feels like the culmination of what laptops should be: powerful, quiet, and with battery life that actually allows you to forget the charger exists.

For external displays I usually keep things minimal—generally a single monitor. I’ve found that too many screens fragment my attention. I prefer to stay focused on one or two windows at a time and rely heavily on keyboard shortcuts and workspace switching.

For peripherals, I tend to gravitate toward things that feel solid and long-lasting. My Voyager is a big part of my setup, but I also care about simple tools like good notebooks and pens.

In fact, one of the most important “hardware” tools in my workflow is not electronic at all: my notebooks.

I carry an A6 Traveler’s Notebook knock-off with two inserts. Both are brandless inserts—usually dotted or blank paper—because I like the flexibility of starting with a completely open page.

One insert is dedicated to journaling, while the other is for task management and planning. I use a loose Bullet Journal–style system: capturing ideas, tasks, and notes throughout the day.

For writing I keep things extremely simple: a Pilot Synergy Point 0.5. It’s a cheap pen with cheap refills, and that’s exactly why I like it. It writes cleanly, it’s reliable, and I don’t have to worry about losing it.

I haven’t gone down the fountain pen and ink rabbit hole… yet.

Recently I added a hardcover A5 notebook to my system. The notebook itself is from a local Argentine brand called Brügge, which I really like. The idea is to collect the “highlights of the day” there—small reflections or memorable moments—so that at the end of the year I can review everything in one place while planning the next one.

If I’m honest, I may also just be looking for another excuse to put ink on paper. Writing by hand is strangely addictive.

Beyond that, my stationery setup is intentionally minimal: a single highlighter, a few paper clips, and some Post-it notes.

That’s it.

I like tools that stay out of the way and let the thinking happen.

In a world where everything is digital and ephemeral, paper has a way of grounding thinking.

And what software?

My workflow is very keyboard-driven and Unix-centric.

I don’t have that many apps installed because I tend to use TUI apps in the terminal.

Neovim is my main editor. What I love about it is that it feels less like an application and more like a programmable environment. My configuration has evolved slowly over time, and I’m always tweaking something.

Most of my day happens inside the terminal, for which I use Terminal. I use modern tools where they help, but I still rely heavily on classic Unix utilities—things like grep, sed, and awk. There’s something satisfying about composing small tools together to solve problems.

For notes that I need to have available or searchable—and also accessible on my phone—I use Obsidian. It strikes a good balance between the flexibility of plain text and the convenience of a polished app.

Outside of coding, I also use a mix of analog and digital systems for thinking and planning. Paper still plays a big role for clarity and focus.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

Mechanical keyboards are one of those rabbit holes that developers fall into eventually. I jumped in a couple of years ago, straight into a ZSA Voyager. Getting used to a split, ortholinear layout was a bit of a learning curve, but I found that it really encouraged me to rethink how I interact with the keyboard.

My layout tends to evolve slowly (based on the default one). I’m not someone who radically redesigns everything overnight. Instead I make incremental improvements—small tweaks that reduce friction over time.

Some patterns I always try to keep: heavy use of layers to prevent reaching for distant keys, navigation keys mapped to comfortable positions, and Vim-style movement patterns wherever possible.

For me, the goal of a keyboard is not to look impressive but to disappear into muscle memory. When it’s working well, you stop thinking about it entirely.

What would be your dream setup?

My dream setup is surprisingly simple.

I’m not chasing the maximalist multimonitor battle-station aesthetic. Instead I like setups that feel calm, intentional, and almost monastic.

In the dream version, a quiet workspace with natural light would hold a single powerful laptop, one clean monitor, a beautifully designed mechanical keyboard, and a small collection of notebooks. A good coffee setup would lie within arm’s reach.

In other words, a workspace that encourages deep focus. Meaningful projects without constant interruptions.

I’m “Wupes”—a nickname that friends and co-workers prefer. I'm the co-founder of Retek, a tech solutions provider for the retail industry. We serve top-tier consumer electronics brands by designing and building innovative tech for their global retail activation projects. Here in Shanghai, I lead a team of hardware and software engineers in our tech lab to bring those projects to life.

Eighteen years ago, I started my career as a game designer at Ubisoft. I spent the next decade as a game developer across several studios, making games for console, web, and mobile—until the arcade genre pulled me into hardware. My skills in making game builds on command line eventually drew me into the world of Linux, and then the embedded.

These days, aside from client-facing work, I primarily focus on process-building for my team, where I create toolchains for the development of our embedded software, and also maintain cloud servers that monitor 4G-connected devices worldwide.

At home, I work for my wife—she’s a product manager at a large Internet company. This means my job description for the husband title includes “listening to her complaining about the corporate stupidity” and “serving as her IT helpdesk for her laptop issues,” which I excel at by asking on most tickets, “Have you tried restarting your computer?”

My ten-year-old son shares my passion for games, especially board games. Together (and sometimes with my wife, if she’s in the mood), we’ve played everything from casual hits (e.g. Flip 7) to heavyweights (e.g. Twilight Struggle).

Our favorite over the past twelve months has been Frosthaven—we loved it so much, the game map is on our living room wall.

What hardware do you use?

My workstation was upgraded just last year. Before that, I'd been running an iMac Pro with two Dell 2K monitors on the sides, plus my iPad Pro that I'd put into Sidecar mode when taken to the office in the morning. My keyboard had long been the HHKB Pro BT, which I absolutely adored.

Last year I decided to move onto Apple Silicon, and took the opportunity to have everything on my desk float where possible.

I got a base-model Apple Mac Studio, paired it with the Studio Display, and upgraded the side screens to 5K with another much more affordable Rich Vision RV200 Pro. I also upgraded the bottom screen to CFORCE 116T—a portable OLED screen, and the only model big enough that came with a VESA mount. After attaching a UGREEN phone stand with MagSafe charger onto another thin arm, now everything floats—except, of course, my beloved Moonlander.

The new bottom screen freed up my iPad Pro. With its 5G connectivity, it's been essential gear for me on the portable end. Pair it with a beautifully cased Raspberry Pi 4 (connected via Blink SSH) over a single USB cable and add a Flipper Zero on the side, and I've got a mobile command station anywhere.

There is also a lovely dev corner next to my desk, hosting a retired Apple Watch permanently on its charging stand, a little storage space for USB gadgets, a 2020 NUC as my build machine, and a funky USB hub (EleksMaker NK6) with satisfying flip toggles.

The USB hub's no.2 port powers one of my favorite office props: the Endurance. I bought the 3D-printed model online and tweaked the motor and USB power supply myself to have its rotating speed exactly at 5 RPM, as in Interstellar, and added the LED lighting in attempt to better reflect how the scene was shot.

And what software?

I’m a longtime Mac user. My current OS setup includes the must-have Raycast, which replaces LaunchBar for me as of last year. Its idea of “every useful thing gets its own shortcut,” boosted with Moonlander's layout customization, has taken my productivity up to a whole new level. Things is my longest-running one-time purchase app—over 12 years—and it still sparks joy every time I open it; and yes, GTD has been central to my methodology.

I love Itsycal for its simplicity over all other menu-bar calendar pop-ups that I've tried. Ice is a solid alternative to Bartender for managing the menu bar, and stat monitor iStat Menus just looks right to me.

My code editor is Neovim. I have been an Emacs user for as long as I can remember typing on a Mac. I “rediscovered” Vim last year when I sat on an international flight without Internet. I was so bored after a few TV episodes on my iPad that I started browsing the built-in commands in Blink, ended up taking the default tutorial of vi, and wow, what a delightful journey to realize that no matter how many words I needed to type, for the work that I do, the power of editing should really be the out-of-box first-class citizen.

I'm so glad that I discovered Ghostty last year. Ten lines of YAML config turned out to be all I needed to get an elegant terminal running on macOS—in place of the bloated iTerm2. I'm exposed to all the basic shells on day-to-day work, and most of my scripts are written in bash. Nevertheless, I find most comfort in fish as my main macOS shell, in place of zsh. Same idea as ghostty: minimum config to get it working in style. Starship is a fine replacement of oh-my-zsh, again for its minimal configuration.

Git's never been easy for me without a graphical interface—until the perfect TUI LazyGit showed up. Yazi is a file manager that makes me feel blind nowadays in a system where I have to issue a ls-ish command on every directory. 1Password is essential in my dev workflow for its CLI integration and SSH agent.

I believe knowledge always sinks in better when rewritten in one’s own words instead of clipping & saving. Thus a smooth and elegant writing experience with minimum effort for formatting goes a long way, and Bear is a beautiful note-taking app. Airtable is my go-to web app for managing any database-like info, work or personal.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

Whenever I set up a new device, I see for myself a great opportunity to take that chance and try something new, stuff that I otherwise wouldn't touch due to the understandable momentum built from the past.

Switching to the Moonlander’s columnar layout was the perfect moment for my Dvorak trial. Since I had to adjust my muscle memory on columnar anyway, might as well make it interesting. I'm glad I did.

My custom layout’s only a few months old, and far from ideal; yet, I very much enjoyed the process of rapidly iterating the design in the first few weeks to accomplish 80% of the core functions, and then transit into the gradually evolving stage of adding something new every few weeks.

Key ideas in my layout range from keys that share the work between left and right hands to app-specific tweaks to an unconventional number pad. I’ve added a supplemental Meh key for secondary shortcuts, plus the ability to hit enter with left hand. I don’t use any home-row mods, since I find the delay from dual-function keys intolerable on frequent letters, especially when Dvorak puts them all on the home row. Shift lives right below the home row; I hate to travel my pinky sideways on regular typing.

Ctrl and Cmd, each at where my thumbs naturally rest, are both accompanied by Alt keys. For me, that's left Alt for dev work, right Alt for admin. Around the thumb cluster, the Space, Backspace, Tab, and Enter are all set to pure keys—again, to avoid delays. A single-purpose Hyper key supercharges my Raycast config.

The positioning of number keys on Layer 2 is unconventional; I spent a lot of time adjusting my numpad muscle memory for it, but it pays off—numbers 1-3 turned out to be used way more often than 4-6, and then 7-9; this makes sense for anyone who also types in Chinese.

What would be your dream setup?

I already have my dream setup—in a practical sense. There's still plenty that I wish to build and improve, but they all belong to the 20%.

In an impractical sense, if we ever renovate a new office and I get my way, I'd turn the whole office into the CIC room from Battlestar Galactica: square screens dropping down from the ceiling to display our 4G dashboard, with DRADIS curve lines scanning through our devices.

My name is Katie Janzen, and I work as a senior software engineer at Amplify Education. We make curricula and learning materials for students and reporting & analysis tooling for teachers.

I work on a product called the Response Interpretation Engine (RIE), which is intended to help teachers by surfacing different ways of thinking that can be derived from how students tend to answer specific questions. It's a really awesome product to get to work on, and my teammates are absolutely amazing. I feel so lucky to be able to work with such outstanding engineers but also incredibly kind and thoughtful human beings.

Outside of work I really like to play basketball with some other ladies on Sunday afternoons. I'm not normally a big sports person, but that's been a lot of fun for me. I've also finally been bitten by the weight-lifting bug thanks to Casey Johnston's outstanding LIFTOFF: Couch to Barbell program (shoutout to No Boilerplate for the recommendation).

I also love to do a lot of more esoteric computing projects in my free time. I recently wrote a little clipboard utility for the command line in Rust called KClip, which I'm really happy with.

What hardware do you use?

My current personal machine is a Space Gray 16-inch MacBook Pro M1 Pro, which I got in 2022 and continue to be really happy with. I ADORE my Logitech MX Master 3S, the last one before they ruined the clicks with the 3S and 4—give me back my clicks, you bastards!!

I finally built my first gaming PC after years and years of putting it off! 🥳 That's been a lot of fun.

The importance of my bullet journal (a bright red hardcover LEUCHTURM1917 A5 Notebook cannot be overstated. I even kludged a pen loop onto it with red Duck Tape. The Bullet Journal Method has been a real lifeline as my work has gotten more complex and my ADHD more challenging to manage.

And what software?

Thanks to hours a day writing code, #1 with a bullet is Neovim. I've been using it for about two or three years now and I'm starting to really dial in a setup that I love and feel productive with.

Lately I've been trying to write a lot more, so that's slowly starting to appear on my website 347online.me. As a result I've recently been getting back into Obsidian for writing and knowledge management. Previously I was trying to build more of a custom solution with just Neovim plugins, but it's looking like Obsidian with Vim motions enabled may be the better compromise for me and my needs.

Between the personal wiki and the bullet journal, I finally feel in control of my life for essentially the first time, which is wonderful.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

I’ve tried alternate layouts on the laptop keyboards, but it’s a huge pain, so I’m still using QWERTY there. On my previous custom boards and my Moonlander, though, I use Colemak-DH. All my keyboards run QMK, so I configure them all in the raw C code. I know you can use GUI remappers, but I really enjoy feeling in complete control down to the metal. It’s really cool how powerful and flexible QMK is, I love it.

What would be your dream setup?

I think my ideal setup for work would be built around a 27-inch 5K monitor. My current monitor is 24-inch 4K, and I really do feel like I could still use a little more space. It also doesn't have an adjustable stand; I just have it on a riser, which definitely feels clunky. I think I wouldn't mind having a wider desk surface. I do sometimes feel a bit cramped in the desk space I have currently. It’s barely wider than most desk mats, so there’s not really room to have one of those and still have other stuff on there—and that would be cool, I think. I also have just an absolutely atrocious chair, it is SO bad, a really nice chair would be a huge upgrade.

Honestly though, I do so much of my work from restaurants, libraries, and coffee shops that I really can't complain about my home setup too much. I really like the flexibility of being more nomadic, so the 16-inch screen on the laptop is a real winner there.

I’m a freelance full-stack web developer and consultant. I help businesses build web apps to solve their problems and create value. I live with my partner in Brighton, East Sussex, UK.

When I’m not hacking on Laravel projects for clients or fun, I like to play retro and action RPG video games, go mountain biking on the South Downs (our local hills / national park), visit crumbly castles, or learn English folk tunes on my D/G Castagnari Lilly melodeon. My family were involved with the folk revival scene in the 1970s and early 80s (that’s how you end up with a name like Joby) so the music has a special place in my soul. I was around some fairly Wicker Man style stuff from a young age ;D

I also attend and present at local coding meet-ups from time to time and help organise PHP Sussex.

What hardware do you use?

My desk is a height-adjustable FlexiSpot, so I can sit or stand with a few programmable presets. I bought the chassis and attached it to a reclaimed wood worktop for a nicer aesthetic, which I’ve since made a mess of while drilling a hole through for cables. I’ve got a LifeSpan under-desk treadmill, which I use far more infrequently than I should, and a Herman Miller Sayl chair.

My development workhorse these days is a Mac mini M4 Pro. I’ve been using mini PCs (Intel NUC and Mac minis) for about five years, now moving away from laptops to get better bang for buck and reduce desk clutter while still packing into a bag on the odd occasion I need to be mobile. Throughout my career I’ve always worked on some flavour of Debian Linux or macOS. After a couple of years using Ubuntu for development simultaneously with macOS for comms and proprietary software, sharing keyboard and mouse between the two using Synergy by Symless, I’ve ended up with just a Mac because I wanted a simpler life.

My keyboard is a Voyager which I’ve had for two-and-a-half years now. I use it for everything, so my ErgoDox EZ is enjoying some time out to pasture. Initially I was worried that the Voyager didn’t have enough keys for shortcuts I’d set up, but after spending a weekend experimenting with my layout and more efficient use of layers I realised I didn’t need the extra keys on the EZ and ordered my Voyager. The small portable footprint, sleek low-profile keys, and integrated tenting make it the split keyboard I always wanted.

For day-to-day pointery, I have a wireless ProtoArc trackball. I really like the fact that the buttons have a tactile click but to make no sound, similar to the silent tactile bump keyswitches I use. It integrates a rechargeable battery and supports wireless connectivity via three switchable channels, which is handy. Before getting into trackballs I was using an Anker vertical mouse with a Razr mouse bungee.

I use a Blue Yeti USB microphone with shock mount and a Logitech StreamCam for videoconferencing / screencast recording. I don’t like monitor-mounted webcams: The downward angle is pretty unflattering if you have a bald head. I mount the StreamCam on a small collapsible Anker desk tripod so I can position it quickly before a call for more beard and less bonce.

My main display is a 27-inch LG 4K monitor, and I use a 16-inch LG portable USB-C monitor usually in portrait orientation just to the side. Over the years, I’ve tried all sorts of double- and triple-monitor setups and developed lots of neck-aches. I really like this minimal setup; the 27-inch monitor is as much as I want for the main tasks I’m focusing on while the smaller portrait sidecar works really nicely for referring to notes, to-dos, Slack, WhatsApp, or displaying a music playlist.

The Invision Vortex monitor arm was a bit of an indulgence. This extremely robust and delightfully glowy arm is rock-solid and prevents the screen bouncing when I’m working and walking on the treadmill. It can be repositioned very easily and complements the RGB lights on my Voyager. I've also got a Galactic Unicorn LED display as an additional piece of lighting flair.

A BenQ ScreenBar Halo has been an absolute game-changer for me. It’s an adjustable monitor bias light for your desk; in plain language, it throws light at the wall behind your monitor and straight down onto your desk to reduce extreme light-level contrast between screen and surroundings, which can cause eyestrain. I’m particularly susceptible to this, given a chronic condition which causes dry eyes and makes it really sore to look at a screen. Controlling contrast between what I’m looking at and surroundings is absolutely key in preventing a flare-up. This is also why website themes which follow the OS light/dark preference should be treated seriously as an accessibility feature.

I’ve never considered myself an audiophile, but I spend a lot of time listening to music as I work and get a great deal of pleasure out of it. When my noise-cancelling wireless headphones broke recently, I “optimized” my setup and got a pair of beyerdynamic DT 990 Pro X open-back studio headphones, which I plug into a portable USB-C Digital Audio Converter (DAC), an IFi GO link Max.

The final piece of hardware in my setup is my Brompton folding bike with attaching messenger bag. The Mac mini, portable LG monitor, and Voyager with modular Navigator trackball comprise my minimal field kit, which packs away snugly into the bag. It goes on trains and in the back of taxis, and it stows under desks in co-working spaces.

And what software?

For day-to-day development work I use PhpStorm by JetBrains. It has good Vim keybindings (a dealbreaker for me) and the Laravel support is excellent via the Laravel Idea Plugin, which is now free. After years managing bespoke Docker Compose-based local environments I now offload most of the configuration and upgrade headaches to Laravel Herd with a Pro subscription and am much happier for it.

In terms of AI I’m primarily a command-line Claude Code user. It’s even better when paired with Laravel Boost development MCP server. I use tmux to group and switch between terminal panes by project as each will likely have one or two Claude sessions, a frontend asset build and a couple of general-purpose panes for logging into a remote server or general command-line poking around.

Productivity-wise I use Obsidian to keep notes in Markdown and synced between my devices. I use Todoist to remember tasks. When sharing short screen recordings or annotating screenshots I use CleanShot X, and for recording and editing longer screencasts with higher production value I use Screen Studio.

Finally, I’ve been using Tidal for higher-quality music streaming to go with those headphones.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

When I started out with the ErgoDox EZ I experimented a lot more with keyswitches. I’m pretty heavy-handed, so I ended up with a mixture of silent tactile Clear and Grey Cherry MX switches for stronger finger and thumb keys and some Brown Cherry MX for pinky outlier keys. It was a lot of fun but probably largely unnecessary. On the Voyager I use the Kailh tactile Browns which came with it but have added a set of Shhhocks to keep noise to a minimum and add cushioning when I bottom out keys as I’m heavy-handed.

I’ve been slowly refining a very opinionated personal layout called Blobfish for a number of years, including through a transition from ErgoDox EZ to Voyager.

The layout gives me hot keys for some of the gnarlier editor shortcuts I can't be bothered to remember, like running and rerunning test suites in PhpStorm, so I can do that quickly while making edits without switching context. I also have shortcuts for changing the text size of non-code-editor parts of the IDE for when I’m making screen recordings or live coding during a presentation, for toggling visibility of different panes like settings or project tree view and also entering the editor's distraction-free mode.

A classic Vim user affectation of my layout is that there is no Caps Lock, and my Escape key is on the left of the home row. I also have cursor keys mapped to the “Vim HJKL” (left, down, up, right) on one of the layers.

What would be your dream setup?

Aside from aesthetic changes (I’d love all my peripherals to be the same colour), I'd like monitors which adjust their brightness based on ambient light levels, so I don't have to do it manually throughout the day. Otherwise I'm fairly happy with how things are ... at the moment.

I’m Charles Heaman. I’m a self-employed software engineer. I predominantly operate alone, designing bespoke in-house operations software to help improve businesses' productivity.

My girlfriend, Melissa, is an impressively strong indoor climber. She is an absolute joy to watch climb. We spend the majority of our time outside work at our local climbing centre.

If we are not working or climbing, we are likely walking our dog, Augustus.

A friend recently introduced me to the ancient board game Go. It is proving to be quite the time sink.

What hardware do you use?

I’ve been lucky enough to have been gifted my three monitors. This resulted in there being three different brands and sizes.

My PC is fairly modest and was built from various parts I have acquired over recent years.

I use an Anker vertical ergonomic mouse.

I use a standing desk, beneath which Augustus can often be found sleeping.

And what software?

I spend the vast majority of my time writing code in Visual Studio Code. With the easily customisable keyboard shortcuts, I’ve been able to make efficient use of the Moonlander’s thumb clusters.

I use MySQL Workbench as a database administration GUI. I don’t think there is anything interesting to say about MySQL Workbench. It works.

I currently don’t make use of any AI agents at work. I’ve tried, but I’ve been unable to realise the benefits.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

I’m currently running the Cherry MX Browns. Though I am keen to experiment with some different switches for the thumb clusters. I love the look and feel of the blank keycaps. I see no reason to swap these out.

I’m working towards minimising mouse usage, so I’m forever tweaking my keyboard layout to reduce travel for more awkward shortcuts.

What would be your dream setup?

I’d like to start by having three monitors that actually match. It’s definitely the next thing that I’m looking to upgrade. My current monitor layout is certainly far from optimal. I could definitely benefit from some monitor support arms.

My current PC is more than performant enough for my work. So I have no complaints there. I plan to just slowly upgrade components as they fail.

I should probably invest in a more supportive chair, and Jimmy McGill makes a cocobolo desk sound pretty cool.

My name is Arthur. I’m French, 25 years old, and I live in Lyon. I work as a full-stack web developer at 365Talents, a French startup that was recently acquired by Docebo.

I’m genuinely passionate about programming. I especially enjoy building web applications with a strong focus on user experience. I love when something feels smooth, intuitive, and just “right.” There’s something incredibly satisfying about turning an idea into a polished product that people actually enjoy using. It’s a bit like digital craftsmanship.

Outside of work… well, I keep coding (yes, I know 😅). I enjoy building side projects, experimenting with tools, and optimizing my workflow just for fun. I also spend time with my girlfriend and try to occasionally step away from my screens. Though my keyboard tends to miss me when I do.

I used to ride my motorcycle a lot, but I recently decided to sell it after a small accident (don’t worry, I’m perfectly fine!). I guess that’s what becoming a responsible adult looks like… slightly less adrenaline, slightly more ergonomic keyboards 😎

What hardware do you use?

My setup is fairly simple and minimal. I use a 14” MacBook Pro (M4 Pro chip, 48GB of RAM) connected to two external monitors (both 27”, 4K, 165Hz).

I used to run a three-screen setup, but I realized that mastering keyboard shortcuts was actually more efficient than constantly turning my head left and right. My neck thanks me.

And what software?

I’m a big fan of using my keyboard as much as possible; I try to avoid touching the mouse unless absolutely necessary. My workflow is heavily shortcut-driven.

For window management, I use AeroSpace, and I rely heavily on Raycast for launching apps, running scripts, searching for things, and automating small tasks. One app I use every day as a developer that deserves more recognition is Gitify, which delivers GitHub push notifications directly to my Mac.

On a day-to-day basis, I use VS Code as my main editor. I like keeping it clean, fast, and customized just enough to stay efficient without turning it into a plugin jungle.

My motto is: “If there’s a way to automate it or bind it to a shortcut, I’ll probably do it.”

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

I like that my setup is very minimal—it’s basically just my keyboard on a desk 😅 No crazy accessories (yet). I might eventually get something to tent it a bit more than the default magnetic feet, just for extra comfort and better ergonomics.

As for my layout, it’s mostly custom. I removed the base number row and shifted all my letters up. There are two reasons for that:

1. I’m two meters tall and have pretty large hands, so the extra spacing feels much more natural.
2. It gives me a much-needed third thumb key, and once you discover the power of thumb keys, there’s no going back.

I honestly spent a loooot of time refining my layout when I got the Voyager. There were many iterations, lots of tweaks, and a few “what have I done?” moments. But now I’m both comfortable and fast with it, and it feels completely natural, which makes all that experimentation worth it.

What would be your dream setup?

My dream setup would definitely include huge windows with a great view, lots of natural light during the day, maybe a cozy carpet instead of a hard floor, and warm lighting in the evening. Basically: minimal, calm, and inspiring.

I’m actually about to move because I’d like to buy my own place, and the office is the first room I’m thinking about setting up properly (even though my girlfriend might disagree on the order of priorities 😄).

But let’s be honest: If you work on a keyboard all day, investing in your workspace isn’t a luxury… it’s a survival strategy.

My name is Max. I’m 24, I recently graduated in Mathematics and worked as a quant at a bank. These days I’m freelancing—exploring startup ideas around AI and designing LLM-powered trading bots.

I grew up in Paris and spent the last six years across Switzerland, Sweden, and the UK for studies and work. I’m now back in Paris, which has the unexpected perk of letting me help my little brother with his high school maths.

Outside of work, I climb and powerlift regularly, and I’ve been teaching myself Japanese daily. On a completely different note, I’m converting a 19-tonne truck into a second home—the truck lives out in the countryside, so I get to switch between city life and a slower rural rhythm, which I really enjoy.

The truck is a proper 19-tonne beast—I actually got my heavy vehicle licence last year just to be able to drive it. The project is a shared one with a friend, though right after we bought it about six months ago he moved to the US, so I’ve been flying solo on it ever since.

There’s a surprising amount of space inside. The plan is to fit two 120cm-wide beds, a shower, a toilet, a kitchen, and a living area with a table and a sofa. The roof will be covered in solar panels feeding a battery system, so we stay fully off-grid.

Structurally, most of the heavy work is done—the floor, bed frames, shower, and so on—except for the window cutouts. What’s left are the smaller but arguably most important details: storage, the electrical wiring, and the water system. The finish line is in sight, but the final stretch is all in the details.

The vision is a mobile second home. It’s obviously great for travelling, and as someone who values freedom deeply, that kind of travel fits me perfectly. But it can also work as a place to live for short periods—the one piece that would make it fully self-sufficient is a Starlink antenna on the roof, and then I can genuinely work from anywhere.

On climbing: I’m currently in Paris, and before that I was in London, so I’ve mostly been climbing indoors at gyms. But my real passion is tree climbing. I’m less interested in technical rock routes and finger strength, and more drawn to reading my body, finding balance, and that specific feeling of freedom you get once you’re up in the canopy. My most memorable moments have been climbing in Zhangjiajie National Park in China and up in the Swiss Alps—hard to top either of those.

Music is also a constant in my life. I tend to oscillate between two very different worlds: hardstyle and hardcore to power through work and training sessions, and classical or original soundtracks when I want to disappear into an imaginary world.

What hardware do you use?

My machine is a 13-inch MacBook Pro (Intel Core i5) that travels everywhere with me. At home, I plug it into an Asus TUF Gaming VG24VQR—a monitor I inherited from my grandfather, since he no longer needed it. Whenever I have access to a proper desk, I also pair it with my ZSA Voyager topped with the ZSA trackball.

The keyboard was the first thing I chose to invest in, and deliberately so—it felt like the most direct bottleneck between my thoughts and what actually makes it onto the screen. A new computer is next on the list; 8GB of RAM is increasingly becoming a problem.

And what software?

I spend most of my time in Cursor, which I find the best IDE for AI-assisted coding—though I haven’t tried the latest versions of Codex or Claude Code yet, so that opinion might evolve. For notes, brainstorming, and to-do lists, I live in Notion. I use Chrome and Comet for browsing, though I have a chronic tab-hoarding problem—I can never bring myself to close anything “just in case.” A good chunk of my time also goes to email, and I use Claude Desktop for pretty much any question that crosses my mind.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

I started mastering the Voyager with a standard QWERTY layout, and built custom layers on top of it for digits and symbols, shortcuts and macros, and trackball controls. After around 30 revisions I feel quite comfortable with it, but I am still not satisfied with my speed.

What drew me to a split keyboard in the first place was how bad I was on a regular one—my hands were never in a consistent home position, so I was constantly looking at the keys. It used to frustrate me that I typed faster on my phone than on an actual keyboard. Now it’s genuinely satisfying to type without looking, to the point where glancing at the keys actually throws me off.

My original goal when buying the Voyager was to eventually switch to an ergonomic layout too. I had settled on Dvorak—I love the idea of having all the vowels on one side of the home row and the most common consonants on the other. I just haven’t made the leap yet. Maybe writing this is the nudge I needed to finally start!

What would be your dream setup?

A stack of two ultrawide monitors (35 inches or more, low latency) one on top of the other, with a couple of smaller vertical screens on the sides. On the machine side, I’d want at least 32GB of RAM and a few H200 GPUs to run neural networks locally. If I had to dream even bigger, I’d add a Neuralink chip in my brain that would allow me to transfer data to my computer at the speed of thought.

I’m a lead UI dev and a massive typing enthusiast. My day-to-day is a mix of heavy coding, deep-diving into documentation, and collaborating with my team. I'm constantly improving things in my work, so I need to improve how I work. I'm in this for a long time, and I’ve heard too many stories of devs suffering with RSI later in their careers.

Outside of tech, I’m a bit of a gym rat: CrossFit, calisthenics, and climbing six days a week. It keeps me sane, but it also means my upper body is perpetually tight. This actually dictates my keyboard choices; I need a layout that lets my chest open up so I’m not hunched over a tiny laptop/keyboard all day.

Note: With a baby on the way and a five-day return-to-office mandate looming, my three-hour gym sessions are about to get a reality check!

What hardware do you use?

I’m mostly a UNIX/OSX dev, and my home office now just makes it easy to enter work mode, where before as shown I was very proud to make my setup as aesthetic as possible.

My daily drivers are a MacBook Pro M1 Max + a Windows PC for variety. The Samsung Odyssey G9 (Super Ultrawide) is amazing for multitasking and tiling windows, though sharing my screen on calls is a nightmare. I’ve learned to share specific apps instead of the 49 inches of screen destroying a Teams/Zoom session. I use a Dell USB dock to hot-swap between my personal, work, and gaming rigs.

These pictures show how I feel using a traditional keyboard, to a pseudo-split keyboard with my Planck, and a proper spread keyboard in the ZSA Voyager.

And what software?

I aim for a 100% mouse-free existence. My hands and arms better be resting when I am at work. Save the energy for my next gym session, and mental power.

I use Neovim for all my coding. Obsidian is my “second brain” for notes and PM, used strictly in Vim mode. For terminal and CLIs, I use Kitty/WezTerm because of the strong multitasking and multipanelling support.

I rely on a tiling window manager (i3 on Linux) and custom launchers on OSX, such as Raycast, to keep my navigation and task switching super snappy.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

I’ve bounced between a few keyboard setups trying to find “The One.”

The Commuter Setup: I used a ZSA Planck for a long time. It was durable, but I had to mod the keybinds to “simulate” a split board. I eventually commissioned a custom wireless replica, but flaky Bluetooth and ZMK firmware frustrations led me back to wired reliability.

I loved my custom Helidox (Crkbd), but it seemed too delicate to survive a London commute. And it was, as after a few commutes it was broken.

The Office Issue: I love the posture benefits of a split board, but I’ll admit I feel a little self-conscious “manspreading” my arms across a desk in a corporate office. Plus, dragging two halves and cables between meeting rooms is a bit of a chore. I have a ZSA Voyager now, which I love, but I mostly keep this at home.

I run Miryoku (36–38 keys) with a QWERTY base. I used to be a Colemak devotee, but as a Lead, I had to switch back to QWERTY so my peers wouldn't have a stroke when we pair-program on my machine.

What would be your dream setup?

The ZSA Voyager is close to perfect. The Navigator Trackball attachment is great, but does not feel 100% yet—the ball keeps on flying off and running away from me. I’m currently using a separate trackball mouse for my mouse-intensive tools, though I might give the trackpad attachment a shot one day. Still, the Navigator allows me to stay at my keyboard for longer.

My ultimate dream? A solid-body, extra-wide Planck. Think of a single-unit board but with the keys spaced out to match a split-width, featuring hot-swappable hardware and reliable Bluetooth, with profiles per device.

I also am a big fan of the layer-switching LEDS on the ZSA products, and wish these could have a bit more versatility, or have a very low-powered screen to show more information about the set layers, etc.

My name is Timothy Ivory. I live in Utah with my wife and our two daughters just outside Salt Lake City. Professionally, I work full time as a Mechanical/Piping Designer for Chevron at the North Salt Lake refinery, where I help keep piping design in-house by partnering closely with engineering, operations, and the field to deliver practical, constructible designs that support safe, reliable refinery operations.

Outside of work, I’m a family-first guy—most weeks you’ll find me chauffeuring my daughters to volleyball practices and games. I also stay active with basketball and boxing fitness classes. In quieter moments, I write poetry (see page 39) and maintain a personal website where I share my work publicly.

I’m also passionate about community and leadership. I’ve served on the Salt Lake chapter leadership team for Chevron’s Black Employee Network (BEN)—including roles such as Site Lead / Co Site Lead and Communications Coordinator—and helped drive strong growth and engagement locally. Salt Lake’s BEN chapter earned the BEN “Site of the Year” recognition (Salt Lake City / #TheLake). In my own leadership and communications write ups, this was also described as the inaugural “Site of the Year” award for the Global BEN network. Over the past two years, that work included organizing or supporting key programs like Black History Awareness Celebrations (including speaker/panel programming), Juneteenth engagements and flag raising, STEM outreach (presentations and judging), and member social events such as the Salt Lake Bees game. I was also recognized through Chevron’s recognition program for BEN contributions tied to multiple events/programming and membership growth.

And in my spare time, I’m hands-on and detail oriented in a different way: I enjoy detailing my own vehicles, and I’m still actively pursuing the idea of opening a car detailing business—because I genuinely love the process of making a car look new again after a few hours of focused work.

What hardware do you use?

I run a Lenovo Legion laptop built for heavy design and modeling workloads, featuring an Intel Core Ultra 9 275HX (24 cores), an NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5090 with 24 GB of VRAM, 128 GB of RAM, a 2 TB primary SSD, and a 4 TB secondary SSD. The secondary drive is partitioned into two 2 TB volumes—one dedicated to project storage and design work, and the other reserved specifically for laser scan data processing, following recommendations from Leica Geosystems for optimal performance.

I currently use a Moonlander split keyboard connected to the Lenovo Legion, which fits well with my piping design and 3D modeling workflows. For navigation, I use a Scimitar RGB Elite wireless mouse, and I recently added a 49 inch Samsung Odyssey OLED G9 monitor to expand my visual workspace. When working from home, I mirror my office setup on a Secretlab Magnus Pro XL sit/stand desk. I really enjoy the home setup for its excellent cable management and the flexibility to switch easily between sitting and standing throughout the day.

Adding a bit of character to each space, I keep my Megafig friends close by: the TMNT brothers Mikey and Leonardo hold down the office, while Raphael and Donatello are stationed at my home office. For extra “protection,” I’m flanked by Forged Legion Knights—premium magnetic, modular collectibles that feel like magnetized LEGO companions, guarding the setup and bringing a creative edge to my environment.

And what software?

For software, I use several applications to deliver complete piping design packages. Forte 3DWorx (also known as CADWorx Plant Professional) is my primary tool for piping design, including the placement of piping, supports, equipment, and related components. I also use Leica Cyclone REGISTER 360 PLUS to process laser scan data collected in the field with a Leica RTC360 scanner. Most recently, I completed laser scanning at approximately 170 locations to support a new refinery design project.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

As for my keyboard setup, I switch between Colemak and QWERTY depending on the task and what feels fastest in the moment. The Moonlander’s 72 key layout gives me room to build in dedicated productivity keys—so things like copy/paste and other common AutoCAD actions can be done with a single press instead of awkward hand gymnastics.

One of the biggest productivity boosts in my setup is my custom Moonlander keyboard configuration through Oryx. I’ve mapped common actions into single keystroke commands—like copy/paste—so I’m not constantly reaching for multikey combinations, and I can keep my hands in a comfortable position (you can even see dedicated Ctrl+Shift+C or Ctrl+V behavior called out in my layout). I’ve also set up one-press shortcuts for window management so I can quickly snap an application into place—either locked to one half of my 49” monitor or arranged into a three-panel layout when I’m juggling design files, email, and reference docs. And when I’m in my 3D design workflow, I can toggle tools like ortho and snaps with a single button press on the right side of the keyboard—something that normally requires reaching for function keys—so I stay focused and move faster without breaking flow.

One of the best parts is how easy the Moonlander is to customize. The online configurator (Oryx/Keymapp) makes it simple to map keys, create layers, and iterate quickly when I want to improve my workflow. I recently ordered Cherry MX Silent Red switches to better replicate the feel of typing on a laptop while also keeping my office environment quiet.

I use the COLEMAK layer for practice and to switch from the norm of what everyone else is using.

What would be your dream setup?

My ideal setup is a Moonlander paired with a dedicated navigation module, rather than integrating mouse control directly into the keyboard. Think of a concept like Naya Create’s Float module, enabling fluid pan and orbit control without having to reach for a traditional mouse. I'm also looking at the Swiftpoint Z3. It's not in full production yet, but based on the Discord conversations, the possibilities with this advanced mouse seem endless. I’m really looking forward to all the ways I’ll be able to use it.

The goal is a consistent, ergonomic setup that works seamlessly both at the office and in my home workspace.

My name is George Cummings. I am a 53-year-old English-Canadian, a married father of two splitting time between Montreal and the Eastern Townships. This year, I am a senior automation specialist working as designer and microservice programmer in cloud operations.

Outside work, my interests are broad: shiny IT things, programming techniques, presentation techniques, music performance, lifelong learning, woodworking, military history. I’ve been a musician, soldier, choir director, sysadmin, netadmin, on-premise and cloud architect, mediator, programmer, teacher, and karateka. Only the IT stuff ever put money in my pocket. I cannot say that I mastered any of my interests, but life is a gift and mine is one big survey course.

What hardware do you use?

I’ll start with the ZSA Moonlander. I figured that if I’m going to spend most of my life contributing to my eventual demise through RSI, the keyboard had better be good. To keep torso twist to a minimum—possibly too late at my age—I try to avoid mouse-work, but sometimes you cannot so I use a Kensington Expert Trackball.

My daily driver, goemon, is a DIY build: a Fractal Design North tower enclosing a 12th-generation Intel i5, 64GB DDR4 RAM, 4TB NVMe storage, and an AMD RX6600 GPU. Sound is provided by a Steinberg UR12 connected to a pair of Eris 3.5 studio monitors. This is hardly cutting-edge to your flashier users but it is certainly enough for what I use it for, including cranking Rammstein, Rush, Tool, and ABBA. For outside, I carry an encrypted Lenovo Thinkbook Yoga 14s ITL, murasaki, that is configuration-synced with goemon.

My lab has all sorts of recycled parts and Raspberry Pi 3s all over the place, but the centerpiece is a Kubernetes stack on HP ProDesk and EliteDesk minis, tricked out with NVMe’s and maximum RAM, all connected to an old Juniper CX2200. I build my own furniture, including the 19” rack, out of plywood, pine, oak, and PLA. I keep to the Fractal North aesthetic.

Oh yes, my work supplied me with a MacBook Pro M1, which I connect to my peripherals through an oddly behaving small KVM, and a bunch of expensive monitors, only one of which I really need.

And what software?

Most of my workday is spent in a Mac terminal window on Neovim, but senior work requires Slack, Teams, Safari/Chrome/Brave, Office365, and Advil. I use Apple Reminders for task management. Most of my personal computer time is spent in NixOS and Hyprland on a kitty terminal window opened to Neovim. When not going down rabbit holes in Brave, I use OrcaSlicer for 3D printing; Spotify, Steam, and VLC for entertainment; and Obsidian for study. I’m writing this text in OnlyOffice.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

As I write this I am using GMC-Tarmak2-DHm. I am transitioning from QWERTY to Colemak-DH for ergonomic reasons. Since I need to remain productive while retraining my muscle memory, I’m attempting the Tarmak approach: Transition three to five keys every month. I will switch to GMC-Tarmak3-DHm in mid-March. Hopefully I’ll master “F” and “B” by then.

The GMC series—QWERTY, Tarmak, and Colemak—is fairly simple. It has three goals and two guidelines:

1. Take heavily used keys away from the pinky fingers;
2. Allow multilingual writing without interfering with programming. Any programmer in Quebec forced to use a CSA keyboard knows how awful it is for braces, brackets, and dead-keys;
3. Converge Linux and Mac altGr/Option key combinations;
4. Avoid three-finger combinations outside capital letters; and
5. Do not introduce lag, i.e., avoid assigning two layout switches to one key.

I use blank keycaps, but since password complexity defeats touch-typing and transition is hard, I printed small stickers for the vertical surfaces. By this summer, I should have the stickers off.

What would be your dream setup?

That’s a toughie. I build as I go and frankly I cannot see myself moving away from the Fractal North. Some days I want to replace the glass top with hardwood so I can create built-ins, but other days I’m pleased with the lighter look. I want to replace or complement the trackball with something smaller and tighter in the centre, perhaps the ZSA Navigator. I enjoy my Moonlander, but since it is attached to The Platform I cannot lug it to work on hybrid days. The ZSA Voyager was delivered to the Townships yesterday.

My name is Zeb Del Rosario, and I live in the tropical north region of Queensland, Australia.

I am an enterprise systems analyst / architect; I am essentially a technical business analyst who heavily leans into the technical space. I bridge the gap between the more conventional business analysts and developers in our organization, whilst collaborating with the subject matter experts to come up with solutions to solve problems, or provide value in some other way. Being an expert in these systems and its integrations also makes me the go-to person for troubleshooting.

I (am about to) have a degree in Computer Science, and apply programming paradigms and design principles to my job quite often!

I come from a background in hospitality and shifted careers when COVID hit; my initial IT job saw me work in managed service providers (MSPs) for a few years, and that allowed me to transition into my current role.

When I'm not working, you often find me at my desk studying; I am in my final semester and consider myself a more mature student, being in my 30s now (it's never too late!). I love playing games and hang out online with friends often.

If I'm not online you'll likely find me going for walks on the beach with the family, reading books, trying to cook a new dish, or window-shopping with the family.

What hardware do you use?

At home I use a custom-built rig; nothing amazing, just the newest parts for the big-ticket items: Ryzen 9800X3D, 4080 Super, etc.…no custom water-cooled loops or anything fancy!

I have an AOC CU34G2XP Ultrawide IPS monitor, with a smaller AOC monitor above it, on a vertical monitor stand.

For peripherals, I use the Logitech Pro X Superlight 2 SE, a Steelseries Arctis Nova 7 Wireless (PC Version), and the ZSA Voyager for my keyboard.

Other frequently used hardware includes about three different controllers, depending on what game/console I play, but I have recently acquired and been loving the GameSir G7 Pro with its awesome hardware!

I use an ergonomic office chair, and I use a lightbar to reduce eye strain. These have been my best ergonomic purchases by far (aside from the keyboard, of course!).

And what software?

For work and at home, I use a mix of VS Code, Microsoft 365 Products, and more recently, Neovim/tmux for coding script files, or just as a text editor to make it easier to read/transform data quickly.

When it comes to more complex projects that do better in a more integrated environment, I tend to use software designed specifically for that purpose; think IntelliJ for Java, Visual Studio for C#, etc.

For convenience in my Windows OS, at both work and home, I am a heavy PowerToys user, and prefer using a custom file system explorer like OneCommander to make it easy to quickly move files via a UI.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

I have a mix of the standard layout's modifier and symbol keys, with minor modifications. The biggest difference is that I use Colemak-DHm, which was a decision I made before purchasing the Voyager; my brain associates hardware to a specific feel, so I figured having never used column stagger or split keyboards before, that this would be the perfect way to associate a more ergonomic layout to the new hardware feel, inside my brain. I know, it sounds weird!

I am considering a more conventional symbol layout like Miryoku layout; perhaps later this year!

I technically use custom keycaps, since I bought them directly from the manufacturers of the Choc Keycaps that come with the Voyager. I have blank keycaps purely to show off my hard work of learning to touch-type in my Colemak layout; I have to say this board is an amazing conversation starter at my workplace!

What would be your dream setup?

I tried building a makeshift tenting setup for the Voyager and thought it felt really good, so having a nice tenting kit for it would be amazing.

Alternatively, if the Voyager had a wireless version (hint hint, nudge nudge), it would be cool to have them mounted on my office chair; it would make me feel like Mr. Terrific, and that would be… Terrific! Haha.

A trackball like the Navigator, to replace my mouse for nongaming use, would be cool.

I would love to change my desk to be a large, adjustable battle station with monitor arms, and have a larger ultrawide monitor, at least 40+ inches.

Finally, to be really dreamy, a mini fridge under the desk!

My name is David Graham, also known as UltraDavid. I live in Los Angeles with my wife and our two cats. I work from home as general counsel and business development lead for ten/o LLC, a media company specializing in esports and other broadcasting, events, marketing, and merchandise. I've been working as a lawyer in esports, video games, and digital media since 2011 and as one of the premier live broadcast commentators in the fighting game community (FGC) since 2010. My adoption of the Voyager comes from trying to overcome significant joint and nerve issues that impact both my work and my play.

When I opened my own legal practice in 2011, I took on clients in the worlds I knew, and what I knew most was the world of video gaming. I'd been competing in fighting game tournaments since 2002 and posting content about fighting games for years as well (my YouTube channel turns 20 years old this March, yikes), so I'd gotten to know people in the FGC both locally and around the world. Then in the late 2000s, new game releases led to an explosion in the popularity of fighting games, and new improvements in streaming tech and internet infrastructure led to the explosion of online streaming. And I happened to know the people who were starting some of the very first popular gaming streams and businesses well enough that some became my first legal clients and some asked me to begin commentating their weekly streams. The company I work for now started the very first partnered channel on Twitch, IPlayWinner, and the channel my business partner James Chen and I started, UltraChenTV, wasn't too far behind. I didn't set out to be one of the first attorneys in the world to build a modern digital media practice focusing on esports, YouTube, and streaming, and I certainly didn't expect to become a content creator who traveled to dozens of events per year around the world to commentate at live tournaments, but I was lucky enough to do both!

Let me say as well that I come from a long line of typists. In World War II, my grandpa fought for the US Army in the front lines, where he was seriously injured. While he was recuperating in theater, the base needed help with clerical work and began looking for typists. My grandpa, who had never typed in his life but knew he would be sent back to the front after healing, volunteered for the position. He quickly learned to type, never had to go back to the front, and was so moved by the thought that typing may have saved his life that he later made my mom and her brothers learn to type too just in case something similar ever happened to them. My mom and dad then passed the same lesson along to my brothers and me. My parents were early adopters of personal computing in their own right; my first computer/console was really my dad's, a Commodore 64 we got when I was three years old. Later, they sent my brothers and me to typing and computer lessons, and later still I honed my typing in the constant competition of AOL and IRC chatrooms, where the slow typist gets ignored. I'm no speed pro, but I learned to type comfortably at 140 words per minute or so.

Unfortunately, that skill began to degrade over time. I have a hypermobility disorder that has led to impinged nerves, broken bones, screwed-up ligaments, arthritis, poor blood flow in my extremities, and more, causing pain and loss of control all over but especially in my hands. By 2012, my manual dexterity had deteriorated to the point that I had to quit competing in fighting games. Eventually I was at risk of no longer being able to type effectively either.

In 2018, the pain and loss of control throughout my body was bad enough that I could no longer ignore it. I began going to physical therapy with a therapist specializing in joint and nerve rehabilitation, learning to strengthen muscles where my ligaments failed me and relearning basic manual dexterity. My therapist said that if I had not been such a dedicated daily typist, the nerve connection between my brain and hands could have atrophied even further. She came up with exercises for me to do on my keyboard and fighting game controller that became important tools in rebuilding my hand control. Typing didn't quite save my life like it did my grandpa’s, but it ended up playing a pretty big role in my own health journey as well.

Eventually, I developed a physical therapy routine that I still do every morning. After years of work, I've regained much of my old hand control and haven't had a torn ligament, arthritic joint, or broken bone since. My manual dexterity will never be 100%, but it's closer to 90% than the 10% it used to be, and I'm ecstatic about that.

Exercising wasn't the only way I regained control, though. I also learned to minimize current and future issues by focusing on ergonomics, experimenting with different keyboards, mice, gaming controllers, desks, and more until I found a setup that feels just about perfect for my unique needs.

What hardware do you use?

My workspace is designed for fidgeting. Even with as much PT as I do, I still often experience pain in places that change minute to minute, making me want to switch positions constantly. And although I have my ADHD under control these days, I still often find that my mind flits around in ways that my body follows. At the same time, my hypermobility lets me feel comfortable in positions that may seem weird to other people. So for me, maintaining proper ergonomics isn't about optimizing one arrangement, it's about being able to constantly readjust my body while keeping it in proper positioning wherever it ends up. As a result, my setup lets me sit, stand, pace, rock, or recline with my arms and legs in just about any configuration I can dream up.

For my desk, I use a FlexiSpot Pro 3. It's an adjustable-height wooden desk that's sturdy enough even at max extension to hold all my stuff and not sway when my cats jump onto it. More importantly, I can easily switch between sitting and standing depending on how my body is feeling. Since I'm thinking about how my body is feeling as I type this, I realize that my legs have been feeling a little restless, so I'm raising the desk up to standing level while completing this sentence. I can't overstate how important that kind of adaptability feels to me.

I have two Gigabyte M27Q monitors mounted on a swiveling dual monitor mount. The monitors look great and have superfast refresh rates, key for the fighting game player who wants to be able to react to anything as quickly as possible.

My office chair is just whatever decent model from Office Depot. I've never felt that chair design was important for me because I can never sit still in them long enough for that to matter.

I also have a Gaiam balance ball chair that I love. Regardless of what position I contort myself into, the balance ball forces me to do it in a structurally sound way. When I'm sitting, I use a footrest that I repurposed from an old IKEA chair. When I'm standing, I use a StrongTek balance board that lets me comfortably rock back and forth.

My PC is a custom-built Gigabyte-only rig. One of the perks of working in esports and gaming is that sometimes productions use things they'd rather give away than hold onto after the event. In 2022, a show we worked on hired a well-known PC builder to speedrun fancy PC builds on stream. Nobody wanted them afterward, sooo I got one! It has a Gigabyte Z790 Aorus motherboard, Intel Core i9-13900KF CPU, Gigabyte GeForce RTX 3080 TI graphics card, Gigabyte Aorus 32GB DDR5 RAM, Gigabyte Aorus Gen4 2TB NVMe SSD, Gigabyte Aorus Waterforce 360 cooler, Gigabyte UD1000GM PG5 power supply, and Gigabyte AC700 Glass case. I've built my own PCs many times, but this is definitely the fanciest one I've ever had.

I use a Sony ZV-1 digital camera for my webcam. Its original purpose was for recording travelogs back in my content creator days, but nowadays it lives on my desk for chatting on video calls and commentating on online fighting game tournaments. My microphone is an old Blue Yeti that I've had for nearly a dozen years mounted on a swivel arm. For audio, I use the headphones and sound bar I've procured from esports events leftovers over the years.

My mouse is a Kensington TB550 trackball. I like it for two main reasons: It minimizes how often I need to move my arms and it lets me position my arms in new ways. When I'm using it, I never need to move my arm at all of course, just my thumb, which feels great. And since it's physically stationary when I use it, I can use it on my leg or chair arm just as well as on my desk. Again, like my other equipment, it allows me to fidget constantly while maintaining good ergonomics. For my other mouse, I actually use a navigation layer on my Voyager that I'll discuss later on.

Speaking of my Voyager, I love it. I designed and 3D-printed a pair of mounts for it that put it at what feels like exactly the right angle and height for my body and that rest solidly on my chair arms if I want. It's the perfect keyboard for someone always on the move. I can stand at my standing desk with perfect posture, as I am while typing this; I can recline in my chair with the left half on my chest and the right half on my desk, as I did this morning; I can sit normally on my chair with my arms spread shoulder width apart, as I did this afternoon; and so on. I also travel with it for work events up to a dozen times per year, and I find that it travels easily and that its flexibility is just as important for me on the road as at home.

For my deskmat, let me shamelessly plug ten/o's licensed fighting game mats! The one I love and use most is our Jazzy NYC deskmat, showing the famous Alex stage from Street Fighter III: Third Strike, but I also really like our Street Fighter 2 Hyper Fighting Guile Stage option. Either way, the mats are wide enough that my cat Ajax can lie on them in between the halves of my Voyager, solving the eternal problem of a cat who wants attention during work. He's not actually in the way, but he gets to think he is!

My whole computer setup is plugged into my CyberPower CP1500 UPS system to protect everything in case of power outages or surges.

When I go on work trips, I take my ancient Surface Pro 4 with me. I like that I can use it like a laptop or a tablet and I love that it doesn't have its own keyboard affixed to it, since I always use my Voyager on it anyway.

Let me also briefly describe my gaming setup. In 2018 I started designing a fighting game controller for myself that I called the splitbox. It started out humbly as a laser-cut wood project with janky wiring and soon evolved into a slightly nicer Lexan panel design. Over the years, as my knowledge and tools developed, it became a fancier and fancier and fancier 3D-printed project. More recently, I've switched gears to an extremely customizable split modular design that lets me mold the rests and buttons to fit my wrists and finger locations with precision. Like with all the hardware I've described, my favorite thing about these designs has been that they allow me to play in almost any position and to maintain ergonomics in pretty much all of them.

For games other than fighters, I use the left half of the Voyager plus the trackball mouse. Yes, I'm a believer in trackball for FPS, RTS, and other fast complex games. I'm not trying to be world-class in Doom or StarCraft or anything, but for what it's worth, my skill is stronger today on this setup than it was on a traditional PC gaming setup a few years ago.

Lastly, no fidgeter’s workspace would be complete without at least one squeeze ball, fidget spinner, or key clicker, and I have a bunch.

And what software?

My software is pretty standard for someone who spends most of the day writing and part of the evening playing games.

I run Windows 11 on my PC. I use LibreOffice for Writer and Calc. My company uses Google Suite for work, so I spend a lot of time on Chrome. I use GIMP and OpenShot Video Editor for the rare times when I need to make pics or vids. I have Discord open whenever I'm at my desk, using it with both coworkers and friends. I make designs for 3D printing in Tinkercad or FreeCAD and usually use PrusaSlicer to slice them.

I mostly use Steam for games. Among the current generation of games I play, the ones I play most are Street Fighter 6 (1200 hours), Mortal Kombat 1 (600 hours), Gunfire Reborn (400 hours), and Doom Eternal (200 hours).

My Surface Pro is so old that Windows 10 started giving it a tough time and it couldn't upgrade to Windows 11. So instead, I installed a lightweight Linux distro called Lubuntu on it that works great. On work trips I only need basic office programs and web browsers, all of which is handled well by this ten-year-old Microsoft device running Linux.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

I use Kailh Choc Low Profile Red Pro switches with the standard low profile black key caps. The 3$Red Pros activate with so little force that typing on them feels almost automatic.

I've already written an extensive tour explaining my layers and decision-making, so please check it out if you're interested in fast typing, easy navigation, and effective gaming.

The first thing you'll notice is that I use the Colemak-DH layout for typing. It would be silly to emphasize ergonomics so strongly in my hardware and then ignore it in my key layout, right? I chose Colemak-DH for its minimal finger movement and emphasis on rolling, which I find not only pain-free but actually quite enjoyable. Relearning key locations after decades of QWERTY wasn't easy, but after nearly a year I'm finally back above 100WPM with bursts at 140WPM. Much more importantly, I almost never have pain in my wrists and hands after typing anymore.

Speaking of typing speed, I use very few mods on my top Writing layer to better preserve my ability to go fast. I experimented a lot with tap and hold delay intervals and related options, but found that there was no window or set of options that was both forgiving enough for me to comfortably use hold, double taps, and tap holds when I wanted them and at the same time precise enough for me to quickly tap type without feeling like I needed to slow down. As a fighting game player, I'm used to executing commands in windows of about 17ms, so I have a pretty well-honed aversion to any kind of input lag.

The only nonstandard option I use on the letter and number keys of my top Writing layer is autoshift, which doesn't seem to cause a delay when tapping a key. In my own testing, the average length of time I press down each key while typing is about 70-80ms, so I set autoshift recognition to double that at 150ms and it works great. In any case, being able to get any shifted key just by holding it is such a great idea that to me it should be standard on every keyboard.

I do put both Enter and my momentary Function layer activation on the same key, with Enter on tap and Function layer activation on hold. I consider this less than ideal for the reasons discussed above, but after much experimentation, I decided that I could live with the Enter key and Function layer not being instant more than I could with any other combination of options.

Another important part of my setup is my Nav layer, which lets me navigate very effectively via digital mouse and other key binds. It's not precise enough for quick gaming, but for most other navigation needs, it's fantastic. I no longer need to move my right hand back and forth between my keyboard and trackball very often because I can navigate effectively with this Nav layer alone, minimizing my hand and arm movement to an incredible degree. I no longer even take a separate mouse on work trips! I do it all with the Voyager.

I have my Nav stuff on the left half of the Voyager because I want the option to use either hand to navigate. The pain in my body is ever-changing, so if using my right hand to navigate with the trackball hurts, I want to be able to navigate with my left instead, and vice versa.

Finally, I want to extol the virtues of the Voyager as a gaming keyboard. This may depend on which switches you get and what layouts you prefer, but for me it's probably the best gaming keyboard I've ever owned. For FPS and RTS games, I put all the key presses I want on just the left side of my gaming layer so that I never have to reach with either hand to the right side. This lets me move the right side of the Voyager out of the way entirely and allows me the same kind of positional flexibility when playing games as when typing or navigating.

What would be your dream setup?

In one way, I already have my dream setup. It's the best, most comfortable, most effective setup I've ever used and I'm not sure how I could improve it. But in another way, I never want to feel that I've attained my dream setup. Like with everything else in life, I want to be on a never-ending search for improvement. I don't know what I might want to change about my setup in the future; I just know that I want to keep my mind open to new options that could help me work, play, and feel even better moving forward.

Photos of UltraDavid by Stephanie "Vexanie" Lindgren

My name is Jonathan Plaza, and I'm a systems engineer who manages the IT infrastructure for the company I work at. The infrastructure is comprised of VMware vSphere, Active Directory, Exchange, Azure, Microsoft 365 and other technologies. My day-to-day work is very standard, but it's when things break that the fun and stress begin! A service that everyone in the company relies on suddenly stops working. People start complaining and all eyes are on you to get it working again, but first you need to figure out what happened in the first place in order to fix it. Fun times.

Outside of work I mainly do a few things. I have a family, so I try to spend time with them like watching family movies, playing with my seven-year-old daughter and making up family games. I also like to play badminton, which is not a common sport in the USA. I've been playing for ten years, so I'm decent at it.

What hardware do you use?

I use an Intel NUC from 2019. It is getting long in the tooth, but it's still dependable for day-to-day activities. I also use a slightly modified Kensington Expert mouse. I added some foam pads to the buttons to make them easier to reach. Of course, I use the ErgoDox EZ keyboard. This has caused me many long nights because I keep finding ways to improve my layout. My monitor is a 27-inch Dell monitor, which is nothing to brag about.

For my desk, I use a standup desk from Uplift Desk. In hindsight, I should have bought a four-legged desk because all standup desks just seem to have some wobble to them. Live and learn.

And what software?

I'm a Windows guy, so I have Windows 11 as OS. I use Google Chrome with three extensions: uBlock Lite, Vimium, and Link Control. The uBlock Lite extension has changed over time whenever YouTube found a way to block the blocker. Vimium is a good extension to help navigate the web without too much mouse usage. Last extension is Link Control. I don't know about everyone else's color vision, but with default Chrome colors I can't tell if I clicked on a link. This lets me change the color of links that have been visited.

For screenshots, I use Greenshot because it's very simple and straightforward. Avast helps protect me from bad websites. My most favorite program is X-Mouse Button Control. It allows me to use “drag scroll,” which basically allows me to move the trackball for scrolling.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

My keyboard setup is OEM. I haven't really felt the need to change switches or keycaps. I lose enough sleep modifying my keyboard layout that I would probably never sleep if I had to think about switches or keycaps.

What would be your dream setup?

My dream setup would be a brand-new mini computer that is way beefier than what I have. If I have a game and YouTube open, the CPU gets pegged at 100% for some seconds when switching between them. So a faster CPU and more RAM would be great because it would get rid of that issue and allow me to run more than one virtual server without making my computer cry!

I also wish I didn't have to use a mouse. I'm still hoping and waiting for a wearable mouse that would work like I want. My desk would be a four-legged standup desk to eliminate any possible wobble. I would probably also like a 32- to 36-inch monitor.

For a keyboard I would like a cross between the ErgoDox EZ, Moonlander, and Voyager. I like the thickness of the ErgoDox EZ case, the 1U keycaps for most of the keys of the Moonlander, and the accessories of the Voyager, with at least five thumb keys. That's the dream.

I'm Ben Calo. I own and operate a consulting firm called Calo Consulting. I help organizations manage environmental and sustainability challenges, which lately has focused heavily on environmental or supply chain data. I'm currently on contract with the State of Arizona Quality, managing strategic initiatives such as predictive driving water analytics.

Outside of work, I am an avid jogger. Living in Arizona allows me to jog year-round; though the summers require a bit of time-shifting due to the heat. I also like traveling, and my favorite destination so far has been Turkey. Sadly, I may have burned my wife out on visiting ancient cities, so our next trip will assuredly be to the seaside instead of trying to visit ruins.

What hardware do you use?

I have a workstation and a Surface Pro 8, but often need to work with client hardware, so I have a CalDigit Element hub that allows me to easily swap between machines. I tend to use two 24" monitors for work.

And what software?

The majority of the time I'm just using MS Office, Trello, and the like, but do have stints with GIS applications and use Claude Code to automate tasks that would have been painful just a few years ago.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

My keyboard setup is almost the standard Moonlander layout, but I've relocated a few keys to make things more like what I've been used to being a standard QWERTY keyboard user. I do tent the keyboard slightly to give my hands a more natural position.

I don't have any custom keycaps since I haven't been able to find any that quite match the feel of the standard Moonlander caps. I did switch out the switches though. I use a mix of Cherry MX Brown and Silent Red. The main letter keys are Reds, and the rest are Browns so I get tactile feedback on keys in the thumb cluster, for layer switching, or that are in the center.

You know, I often read that switching from a standard keyboard to a Moonlander was hard. It was hard. It was like typing with mittens for the first few months, but I eventually got used to it, and now I am reluctant to go back. I can easily switch from Moonlander to standard if I need to though. It's not a big deal to use a regular keyboard. It's picking up a different game controller. Muscle memory just takes over.

What would be your dream setup?

I'm very close to my dream setup. One of these days I'll upgrade to two 27" 4K monitors though.

My name is Simon, and I'm from Montreal, Canada. I consider myself a polymath for everything related to startups. I love the craft of designing and building software. What I care about the most is getting clarity and sharing it with others. It could be by designing a good user experience, making a good developer experience for our team, or writing a requirement for a new feature. I do a lot of technical work, but I see it all as tools. The real goal is the experiences.

Outside of work, I spend most of my time learning new things by reading. I keep myself active by doing CrossFit and yoga. I'm also a coffee and keyboard enthusiast.

What hardware do you use?

I built my own Computer-1 AMD machine running Omarchy, and I'm using it with a Samsung Odyssey Neo G9, though I'm starting to think smaller might be better for focus. Furthermore, I have a Xiaomi monitor light bar to keep eyestrain down.

My keyboard is the ZSA Voyager, and I use a Razer DeathAdder v2 mouse. Audio setup is Yamaha HS4 speakers, and for meetings I use a JLab Talk Pro mic with my good old Sony WH-1000XM3s. I keep Roller and Scroller fidget toys nearby for when I'm thinking, and a CO2 monitor because air quality matters more than people realize.

And then there's my coffee setup, which is basically a micro café: AeroPress, Hario V60 Switch, Cafelat Robot manual espresso machine, Comandante C40 grinder, and a Subminimal NanoFoamer for microfoam. Good coffee isn't optional.

And what software?

On my desktop it's Ghostty terminal with Neovim, OpenCode, and Lazygit configured for the stacking workflow. I use Zen Browser for web. Linear keeps my work projects organized, Figma is where I do design work, and Slack is for team coordination.

On my iPhone I'm constantly in Readwise processing highlights from articles and books, using BoldVoice to work on my English pronunciation (French is my first language), saving things to MyMind when inspiration hits, and finally asking Perplexity questions throughout the day. These change somewhat frequently because I like exploring new software.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

My setup for my Voyager is pretty standard. I choose the Red Pro switch since I wanted something simple and familiar for this keyboard. I still own other keyboards that are heavily modded, but this one is just perfect as it is. The layout is a homerow-mod QWERTY with the chordal-hold feature that I made.

I’m really satisfied with the results based on multiple inspirations from other layouts from the Oryx community. I ended up with something simple yet powerful, optimized for Omarchy Linux.

What would be your dream setup?

I already have my dream setup, I'm deeply grateful to have an office like I wanted ever since I was a teenager. It still has things I want to gradually improve. I continue in the search for the perfect chair and I am looking at getting the Navigator as my main pointer device and having an MX Master mouse for Figma work. Other upgrades will come out, but so far I'm pretty satisfied of the setup, probably better than I could even dream before.

I'm Castor and at heart I'm a digital tinkerer with a keyboard obsession. I'm currently returning to university as a Masters student in Cyber Security, but I spent the last three years in industry as a back-end software engineer. One shameless mention I'll sneak in here: I wrote an open-source tool to manage large projects with a simple command-line interface. After working on a codebase that spanned well over a hundred repositories, this tool (PanHandle/Twit) took the onboarding setup from days to hours and helped automate routine improvements, deployments, and testing. I now use Twit to manage my personal projects and university assignments; feel free to give it a look and raise some features or issues to tackle. I'm still working on my code-confidence and have endless more projects tucked away. When I've uploaded my work I feel a “commitment to maintain,” so I've not shared any of my one-shot-projects. I may not always have the time to make the improvements, but engagement and feature requests are always an encouragement far beyond my own wrinkles.

As a person I'm an advocate for individualised learning; my partner works in education and I've had nontraditional schooling, so I'm never content when at idle. We both have ADHD and some other needs, for me that includes but is not limited to dyslexia, dyspraxia, and various anxieties. So I don't choose to go out super often, but the nest I've built at home is comfortable and adorned with my favourite things. I'm an avid sci-fi fan, from reading to gaming and films, I love to immerse myself in spectacular narrative. I've just finished reading Rogue Protocol by Martha Wells, but my go-to underrated recommendations would be A Memory Called Empire by Arkady Martine and the Emily Wilde series by Heather Fawcett. We also have two incredibly well-behaved cats who cause a more-than-appropriate amount of chaos, coat every surface in fur, and look stunning doing so.

My love for keyboards first came from cheap no-name boards, the first step above the QWERTY membrane keyboards. I then was drawn to the ergonomic community as I spent more and more time programming, so upgraded to the venerable...Lily58. I still love this keyboard, but wanted something more. I'll stay light on the detail here, but look out for the fourth section. The short of it would be I then upgraded to the Moonlander, grew my collection, and made my own customisation. I'll spare the mildly embarrassing photos, but I've designed many mounting systems for keyboards by expanding on a quick-release model, including a belt mount that I've used to be fully mobile whilst typing comfortably. At some point I'll be brave enough to design my own board, PCB and all, but right now uplifting kits, prebuilds, and silly mounting systems are my happy place.

My other hobbies include running a Dungeons & Dragons campaign, elaborate coffee-brewing, writing fiction, and some paltry attempts at poetry. Ahead of the ask, I offer apologies as I yet have no novel to share, I write for myself and for my love; maybe one day. I also love puzzle games such as The Talos Principle and word games such as the Minute Cryptic.

What hardware do you use?

Let’s start with what you can see. There’s an Amazon Fire Max 11" Tablet, kept on a VESA-mount arm when not travelling, and a ThinkPad (Gen3, I think?) USB-C dual-display dock. I use three monitors, each in a 5760x2160 layout. My main one is an Asus 30" 4KS gamer monitor (it said gaming on the box 😉), and ex-office e-waste lives on as those two ancient HP 1080p stacked secondary displays. My beloved Moonlander is mounted on a modified ZSA Platform, and it runs with a SterlingKey Bluetooth keyboard adaptor (I modded this too, adding some mounting magnets). Nearby is an Elecom HUGE Trackball. A USB switch is perfect for all my peripherals. Just out of frame, but always in use, are a Flashforge Adventurer 5M Pro 3D Printer and a Razer microphone on a swing arm for in-game chat. It all sits on a large four-poster standing desk.

This setup has been tailored around home and work-from-home use. The dock allows a work laptop to be added without visibly messy cabling, and my main PC allows for gaming and passion projects with a baseline amount of separation. I keep my work-self and my home-self at a healthy distance in ritual ways, such as a wired headset for work and wireless headphones & mic arm for social settings. With returning to uni, that dock is awaiting a new study laptop, and I'm planning to maintain a similar level of balance.

One confession regarding my desk: It is not often as tidy as the photos might suggest, as I'm often doing some project that eats up space. Just recently I've working on a custom keyboard for a friend, a Lily58 Pro with dual encoders. To this end I designed a case in OpenSCAD, assembled the parts, and overhauled the QMK build to be “just right.” I gifted onwards my original Lily58, so the blank keycap one on open display is one I made for my collection. As this is my friend’s first step into the world of custom ergonomic keyboards, I wanted to give them a gentle introduction to the hobby. I can honestly say was both nervous and overjoyed to see their first reaction to the finished build.

And what software?

Firstly and for some unsurprisingly, my OS of choice is Linux and I mainly code in a tweaked version of LazyVim. That being said, when it comes to writing prose for my personal writing projects, I use Obsidian. For my academic work I've used a fair few systems, from paper to para and zettlekasten, but my submissions and papers are all powered by LaTeX. Writing is a passion of mine, and tailoring the editor to the task is a great way to mode-switch your brain. I'm not finished making a template vault for Obsidian, but I'm sure that will be on my GitLab one day.

I program in a fair number of languages, with professional experience in secure cloud systems, and so spend a ton of time in the terminal. My choice languages to write in, however, would be Go, Python, and Rust. For my terminal I use Bash inside Alacritty, often splitting the window using tools like Zellij. My dream work day ends with testing on one side of the screen and some no-longer-broken code on the other. For my 3D modelling I use OpenSCAD. I've tried to wrap my head around other options such as Blender and FreeCAD, but OpenSCAD is the one for me.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

Without doubt, the stock Moonlander was one of best things I've ever bought. It has fundamentally changed the way I type and work. I'd already taken the leap from the classic mechanical keyboard world to the columnar split; I'd built and moved over to my own Lily58 but it lacked something that I couldn't quite articulate at the time. I was more comfortable, and my shoulders, wrists, and typing habits had improved. As much as I tried to ignore it, my keyboard still fell short of where I wanted to be. Then, after an impressive amount of convincing I was encouraged to make the next leap: a black Moonlander with Kailh Copper and QWERTY legends.

On the first day I must have rearranged the layers a minimum of twenty times, tuning the board and myself to this new keyboard, finding things that I loved and things that I loved less. I'll explain more on the less-loved things later, as they are almost all resolved. I took it to work, drawing a distracting amount of attention—more than my own custom split keyboard ever did—and it felt good. The itch was almost scratched, and I was happy. I had a keyboard of a quality that I could not achieve on my own and I knew what I would need to do. Now my layout has significantly evolved and is called Cromulence.

I'm about to go into a horrendous amount of detail, but for those who would like to skip to the next question, I've been concise at the end. Skip ahead, I won't mind, I promise. 😉

So, if you would indulge me I'd like to start with my first base-model gripe: tipsy tenting. I'm told that there is a right way to type, or more that there is a way that you should hold your hands for “best” ergonomics. I'm not an authority and I fail at doing this, but one should “float their hands above the keyboard in a neutral hover.” For me this aches, and so I love the wrist rests; I rest my arms heavily on them and I found it causing the board to tip towards me. The ingenious tenting leg and thumb cluster combination was overpowered by my heavy-handedness.

Thus my first Moonlander-targeted 3D print was a slightly modified tenting stand I'd found online. Credit goes to Korri on Printables. This, even modified, afforded no space for the folding wrist rest to travel attached, an acceptable compromise for the time being and I could always upgrade in time. I reasoned that printing is cheap, already having the equipment to do so, and it sufficed. I even printed one of these plastic platforms for a friend who had seen my Moonlander and then purchased the exact same keyboard, same options and all. A few months and other modifications later, we'll come back to those if you will excuse the timeline.

Another friend bought one for travel between their home and office. They had a much older monolithic keywell keyboard and wanted a step in the more portable direction. Along with their one, they bought two Platform kits and gave me one as an overwhelmingly generous gift. With this convoluted tale, tenting was solved.

The next one was my own fault; legends limit layers. I thought I'd make the change from keyboard to keyboard easy, keep key-glyphs I could look at if I got lost. When I used a classic-layout QWERTY keyboard I could touch-type, but not in the correct way. I would type like an overcaffeinated spider dancing on hot coals, not the gentle homerow-grounded typist I am now. I still dance and wander when I need to use a standard keyboard, and I think this is a product of columnar stagger and space, splitting the keyboard into two positionable parts allows for better hand health and more intentional usage. That being said, the best way I nailed my fingers to the homerow was swapping to a Colemak-DH-based layout. I'm now faster than before and it force-taught me to type the “correct way.”

For those reading this and curious for themselves about swapping layout or form factor, I can and do type decently well on a traditional keyboard for situations when spreading out is not feasible, but I'm back to that chaotic dance. You may have noticed, most keyboards have little bumps on the homing positions for your index fingers. I love them, and the Moonlander optionally has them in the printed keyset on the F & J keys. I say “optionally,” as bumpless alternatives are included for other layouts, such as Colemak-DH. This is where I wished I had bought blanks, as reordering the keys moves or removes the homing bumps, and I found my counterproductive “looking at the keys” habit hindering my move to the new layout. So I bought some DSA-profile set of blanks online, adding in O-rings for additional tuning on my key-feel. The DSA key profile is naturally a standard height. The printed set included is OEM R3 profile but the blanks come sculpted like normal, which means that each row can be a different height and mixing R1 and R4 gets unpleasant. I have used DSA profile before and so these were a logical option and make quite a difference in the way the keyboard feels. The only key that remains unchanged is those eye-catching red arrows but the height difference is welcome there as the OEM key is taller. I have also replaced the switches and cannot praise hot-swap enough here for making continual changes possible. I'll not count this as an upgrade though, as the Kailh Copper switches are nice and fine too. Suffice to say, hot-swap keyboards are a tinker’s dream and I'm bound to change my switches again in the future.

The Moonlander Platform, now there are a few things I'd add. Out of the box my Platform(s) had two rubber bumpers that sat between the top and bottom hinge; these blocked the wrist rest from folding in, and so as you can see in my pictures I moved them to beneath the thumb cluster. I'm sure these had a reason, remember that I'm no authority here.

As for additions, in the bottom plate there are four holes that are perfect for mounting things, such as a bolted-in magnetic plate you may spy holding the Allen key. The travel pouch has a great spot for this tool, and I keep a spare in there too, but this second set keeps one at hand for those pesky tweaks. I've got these on both sides, with one being smaller for the M4 bolts that hold those plates on. The tenting mechanism on the platform is super adjustable at the cost of needing careful tightening—too much and those injection-moulded orange skates can shatter, too little and you may experience drift. As I said, I rest my hands heavy and so I kept the tools close to adjust often.

My printed plastic platform had fixed positions and a flimsy bounce when typed on, so this was better, but I feared the worst by the time I was on the included spare set of skates. Then, a presumptuous thought appeared: I can print them. This was followed by another presumptuous thought: I could get them printed in metal. I reached out to ZSA for the skate's file, and their support was wonderful: I tweaked the wings on their part (it needs more clearance for the rail's bump BTW) and reverse engineered the receiving latch with a trusty set of calipers and a few iterations. If you look closely, you can see these are printed in white in the photos; however, this is not metal. Sadly, the parts were too precise for what services I could find, but the printed versions have worked wonderfully and it was a fantastic excuse to learn more printing and design. One notable difference between my latch and the real one is the omission of the pillar below the part, and this gives me more space for folding while staying at my preferred adjustment. First-party parts should suit you best, but I find it right to repair what I can.

Earlier, before making my own latch, I also made the plate you see beneath the platform and is one of the biggest upgrades to the Platform for me; my rubber feet underneath came unstuck. I tried gluing them back on, replacing them with new ones, and still they would migrate across the underside as I typed. Without a divot to sit in, the stuck-on rubber had no hope. This plate is the second iteration of this (the original omitted the tripod mount). The plate keeps the feet in place and gives them a hard surface to push against if they experience any shearing force, all without raising the keyboard too high or impinging on the portability. The tripod quick-mounts are a part I'm currently toying with and are useful for quickly adding the keyboard to arms that I've mounted underneath a standing desk. I don't do this all the time, but the option is nice.

I've even added a small ring-mouse to the side where before a tenting leg was mounted, which allows me to navigate naturally with minimal movement away from the board. I'm a big fan of trackballs, and I'm hopeful the Navigator will make its way to the Moonlander ecosystem. Until then this is a light and simple addition done on the cheap. I'm not brave enough to add some form of trackball myself.

In summary, I love my Moonlander and I'm lucky to have a typing experience as good as this. My additions are labours of love and I hope you see that in the above, but if you've skipped ahead I'll list the short version here:

TL;DR What ~ How ~ Why

• Tipsy Tenting ~ Procure a Platform ~ Stock legs slipped; plastic printed platform was flimsy. ZSA did a fantastic job on this one.
• Limiting Legends ~ Get blank caps with bumps ~ Layouts change, QWERTY is not forever, and keycaps are awesome.
• Missing Mouse ~ Added a cheap ring mouse ~ The Navigator is not here yet and minimal movement is best. The simulated mouse is mostly good.
• Positioning Platforms ~ Added an Allen-key plate ~ Keeps the tools you need in reach. I might add more later on.
• Precise Platform Parts ~ Modelled the latching parts ~ I wanted easy replacements and in future maybe metal ones.
• Platform's pad performance ~ A plate holds rubber feet in place ~ The stock feet slipped off, and I needed something more secure.

What would be your dream setup?

Well, there are many things that make the perfect keyboard, and I've been growing my collection to find out what this means for me. I've still got keyboards on my wish list, but my dream keyboard is something quite custom. I find the Choc ecosystem less flexible than MX, and hot-swap is a must. I've grown to love and rely upon per-key RGB for navigation in layers and portability is what I would deem a "compromise-able" must. Even in a fixed setup such as my desk, I find the ability to shift things around and take my keyboard when travelling a great comfort in many senses. Though I have a vintage lefty Maltron that gives me the itch to have concave keywells, so I'd love to have that in my dream keyboard. In the terminal a pointing device has little point 😜, and for gaming I'd use my Elecom Huge, so mouse keys are a convenience but an inbuilt trackball or trackpad would only be an auxiliary device. I love the folding nature of the Moonlander's thumb cluster, wrist rest and Platform. I've more than once spent time sketching, modelling, and PCB-designing the ideal keyboard, but I'm not there yet with my CAD skills.

Otherwise my desk is finally my dream, a main content screen that provides comfort for gaming and work with two auxiliary displays for when I need to check messages or play second-screen content. I'm sure my setup will evolve and shift as I find new challenges and grow as a person, but I am content with what you see for now. That said, I am ordering a Ploopy mouse for my setup to keep the dream lucid.

I am professor at a Spanish public university (Universidad de Cantabria), where I teach Hydrology to future civil engineers. I also do research on hydroclimatology and hydraulic engineering, and I complement my activity with technological transfer (or consultancy, depending on how you would like to look at it).

Most of my time is devoted to doing research, advising PhD candidates, and trying to get funds to do more research. Teaching is an important part of my activity, but after some years it does not demand lots of time outside of the exam periods, so I would say that research is my main time-consumer, although my position is justified with the teaching that I do.

I am a very curious person, and I devote a lot of time to “work.” At the end of the end, an important part of my work is studying and learning new things. Since I am very curious, I feel very privileged to be paid for learning new things and trying to solve new problems. I would not call myself a workaholic, but I must recognize that I devote a lot of time to work-related stuff.

However, I do also have many hobbies. I have always liked music a lot, so I devote some time to playing my Spanish guitar. I am not really good at it, but it relaxes me a lot to play music by myself.

I also love reading books, nonfiction and novels alike. I am always reading at least one book, if not multiple books at a time. Back in the day, before buying an ebook reader, I was carrying a book with me most of the time. Now, in my device I have all the books that I am reading and all those that I may want to read in the near future, so being an avid reader has never been easier.

I also love the sea, and walking along the local beaches of Santander and its surroundings. Indeed, I have always had a special relation to the sea. I do not even remember when I learned to snorkel and fish, since I have been doing it forever. Lately, I have started doing scuba diving, and it has been one of the most wonderful activities I have ever undertaken.

What hardware do you use?

I use two Linux workstations and a Linux laptop. The workstations are configured with Linux Mint and the laptop with Fedora. I have always liked Debian and derivatives, and Linux Mint is a sweet spot between usability and stability. I tried to use Ubuntu, but did not like snaps much. I have a similar problem with AppImages and Flatpacks. I understand why they exist, and sometimes they are very useful, but in general terms I am so used to the usual way of installing programs that I try to avoid these newer packaging options when I can.

The reason why I use Fedora on my laptop is because it is a Republic of Gamers one, which required a custom kernel when I bought it to function properly. Since the very nice people at Asus-Linux suggested to use Fedora, I followed their recommendation and have since been very happy. I recognize that the quick release cycle of Fedora creates some problems with software that I need and use for work, but being able to use my laptop to its fullest is a must, so I try to navigate the issues when they appear.

I have two Moonlander keyboards. Both black with unmarked keys, one with Cherry Browns and the other with Cherry Blues (this latter one is my favorite). I tried a keyboard with Chocs, but didn't really get used to it. It was also smaller than the Moonlanders, and I do prefer to have some extra keys around.

An important hardware piece is my Huawei MatePad Pro 12.2 tablet. I like handwriting a lot, but before buying the tablet, I was losing my notes all the time, so losing a lot of my ideas and developments. The Huawei tablet is really good for writing by hand, and I synchronize my notes to my workstations, so basically, this way, I can centralize all my efforts into my hard drive and never lose an idea anymore.

And what software?

Most of my time is devoted to writing things, so after many iterations, I ended up using Emacs. I use it to program (mostly Julia and Python) and to write documents (Org mode, markdown, quarto and LaTeX). Lately, I have even been able to configure it to read and write email, which has improved my productivity a lot.

I also use Podman, since most of my data analysis and scientific software development is done within containers. I also use Jupyter Notebook as my main data analysis tool.

OnlyOffice has become a must to be able to interact with people who use Word for document generation. I have always used, and still use, LibreOffice, but OnlyOffice has better compatibility with Microsoft's software. Indeed, OnlyOffice allows me to even use PPTX files almost without any modifications.

Within the software that I use, a very important mention must go to Tailscale, which has allowed me to create a private VPN where I connect my devices and can, basically, connect to my workstation from anywhere using my laptop. In this way, I have access to all my files easily, without relying on cloud providers. It has really changed the way that I work.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

I have very simple needs, and so I use a simple keyboard setup. I use the Moonlander flat, and that is it. It allows me to spread my hands and keep my shoulder blades tucked it. Since I started doing this, I have reduced severely my shoulder and neck pains. Just for this, buying the Moonlander would have been a more than worthy decision.

However, being able to create my own layers has proved very useful. My main layer is a QWERTY one, with a couple of tweaks that makes my life easier (location of Ctrl, Space, and Return, for instance). Then, I have a second layer with all the symbols that I may need, organized in a way that opening symbols are on my left hand, and closing symbols on my right one.

There is a smaller third layer with some additional keys—Fn keys mostly—that I use not so often, and that is it.

What would be your dream setup?

I am very close to my dream setup, to be honest. I would say that my dream setup would be having a very lightweight tablet that could be used as a laptop. Ideally, the tablet should have Linux. Nowadays, I emulate this behavior by carrying both the tablet and the laptop, but if I were able to fully merge both devices, I would be really happy.

My workstations are already all that I can dream of. Probably, the only piece that would really make me feel like I am really dreaming would be to have priority access to a HPC cluster computer any time that I needed it. With that, I could stop dreaming and just live the digital life.

Hi, my name is Dino Seiler, and I am an electrical engineer working at 89grad in Switzerland as an embedded software engineer. I am a former motorcycle mechanic who made the transition via electrical engineering to embedded systems / software development.

In my free time, I have been into Thai boxing for twelve years. For the last couple of years I was also part of the trainer team of the club. Two years ago I stopped due to an injury, and since then I have been more into badminton and soccer.

Aside from this I always have DIY/electronics side projects, where I try to automate stuff at home, or try to create new cool stuff (automating cool stuff, to gain more time to do other cool stuff—never works out, and often results in short nights ;) ).

What hardware do you use?

In the office I work on a Voyager in combination with a Logitech MX Vertical mouse.

I work on two different laptops, a ThinkPad P14s laptop with Ubuntu on it, which is my main computer; and a second ThinkPad E14 Windows computer.

I feel the need to explain why I need two different laptops: For certain projects, I need to work with proprietary compilers and IDEs (which only run on Windows). A dual boot setup was not optimal, since I often use our custom-made tools and scripts from the Linux side, to analyze the things going on on the embedded platform, while I operate the IDE / hardware debugger from the Windows machine.

The two screens are 27” HP office monitors, one always wired to the Linux laptop, the other one switching from time to time to the Windows laptop. To ease the switch from one computer to the other, I have a dual-host USB switch. With this switch, it's easy to switch from the Ubuntu machine to the Windows PC without having to rewire keyboard, mouse, and other hardware.

Another important piece of hardware is my headphones. Since I work in an office with lots of people, it can get a little loud, so I really enjoy my Bose QuietComfort noise-cancellation headphones.

I also like a big mouse mat that gives my work space a softer and warmer feeling. With a plain desk, my fingers get cold rapidly, so I use a big mouse mat.

The ThinkPad Thunderbolt 4 Workstation Dock is not only handy for the two monitors, but also a necessity when I have multiple analysis hardware tools in use at the same time. This could, for example, be a logic analyzer, a comm interface like CAN Bus USB adapter, and a hardware debugger, or a power profiler kit.

The stuff on top of the monitors is basically the desktop test setup of an e-bike where I work on the IoT module. And then there is some other wall-mounted hardware for an embedded Linux project we currently are working on.

At home, there is an outdated gaming PC on the work desk, running Ubuntu as an OS. The screen is a 34” curved Dell I got secondhand for free.

In front of it there is the Moonlander in combination with a Logitech MX Vertical mouse.

And what software?

If possible I work on Linux/Ubuntu machines, where I have a Neovim and tmux-centered environment with zsh/OMZ as a terminal.

Apart from that I mostly use the pre-installed Linux applications like Thunderbird, LibreOffice and so on.

When I have to work on Windows, there is not much installed except for the programming-related applications, which are some kind of proprietary IDE like IAR Embedded Workbench or arm KEIL uVision.

When it comes to writing firmware, there are a number of software programs involved.

There is quite important hardware and vendor-specific software like nRF Connect for Desktop plus its specific apps, or the different STM32Cube software packages, or Zephyr OS.

For embedded debugging, I often work with GDB plus a customized GDB dashboard.

When designing electronics (which has become quite rare with my current employer), I work with KiCad. The designs we make ourselves are not so complicated that proprietary tools like Altium Designer were worth it.

Obviously we use Git a lot, in combination with GitLab. Also for documentation, most of our doc is done in GitLab wiki pages.

I use many other software tools, such as savvycan for analyzing CAN-Bus traffic, Wireshark for network analysis, and the Saleae Logic Analyzer UI for examining various protocols, among others.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

I use a custom layout for both the Moonlander and the Voyager. At first the Moonlander was configured a little differently, with more keys and functions, but over time the two layouts became more and more similar. One key feature of the layouts is home row mods, but in a different order from the original suggestions. Shift under the index finger was not intuitive enough for me. And also <Ctrl> + <Shift> had to stay on pinkie and ring finger for copy-paste actions.

I use a Swiss German base layout, to have access to all the (Swiss) German and French special characters. In addition, I have a dedicated symbol layer as the first layer, with symmetrical aligned symbols for left and right hand; an arrow layer with Vim-style placed arrow keys; and a number layer on the home row, often used when entering long numbers.

Now some words on the keyboard switches. Since I work in a big office with about twenty co-workers (and do night sessions at home), the goal for the switches is to be as quiet as possible, not to disturb other people.

For the Voyager I settled on Ambients Silent Kailh Low Profile Choc Switches (linear 50 gf). At first I tried the 35-gf linear switches, but they were too light for me. Since my fingers often rest on the home row, with the light switches I often activated the keys by accident. So I switched to the 50-gf version, and with those I am really happy.

On the Moonlander I use a switch with somewhat similar characteristics, CHERRY MX SILENT RED (linear 45 gf), except for the thumb keys. On the thumbs I use a little heavier silent switches (linear 60 gf).

What would be your dream setup?

If I were to change anything it would be the following three points:

1. With the focus on programming, I would go for a single-screen setup with one big 16:9 OLED screen (32”) with 4K resolution. With my current text editor setup, I do not really need multiple windows open in parallel. On my wide screen, it often takes more time to do the head and eye movement and find the orientation on a split window, than to just switch the file in the same window. Since switching between windows goes so fast, I believe, that the extra height is more beneficial than the added width of a wide screen. I’d like the OLED screen for when the sun light directly shines on the display from the back.
2. I really like the aesthetics of small computers. I would replace my PC with a powerful Small Form Factor PC; maybe one of the small TUXEDO Computers builds.
3. I would change my desk for a large standing desk.

I’m Jackson, and I’m a VFX artist and software developer. I dropped out of college to work on Mufasa & Snow White as a virtual production stage operator (making on-the-fly animation/lighting/layout changes on stage during a shoot). These projects later led me to working at Lightstorm on the Avatar sequels, initially as a stage operator and later, as a full-time developer.

Virtual production is a widely misunderstood concept, many people understandably think only of the LED volume-based filmmaking that was popularized by the Star Wars Mandalorian TV show. Virtual production, in Avatar’s case, actually refers to the process of using a capture volume to track actors’ performances, as well as the motion of props and a virtual camera. For those curious to learn more, there are now several videos online, including one featuring Stephen Lang on performance capture and another with Michelle Khare on Movie Surfers.

Outside of work, I enjoy spending time with my wife, Isy, and our cat, Maple. Lately, we’ve been really enjoying Arc Raiders, and Maple includes herself by getting toasty on the PC.

As a nerd, I naturally have an endless list of side projects that somehow seems to keep growing.

One of these is a Mac app, Sift, for dealing with image sorting, categorizing and culling, with the primary goals of simplicity and speed. If you’re curious to test Sift, feel free to reach out on Mastodon!

Another side project I’m particularly proud of is my wife’s website. The goal there was to create a solution with no ongoing costs (save for the domain name), and make it really fast. I managed to set up a headless CMS, Strapi, that the static site build process interfaces with, as well as some local DNS stuff so as to provide admin / preview / status subdomains (all hosted via Docker on a Raspberry Pi). The site gets built and uploaded to the static host, so there’s no port forwarding to be had! I wrote a post about the process, although I still need to do a follow-up post, as I don’t cover the more recent DNS/subdomain stuff.

Other than software, I also enjoy photography (both digital and film) and cinematography. I tend to shoot most of my photos on my Fuji XT5 with an assortment of lenses, from the Fuji 35mm f2, to the vintage Vivitar 28mm f2.8. My processing workflow used to be primarily in Lightroom, but since cancelling my subscription, I’ve had to find other ways to do all of that. I’ve been seeing some really good stuff with Darktable’s RGB Primaries module, which handles color far better than the average photo editing tool. There’s a phenomenal video by a fellow named Gus that opens up the rabbit hole of digital color, and for further reading, Troy Sobotka’s Hitchhiker’s Guide to Digital Color is a great theoretical primer.

What hardware do you use?

My main machine I get work done on is my 14” MacBook Pro with an M4 Pro. It’s been a pretty phenomenal little machine—so ridiculously portable and light, and it can handle just about anything I throw at it. For the more GPU-intensive tasks (like the odd Blender project I mess around with), I use my PC, which I built a few years ago.

For displays, I’m running Alienware’s AW3225QF 32" 4K QD-OLED monitor, alongside a dying LG 27GN950-B. While neither of these land in the “retina” territory if you were to ask Mac purists, the gaming situation when trying to use something like my wife’s Studio Display wasn’t something I particularly enjoyed.

This all runs through a CalDigit TS5+, which has allowed me to live out the “single-cable dream” for switching between my work and personal Macs. For gaming, I just swap keyboard cables, as the Thunderbolt & AMD story is a rather short one.

When it comes to the keyboard, I’ve been using the Voyager for a little over a year and a half now, and it is my favorite keyboard I’ve ever used. I previously came from more traditional mechanical keyboards, a few of which I built, but the RSI pain in my hands was tough to deal with. Also, carrying around a heavy keyboard was rather annoying, since I have a hybrid work situation. Switching to the Voyager solved both of these issues for me.

While I do have the Navigator, I’ve struggled to fully feel at home with it. That said, the discomfort that I feel feels incredibly similar to the first few times I tried the Voyager. I almost gave up! But after forcing myself to type on it and no other keyboard for a week, it clicked, and now I can’t live without it. It’s probably the same with the Navigator, just need to give it a fair go. So for now, the mouse I use is the Logitech MX Vertical.

And what software?

For operating systems, I’m all-in on macOS & Linux. I only really use Windows to game, and if I had my way, I’d be using Bazzite. I did try Bazzite for a few weeks, but the Nvidia-related crashes that I encountered were pretty obnoxious, so I switched back. My wife’s PC (which uses an AMD GPU) is running Bazzite, though, and is pretty fantastic. I love how far the Linux world has evolved in just the past few years!

As far as applications or software I use every day, I spend most of my time within Ghostty, which is easily my favorite terminal emulator. I’m a big fan of the care and craft that Mitchell Hashimoto has been pouring into it.

For my code editor, I use Neovim. I haven’t had the time to fully spruce up my config for public consumption, but some plugins I enjoy are Snacks and Mini. When it comes to customization of the aesthetics (which I love to do!), I’m currently using Kanagawa (Dragon) paired with Google’s new monospace font, Google Sans Code. I was previously using Kanso (Ink) & GitHub’s Monaspace Neon. When I’m building interfaces, I use Figma for design exploration and mockups.

I’m a huge fan of Blender, as I mentioned previously—it’s such a phenomenally designed piece of open-source software. I recently used it to previsualize one of the projects I shot. With a photoscan of the location, I was able to drop in a free character model and play around with shot ideas ahead of time. It helped me figure out where to place the actors, and what side of the line to be on.

However, most of my time is spent in Unreal—most recently, I made a free plugin that adds a tiny bit of functionality that I felt was missing from the Engine.

Some other quick app shout-outs: for task management, I keep track of my to-dos in Things 3, Reeder is fantastic for RSS aggregation, and Obsidian is where I store all my notes.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

My setup is pretty simple. I did make some modifications to the Voyager, such as replacing the switches with Ambients Silent Twilight, as well as keycap spacers. These tweaks have made the typing experience downright heavenly (and nonirritating for my coworkers).

I toyed around with those MagSafe phone mounts for the Voyager, as well as gone so far as to have purchased the tripod mounts, but given how often I switch back and forth between on-site and remote, I’ve lately just stuck to the stock risers.

As much as I’d love to explore Colemak or Dvorak, I currently just use QWERTY. I am often switching between “regular” keyboards (such as ones on my laptop, or brief interactions with random workstation keyboards at work), so the constant context switching would be problematic for me.

As far as the layers on my layout goes, I (under)utilize home row mods, as well as have a dedicated layout for gaming, where home row mods are entirely disabled. To make this nice and obvious, I enable specific backlights for various layers (an idea that I’m sure isn’t groundbreaking), which really helps to immediately identify what layer I’m on.

What would be your dream setup?

I think for me, it would require having the space to separate a work desk from a gaming desk. Plus, it would simplify the cable management situation. That said, for the immediately tangible things, I’m eager to see what Apple does with the next-gen Studio Display, although the PC element could throw a wrench in that.

But ideally, I’d love to have a magical spec (“Thunderbolt 5”) that would allow me to plug my CalDigit hub into my Mac or PC, and have the full bandwidth provided by the spec, AMD be damned. The “one-cable dream” but truly ubiquitous. Alas!

Hi! My “innie” is Tomas, who works at a bank in NYC doing banky stuff. But let’s talk about outtie me: I’m msg, live in Brooklyn, and love tinkering. From remodeling my bathroom (Toto toilets that open when you approach are life-changing!) to messing with Prusas and elite-C Pro Micros… well, we had to get to keyboards at some point.

I also do outdoorsy stuff. In the last six months, I've camped in Algonquin (ON), Letchworth (NY), Jim Thorpe (PA), and Winter Harbor (ME)—the last one extra fun because it felt like stepping into Fallout 4’s Far Harbor expansion. Steam says I’ve put 582 hours into Fallout 4 -no comment-. The rest of my free time goes to playing with my dog Lizzy.

What hardware do you use?

At home, most magic happens at my Herman Miller desk, standing or on the Embody chair. The “dirty work” is on an Ikea utility cart in the shed—though in freezing NY winters, I’ve soldered at my desk.

Desk essentials include Voyager keyboard, Flowerpot and funky Dyson lights, speakers, USB outlets, R2D2, ghosts, and Zippos for the Kamado grill. Under the table are a Cerberus Sliger desktop with AMD Threadripper, RTX 4080, and other goodies. A nearby closet is a mini IT hub: TP-Link routers, switches, QNAP NAS, NUC running home automation, Lutron bridge… and lots of blinking lights I mostly understand.

On trips, I use a GPD Mini, a mouse, and half a Voyager with a StarCraft-friendly keymap.

And what software?

Most days I use ProtonVPN, Firefox, ProtonMail, Steam, Plexamp, Discord, and Notepad. To the chagrin of all those fancy Pacific Coast apps, Notepad is my to-do manager. I edit screenshots in Paint, and I indulge nostalgia in mIRC (username e-621 circa 1995, more recently msg). As needed, I use Fusion 360 for 3D design and Visual Studio Code for coding, mostly on my website.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

Custom layout? Definitely. Voyager Oryx logs shows 94 revisions—77 on the StarCraft-friendly version with numbers, 17 on the one my innie uses (Excel-heavy life).

That F2 key? StarCraft (above) or Excel (below), pick your poison.

It was easy to pick keycaps for the Planck: GMK Laser on office keyboard, Vilebloom with Nuke artisan at home, Mario-ish on the sticks-and-screws abomination for IT debugging. Tactile Zealios are my fav switches.

My Voyager has Choc switches (orange) with ZSA rubber dampeners. Keycaps are white Chosfox ones, so the color scheme follows the LED lights. Not super easy to find other options, but they look nice. I kept the scheme from my Vilebloom days.

What would be your dream setup?

Honestly, living the dream already. Maybe more keycap options for Voyager—that’s worth a little dreaming.

I'm Andrew Smith. I live with my partner in Fayetteville, Arkansas, USA. Full-time, I work from home as a network security engineer for the Defense Health Agency, helping to protect the networks of U.S. DoD hospitals and clinics around the world. I'm also a data operations warrant officer in the Army National Guard.

When I'm not working, I like to cook and eat, especially Korean food. I like running, cycling, hiking, sailing, and canoeing. I play French horn. I'm also trying to learn to play tennis and pickleball and ukulele. I'm an Android enthusiast. A couple of years ago I started doing a lot with Android automations. More recently I’ve been experimenting with hosting servers and services at home.

What hardware do you use?

My partner and I worked together to design and assemble my desk from T-slot aluminum extrusions. T-slot is amazing. It’s like Erector Set for adults, but nonproprietary and with more options. This allowed me to experiment and iterate and tweak things until the desk fit me perfectly. Aluminum extrusions make it super easy to mount virtually everything, from monitors to keyboards to cup holders. The shelves are finished plywood.

The desk is infinitely adjustable, but not quickly adjustable. It stays at standing height. Until recently, I would switch throughout the day between standing on a balance board from FluidStance and sitting on a Håg Capisco stool. Both have now been replaced by an inexpensive treadmill. I’ve found typing while walking to be easier than I’d imagined, but using my trackball mouse to be a bit more difficult than expected. So I’ve customized the mouse significantly to increase its functionality and to reduce the need for precision.

I don’t use all of the colors available from most smart lights, but I do like bright cool white light during the day and nice warm white light in the evening. When the back of the desk was close to a white wall, I had a pair of Govee Flow Plus light bars mounted behind the monitors. The light reflected off the wall, providing really nice background light. That doesn't work now that the back of the desk is not close to a wall. Now, for ambient lighting in the evening, I have six Taysing LED mini indoor spotlights on a smart plug. They’re pointed at the wall, ceiling, and desktop and provide just the right amount of warm background light.

After my doctor recommended I try a light therapy box to help mitigate the effects of the sometimes short, gloomy days, I found the Carex Day-Light Elite lamp which, despite the company not advertising this fact, works perfectly with a standard 100mm VESA mount. It’s mounted to the desk with an adjustable Ergounion E6 monitor mount with extension arm. During the day, when it’s not pointed at me, it’s pointed at the ceiling. Even at 50% intensity, the reflected cool white light really brightens the space.

There are a couple of small, utilitarian storage bins mounted unobtrusively on one side of the desk. They’re great for holding my wallet and glasses and things like that. A metal file bin is magneted to the other side of the desk. There are bolts mounted strategically around the desk acting as hooks for various key rings, headsets, etc.

I have an old corded telephone mounted to the desk, too. And it works! It's plugged into an Obi200 VoIP adapter (unfortunately, no longer sold or supported), which is linked to my Google Voice account. So when someone calls my Google Voice phone number, my mobile phone, Wi-Fi tablet, computer browser, and corded phone all ring.

I’ve got the Peak Design Qi2 wireless charging stand on my desk. It really is a very well-designed piece of equipment. I’ve been a fan of Shokz for a while. I usually prefer to use bone conduction rather than over-ear or in-ear headphones. Now I’ve got their OpenFit earbuds. They’re not bone conduction, but they don’t cover my ears or block out other sounds. They’re really comfortable. And the case nestles perfectly in the indentation in the back of the Peak Design wireless charging stand.

I have three 27” monitors—two portrait flanking one landscape. I find portrait layout to be more useful for more of what I do. I work in the command line a lot, remotely managing a variety of Cisco, Ruckus, and Juniper network switches. To me, command line, chat, email, and Word and PDF documents all usually work better in portrait. I had a difficult time finding good VESA mounting hardware for the two portrait monitors. I ended up with VideoSecu ML411B mounting brackets, and they work quite well. My partner designed and 3D-printed a great, simple mount for the landscape monitor.

Our house is small and the desk is in the thoroughfare that was intended as a dining space, so tidy cable management was a priority for me. I'm quite pleased with how invisible the cables are from any angle you look at the desk. I had plans to get a shoji screen to partition the space off a bit and hide the back of the desk, but the desk looks so good I don't want to hide it!

For cable management, I used StarTech open-slot cable management raceway. There’s a Monoprice under-desk cable tray mounted below the top shelf of the desk. I found a 36” aluminum Tripp Lite twelve-outlet surge protector that happens to match the width of my desk perfectly. And, of course, the aluminum matches the aesthetic. It’s mounted to the back of the desk, with outlets facing down, toward the cable tray. I got a couple sheets of 1/8 inch plywood, finished them and added magnets. They attach to elevator bolts on the back of the desk. They cover the only areas where the cables would otherwise be exposed and are very easy to remove when I occasionally need to work with the cables.

I don't require anything particularly powerful for my personal computing. My personal laptop is a Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Carbon, and my daily driver is an Asus Chromebox 3. It took me a while to find a good USB-C dock with three DisplayPort ports that would work with both my Chromebox and the Windows laptop I use for work. I ended up with the DK31C3HDPD by StarTech, and it's been working great. Both my personal Chromebox and my work laptop are plugged into a CableMatters USB-C switch, and the switch is plugged into the dock. All the peripherals are plugged directly into the dock. This allows me to switch all peripherals between the two computers with the press of a button.

The Chromebox and USB-C dock are mounted to the back of the desk and visually obscured by the plywood. The smart card readers I need for work, Obi200, and USB-C switch are mounted to the underside of the top shelf, out of sight.

My Voyager keyboard and Ploopy Adept trackball are mounted to a telescoping section of T-slot that allows me to stand about 1.5 meters / 5 feet away from the monitors. This reduces eyestrain from working at a computer all day and, hopefully, helps slow the progression of myopia. I used ZSA’s Tripod Mount kit and standard ball-head tripod mounts to connect the keyboard and mouse to the T-slot. This makes for easy, secure tenting of the keyboard and mouse at the perfect angle.

The Ploopy Discord is very active, especially the #adept and #adept-mods channels. I hung out there for a little while and learned about ball transfer units (BTUs) for smoother trackball movement and various other modifications people have made to the Adept. My partner incorporated some of those ideas and some of his own into an Adept mod that looks great, functions beautifully, and attaches to my desk perfectly.

And what software?

When I first got the Ploopy Adept trackball, I customized it using the VIA web app and used it quite happily for a while, until I realized it had so much more potential. So I got QMK running on my laptop, then got to work programming a super customized, super functional mouse with nine layers and a plethora of custom keycodes.

I used to strive to keep my hands on the keyboard and only use the mouse when necessary, but this customized mouse kind of flipped that paradigm for me. Now anything I would have used a keyboard shortcut for in the past, I can do from the mouse. I incorporated several shortcuts that were new to me and several I was familiar with, but could never quite remember. Now I don’t need to remember the right combination of modifiers and letters or arrows on the keyboard; it’s all laid out on my mouse’s six keys in a way that is very logical (at least to me). I can quickly Shift-click; Control-click; Enter; Backspace; Delete; Escape; Tab; Refresh; Undo or Redo; cut, copy, & paste; switch apps, tabs, & virtual desks; control media; and so much more, without navigating the right-click menu, all from my mouse thanks to my custom firmware.

If ZSA’s Navigator had been released a couple of years earlier, I’m sure I would have purchased it and loved it and never thought twice about the Ploopy Adept. But I’m glad I got the Adept and learned a bit about QMK and coding in the process.

Android is my mobile OS of choice. I like that Android provides a lot of opportunity to tinker and customize. I use Tasker to automate a lot of things, like turning the mobile radio on or off depending on whether or not Wi-Fi is connected, turning VPN and private DNS on or off depending on the network connection, and turning the ringer on or off depending on which Wi-Fi network and Bluetooth device are connected.

My personal laptop is currently a dual-boot setup running Ubuntu Budgie and Windows. I’m enjoying the Budgie Desktop Environment. I’m a big fan of Notepad++, and just started using Obsidian (h/t ZSA Loves and several other ZSA People interviewees).

I’ve been using the Beeper chat consolidation app since I learned about it shortly before it blew up in tech news. It helps me in a couple of ways. It enables me to use Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, X, and Discord direct messaging on my phone without having any of those apps installed. And it allows me to easily get Signal and WhatsApp messages across multiple devices, despite both services’ limited multidevice support.

We started self-hosting about a year ago. We’ve got Proxmox Virtual Environment set up on our home server with containers for a Turnkey Linux File Server, a Turnkey Linux Media Server running Jellyfin, photo management using Immich, a Syncthing server, and home automations using Home Assistant. I’m considering hosting my own instance of Bitwarden for password management and my own Matrix bridge for chat. The list is endless. This is a blessing and a curse.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

I type on the Voyager at home and either the Planck EZ Glow or a Reviung41 when away from home. I only use keys within one position away from home position and have the same 39-key layout programmed on all three keyboards.

My base layout is very close to Halmak. I modified a couple of characters in the center columns to better align frequency with ease of reach on a columnar layout. I use home row mods for my home keys, and all of my thumb keys are dual-function keys with layer switching hold actions.

Numbers and symbols are on the layer above my base layer. Navigation keys, like arrow keys and mouse keys, are on the next layer up. I've made the arrow keys more powerful with tap dance. Tap for left arrow, hold for Ctrl + Left to go back a whole word, tap and hold for Home to go to the beginning of the line, for example.

I have another layer with the FN keys and a bunch of macros to send characters that don't have their own keycodes, like em dash and en dash and bullets. I have Unicode macros on one side of the keyboard—for Linux and chromeOS—and alt-code macros mirrored on the other half of the keyboard for Windows.

I don’t do much gaming, but I recently added a PC gaming layer with WASD keys in the same positions as the arrow keys are on the navigation layer. I did my best to optimize this layer for gaming with my limited experience.

I know the Halmak layout isn’t for everyone, but I hope some of the principles I’ve added to my layout over the last few years might be helpful to someone.

I appreciate the Voyager for its elegance, but I don’t travel with it, so the super thin keycaps were not a selling point for me. I got resin-printed key covers to replace the top row of unused switch slots and a set of KLP Lamé keycaps from 3dkeycap to give a sculpted profile to the remaining keys. They are blanks in a solid grey color that lets the keyboard LEDs shine through. I don’t like animated keyboard LEDs, but I have customized solid LED colors to make each layer visually distinct and to help me out with some infrequently used keys. My Voyager has clicky Kailh Choc White keyswitches.

My partner made the Reviung41 keyboard for me as a gift. The bottom and top plates are walnut. It’s beautiful. It doesn’t have LEDs. The keycaps are blank black DSA profile. It has Cherry MX Clear keyswitches, which are nice and tactile, but quiet—ideal for my travel keyboard.

What would be your dream setup?

Since I started using a treadmill at my desk, I’m addicted to walking. The inexpensive treadmill I have now overheats despite a cooling fan we added over the motor, an additional external fan, frequent dusting, and copious amounts of lubrication.

The Office Walker is a manual walking pad that is not yet in production. I’ve been following its progress on Discord for a while now and backed the Kickstarter as soon as it launched. I think it will be a significant upgrade and I can’t wait for it to arrive.

I just learned about the Svalboard. I’m interested in it for the ergonomics and the magnetic switches. I’m all about a weird-looking keyboard, but I do feel it would be a downgrade in terms of aesthetics and elegance compared to the Voyager. I’m pondering taking that plunge.

I've spent a lot of time on my desk setup, and there's nothing else I can think of that I would change.

Hey y’all! I’m Heather Kuceba, a residential real estate agent in the greater Seattle area of Washington State. I’m all about educating my clients so they feel informed and confident, and (dare I say) they have a little fun along the way. Buying and selling real estate is stressful enough; I try not to be.

Outside of work, I’m a bit of an enigma: equal parts nerdy, geeky, silly, athletic, tomboy, girly, and friendly. I love paddleboarding and kayaking in the summer, lifting weights, getting humbled in hot sculpt yoga, learning about nutrition, obsessing over ergonomics, and playing with my two pups: Light (a seven-year-old Beagle) and Rem (a two-year-old Pit mix rescue).

You’ll also catch me watching anime (yes, the dog names are references to one in particular) or listening to a polyJAMorous music playlist that gives the average person whiplash. Imagine driving to work and hearing a hard rock song, followed by K-pop, then indie, then pop, then dubstep, then piano, then whatever else sparks joy in the moment.

What hardware do you use?

Since I wear approximately 1,259 hats as a real estate agent, I need equipment that can keep up. My core setup includes an LG UltraWide monitor (for all the multitasking), a Lenovo Yoga 9i (for bouncing between contract writing and marketing designs), Bose speakers (for jamming to heavy dubstep one minute and soft piano the next), and a Logitech Brio camera (for client calls and CE classes). A Dell dock makes it all talk nice around the campfire. I navigate with my Logitech vertical mouse (for my wrists, which protest traditional mice) and of course, my beloved Moonlander. Then there’s my Larq bottle (aka my emotional support hydration vessel) and my Stimagz (aka my ADHD’s emotional support fidget).

All of this sits on my black-glass L-shaped desk, which resembles a perfect blend of hardworking professional and “tornado touched down midproject.”

And what software?

I am a Windows + Google girl, but I utilize a rotating cast of software and programs to run my business and my everyday life.

Cloze CRM is my second brain for remembering birthdays, addresses, “what was their kid’s name again?”, and all things drip campaign. Adobe, Canva, & Studeo comprise my design & marketing trifecta. ChatGPT is my marketing manager, copy editor, and crisis-prevention assistant (so I don’t sound like a total nincompoop). Plus too many others apps to name or remember.

Bonus shoutout to Home Assistant and UniFi. It’s my husband’s nerd domain, but I still get to enjoy the smart house magic.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

Aside from keeping the standard QWERTY layout for the letters, everything else is fair game. I tweak my layout constantly—so much so that I even updated it while writing this. At this point, looking down at the keycaps confuses me more than it helps.

Needless to say, blank keycaps were on my holiday wish list this year. Sadly, though, no one in my circle understands my descent into keeb-dom, so I had to play the role of ZSA-Santa for myself.

Switchwise, I am still using the Kailh Coppers that I got with the board—just enough click with light, snappy feedback. I haven’t had the time to explore the vast world of switches yet, but I’ll fall down that rabbit hole eventually.

Layerwise, I mostly live on a well-oiled layer 0, but I have built out a numpad on Layer 1 that color-codes the numbers and symbols. I have plenty more ideas circling around my brain, but I’ll let Future Heather work those out.

What would be your dream setup?

I have big dreams for my office, my desk, and my Moonlander.

My office: We built a house a few years ago, but my office is still a “work in progress” (read: the unbuilt closet system has been sitting on my floor collecting dust for the last year+). But for now, imagine a dark color palette with bright accents, wood touches, and a moss wall. I have floor-to-ceiling windows overlooking a small lake, and I want to bring some of that cozy, outdoorsy energy inside.

My desk: I want a monitor arm and laptop stand to free up precious desk real estate. And maybe one day I’ll actually build that closet system so that I have more space for shenanigans.

My Moonlander: You already know that blank keycaps are next on my list. After that, I am eyeing a tenting system like ZSA’s “The Platform” to continue dialing in those ergonomics. I used to hit 80 WPM on a mildly ergonomic keyboard, and I am determined to perfect my setup and inch my way toward the 120+ WPM legends that I see in the ZSA newsletter. One day I’ll get there!

I’m Karen Sprenger, and my official title is Managing Partner, Technology at LMG Security, a cybersecurity consulting firm. Our company focuses on proactive security. Basically, companies hire us to hack into their networks, then write a report about how we got in and how they can improve their security. We also help them build strong programs and ensure they are in compliance with regulations and so on and provide technical training. We used to also offer incident response, and that brought about my most unusual role. I was the “Chief Ransomware Negotiator.” Talking to criminals was definitely not a career possibility that was mentioned on those aptitude tests in high school.

Although I have a music performance degree, I’ve worked in technology for over thirty years, working as a repair technician, network engineer, and then director of IT, before specializing in digital forensics and information security for the past twelve years. I’m the co-author of Ransomware and Cyber Extortion: Response and Prevention, written on my very first ErgoDox EZ keyboard, and am an educator and speaker. My favorite thing about a career in technology and cybersecurity is that I never stop learning.

When I’m not working, I love to read (primarily mystery, fantasy, and science fiction), ride my Peloton, and explore the beauty that is Montana. In the winter, I also do jigsaw puzzles and build Lego models. And I love music, of course! Most of all, I love spending time with my three poodles: Sadie, Josie, and Mellow. My ideal weekend would be a tiny cabin in the mountains with no cell or internet service, my dogs, a supply of Diet Coke, and a tall stack of books.

What hardware do you use?

My personal setup is a MacBook Air with an OWC Thunderbolt Dock, a 48” curved Samsung display, an Apple Magic Mouse, and my Moonlander Mark I with The Platform and Kailh Box Red keyswitches.

For five years, I used an ErgoDox EZ with Kailh Box White. I loved it, but I have rheumatoid arthritis and as my thumbs started to bother me more, I thought I would benefit from the adjustable thumb keys on the Moonlander. I made the move earlier this year, and it has been everything I hoped it would!

Interestingly enough, I used ChatGPT to help me choose not only the best keyboard for me, but the best keyswitches. Even allowing for other vendor choices, ChatGPT picked ZSA. (I was glad—your customer service and support are second to none.) Since ergonomics are important, I also have a curved Uplift standing desk and a Steelcase chair. My tip for outfitting a home office? Take advantage of open-box and refurbished equipment sales. You can save hundreds and walk away with a like-new piece of equipment.

And what software?

My software use is fairly standard—browsers, office suites, emails, chat apps, and so on. I do spend a lot of my day in a terminal, so that makes access to keyboard shortcuts and comfortable typing imperative.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

My layout is pretty simple—one of the reasons that I call it Ki$$. I was using an ergonomic keyboard from another vendor when I got my ErgoDox EZ, and so my layout in part was driven by where I was already accustomed to keys being located and then later, I modified that to fit my Moonlander.

I primarily use Layer 0, except when I need to change the lights on my keyboard. (The lights make me way happier than they probably should.) Now that I’m using Terminal and Linux more and more, I want to spend some time building combos.

What would be your dream setup?

We’re just heading into winter here in the mountains of Montana, so this time of year I dream of a bigger office with a fireplace to keep me cozy, beautiful built-in wood bookshelves, and a cozy couch with plenty of blankets and hot chocolate, and a McDonald’s Diet Coke machine in the corner that magically fills itself.

In all seriousness, I’ve worked over the past almost six years to put together my dream setup a bit at a time and I’m pretty close. I am still looking for an ergonomic mouse, trackball, or trackpad that works for me. The Apple Magic Mouse is close, but I think I need an angled mouse pad. Although I did just read that the Navigator will now work with my Moonlander, so I may need to give that a try.

I’m Joel Wilcox (pronouns: he/him; other identities: Autistic/ADHD). I’m nearly absent on social media, but operate under variants of the name Hirk Eukvic in the places where I’m present online. The screen name is my given name typed with my hands misplaced on the home row of a QWERTY keyboard; I’ve not discovered any other names that remain pronounceable using that cipher.

Although a former manager accurately described my career track as “bizarre,” I’ve finally settled in as a technical editor and UX specialist. I got here via a convoluted path: immunology research assistant, copywriter, fisheries observer, oil spill remediation, academic publishing editor, technical writer, then training and development QA, punctuated by three halves of a Master’s Degree in Technical Communication.

My day job duties now range from policy and procedure editing to user experience research on our internal systems. I hope to avoid another drastic career change. On the side, I volunteer as a community moderator for ND Connect and mentor other neurodiverse professionals. I have a similar volunteer role with my full-time employer, where I lead neurodiversity employee experience.

I currently live in California with my amazing partner and two cats who function as our “kids.” After work, if I haven’t had enough of writing, I hammer away at my novel. When I’m tired of writing, I build wood models from uGears, dabble in soldering projects, and read fewer books than I’d like to. I have a pass to the US National Parks and try to get outdoors when I’m able. And my life has a soundtrack, because I’m a major audiophile.

What hardware do you use?

Work occupies a lot of my life, but fortunately I still work from home and can customize most of my equipment. My desk is a generic powered sit/stand conversion. It usually stays standing so I can keep my WalkingPad under it. I’ve got a work-issued Dell widescreen monitor that’s VESA-mounted to the desk, and until recently I used a Logitech MX Ergo as my mouse. Then there’s my ZSA setup, which I’ll get to later. As you’ve probably figured, I’m deeply invested in my ergonomic workspace.

My personal laptop is a Framework Laptop 13 based on an AMD Ryzen 7640U mainboard. I like Framework because of the same philosophy that drove me to ZSA: future-proofing, and reducing e-waste. The laptop mostly exists for boring stuff like web browsing and budgeting, but it’s also good for novel-writing.

My audio gear is constantly in flux. In the winter, the core is a Bottlehead Mainline DIY headphone amp, which runs on two Sovtek 6C45Pi vacuum tubes and a single Northern Electric 12AU7. This beast strictly runs in the winter because vacuum tubes are hot, and they make my office uncomfortably warm in the summer. Behind it is an iFi NEO iDSD digital analog converter, at least until I sell it for something else. In the summer, the driving force swaps out to a stack from Schiit Audio (yes, their name is pronounced as you’d expect). The music comes from my Roon server on my overly complicated home network and mostly runs a pair of Meze 105 AER headphones.

I live out in the countryside, so my high-speed internet comes from space, courtesy of Starlink. I promptly bridged their modem-router to an ASUS ROG GT-AX11000 Pro router, which is meshed via Ethernet cable to a lesser ASUS router in the living room. The ROG serves, among other things, my work/personal computers, a Synology DS224+ NAS and a Roon ROCK server built on an Intel NUC. And that’s not to mention all the IoT devices.

And what software?

For work and home, I’m primarily ingrained in the Microsoft ecosystem. At work, this unfortunately involves lots of time fighting with SharePoint and other MS365 products. I still appreciate Microsoft tools like Planner for my time management, so I really hope they’ll make that available outside their enterprise plans. At home, I’m equally stuck with the usual Microsoft products, (Windows, Word, Excel, etc.). However, I’ve bounced between MacOS and Windows for most of my life. The first computer I used ran MacOS 7.0, and I’ve used Windows since the Win 98 days.

I also joke that I’m “bitextual” because I swap out Android and iOS devices regularly. My next exploration will likely be Ubuntu Linux, since my Framework laptop can run Linux natively as easily as Windows.

My novel, which I mentioned earlier, is a Scrivener project. The software has a steep learning curve, but it’s a lot easier to manage the many notes, backing materials, and document versions in Scrivener than in Microsoft Word. I discovered in my publishing days that Word’s change tracking is very unstable in large documents. I stream my music through Qobuz and integrate that with my local music collection via Roon. On occasion, I play retro games on my computer in ScummVM and, if I ever get around to it, will explore editing my back catalog of photos in ON1 Photo RAW.

Browser-wise, I’m a Firefox user in most cases. I use DuckDuckGo when I need a Chromium-based experience for certain websites that don’t tolerate Firefox. I use the Proton suite for my VPN and email, and 1Password to keep track of my logins.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

I learned about ZSA from a web search for “best ergonomic mechanical keyboards.” In my 10+ year career in front of a computer, I’d recycled far too many keyboards that failed me on durability, comfort, or both. A year later, I’ve highly customized my Moonlander.

I added a ZSA Platform to my setup almost immediately to align my wrists better when I type. Usually they’re tilted between 30 and 40 degrees. The adjustment wrench lives on my desk so I can fidget with the angle from day to day.

Most days, I work with the Kailh Gold switches that ZSA installed. I like the typewriteresque clacky sound, and I’m heavy-handed enough to need high actuation pressure on my switches. When I’m not working from home (which is rare), I swap them out for Glorious Fox switches to avoid bothering co-workers.

To indulge the novelist in me who dreams of typewriters, I added Datamancer’s Elemental Alchemy keycaps. Their caps are meant for a standard ANSI/ISO layout, so I improvised with the arrangement of their larger caps for the Moonlander’s thumb wings.

I was thrilled to learn about the Navigator … until I found out it’s designed only for the Voyager. ZSA, being the fantastic folks they are, told me about their official 3D printable Moonlander shell. One custom print job later, I’ve finally got myself a left-handed trackball. The shell still works with the lift kit—it just takes a longer screw (about 10 mm) and 2-3 washers between the Platform and the shell to level out the mounting area.

Since I have a glass-topped desk and clammy hands, I also made a few more janky mods in the form of Velcro strips to lock the keyboard in place on the slick desktop, and felt strips on the palm rests that I replace on occasion. Nothing to see here, folks …

In terms of Oryx, my layout is pretty vanilla. The custom macros I use are primarily for triggering screen captures and toggling video/mic for Zoom and Teams. I use different RGB patterns to indicate the active layer and highlight my home keys. My Navigator layer uses per-key lighting to highlight mouse keys and mouse combos like Shift-Click or Ctrl-Click.

What would be your dream setup?

I’d dare say I already have it. Were I to dream bigger, I’d likely spring for a Framework Laptop 16 so I could add a discrete GPU and extra power. I might also invest in a Canon full-frame DSLR so I could explore photography with fewer hardware limitations, especially if I could link up with a telescope to do proper astrophotography.

The rest of my spending would likely be on my audiophile hobby. I’d love to buy all the music I stream in high-res FLAC files so that I’d no longer have to worry about albums randomly being pulled from services. I’ve always been curious about electrostatic headphones, maybe a pair of Dan Clark Audio Corinas (the prices on electrostats are eye-popping, but hey, I’m dreaming here!).

And while I’m dreaming, I’d like a custom-built home in the countryside. But I’ll settle for sunsets like this in the triplex unit I rent.

My name is Cherae, and I write fantasy (and sometimes sci-fi) under the name C. L. Clark. I wrote the Magic of the Lost trilogy, which starts with The Unbroken, and if you’re an Arcane/League of Legends fan, I wrote the Arcane tie-in book Ambessa: Chosen of the Wolf. I also teach creative writing and write essays for different websites like Reactor Magazine and my own blog.

When I’m not writing or reading, I’m swinging swords or kettlebells, or I’m running. Lately, I’ve fallen in love with trail running. My current read is an excellent novel called The Shipwright and the Shroudweaver. I also love traveling.

I also enjoy playing video games and TTRPGs, like Dungeons & Dragons, and solo RPGs like Ironsworn, or a new favorite, Lordsworn. I love storytelling in any fashion, so these are as much an extension of my writing mind as well as something I do for fun.

What hardware do you use?

My tech needs are pretty simple, and in fact, quite low-tech. I have notebooks. Lots of notebooks. I have my bullet journal for the catch-all of daily life; a notebook for miscellaneous writing project stuff; a notebook for a specific projects when I have enough material and want to drill down; a little reading notebook where I keep notes on what I’ve read, how it made me feel, and what I thought about it craft-wise (I prefer this to Goodreads); even my workout log is a little notebook. There are also lots and lots of pens, including fountain pens (you might be able to see the stain on my desk from an Incident).

I have a Mac mini as my desktop and a MacBook Air for when I’m writing away from my desk, like on my couch or in a coffee shop, or when I travel for teaching. I have a flat Apple mousepad that sometimes lives between the split keyboard, and sometimes outside of it. My keyboard is the ErgoDox EZ. There’s also a Yeti mic for whenever I get roped into doing short story narrations.

I keep dice nearby to roll for more of that click-clack sound, though I also use them in the writing process to help come up with new ideas, putting a bit more of the writing process to chance.

I still don’t feel like I’ve got my setup quite optimized yet, but it’s a work in process.

And what software?

Scrivener (from Literature and Latte) is my primary writing software. It’s great for me to be able to keep all of my drafts for a novel in one place, while still keeping them separate from each other. I can move scenes and chapters around, take “snapshots” before I make major changes just in case I want to go back, put in images and research files and documents full of names and other ideas. It also compiles well into other formats like Word when I need to send things to my editors, or .epub when I want to send them as ebooks to friends—or just to read them myself, and get into the feeling of reading a book and not a draft. That said, when I get into later phases of the draft, I do have to switch to Word just to keep things compatible with the publisher files. But Word struggles with 500+ page documents.

I use Scapple, from the L&L family, for brainstorming in a freeform way whenever I’m not actually in a notebook, and the Notes app is my trusty on-the-go or right-before-bed sidekick. Every book I’ve ever written has a file for those random nighttime thoughts. My website is hosted on Ghost.org, which also has a nice blog writing interface, so I write all of my newsletters/posts there.

On the audio side, I listen to music on Qobuz. Ninety-nine percent of the time, I’m listening to music when I write. Even when it’s not a story—right now as I type this, I’ve got the Baldur’s Gate 3 soundtrack on. I even make playlists for my books: Here's one for The Magic of the Lost trilogy. For my narrations, I use Audacity.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

My ErgoDox is black, with blank keycaps and Cherry MX Brown keyswitches. I got the blanks because I like touch typing but it’s also a bit of a gloat: Once, when I posted a picture of my laptop screen, a reader commented on the wear on the letters of the keyboard (some of them were completely gone—hundreds of thousands of words will do that)—so now that’s not a problem.

I got the Browns because I really wanted the click-clack sound, and that has been a great way to get me back to the keyboard on days when I don’t want to. I just like it. I’ll probably try other switches, but unless I have to go to a group office setting, I’ll probably stick to the noisy ones. The Browns are a nice level of noise. I may also get some different color caps for the nonletter keys just to add some intrigue to the board, and maybe help me remember what I’ve done with things like End and Home. I also have the tent kit, but found that I tend to prefer the board flat most of the time.

When I switched to the ErgoDox, I also decided to do everything at once, and moved from QWERTY to Colemak-DH. It took a couple weeks to get up to speed for novel writing, and it made it hard to use my own laptop, but I found a Colemak-DH workaround for that. (Now I’m just stuck whenever I have to use someone else’s computer.)

The layout is pretty standard—no wild macros for me—but I have tried to optimize for writing. I call it “A Novelist’s Layout.” One of the bonus keys on the keyboard automatically opens a comment in Word, and if I double-tap-hold the right letter, it works as CMD+[letter], so tapping and holding Z will undo, or T will open a new tab, and so on. (I also had this for vowels like CMD+A, but I realized it takes away the Apple accent shortcuts, and as a fantasy writer, I really needed those. ;))

I don’t really use layers, except for the standard media, though I have tried using the mouse scroll function for when I have to read large documents, like student work, but don’t want to have to keep moving to my mouse.

What would be your dream setup?

I’m pretty content with my setup, though as I said, I don’t think it’s quite optimized. I used to use my laptop as a second monitor, but I don’t really feel the need for that at the moment. Maybe a slightly larger one than the one I have, is all. I wouldn’t mind a proper webcam, though, as I now no longer have an integrated one. Maybe a ring light as well. I do a lot of virtual talks with classrooms, book clubs, and book stores, so those would be definite upgrades.

I’d also like to upgrade the mobile side of my life. Since I have to travel for teaching and spend a lot of time writing in coffee shops, a more portable ZSA Voyager is on the list for one day. Maybe with slightly quieter keyswitches, for everyone else’s sake.

I'm Matt Patterson, a frontend software engineer at Canva. I focus on building new features within settings and improving the overall UI/UX. I also manage a couple of projects outside of work, including Oppyfinder and Tokyo Chuko, both of which help people discover secondhand and vintage stores.

Outside of work, I enjoy tinkering with electronics—mostly with retro devices and smart home automation. I'm also a metalhead and love going to live gigs when I can. There's something about the energy of live music that helps me disconnect from screens and recharge.

I spend a lot of time at the park with my dog, Obi. He's an Old English sheepdog with plenty of energy. Recently, I've started learning Japanese, primarily to be able to watch anime without subtitles, but also to keep my mind active. It's been surprisingly great for meeting new people too.

What hardware do you use?

I use a single-monitor setup with my clamshelled MacBook Pro. I like the minimalist nature of using a single monitor, knowing that wherever I am working I get a pretty consistent experience.

I use the Voyager keyboard with the trackpad positioned between the two halves. While I have experimented with variations like tenting and wrist rests, I find this approach to be the most comfortable and versatile.

And what software?

I primarily use Neovim for coding. Maybe you're starting to see a pattern here, but Neovim is great for versatility and speed. I can use the same Neovim config across all of my different environments, and it works consistently everywhere. It mostly works well out of the box, though I've vibe-coded a few plugins to improve my workflow and efficiency when working with large codebases like Canva's. A simple yet effective one is lualine-lsp-info.nvim, which helps me track LSP memory on the fly.

For Java development, I switch to IntelliJ IDEA, and I'll use VS Code when collaborating with teammates who aren't familiar with Vim. I also use Vimium in the browser to maintain consistent keyboard navigation across all my tools.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

I use a standard QWERTY layout on my Voyager with the stock keycaps. I wanted to reduce the friction when learning to use a split keyboard, though I'm open to one day learning another layout, such as Colemak-DH.

For switches, I use a combination of Twilight and Nocturnal switches. This mix provides a good balance—they're quiet enough for office use but have enough resistance that I can rest my fingers on the home row without accidental key presses. Someone on Reddit recommended this combination when I was looking for quieter switches for the office, and it's worked out perfectly. I also use Shhhocs to further dampen the sound.

The split keyboard took about six months to fully adapt to. I initially tried using it part-time while working, but eventually had to commit fully and accept the temporary productivity hit. It was worth it though—I'm now a better touch typist than I ever was on a standard keyboard.

What would be your dream setup?

I'm actually pretty close to my dream setup. It's simple, effective, and versatile. I use the same setup at home as I do in the work office. I'm really looking forward to the trackpad accessory for the Voyager, as that might be one of the only changes I would make in the near future.

As I've gotten older, I've become more conscious about the long-term sustainability of my career. I want to be able to continue programming for the next thirty years, and that means taking care of my hands now. The split keyboard was the first step in that direction, and adding voice control would be the next.

I learned the importance of ergonomics the hard way—trying to maintain intense work and gaming schedules just isn't sustainable without the right setup. Now I'm more focused on finding tools and techniques that will let me work efficiently without causing strain or pain.

The goal is to have a setup that's both productive and sustainable, allowing me to continue doing what I love for decades to come.

I'm Nico, an MS student in Applied Data Science at the University of Chicago (graduating this December!). Outside of my coursework, I make and contribute to software tools for scientific research and error detection, participate in and organize local Rust events, and love teaching the language. I've recently developed a specialty in Rust-Python interoperation, and have written about and given workshops on the subject, because data scientists deserve good tools too.

I also GM tabletop games, listen to lots of showtunes (Something Rotten and the Legally Blonde musical are favorites) and heavy metal (Lords of the Trident, Gloryhammer, Judas Priest, and Powerwolf are favorites). My one big nonshow-tune nonmetal recommendation is the band Kiltro: extremely highly recommended.

I also write about nonprogramming topics at times, mostly essays, but I'm trying my hand at fiction as well.

What hardware do you use?

I use a MacBook Pro (though I'm planning to switch to Linux for my next laptop) and a Moonlander. I move around constantly, so portability is my primary need, and the Moonlander packs up nicely!

And what software?

My coursework mostly uses Python in Jupyter Notebook, but I've been teaching myself Rust for the last year and I've been smuggling it into group projects. I've gotten more and more comfortable in the terminal since the start of the year, and now I basically live inside it. Most of my coding is done in Neovim, and I recently started using Rafael Bagmanov's Bookokrat for reading epub files directly in the terminal, which I'm already loving.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

I love taking advantage of the Moonlander's layers to put a numpad under my left hand and most symbols/brackets under my right hand. It feels great being able to write code without leaving the home row.

I've been using my current configuration for a few months, and it's still a work in progress. I'm not even making much use of the third layer yet! Once I have some free time, I need to sit down and really polish it now that I've gotten more experience. Maybe I'll look into getting custom keycaps once that's stabilized.

What would be your dream setup?

This is already pretty close to my dream, since I move around a lot and need a keyboard that I can set up and pack up quickly. If wishes were fishes, a wireless Moonlander would make that even easier, though I don't know where you'd fit the battery.

During my summer internship, I got to use a second monitor at my desk, which was a lot more comfortable. For a more stable, sedentary setup, two monitors plugged into a PC would be so much more convenient, and I wouldn't have to fight for space with the laptop keyboard. Not sure if I'd spring for a trackpad, mouse, or really go for it with a trackball. Time will tell!

My name is Jon Zelner, and I am an associate professor in the Department of Epidemiology at the University of Michigan School of Public Health. I live in Ann Arbor, Michigan and lead a research group (epibayes.io) focused on the social and spatial epidemiology of various infectious diseases from influenza to Covid to MRSA and others. Our research is highly quantitative with a focus on Bayesian hierarchical modeling of complex infectious disease datasets with all kinds of interesting metadata. I also teach undergraduates and graduate students at the University of Michigan.

Outside of work, I spend a lot of time hanging out with my wife and two kids, 8 & 11 years old, and ferrying the kids around to their various soccer games, weightlifting classes, playdates, and so on. Other than that I like to run and bike around town (in the warmer months). I have recently rediscovered my love of PC gaming (particularly flight simming) and photography at the tender age of 44.

What hardware do you use?

Most of the time, I can be found working in a coffee shop or at my dining room table with my M4 MacBook Pro 16". I love this machine because of the nanotexture screen, which lets me work in sunny spots in nice weather, and the seemingly eternal battery life.

A lot of the time, my Mac has my Voyager attached to it, whether I'm sitting at my dining room table, in a coffee place, at my backyard picnic table, or have it docked at my makeshift home office in the basement. I have ADHD and have always found it very hard to work in an office—after about an hour or two I tend to find myself falling asleep and need a change of scene to keep going. So being able to take breaks, pack up, and walk/bike/drive to the next location is the highest priority for me.

Relying on my laptop's keyboard almost exclusively over the years started to hurt my hands, particularly as my thumbs have become a bit prematurely arthritic. So, the portability and relative durability of my Voyager were its biggest selling points, as I can take it with me and still have a reasonably ergonomic setup wherever I go. But it took me a while to get here. The first split keyboard I ever purchased was the ZSA ErgoDox EZ way back in 2017, after which I decided to get myself a Planck EZ for travel, etc. This kicked me off on a multiyear journey to find my Goldilocks keyboard.

I haul everything around in a very well-loved Tom Bihn Synik 30 that is functionally my real “office.” Fully loaded with my laptop, Voyager, water bottle, coffee mug, and large external battery, it often tops out at 20 lbs. I found this out because my kids insisted on weighing it, as they were incredulous about the weight. I wish it were lighter, but it's worth it.

During Covid lockdown, I ended up burning some time (and money) building a bunch of custom split boards, but never found one that worked quite right for me. At first, the excitement I had for mechanical keyboards mostly came from nostalgia for the clicky IBM Model F keyboard that was attached to the first PC I built with my dad back in the 1980s. I found that all the mechanical boards I tried worked well at a desk where I could adjust the height of the monitor, etc., but worsened my RSI on the go. I started to realize that the height was the problem, particularly on a dining or coffee shop table that can sit higher than a good desk or keyboard tray. Plus they were very heavy and moderately embarrassing to pull out and set up in public.

So, last year I bought a nice prebuilt low-profile split board from someone online who was making them at home. I loved the board, but after a few weeks of carrying it around—even in a case—the exposed connectors and controllers started to loosen, and I realized it would give up the ghost if I kept tossing it in my backpack. So, I put that one in my campus office, gave into temptation, and got a Voyager for home and my nomadic workdays. Obviously the Voyager needs to be treated with care, but it is decidedly more robust than my first low-profile board or any of the ones I have built on my own.

And what software?

Being a professor in my school requires you to do a lot of different things over the course of a given day or week. We are research-intensive but take teaching and service seriously. I tried to live a Linux-only lifestyle for my first few years in this job, but I eventually gave up and went back to the Mac because the friction around using programs like Word and Excel—the lifeblood of any healthy bureaucracy—quickly became overwhelming. I miss i3 every day, even though I have found some decent Mac-based compromises for keyboard-based window management.

When I get to do hands-on research, I spend a lot of time writing code in R and Stan, and increasingly Julia, usually using VS Code or the excellent VS Code fork Positron for data science.

For teaching, since my lecture slides can be math- and code-heavy, and I like to work in plaintext, I tend to make slides and other classroom materials in some combination of Quarto for the modern R Markdown experience or Typst for super clean formatting, super fast PDF compilation, and the general pleasantness of working in it.

For writing papers, I switch between Word, Google Docs, LaTeX, and Typst. I learned a long time ago to not let my esoteric (and constantly changing!) software preferences be a barrier to collaboration. So I try to use whatever works best for the colleagues and students I'm working with and shoehorn it into my preferred workflow.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

My keyboard setup is pretty vanilla. I ordered my Voyager with Red switches, but I knew I was going to switch them out for a set of 35g Ambients Silents that I ordered from Lowprokb. I like the feel of the Ambients much more and I like a quiet board (plus I don't want to annoy people around me—at home or on the go—with keyboard noise).

I like the fact that the Voyager has a decent number of keys, because my brain space for layers and combos is limited. For me, the big quality-of-life things are mapping the arrow keys to HJKL Vim-style on a layer that is activated by holding down the semicolon. I also have Esc and Ctrl mapped to the same key via a mod-tap. I have some other stuff like controlling the backlight or volume mapped to other layers, but I honestly don't use them too much.

What would be your dream setup?

I think I'm pretty close to it for my needs. What I have right now is the most portable and ergonomic setup I've ever had. The big thing I'm missing is a svelte hard case to more securely carry my Voyager around in, particularly one where I can do so without pulling out the TRRS cable. Sometimes when I put it in my backpack in the case, it can get a bit smushed and a keycap will periodically come off, despite being careful. I wish the MBP was a little lighter for the sake of my back and shoulders, but I can't live without its big, bright, antiglare screen, since it is usually the only one I use.

Outside of work, I'd love to be able to go all-in on a legit flight-simming setup, but that is just not in the cards right now. And I am not really dedicated or skilled enough to justify it, but some rudder pedals and nav displays would undeniably be cool to have.

Hi, my name is Accel Maeshiro, and I’m a backend developer at Kambista, known as the first digital currency exchange company in Peru. I like coding and constantly improving my skills.

After spending long hours coding, I started to feel the pain and began to notice how much my keyboard setup mattered. That led me into a deep dive into keyboards, and after all the research, I was convinced that the Voyager was the perfect one for me.

As soon as it arrived, I switched my layout to Colemak, just as I’d planned. It’s been a long journey, almost six months now, and although I’m not as fast as I’d like to be yet, I’ve reached 60 WPM, which feels great. Seeing that progress keeps me motivated.

I used to work with Neovim, but Colemak felt a little awkward with it, which discouraged me for a while. Still, I want to get back into it. There’s something deeply satisfying about refining both my tools and my workflow.

Outside of work. I like the Hindu philosophy. I practice it with devotion. I like to think about existence and what we are all doing here, living and dying. I like to do exercise and read books— I don't go out as much—and I constantly try each day to keep my phone and distracting content from winning over myself.

What hardware do you use?

My hardware setup is my pride and joy to be honest haha. My absolute favorite piece is my Apple Studio Display, I’m proud to own it.

My main machine is an M3 Pro MacBook, and I sit in a Razer Iskur V2 chair, which is very comfortable. I alternate between AirPods Pro and Apple AirPods Max, depending on my need. When I first bought the Voyager, I saw a YouTuber pairing it with the Magic Trackpad and I knew this was the way, an amazing idea. It’s such a smooth combo.

I honestly love my entire setup. Now it’s just about putting in the hours to match the skills I’m aiming for.

And what software?

On the software side, I mostly use Visual Studio Code, Mongo Compass, Postman, Firefox, GPT, Claude, Raycast, and Maccy. On the terminal, I use Alacritty, Neovim, zoxide, fzf, eza, pnpM, among others.

In my projects, I always try to follow Clean Architecture principles and write Clean Code; that’s what I enjoy the most. I love finding ways to make complex ideas simple, elegant, and readable. I like that there is another backend on my team who I can constantly talk to, share programming knowledge with, and think with together about the solution to a task.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

Getting started with the ZSA Voyager configuration was tough at first. I’ve already gone through 142 revisions, small tweaks, improvements, and experiments. I’ve checked out other people’s layouts, but none of them felt quite right. I’ve learned that every person’s workflow is unique. For me, speed is crucial, so I don’t use home-row mods. Discovering the power of thumb keys was amazing, they make everything more natural.

If I could change just one thing about the Voyager, though, I’d add one more key per thumb cluster. Right now, it has only two per side, and with three, it would be absolute perfection. Many of the workarounds I’ve created would disappear instantly. But I’m still hopeful, haha.

What would be your dream setup?

As for my dream setup, honestly, I think I already have it.

I am DJ, and I am a DevSecOps engineer for a large company in the financial sector. My hobbies are quite varied, but I enjoy building robots and models, reading books, and playing the bassoon. I tend to hop around when it comes to hobbies, finding things that I enjoy and jumping in wholeheartedly.

I really love anime and learning new languages, though Japanese just doesn't want to stick with me for some reason. Instead, I have gotten very good at reading subtitles, which has worked in my favor, since I have three dogs who love to let me know when people come by their yard (or the neighbors’ yard). Russian, French, and Icelandic seem to fit with me a bit easier when it comes to learning languages, though I am hardly fluent in any of them.

Aside from hobbies, I help my wife with her many hobbies as well. I have learned quite a bit about sewing, knitting, and fiber work in support of her passions. We hope to eventually get a farm and raise our own goats and sheep so she can make products from start to finish.

What hardware do you use?

Work laptop is a Windows Surface with a 34-inch curved monitor, which allows me to have multiple desktops showing at the same time.

Home desktop is a custom-built system with an AMD 9800X3D with 16 GB of DDR5 RAM, GeForce RTX 5070, and a X870E-P PRO MSI motherboard.

I use a KVM to switch between my work and home PC using the wonderful Voyager and the Night keyboard layout, though I do have a QWERTY layer for gaming if needed. For a mouse I use a Logitech ball mouse, but do have a wireless Razer mouse for games. Headphones are my reliable Bose QC45 and a backup Blue Yeti mic.

And what software?

Right now I am using Windows, though not by choice. It's still the best OS for gaming, sadly. WSL on Windows at least gives me my own little slice of Linux goodness. I would prefer to use Arch or Gentoo, but Ubuntu has its uses and tends to be a stable Debian-based system. I have also enjoyed dabbling with NixOS, but haven't done much with it as of late.

Most of my day is spent in VSCode working on Terraform or GitLab pipelines. I love to play with Kubernetes, but that usually ends up with me just playing with YAML files and scripting in Bash.

Steam is my friend when searching for games, Twitch to find entertainment during work—though I also dabble in the Adobe suite to help my wife out. I am terrible at drawing, but given a good 3D model, fairly decent at animation.

For days that offer more adventure, I will use tools like Nmap, Metasploit, or Burp Suite. Then there's Docker to set up a local test lab or even GCP to build out replica environments with OpenTofu.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

I use my Voyager as my primary keyboard. It has been an eye-opening experience to use compared to a traditional keyboard. It has also guided me down a road to a small obsession with different keyboard layouts and their usability in the effort to lessen issues with carpal tunnel.

I have taken the Voyager and added my own Kailh Choc Burnt Orange switches, which are a bit on the heavier side, but have a nice click and crisp feel to them. My original layout was based on Norman, since it was an easy switch from QWERTY.

Lately, I have been drawn more to using the Night keyboard layout, but am happy to try all of them to find the best one for me.

My desk has a small shelf so I can adjust the height of the keyboard, the desk, or both to find that perfect angle for myself sitting or standing or even walking on a treadmill.

What would be your dream setup?

More monitors, or larger ones, would always be welcome. Maybe some more space for a regular mouse when gaming. Otherwise, my setup is pretty nice overall. I have plenty of space for my mess as I work through a problem, but it also cleans up nicely when I’m done. Now I just need a mini fridge to keep my drinks cool during long working sessions.

Hello, I'm Alessandro, a machine learning engineer from London, UK. I'm originally from Italy, but I moved for studying a long time ago and never went back. After a short period in academia, I pivoted to industry to work on computer vision for smart-cities applications and autonomous vehicles.

Time off work is spent going around London with my family. We've covered most of the Opinionated Guide to Kids' London and we have a PhD-level knowledge of the green spaces in South East London. When not on the move (i.e. after bedtime), I like to indulge in short chess games, code-golfing sessions, or adding features to one of my side projects.

What hardware do you use?

Space is at a premium here in London, and I do not have a spare room for working. As a matter of fact, I do not even have an extra table to set my working equipment on. While looking around the house for an empty corner, I realised that I didn't need to buy a new table; the perfect working station was already in place.

I'm using our IKEA Hauga cabinet as a standing desk. The top side is deep enough to fit a notebook and, more importantly, at the perfect height for my forearm to be comfortable. My 24" AOC monitor is held by the Suptek Single Monitor Arm, for which I drilled a pass-through hole in the cabinet top. This being a standing-only desk, I tend to spend a lot of time on my feet. Hence, my working-from-home outfit includes a pair of comfy shoes, which I consider an important part of my setup.

There's no really space on the top of the counter for anything more than my Moonlander, a Magic Trackpad with a cushy wrist-rest, and a notebook (this was handcrafted by my sister using canvas from The Owlery print shop). I briefly toyed with the idea of having the computer inside the cabinet between mugs and plates. However, the logistics of moving the laptop around fragile items seemed complicated, and I ended up adding one more feature to the furniture.

I secured an under-desk laptop mount to the side of the cabinet to gently hold my laptop, a 13" 2017 MacBook Pro (still rocking!). All the peripherals (monitor, keyboard, USB camera) and power are passing through an Anker 555 USB-C Hub, using one of the laptop ports. The home setup is completed by the Audio-Technica M40x headphones, which I plug directly into the laptop.

When I’m commuting, most of the setup stays at home. I store the laptop and my notebook(s) and pens in a small backpack and swap the M40x for a pair of AirPods2. In the office, the hot-desking policy makes difficult to have a stable setup, but I still have to work out the best hardware arrangement, thus I rely on the laptop trackpad and keyboard to carry on.

Apart from the work hardware, I also have a small home-lab project in development. The main requirement is that it should be out-of-sight, as not everyone in my household likes to see a server rack in the middle of the living room...the design I came up with develops vertically, and it's concealed yet again in a piece of furniture.

This is a mix of EKET cabinets purposely installed next to the optic fibre socket. The lower cube holds the modem, while the Wi-Fi access point is on the upper white one. Cables run across the cubes where I have two Raspberry Pis (a Zero 2W and a Pi4 model-B), and a Beelink Mini S12. All the PCs are connected to the LAN via a five-way Netgear switch.

And what software?

I like my MBP, but it's not designed for the computational load of modern deep learning pipelines. My workflow mainly consist in ssh'ing into much more powerful machines in the cloud, where I can access all the hardware needed for training and inference. Therefore, most of my time is spent in a terminal emulator with a Zsh shell. My current favourite is Kitty.

I don't customise my setup too much. I would rather learn the defaults than come up with a complex configuration. This is why I use vanilla Vim with only the fzf plugin for searching files. That fzf is also the one plugin I installed at shell level through oh my zsh (I like the default prompt styling too). Following this philosophy, lately I've been enjoying typing into Helix, a modal editor with good (and opinionated) defaults.

When outside the terminal, I use Sublime Text to open large text files, and Sublime Merge as my Git GUI. I'm not a big fan of IDEs, but I use Zed to play with agentic vibe-coding and GoLand for its great built-in debugger. I'm also trialing Obsidian for note-taking, but I don't feel ready to let go of pens and paper yet.

Nowadays I mainly code in Go and Python, but Julia is my to-go language for fun projects (e.g. Advent of Code and code-golf). I'm using uv a lot as Python package manager and Docker for containers.

The last bit of laptop setup is around system-level shortcuts. I'm slowly discovering all sort of features in Raycast (mostly the clipboard and scripts management) and Hammerspoon.

The home lab is currently running a Pi-hole server on the Zero 2W and a media centre stack — Jellyfin, Calibre, Navidrome, and Immich—on the mini PC. The pi4 is used for self-hosted experiments. Some of these are exposed to the wider web via Cloudflare zero-trust tunnels, e.g. my gif search engine asdfasdf.fyi (very proud of the inward-rolling URL).

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

For a long time, before the ortholinear-split enlightenment, I used a keyboard I assembled myself from a kit based on the HHKB layout using a Satan-GH60 board and QMK firmware. It's equipped with Zealio v1 tactile 62g switches (now re-released in a redux version) and plain XDA profile keycaps.

This served me well for a long time, as I managed to repair it several times with the help of the solder iron. However, I'm now full time on the Moonlander, which I modded a bit to my liking.

I installed new tactile switches (Zealio v1 again) and reused the same XDA profile keycaps, to which I also added some dampening O-rings. Then I started optimising my layout with the aim of minimising travel distance. This made me discover the Corne keyboard which, although a bit extreme for me, helped in shaping my current layout.

Once I realised that some of the keys were not used, I decided to remove their switches and cover holes with some 3D-printed caps.

I believe there's room for improvements here. I'd love to also remove the innermost columns and get down to a 3x5 layout, but it needs more experimentation with home-row mods, something I still need to get used to.

What would be your dream setup?

Well, where shall I start?

For as much I like my standing desk, I'd like to be able to sit while writing notes or trying to focus on bits of code. A drastic furniture reshuffle may provide some room for a sit-stand desk and one of those fancy office chairs. This is unlikely to happen, and it's okay. The latest episodes of daydreaming brought me to the opposite direction: What if I could get rid of a desk and monitor altogether?

I'd love a productivity-aimed Apple Vision Pro setup, but despite the promising reviews I'm not ready to pull the wallet trigger yet. Alternatives are not there yet in term of spatial computing, but I'm keeping an eye on this space. I'm confident that 2026 will bring the features I need.

One feature I'm really missing, but I'll act upon soon, in my setup is the difficulty in reaching the touchID button when the laptop is docked. The dream would be an official touchID keycap on the Moonlander (hey ZSA, wink wink!), but for now I'll settle on a self-hacked version. There are interesting mods for the Magic Trackpad, but I'm playing with the idea of embedding this in the right-hand side of my Moonlander, perhaps 3D-printing a new case.

My name is Maciej Lech. I am a Roblox game developer, and I am known as @sleazel in the community. I have developed two major games on the platform, including one moderately popular one known as “Crazy Stairs + VR”. I mostly focus on scripting in Luau (Roblox’s fork of Lua) and build my games from the ground up. Roblox does get a bad reputation among developers (much of it earned), but the engine is great, multiplayer works out of the box, and they host your servers for free.

I treat Roblox development as a hobby. Working with engines like Roblox or Unity allows solo developers to make games that still look and feel great. While I have nothing against collaborations and big studios, I think some of the most unique games out there are made by one person. And I have always preferred working alone anyway.

I am currently a single dad, and one of my kids is severely disabled. I started programming as something I could do from home while still taking care of my son. While Roblox developer payouts are not great, I still find it crazy that I can support my family doing what I love.

I myself do not play many games anymore; I think the last one I played was Robocop: Rogue City, mostly due to nostalgia. I miss the old adventure games, like Monkey Island or Discworld. I think I may make a puzzle/adventure game myself in the future.

My other interests are twisty puzzles (Rubik’s cube variants) and fantasy and sci-fi books.

I used to cycle a lot when I was younger, but I switched to trail walking so I can go out with my son more. He seems to like it a lot, and there are a lot of beautiful trails in England!

What hardware do you use?

I have a metal frame desk with a monitor riser. I am a big dude, so my desk is big too. I need space for all those coffee cups!

I managed to grab the Omen PC (OMEN 40 GT21-1004na) as a bargain one day. It has NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4070 Ti graphics, and the processor is Intel Core i7-13700K. My previous five-year-old Ryzen 5 could not keep up with local multiplayer tests.

Other than the PC, there is nothing too special. I have three 1080p 75Hz Huawei monitors, two Edifier speakers that have seen better times, and a standard Logitech mouse. The coffee warmer is extra handy if I do get into a scripting trance.

I have a very comfy chair from a UK-based company called Slouch. I can sit on it for a prolonged amount of time, and it is ten times better than my previous IKEA one.

And what software?

I have always been a Linux fanboy, but unfortunately, Roblox Studio does not support it. Even if I managed to run it on Penguin somehow, the almost weekly security updates would likely break it, and I wouldn’t be able to do any work. Windows 11 it is.

For programming, I use Roblox Studio. I tried to use extensions like Rojo (which enables GitHub for Roblox), but since I am a sole developer, I found it rather daunting to use. I am perfectly comfortable with programming in the studio directly. Besides, Roblox autocomplete (Intellisense) has become much better recently.

I am also scripting and maintaining a chatbot for my Crazy Stairs Discord community. It is written in Python, and for that, I use Visual Studio Code plus GitHub for version control, as the project is slowly being taken over by one of the fans.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

Like I mentioned before, I am a rather big guy. When it comes to typing on standard equipment, I usually have to hunch my back, as my arms are naturally farther apart than those of an average person. I have always found programming uncomfortable just for that fact.

My first attempt at alleviating that was to get the Microsoft Natural keyboard, which was the biggest one I could find. It helped a lot; my posture was better, and I learned how to touch-type QWERTY on it. However, it was far from perfect; I found the left-hand stagger to be idiotic. While the right hand followed the stagger more or less naturally, the left-hand fingers (which do the majority of work in QWERTY) have to curl in a very uncomfortable way. Especially on the bottom row.

While I knew the stagger is a relic from the mechanical typewriters, I have wondered what I could do to make it better. I found some answers at the One-Hand Keyboard website.

It explains something that is known in the alternative layouts community as an angle-mod. Reluctantly, I re-learned QWERTY with this angle-mod, and it helped a lot. But I was not satisfied. The top row on the left-hand stagger was still very weird, and it caused my fingers to push on each other while typing “W,” “E,” and “R.”

It still blows my mind that the majority of people type like this. I decided to say goodbye to the stagger once and for all and bought a Moonlander.

Since that was quite the investment, I decided to go all the way with this. I have ordered blank caps (sculpted) and switched from QWERTY to the Colemak-DH layout, which I have used before on the Microsoft equipment. It took me a big chunk of the summer of 2022 to relearn typing, but it did pay off big time. Not only do I find typing much more comfortable right now, but I also learned how to touch-type symbols and numbers, and to navigate from the home row. (I was only touch-typing letters on my old equipment).

I have since made some modifications to the Colemak-DH to be slightly better for writing in Polish (my first language), without damaging the benefits of typing English too much.

What would be your dream setup?

I would definitely upgrade my screens to 4K, maybe slightly larger. I was thinking of one giant one, but the price and fragility (especially with my kids using my PC sometimes) are probably not a good mix. Roblox has recently uncapped the 60FPS limit, so 120Hz would be nice too.

Making multiplayer games requires coding local and server scripts at the same time, and getting two vertical monitors just for that has sped up my work a lot. Therefore, a fourth screen (maybe above) would not hurt. You can never have too much display space when it comes to coding.

I could also use new speakers, maybe with an extra woofer. The Edifiers have served me well over the years, but it is time to retire them. I cannot imagine coding without some nice ambient music in the background.

The PC itself is good enough, and I have no plans to upgrade it anytime soon. Multiplayer testing is mostly an issue with available display space right now, and not the performance.

The desk is pretty worn out by this point, so I might get a new one. Probably even bigger!

Starting with the hardest question first, are we? Honestly, I never really know how to answer concisely because I don't have the “three things I am all about” to put between | bars | on my LinkedIn profile title. But let's try: I am a husband, a godfather to a fast-growing two-year-old, and a Swiss-American. I feel strongly about beauty and elegance, not just on the surface but also when it comes to—let's call it “functional aesthetics.” For example, is a tool well-suited for its job? Does using it delight users and add to their sense of competence?

I am an independent consultant and a generalist. I studied business, psychology, information systems, and cybersecurity, and finally graduated with a PhD in Information and Decision Sciences from the University of Minnesota. I worked in software development and management consulting roles before striking out on my own. In my career, I've written a lot of long-lived software¹ and made a lot of short-lived PowerPoint slides. I've given presentations to boards of publicly traded companies, driven forklifts, made lattes, developed training and change management programs, and helped ERP implementations succeed. No two challenges are alike, which I love, and it keeps me on my toes.

Being self-employed and loving most of what I do, there's no strict line between work and “outside of work.” I enjoy hiking in the Swiss mountains, making fractal art, and marveling at the beauty of creation—both by spending time in nature and by learning and seeing the amazing elegance of life in things like immunology and biochemistry as well as code and everyday things.

What hardware do you use?

Mainly a Dell XPS 13 9310 (11th Gen i7, 32GB RAM, 2TB SDD). It's going onto five years and has been rock-solid and great to travel with. I love hardware that lasts.

In my office, I have an IKEA standing desk with a 40" curved 5K LG 40WP95CP-W display that also serves as a docking station (USB-C rocks) and makes three-column tiling layouts work so nicely. I used to have a dual-screen setup, but ever since 4K became affordable, I prefer to get everything I need onto one screen and flip between virtual desktops as needed.

Then, of course, there are the keyboards. So many keyboards. When I had a “big corporate job” as CIO, I had to write a lot of emails. Doing it on a clicky keyboard brought so much joy to my day-to-day.

We own an ErgoDox EZ that has become my wife's daily driver, a Planck from ZSA, a Moonlander, a Voyager, a UHK60v2, a Keychron K17 Pro, a Keychron V5 Max, a Logitech G413, a Logitech K845... the collection has certainly built up. Some people store wealth in gold bullion; mine seems to be in mechanical keyboards.

I use a Synology DS1621 as NAS (though I am frustrated that its OS is stuck on a Linux 4.4 kernel) with an off-site backup. Then, I run a cheap Hetzner VPS for some 24/7 services and as a build server. Finally, there are a couple of Raspberry Pis around, one to run VPN and Pi-hole (which didn't want to work nicely on the Synology because it also runs as AD Server), and a couple for occasional pet projects.

And what software?

I'm a big fan of and advocate for UNIX Philosophy—things that do one thing and do it well, like ZSA keyboards and their rationale for not including Bluetooth or wireless options. This shows up in some of my software choices, too, as does my pragmatism. I prefer simple, stable, effective solutions to perfect or fancy ones.

I use Void Linux² with KDE Plasma and Krohnkite³. Now that I’ve got the hang of tiling, I find it hard to imagine working any other way. For comms, I primarily use Slack and Thunderbird and sometimes Signal and Discord. I have Chromium set up with multiple profiles, one per client. This is the best way I've found so far to work with multiple Microsoft Teams accounts (which most of my clients use, he said with a heavy sigh), far easier than what the app supports natively. I also use VSCode, Neovim, KeePassXC, Flameshot, Meld, DB Browser for SQLite, Firefox (for some pages that don't work well in Chromium), and xfreerdp (to connect to Windows machines) almost every day. Then I need bash, a C compiler, Python, Docker, git, rsync, sqlite3, and ssh, and life is good.

I use V for some things. It’s a new language that I think gets a ton of things right and has a very competent group of core developers.

There's no way around Excel in my line of work. For that, I have a VirtualBox with Windows 7 and Office 2010, which is lightning fast. Everything opens in a split second. Maybe I don't deal well with change, or maybe I just really like things that work great without an internet connection (and that I paid for once to use forever).

Finally, keyd is essential for when I don't have the luxury of using a configurable keyboard. It gets remarkably close to making ordinary keyboards do fancy things we've come to expect from having customizable firmware.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

I am always tweaking something in my keyboard layouts. In fact, I just had to update my layout tour because of all the recent changes. However, I have settled on a few must-haves. First, I must be able to use Vimlike navigation with h, j, k, l as arrow keys and y, u, i, o as their steroid versions (Home, PgDn, PgUp, End). Caps + x must work as Delete, with Caps + z as Backspace. I require an easy way to compose umlauts (ä, ö, ü) and guillemets («») for writing Swiss German without having to change keyboard layouts. And my ortholinear keyboards must have a NumPad layer.

I made a big mistake early on, which was trying to change to Colemak and ortholinear at the same time. It took me a while to unlearn so I could get decent at each on its own. Now I use QWERTY on my ortholinear keyboards and once I am very comfortable with that, I may come back to giving Colemak-DH another try.

Inspired by Robin's post, I am experimenting with Home Row Modifiers again. I tried before, got frustrated, and left them alone for a while. Robin's tip about starting with Shift and arranging them by frequency of use made them much more sensible, but I am still getting used to them.

I try to keep my layouts as closely aligned as possible between my different ZSA keyboards and my keyd setup.

What would be your dream setup?

I am generally very happy with my setup. If I could change one thing, it would be completely eliminating fan noise. I enjoy the sound of keys clicking. Fan noise, not so much.

Hi there! My name is Tiago Ávila, and I'm a software engineer based in Brazil. For the past few years, I've been working remotely for a U.S. company, where I primarily use C#/.NET and TypeScript with Angular to develop and maintain web-based systems.

Beyond my day-to-day work, I like exploring other programming languages and technologies. I really enjoyed studying Elixir, which I still use for personal projects, and I'm currently focused on Rust. My interest in Rust led me to start building video game emulators—I've already created one for the Chip-8 and am now working on a Game Boy one. This interest in low-level programming has grown, and it even led me to buy an Arduino, which I'm excited to start experimenting with soon.

Outside of technology, I make sure to have a healthy work-life balance. I enjoy working out at the gym and riding my bike on the weekends. I like spending my free time with my family—especially my wife and my mom.

Among my hobbies, the main one is reading, as it gives me a great break from screens. I also enjoy watching movies or series with my wife and playing board games with family and friends.

When I take vacations, the main plan is to travel to really disconnect from everything.

I used to play guitar and recently bought an electric drum set, which has been a lot of fun.

What hardware do you use?

I primarily use a Dell G15 laptop, which is configured as a dual boot. I use Windows for my work-related tasks and Linux for personal study.

Lately, I've been focused on improving the ergonomics of my workspace. I've invested in a new chair, a standing desk, and an ergonomic vertical mouse, the DeLUX M618PD. For my display, I use a wide second LG monitor, which significantly helps my workflow by reducing the need to constantly switch between windows. For meetings and music, I use a Logitech G435 headset.

And perhaps surprisingly, I also rely on a notebook and pencil. I find that having something physical to write on helps me better prototype and organize my ideas.

And what software?

For my professional development, my main IDE is JetBrains Rider, which I use for my C#/.NET projects. My team also has a subscription to Cursor, an AI-powered IDE, which I've found incredibly useful for its advanced features that help me write and understand code more efficiently. I also use LinqPad for fast prototyping of C# code or for analyzing SQL queries.

For my personal projects, my preferred code editor is Visual Studio Code because of its extensive ecosystem and flexibility with various programming languages.

Regardless of the IDE, I really enjoy Vim/Neovim and integrate its capabilities whenever possible. For Rider, there is the IdeaVim plugin, and for both Cursor and VS Code, I use vscode-neovim. These plugins allow me to maintain a highly efficient, keyboard-centric workflow, keeping my hands on the keyboard and avoiding the mouse for common tasks.

Beyond my code editors, I use a few other key tools to streamline my work. To manage my Git repositories, I use Fork, which provides a clear and intuitive graphical interface. Notion is my go-to for project management and documentation. I use DevToys, which I think of as a "Swiss Army knife for developers," for quick tasks like formatting JSON or converting data. I've also been exploring Wave Terminal, an open-source terminal that integrates file previews, editing, and other “superpowers” to make the command line even more powerful. For managing my clipboard history, I rely on ClipClip on Windows and CopyQ on Linux.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

I use a Moonlander keyboard with a custom layout, which I designed specifically for my workflow.

When building it, my main goal was to optimize for comfort and efficiency. I created the layout to minimize hand movement and avoid stretching for keys, so you'll notice that some are intentionally left unassigned. I also made sure to preserve some muscle memory from regular keyboards, like the familiar Alt + Tab movement, to make the transition seamless.

I incorporated a Vim-like arrangement and placed my most-used commands and keys on the home row, allowing me to stay focused and productive without my hands leaving the keyboard.

Furthermore, I've created dedicated layers with macros for common coding tasks, such as debugging or writing specific queries, to save time and reduce repetitive motions.

What would be your dream setup?

I'm quite happy with my current setup. The only way I feel like improving on it would be a super ultrawide monitor and a new laptop in the future.

I’m Alexander Thulin, a software engineer from Sweden. I work at IKEA, where I’m part of the team building a 3D room configurator—a tool that helps people design and explore their spaces in a more interactive and visual way.

Outside of work, I’m usually deep into some hobby project or game. I love 3D printing and model making, which often overlap with my fascination for creating functional, tangible things. I’m also a big fan of board games, gaming, and reading (I’m currently enjoying Wind and Truth by Brandon Sanderson). And whenever I get the chance, I like to dive into something completely new, just for the joy of learning.

What hardware do you use?

My daily driver is a MacBook Pro. At work, I connect it to a single external monitor, and at home I usually run a dual-monitor setup.

Beyond that, I use an Apple trackpad (which I’ve grown surprisingly attached to) and a Stream Deck for shortcuts—it’s great for saving time on repetitive actions and feels like having a customizable control panel on my desk.

And what software?

VSCode is my main editor, and Git sits at the heart of my workflow. I like to keep my toolset fairly simple and reliable.

One piece of software that deserves a shoutout, though, is OctoKeys. It’s fantastic when you’re switching between languages on different keyboards and systems—for example, I can have English mapped on my Voyager and Swedish on my laptop without any friction.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

At work, I use the ZSA Voyager, and on my gaming PC at home I switch to the ZSA Moonlander. Both are fitted with Kailh Brown switches—definitely my favorite, with just the right amount of tactile feedback.

My layout is a fairly standard home-row mod setup, with a few tweaks to make writing in Swedish more natural.

I’ve also mixed in some DIY: I designed and 3D-printed a wrist support and tenting stand for the Voyager, which has been a big ergonomic upgrade.

Overall, my setup philosophy is simple: ergonomics first. I want my keyboards to support me in working (and gaming) comfortably, not fight against me.

What would be your dream setup?

I’m actually very happy with the setup I have today. If anything, the one upgrade I really need is better cable management—that’s the missing piece to make everything feel as clean as it works.

If I could dream up the perfect desk, though, it would still be rooted in ergonomics. A setup that looks good is nice, but one that feels effortless to use—that’s the dream.

The name’s Ladislav, but where I come from, that sounds really formal, and most people call me Laci. I use the handle “zblesk” in most online places. I work for a small company as a senior software developer and mostly deliver solutions for much larger enterprises. That works quite well for me: My task list is varied, and I don’t have to deal with too much corpo bureaucracy. This is illustrated by my latest large project: When it was starting, I got to do everything “technical” in it—architecture, frontend scripts, backend tools and plugins, web services, integrations, the occasional report. Then, as the project grew, I got to hand off things to other devs until I was left mostly with just the architecture and integrations, the latter of which take up most of my time. I work from home four days of the week.

When I’m not working, most of my time is spent with my wife and three kids, the oldest of whom is ten. We hang out on playgrounds, go on bike rides, play board games, read books, things like that. But the kids are capable just playing among themselves with Legos or various other toys, so even these two summer months, when the adults still have to work but the schools are closed and the kids are home, are quite manageable. They do get some screen time, but it’s very limited.

They’re fun to have around even when I’m working. Last time I went to check on them because they had been suspiciously quiet for a couple hours, and found that the girl had crocheted tiny clothes for a bunch of Lego animals, and they started a puppet theatre. It’ll be so boring in here once they go back to school.

In the few hours of free time I get after all that, I try to do some of my (way too many) hobbies: things like language study, video games (where more than half of my play time is recently spent on retro games), and books. I prefer dead tree editions for nonfiction and audiobooks for most of the rest, because I can listen to them even when driving or doing endless chores around the flat. Then there’s self-hosting: I run dozens of applications, many of which I use daily. I also do programming as a hobby—mostly to write systems that support my other hobbies, and I keep adding just the feature I currently need. So I have my databases for books and games (which are integrated to various third-party data sources for enrichment), various trackers, various dashboards for visualizations and control, a universal search engine that indexes everything and makes it searchable in one place (even things from third-party apps, such as collections of e-books in Calibre, links in Raindrop, audiobooks in Audiobookshelf, our family tree, etc.). (And yes, that does mean I sometimes finish working on some enterprise integration at work, only to start working on my own personal integrations after that. But it’s totally different, honest! 😁) I like taking plenty of notes on the things I learn or do, and occasionally I write blog posts about them as well.

Last but not least, the keyboard hobby was thrust upon me against my express wishes, and I still kinda resent that. 😄 My plan was to get an ergonomic keyboard before I get carpal tunnel syndrome—I didn’t want to know anything about keyboards, didn’t care whether it was mechanical or not, I just wanted somebody to tell me what to buy. After a couple years, it was clear I didn’t know anyone who knew anyone who could help me, so I begrudgingly ordered a switch tester kit and started fiddling.

A funny thing happened: I told a friend I’m considering a Moonlander, and he ended up ordering it before I did. He just asked me what exactly I’m gonna order, and bought the same thing. 😑 But so far, that’s the only person I know who uses a non-boring keyboard.

What hardware do you use?

I’ll start with the hardware I use for fun, because that’s the shortest list. I use three retro game consoles: one is the poetically named Anbernic RG35XX Plus (with Knulli as the OS), which is a great all-rounder. That was my most-used one for over a year, until I got the next two. The GKD Pixel 2 (with RogueOS) is a niche handheld (and hard to get for a normal price) that can play basically the same things, but it’s a lot smaller and very sturdy. Ideal for carrying in a pocket. And the latest (and for now, final) addition is the Retroid Pocket Flip 2 (running Android). Being larger, it’s more of a “couch console”—a larger screen and more processing power that can run newer platforms the others can’t.

As for my daily driver computers, I have a Dell XPS 15 from work. It’s not amazing, but it’s good enough. I only use it directly when at work. When I’m home it just sits in the back, where it isn’t in the way, I sit at my personal computer and RDP over to the notebook. This way, I can access both my personal and company tools while still maintaining complete separation between them.

My kids like to create, and they often make gifts for me. I always keep some of them displayed; in the lower right of the picture, there’s an orange T (for “dad”) made with model wire and crochet yarn, and a green picture of “kitty Kirby with whiskers”; on the top right, a paper butterfly clipped onto a headphone receiver. (I don’t have the entire desk for myself, so the left part off-screen has the wife’s things, and there are boxes with sewing knickknacks under it.)

The personal computer has a Ryzen 5 3600, 32 GB 3200 MHz RAM, and a GeForce RTX 3060 (OC 12G V2). That’s enough for my work and hobbies, as well as video games. It helps that I never really felt any need to follow the hottest releases, nor do I insist on the highest graphical settings, so I’ve upgraded the PC maybe once in 8-10 years. And I keep adding old drives as they accumulate.

Not much to say about the displays—they were cheap, and two of them are also quite old. But they’re all hanging off arms mounted at the back of the table, which gives me more flexibility to move them about—which I do surprisingly often—and leaves the desk clean.

When my super-cheap vertical mouse finally died after ten years, I bought the MX Vertical Mouse. I have large hands, and while this is not perfect, it’s the best one I’ve tried.

Among my favorite gadgets is the tiny Niimbot Q110 thermal printer for label stickers (it’s the small white box under the right display). I also have a collection of (cheap) gamepads which I use with my PC or the retro consoles. With larger gamepads I prefer the Xbox-style layout; I have the Anbernic RG P01 and the 8BitDo SN30 Pro. I also love the very small ones; I used to buy the 8BitDo Zero 2 gamepads while they were cheap; I gave a bunch of them to friends to get them into gaming. They tend to be too expensive for that now, so I switched to the ShanWan Q36. You can often get them for 5-6€ apiece. When the kids wanted to see what gaming was like when I was a kid, I connected a couple of them to the RG35XX console and hooked it up to the TV via HDMI. Then we played some NES games.

And the last part is my “server stack,” which I’ve made into a literal physical stack and stuck it into the inaccessible, empty space between my PC and the wall.

The most important in there is my server, which runs a bunch of apps and hosts all our files (i.e. it’s also a NAS). It’s the Aoostar WTR Pro AMD Ryzen 7—one of the cheapest that also has enough processing power for more than just hosting files, and enough space for drives. (It takes up to four HDDs and two M.2 SSDs.) Right under it is a UPS, and behind it—a tiny switch.

An old Synology NAS placed at my parents' house works as off-site backup, synced with Resilio Sync.

And what software?

My home computer runs Windows 10, which I used to like before they added so many more ads. The first Windows I used was 3.11, and I’ve used pretty much every version since then, and liked them at the time. That streak broke with 11, which completely sucks. That’s what my work computer runs. Fortunately, there’s StartAllBack “to fix all Windows 11 deal-breaking UI issues.”

I keep trying various desktop Linuxes (or is it linuxen? English is hard), but I’ve always bounced off—until this year. I put Zorin on a spare home notebook, and it actually seems nice to use? I kinda want to use more of it.

My NAS runs Unraid, because I mainly need reliable storage; and all my headless servers and devices always run Ubuntu Server. My phone runs Android. And all devices are connected to a mesh network with the Tailscale VPN.

The apps that are most important for me are virtually always running. I use KeePass for passwords, and also have it integrated into Firefox. For notes, it’s Joplin with a bunch of plugins. I take notes often and have tried many apps and platforms, and this one has beaten ’em all so far. I use Element (for Matrix) for all my chats. Listary is a blazing-fast search & launch tool that integrates well into many parts of Windows. I launch it with the left red button on my Moonlander. For music, I like Feishin.

Besides those, I use ShareX for screenshots, Heynote for cute scratchpads, and Mailbird for legacy mailboxes, though I’ll switch the moment I find something better.

I used to like Python, but didn’t like how it—and even more importantly, its tooling and ecosystem—has evolved over the decades. So my most-used language currently is C#, which has a mix of high-level constructs, low-level features, dev tools, and analyzers that I think is unmatched by anything else. So for that I use VS Code and Visual Studio 2022, complemented by LinqPad. Either because of work or because of all the integrations and plugins I write in my spare time, I also use JavaScript, TypeScript, and Python. And because I’m interested in programming language design, I sometimes experiment with others, to write smaller subprojects in; for example, Crystal is interesting and fun to work with, and does some novel things with static type checking. The hardest thing for me to do well is CSS.

PowerToys is a great collection of utilities for advanced users—my most often used ones are Image Resizer (integrates into the Explorer menu), Fancy Zones (a window manager), Text Extractor (like a screenshot, but only extracts text from the selected area) and Power Rename (integrates into Explorer menu, allows for regex-based renames; for more complex tasks I use Advanced Renamer.)

I use the Proton suite for email, calendars, privacy VPN and cloud backups, and I use Resilio Sync to back up data from my computer drives to my NAS.

On Ubuntu Servers I always install the fish shell with the Fisher package manager and extensions Z (for FS navigation) and Tide, “the ultimate Fish prompt.”

The other important part of the software I use are all the apps I host myself. They either run on the Aoostar NAS I already mentioned, or on a cheap Hetzner VPS (running Ubuntu Server). There are dozens of apps I host, so I’ll only mention the most often used ones here. Keep in mind that this is what I use for my personal stuff, not my job.

I really like Obskurnee, which I wrote as a companion app for book clubs. Audiobookshelf and its companion Android app are great for audiobooks. Miniflux handles my RSS/feed reading, and for other reading I turn to Karakeep. Karakeep was originally replacing Pocket for me, but I now often use it for archives as well. I’m still keeping ArchiveBox, where I already have a big library, including sites no longer online; but that project has issues and is not very active, so I find myself using it less and less.

I use Forgejo as a git repository/code forge. Joplin Server synchronizes my Joplin notes and attachments across devices. I like NocoDB for spreadsheets, databases, and their APIs. It’s similar to Airtable and extremely useful for all sorts of things. For dashboards, I use Metabase; I like n8n for workflows and automation. Ignore all the “AI” stuff on the n8n website; that’s new, and the app itself is powerful and nice to use. Nextcloud is mostly for sharing files with friends, and Immich holds my family’s photo library. I use Navidrome for music. For identity and access management, I use Authentik; I now have single sign-on for a whole bunch of these apps. The open-source community never ceases to astound me.

I like owning things I buy, so I mostly buy media (music, audiobooks, games) in places that don’t put restrictive DRM on them. Thanks to that, I could load all my purchases into my servers when I decided to host my own libraries.

I also run Synapse server for Matrix, a decentralized, federated chat platform. That basically means—you know how you can send an e-mail to any recipient, regardless of whether their mail servers run in Google, Microsoft, your company, or wherever else? But you can’t send a message from WhatsApp to Messenger or Instagram, even though they’re run by the same company? Matrix being “federated” means you can host your own server and chat with anyone on any other server, just as you can send them an email.

The next logical question is: Why would I care if nobody else is using it? And that’s a valid argument. Luckily, there’s a host of “Bridges,” which let you connect your Matrix server to WhatsApp, Signal, Messenger, and a couple dozen other chat services. The result of this is that I only ever have to use one chat app, the Element I mentioned above. (Most Matrix-related software has generic, hard-to-google names, sorry.) It’s available for all platforms, including the web. That means on any of my computers or phones I only need this one app to get access to Matrix, WhatsApp, Signal, or whatever else I want.

What started as a throwaway experiment (“It sounds cool, but why would I use it when nobody I know even knows it exists?”) quickly grew into one of my most-used, load-bearing apps. It’s the only chat app on my phone.

There’s also a bunch of other apps I host, but these lists are long enough already. So just a quick mention of Webtrees for genealogy, Podsync for generating podcasts from YT channels, recently added LubeLogger for tracking my car-related expenses and maintenance, and Nginx Proxy Manager.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

In the first question, I talked about how I didn’t want to know anything about keyboards. For me, none of this was ever about style, or mechanical properties, or typing speed—just ergonomics and comfort. By the time I was confident I could order a decent keyboard that I’d maybe like using, I knew what a broad hobby it can be, but still thought to myself—haha, why would anyone choose a weirdo layout? And solder their keyboards by hand?

Fast forward half a year. I disliked bringing my Moonlander to work because it’s bulky, and setting up/tearing down the tenting multiple times a day is a hassle. But there was no way I could (or would) spend that much money on a second keyboard. But some of these kits I saw online looked pretty nice!

So I ended up making a prototype by hand, then a macropad or two, then a portable keyboard from a kit. Then, when that turned out not to be ideal, I made another one a year later. Thanks to the controllers and switches (i.e. the most expensive parts) being socketed, the budget for a complete keyboard changeover was about 40€. That’s how I ended up with my current Rev57LP—a “split unibody” type of keyboard that’s pretty portable and fully wireless, so I can use it with my phone as well. Since I wanted for it to be as portable as possible, it uses the low-profile switches and has no LEDs. I wanted the lightest possible switches, so I got Kailh Purple Choc v1 (25±5gf), because the Pinks (20±5gf) weren’t available yet. I had an annoying problem, though: When my hand was in the resting position, I kept pressing the thumb key by accident. I started thinking about how to fix that in the ZMK firmware, but fortunately, it occurred to me to just switch the switch for a Kailh Heavy Dark Yellow (70±10gf). That solved the problem, though in retrospect I shouldn’t have gone for the heaviest one available.

The next keyboard I always keep on my desk at home is the Reviung5, a tiny macropad I use for media controls. It was designed to be wired, but I hacked it to make it wireless. (It can be quite easy! I wrote about it on the blog, but my article named “Turn your wired QMK keyboard wireless” also came out as part of Issue #6 of the Paged Out! zine. If you don’t know it, check out its cool, experimental format!) It lasts for months on a single charge. And I got the funky keycaps as a Christmas gift from a friend—she knows nothing about keyboards but wanted for it to be a surprise, so she read my keyboard-related blog posts and then hoped she got it right. I was quite impressed by that.

Both of those keyboards were designed with the QMK firmware in mind (the one ZSA’s keyboards are based on), but I converted both to ZMK. Initially, that was because of ZMK’s first-class wireless support and excellent power efficiency, but I ended up liking it far more than QMK and would use it everywhere if I could. Firmware for the Rev57LP was readily available, but the one for Reviung5 I had to create myself. Huge thanks to the very helpful folks in the ZMK community. (I also contributed to it, so it should be easier for you.)

And now we’re circling back to the Moonlander. I’ve been using it for perhaps two years and been quite satisfied, but I started noticing I prefer the feeling of the low-profile switches to the bulky MX style. I didn’t really want to get rid of the Moonlander, but wasn’t sure what else to do, and how to keep the costs down. It took me embarrassingly long to come to the idea of converting the Moonlander to low-profile switches. During my research, it occurred to me to contact ZSA’s excellent support, and it turned out they were experimenting with this as well for a blog post. I wrote my own blog post on the same subject—but long story short, with their guidance, I ended up using the linear Outemu Low-Profile Red switches (50gf) and the Tai-Hao Thins LP Black Keycaps. (They didn’t have a set that would suit me, but were willing to make a custom one for me.) To spice it up a little, I got the clickiest switches I could find (in this case, Outemu Low-Profile Blue, 60gf) and put them on some of the rarely used keys, including the big red ones. The occasional clicks while I work make my day.

Word of warning, though: It seems to me the clearances are a bit too tight, and the Outemu switches are quite difficult to pull out. I’ve destroyed a few of them and bent my key puller. It’s not a problem now, but I would be hesitant to change them again, in case I damage the keyboard.

I clearly didn’t have enough problems in life, because at this point, I started thinking about changing my layout. When the keyboards are this nice, QWERTY starts to feel more and more uncomfortable and annoying. But the question of what to switch to is not an easy one. The ideas behind Colemak Mod-DH sounded great, but the layout was designed for writing in English. I write a bunch of Slovak as well as English, so the letter and bigram distribution would be different. But I didn’t want to go for something completely custom, either, and eventually settled on the Savetier layout. I won’t go into the details here, but there’s a bunch of them in my blog post Alternative keyboard layouts for Slovak if you’re interested in more info on how I chose the layout, made the transition, and evaluated the results. I’ve been using it for almost two years now, and I’m not going back. I don’t know of anyone else using Savetier though, so if you do, drop me a line.

Other than that, my Moonlander layout is nothing special. A lot of tap mods (~30 on layer 0), a layer for symbols and shortcuts, and some other layers I don’t use much anymore—for example, I have a layer for media controls which is quick and easy to use, but now I just use the Reviung5 macropad instead.

One problem with non-QWERTY layouts with a bunch of tap mods: Good luck gaming on them. I work around this problem by having a Games layer that is just a vanilla QWERTY with no special functions, and the numbers and F-keys rearranged so that games can be played using the left half only.

What would be your dream setup?

I’m quite happy with my current setup, so no big complaints here. But there’s always something to tweak. For starters, I would like to have higher quality displays—preferably all of the same kind and quality. The NAS could use quieter fans and a small KVM.

If Outemu LP switches for the Moonlander were available in lighter versions, I’d make the switch, pun intended. Chair-mounting also sounds good in theory, but I haven’t had a chance to try it in practice, and the whole setup is too expensive for something that might not stick.

The Rev57LP has the most things I’d like to change, but they don’t seem very realistic. (It is open source, but I currently don’t have enough free time to learn how to use KiCAD to make the modifications myself.) The biggest flaw is that there is no cover on the controller board, and the pins often snag on things. I also wish it had a horizontal rotary encoder, support for a low-powered display such as the nice!view, and a pointing device.

One day, maybe.

I'm Olivier, living and working near Paris (France). I like to enjoy life by listening to music, eating good bread (luckily I live in France), and listening to documentaries or podcasts about technology and science.

I love listening to music every day at home on my Kef iQ5 speakers and Atoll IN50 amp. My CD player is losing quite often to Deezer, but I still use it from time to time to listen to old anime music and out of nostalgia, to see its white LCD screen display the playback time of the tracks. I like a wide range of styles: 80s pop, current pop, Japanese anime, hard rock, trance, classical (J.S. Bach is my god), movie soundtracks (my current favorite is Interstellar). A few years ago I could listen to Ravi Shankar for hours. I also enjoy music with my B&W Px7 S3 headphones at the office, when walking outside, or at home while making coffee.

I like drinking coffee and tea, but coffee is my favorite. I like the simple processing and taste of the French press (and no waste), and the quick preparation of the AeroPress, especially for caffeine-free coffee in the evening.

Previously, I worked for Europe's largest legal publisher, where I handled SGML/XML files for web and print publishing. Now I work as a senior software developer on code analyzers at a company specializing in software intelligence.

When I was younger I hiked a bit in Ireland and the south of France (Collioure to Cadaques, where you can visit Salvador Dalí's house, impressive!). I still like to walk, when my knees allow it. Lately I go to the gym to keep myself in shape.

What hardware do you use?

At home, I use a 24" 1920×1200 Eizo monitor because I wanted one with good colorimetry for photo editing. My PC is homemade from a few years ago, with a silent Fractal Design case, Intel i5 CPU, 20 GB RAM, a Samsung SSD for the OS, two Western Digital SATA drives for the data, and a fanless GPU (also to keep the case quiet). Finally, my input devices are a Kensington SlimBlade trackball and a Moonlander. The trackball is very comfortable and helps to reduce wrist pain.

Years ago, when my wrists started to hurt, I bought an ortholinear TypeMatrix keyboard. It helped, and so did learning the BÉPO layout. Later I discovered split keyboards. I didn't want to solder my own keyboard, so I bought an ErgoDox EZ. I was planning to bring it home after work, but that turned out to be too troublesome, so after a few weeks I bought a Moonlander. The Moonlander is thinner, so I kept it for home, since my desk is high (it was made for lovin' you—uh no, sorry Kiss, it was made for writing).

For working from home, I wanted a good chair, to avoid back pain. I bought an Aeron chair from Herman Miller. It is comfortable and easy to adjust, and the armrests are very good. It's expensive, but since this chair lasts for years, the annualized cost makes it worth it—and health is priceless anyway. The keyboard and trackball are connected to a USB hub that I just plug into my PC or my work laptop. I rarely need to use both at the same time, so no need for a KVM. I usually use a USB to Ethernet adapter to ensure a steady Ethernet connection.

When traveling, I bring my notebook, an Asus UX331. For long vacations, I also pack the Moonlander, but for short ones I just leave it, to save space.

I also have a few smart home devices: lighting, roller blinds, robot vacuum cleaner. Ah, and a Netgear 24-port gigabit switch for the 1 Gb/s Ethernet wall plugs in each room (there is nothing better than a good cable for important meetings in the kitchen or the second office aka bedroom).

At work, I have a 27" monitor, a laptop, my own ErgoDox EZ, and a Kensington SlimBlade trackball. The ErgoDox has almost the same configuration as my Moonlander, except for color layers, since the memory is too small to support all of the Moonlander's configuration.

And what software?

At home: EndeavorOS (Arch flavor with graphical environment) with paru for package management, Qtile as tiled window manager, Neovim (with LazyVim for light editing, but I'm still learning to use it and the "vim way"), Firefox, Notion (planning to move to Obsidian or an open source alternative synced with git), Proton (mail, VPN, password manager, and 2FA), Deezer for music, CopyQ as clipboard manager, VLC for videos, PyCharm or VS Code for coding. WezTerm for terminal, and zsh.

At work, Windows is mandatory, but I can't work without a few GNU tools, so I have WSL2+Arch Linux to use PyCharm for coding and CopyQ for clipboard management. I'm experimenting with a few IDE for "AI" agents as well.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

I replaced the switches with silent ones (Gazzew Boba U4 Silent Tactile Switch) for the peace of my co-workers and my loved one. I prefer lighter switches (Kailh Copper), so I kept those for the most-used keys, Space and Enter (the ones in the middle of the thumb pad).

At home I have more translucent keycaps, to enjoy the colors. For work I kept the original ZSA keycaps. I love their texture and prefer a more discreet look at work.

Both keyboards use a customized BÉPO layout (BÉPO is optimized for French, but I moved some keys since I write in English a lot when coding). I shifted the pinky finger columns down because I have short fingers, bravo for programmable keyboards :) ! Special characters, numbers, and function keys are on their own layers. I played with layers to add some vim motions and rarely used key combinations for Linux. I spent many hours tuning the layout, but it is mostly stable now.

What would be your dream setup?

Glasses with 3D screen projection to replace the monitor, Moonlander or similar with Kailh Copper switches attached to my Aeron chair. Voice-controlled barista robot capable of preparing and bringing me my coffee. For working remotely, add a home with an office and a nice view of the forest (without mosquitoes).

My name is Ahmed Elsalahy. I’m 33 years old, and I work as a lead embedded software engineer at an awesome quantum startup called Q*bird. I’m a Muslim, Egyptian, and happily married, and I’ve been living in the Netherlands for the past six years.

It would be super cool if I were the first Egyptian to be featured in ZSA People, but I don’t have the data to back that up (though I did a small search with the keywords Egypt, Pyramids, Nile, and Mohamed Salah 😅, and surprisingly no one has mentioned them before).

My mother is an incredible human being. She raised me and my two younger siblings as a single mom while working full-time as a gynecologist. She always encouraged us to explore, learn, and keep improving every single day. Despite the challenges, she worked tirelessly to provide for us, and even bought us our first computer when I was 13, as it was something we couldn’t afford before. I still remember how badly I wanted one! That moment sparked my passion for electronics, system architecture, and computer engineering.

After finishing my bachelor’s degree in electrical engineering, I dove into the world of embedded systems and completely fell in love with it. That passion drove me to earn two master’s degrees in the field, one from Technische Universität Berlin (Germany) and another from the University of Turku (Finland).

When people ask me what I do (usually after I mention “embedded software/systems engineer”), I like to answer with a question: Do you know how keyboards work? I then explain: Think about how, when you press a button, a character appears on the screen, and how pressing two buttons together can create something different. That explanation usually sparks a look of wonder and makes people nod in understanding 😁.

I like to say embedded engineers are the marriage counselors of technology: We help hardware and software live happily together. That means deeply understanding where the hardware is coming from, how the software can help, and making sure the two exist in harmony. When they do, we know we’ve done our job.

This seamless integration between hardware and software is what makes me jump out of bed each morning with excitement. Honestly, I love what I do so much that I’d probably do it for free (but please don’t tell my boss 👀).

Outside of work, I enjoy traveling, playing football ⚽ (soccer), watching anime, and tinkering with keyboards. I’ve been lucky enough to visit 15 countries and live in six of them for more than a year each. All this travel makes me really appreciate the diversity of ZSA People, as it feels like I get to briefly visit a new country and meet an amazing new person every time I read about someone’s journey, setup, hobbies, and learnings.

What hardware do you use?

I ordered the ErgoDox EZ back in 2020 (can’t believe it’s been five years already!). There’s actually an interesting story behind how I ended up giving it away as a gift 🎁 to a close friend, and how I eventually found myself owning both a Voyager (2024) and a Moonlander (2025, which I’m using now to type this interview).

When I first received the ErgoDox, I was super excited, but that excitement quickly turned into feeling overwhelmed and anxious. Let me explain: Everything about its design felt so carefully thought-out, so refined, that I felt the pressure to match that perfection. That meant diving straight into switch hunting (thanks to hot-swap), which pulled me into a rabbit hole of customization such as lubing stems, springs, the whole thing 🤯. I wasn’t ready for that level of customizability.

At the time, a preassembled hot-swap keyboard was a luxury most brands didn’t offer, so I felt I had to take advantage of it. But instead of just enjoying the keyboard, I piled on more: finding the best layout, best LEDs configuration, best keycaps, most ergonomic setup, and so on, and it got so overwhelming that I literally had to create a to-do list just to ride the beast!. And after all that I sat down to type, and managed to do total of 20 WPM 😑.

Add to that:

• Learning touch typing properly for the first time,
• Actually using my thumbs for something useful for the first time,
• Adjusting to a split keyboard,
• Fixing bad typing habits (like my right hand reaching out for the B key in a QWERTY layout),
• Muscle memory challenges,
• Juggling three work setups (office, lab, home) unless I wanted to buy three keyboards 💸,
• And trying to stay productive in a 40-hour work week.

As you can imagine, the frustration built up. I’d work my way up to 30-40 WPM over a weekend, only to fall back to 20 after using a different (non-split, staggered) keyboard at work.

To be fair, I think 80% of that was personal. ZSA really does provide all the hardware and software you need to make the transition achievable, but I just couldn’t find my way through it at the time.

Fast forward to 2023: A close friend visited me from Sweden, spotted the ErgoDox on my desk, and lit up like a kid in a candy store. He had been considering buying one himself, and right then I knew it was time to declare defeat, and I told him I hadn’t managed to integrate it into my daily life and offered it as a gift. To my surprise, he was over the moon, and he even told his partner he wanted to cut the trip short just to get home and try it out 🤣. Honestly, it felt good to pass it on to someone who might utilize it in their day-to-day work.

At that point, I admired ZSA from afar, enjoying every newsletter and blog post, but no longer trying to apply new layouts or use new tools such as Keymapp.

Then came late 2023 and the release of the Voyager. My first reaction was: No. We’ve learned this lesson the hard way. But every couple of days, my brain would tell me it might solve all your problems.

I told myself I wouldn’t buy it unless I sold all my other mechanical keyboards first. So I sold four of them on Marktplaats, and when someone listed a barely used Voyager for sale, I couldn’t resist. At least this way, I thought, I could resell it if things didn’t work out, and I have saved on customs. (Funny enough, I still chat with the original owner, and he even offered to sell me his second Voyager later 😆🤦).

The moment I tried it, I had a good feeling. I started at 12 WPM 👀, but within two hours I was at 40, and by the next day it was 55 WPM at work. Within a week, I was comfortably hitting 80 WPM. That’s when I knew that this was the dream hardware/software combo I had always wanted.

The Voyager made it easy to fully embrace the luxury of flashing layouts through the Oryx configurator. And honestly, it’s hard not to sound like a fanboy at this point, but anyone who has ever worked in embedded knows how ridiculously complex it is to make something like this just work. From customizing a layout in a web GUI, compiling it into firmware, streaming it to the keyboard via USB bootloader, validating the binary, and rebooting into it seamlessly, and doing that 30 times a day if you want. That level of reliability? Pure Mercedes-class engineering 👏.

I spent a year with the Voyager and loved every second. Then one day, I spotted a good deal on a Moonlander and picked it up, and that is mostly because I missed tinkering with switches and keycaps (the Voyager’s low-profile design limited that). To my delight, I hit 60 WPM on my first test using the same Voyager layout, and just a few hours later I was enjoying it similarly.

So that’s how I ended up falling in love with ZSA’s hardware, and eventually trying all their split keyboards. The lesson for me is that, like any instrument or tool worth mastering, you have to accept that it’s okay to feel overwhelmed at first. Be patient, use it everywhere you can, and tackle the challenges at your own pace. The Voyager was my training wheels, and it turned the whole experience into a wonderful voyage (pun intended 😉).

The more you master a tool, the harder it is to replace it, and the more you want that tool to keep evolving. I think Erez and his team deeply understand that, and they deliver on it every day.

There's other hardware I use daily, too. My main computer is a MacBook Pro 14-inch M4 Pro with 24 GB RAM. It travels between work and home.

At home, my setup includes an LG 34UC99-W Ultrawide monitor (six years old and still going strong) on an IKEA VATTENKAR monitor stand, a Magic Trackpad, and my Moonlander. Two Philips Hue bulbs behind the monitor (I named them Fire 🔥 and Ice 🩵), attached with an E27 clip + splitter, light the space. It all sits on an IKEA RODULF electric standing desk.

My work setup uses a widescreen monitor, the Dell U3421WE Ultrasharp, my Voyager (easy to move between desk and lab), and another Magic Trackpad.

A few other essentials can travel. I love my Supernote Manta tablet (for notes and reading, and the battery lasts two weeks on this thing 🤯), and sound is supplied by AirPods Pro 1 (yes, Gen 1, still solid!) with an ESR Cyber Tough Case (HaloLock).

One special piece of miscellaneous hardware is the “battery eater” 🐕 gifted by a dear friend. The way it works is that it consumes a dead battery and uses it to blink for half a year, draining the last bits of leftover energy.

And what software?

As you might imagine, I love software that gives me deeper control over hardware. On my Mac, I use Raycast (previously Alfred) for quick launching and workflow automation. Lunar lets me control display brightness using keyboard shortcuts. Amphetamine to manage the system/displays sleep intervals. I keep an eye on my typing heatmap with Keymapp. Mouseless lets me move the cursor anywhere on the screen using a keyboard-friendly grid, and Superkey searches for keywords on screen and moves the cursor to them without lifting my hands off the keyboard. BetterTouchTool turns the Magic Trackpad into the ultimate customizable input device.

Visual Studio Code (with the Vim extension) is my code editor; I also use the integrated terminal with Oh My Zsh. PopClip is helpful for quick actions on selected text. I like Obsidian for notes (paired with VSCode + Foam extension, all synced to the same vault for quick markdown editing). My go-to task manager is TickTick.

For focus and productivity, I use Brain.fm. And then there’s Dynamic Wallpaper—because small aesthetic touches matter.

I’m also a big fan of the Shades of Purple VSCode theme by Ahmad Owais and the Monaspace Argon font.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

My Moonlander is fitted with the newly released Gateron Type R tactile switches, which both sound and feel amazing. On top, I’m using my GMK MITO Laser custom keycaps, which I originally purchased with an older DROP keyboard. I also use the ErgoDox EZ wrist rests (my friend forgot to take them when I gifted him the ErgoDox, and they happen to work perfectly with the Moonlander 😅).

Since I share the same layout with my Voyager at work, I decided to keep the last row of switches exposed (because I have a limited set of keycaps). Funny enough, the dark reddish style of the switches actually complements the keycaps and the original Moonlander thumb cluster button really well.

At work, I use the Voyager with a custom switch mix: Sunset Kailh Low-Profile Choc switches for the stronger fingers, and Kailh Choc Pro Reds for the weaker ones (like the pinky).

I added just four purple 🟣 custom keycaps to add some flair while staying subtle.

To improve ergonomics, I mounted the Voyager at a slight angle using two UGREEN magnetic MagSafe phone stands. It turned out to be a very cost-effective solution, thanks to the exposed magnetic mounting points on the back of each half.

My layout is a simple layer-based QWERTY where I make sure that I can access as much functionality using my thumbs, and it works really well for my use case. It’s mostly shortcut-based where Hyper + letter opens an app, and Meh + letter does functionality within the app.

What would be your dream setup?

My previous boss (and now close friend, shoutout to Wienke Giezeman!) bought the Apple Vision Pro right after it was released, and he graciously let me try it out. My mind was absolutely blown. I can really see a future where we don’t just look at devices anymore, but rather through them.

The advanced eye-tracking system for navigation and interaction made me imagine a world where the traditional monitor-and-mouse combo disappears, replaced by a single, lighter version of the AVP, or something like it. Such a device would make digital interaction fully portable, allowing us to completely rethink the workspace.

I imagine a future with less need for adjustable desks, more freedom in hand ergonomics, and a healthier way of working, since we won’t be sitting in the same place for eight hours straight.

In that future, I’d probably create one or two virtual monitors to focus on, and use a mix of voice and keyboard for data input in the short term. Longer-term, who knows, maybe a Neuralink-type interface could translate thoughts directly into actions within that virtual workspace.

But for now, my current setup is good enough to keep me happy while I wait for that future.

If you’ve managed to read through this whole interview, thank you 🙏, and I’d love to connect and geek out about these things together. Let’s connect on LinkedIn.

My name is Scott Morse, like Morse code, though I only learned to code later in life, feeling almost like I was doomed to be a software engineer.

My first main passion was, and still is, music. I studied jazz and classical music, with guitar as my primary instrument. After my studies in college, I lived completely off of music for a while, gigging on weekends and teaching up to forty music students during the weekdays. Later, I worked on cruise ships as a sight-reading guitarist for a year, meaning I read new sheet music daily and played a variety of styles every week.

During my time working on the cruise ship, I started to learn how to code, at first out of pure curiosity, but I quickly found that I truly enjoyed it, and it's no coincidence it became a secondary passion. I took a four-month coding boot camp course after some months of learning Python on my own. Since then, I have worked for various companies, from the startup to enterprise, primarily in the education and music industries, starting first as an intern and later waking up one day as a technical lead engineer for a multibillion-dollar company. Now I've taken a step back from the corporate world for more of my own independent pursuits.

Over time, I've learned that there are compelling parallels between musical composition and the composition of code. Music theory is often literally called "codified music" by academics. Sheet music is an abstract language of instructions meant to be executed in order by a musician, while code is also an abstract language of instructions to be executed in order by a computer.

I say that all software engineers are "sight-readers" in the same sense that a number musicians are with sheet music, in that we must be able to comprehend the code we read quickly in order to work efficiently enough with it. There is a two-way street then between the writer and reader, where the writer must set the reader up for success, and the reader must practice literacy in the language. This is, at least, the ideal situation for everyone to have a good time.

Despite the nonhuman nature of computer technology we are well aware of, code is designed for human beings to read and write, or otherwise, we'd just use binary directly. The practice of writing and reading code is still therefore very much a human activity, a relatively new use for the language center of the brain.

It might not be a surprise that I live a lot in my head with these geeky pursuits. However, to play the guitar or to type code requires heavy use of my hands. At times, I've struggled with tendinitis in my arms and anxious trips to the hand doctor to check for carpal tunnel. While my Moonlander setup plays a part in my solution for this by providing me with ideal ergonomics and shortcuts, a lot more goes into play to keep myself healthy in my pursuits. About a year ago, I started to heavily get into the practices of yoga and Alexander Technique in order to attempt to correct issues with my posture and muscular tension that are common among most people these days but were clearly causing me specific issues due to my hand-heavy obsessions.

Yoga has quite literally helped me bring more balance to my body and mind while strengthening postural muscles and arm muscles that support the hands, and there is growing evidence that improving your sense of balance can directly affect even your mental health, perhaps allowing us to abstractly balance our lives better, similarly to how we use more primal neural circuitry like fight-or-flight to manage purely abstract threats in our imagination, for better or for worse.

If we consider that the head is as heavy as a bowling ball, then simply holding it a bit out of balance means that your small neck muscles are going to work very hard to hold it up, just like holding a bowling ball out with your fingers would tire and stress your arms. The balance of the head and torso are a keystone of both Alexander Technique and yoga. My neck tension clearly had been snowballing all the way to my arms and hands and more.

A perspective shift that was important to me is that when we type, play the guitar, knit a funny sweater for a friend, or knead dough for a strudel, we are not "just using our hands," but we are always using the entirety of our body and mind to perform these actions, and to neglect this is ultimately to our hands' detriment. In yoga, we have the term āsana, simply meaning "posture," including postures such as the Downward Facing Dog (Adho Mukha Svanāsana) or Locust (Śalabhāsana). In practice, yoga teachers explore a variety of āsana, sometimes creatively, using postures that don't always have a strict definition. My personal perspective on āsana is that it represents the set of all healthy positions you can make with your own body, which is why everyone's yoga practice differs. When simply thinking of it this way, I think it's easy to see why strengthening your ability to hold yourself in a variety of possible positions healthily is good for both the body and mind.

Similarly to how we can place our bodies in a variety of postures, when we type or use any hand instrument, we also place our hands in a variety of mini āsana, our hands stretching or bending fingers in a variety of postures of their own, including the hand positions for Vim typing, different guitar chords, paintbrush techniques, and the like.

My main drive in life at this time is to further integrate these three main domains that I pursue self-improvement in: music, technology, and the use of my body and mind through yoga. And if possible, I'd like to remain healthy in body and mind in doing so, as it can be a struggle to find balance between my interests. I have to thank ZSA for inventing tools that assist me on several levels in these pursuits.

What hardware do you use?

My main workstation computer is a desktop PC I built myself, nicknamed Moo Deng after the famous baby pygmy hippo who was viral at the time, and is similarly fast, thick, and dark grey. Conveniently, I had recently purchased a special edition Moo Deng: Full of Rage guitar distortion pedal from 1981 Inventions that came with a custom sticker I donned on the front of my PC case. This is the machine I primarily use my Moonlander on.

My standing desk itself is an important tool, made by the company UPLIFT out of Austin, where I was living when I got it, so my custom desk arrived in only two days after order. The entire top of the desk is whiteboard, which I use to take notes, make to-do lists, or work out and diagram solutions to software problems. I can slide an Egofit treadmill easily underneath, which I use most often while playing games like Balatro with a wireless controller.

For audio, I currently have the EVO 4 interface, which allows me to use microphone inputs with phantom power and has a dedicated guitar input so that I can record directly in, or with my Line 6 Helix digital effects station.

I also have a Framework 16-inch laptop, a modular laptop that allows for the replacement of just about any critical part. I've been highly satisfied with this machine and write my own QMK firmware, the same keyboard firmware ZSA's Oryx builds on top of, for the macro pad on-board.

On both machines, I run Arch Linux, using the KDE Plasma desktop environment. This has been my favorite operating system setup for several years now.

In the photos, you may see one of my Tidbyt devices, a small screen that can run simple apps written in a Python-like language. I mainly have it for fun, and it also happens to perfectly hold up a monitor that's a bit heavy for its arm.

And what software?

As I said earlier, I am primarily an Arch Linux user using KDE Plasma for my desktop.

On my PC, I even run custom KWin scripts that give me fine-grained control of window management, using my still prerelease (at the time of writing) open-source project kwin-ts that lets me write KWin scripts in TypeScript rather than JavaScript with relatively accurate runtime types.

For my command line, I use the Z shell (zsh) primarily with the Zellij multiplexer.

My primary coding language is TypeScript, and naturally my main IDE is then Visual Studio Code. Vim is my primary shell-based editor, and I use the Vim extension for VSCode. While not a Vim superuser, I take advantage of certain shortcuts and tend to use a hybrid modern/traditional approach to development, trying to be strong with my command line but willing to use a more modern graphical interface if I like it enough, especially since my hardware can handle about any workflow.

I tend to approach guitar similarly, using a hybrid fingerpicking technique based on classical, blues, and country/bluegrass styles, and the style in which I write TypeScript can also appear as a nondogmatic hybrid of functional, procedural, and object-oriented patterns.

When it comes to developing in TypeScript, I prefer to use the newer Bun runtime for its speed whenever I can, whether for scripting or building React apps. I have yet another early-in-the-works open-source project, bun-workspaces, for providing more features on top of Bun's monorepo capabilities.

I enjoy using Obsidian for note-taking with Markdown syntax and having secure sync between my devices.

I'm also versed in Talon, the developer-friendly accessibility software for voice commands. I learned to use this after my last case of tendinitis, and at my peak of practice I could demonstrate to coworkers how to write a simple React web app without ever touching my keyboard, using the Cursorless VSCode extension, which works with Talon for hands-free voice coding.

I do not use Talon to nearly that extent regularly, but I have found that even outside of injury or other accessibility reasons, voice commands can be inherently very intuitive and quick to remember and use. I often develop using a hybrid of Talon commands and Moonlander shortcuts, picking whichever feels easiest.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

My friend Cole sent me a link about the Moonlander after he discovered it, and upon learning that it could be mounted to my chair arms, I had to try it. I had only used run-of-the-mill keyboards prior to this, but as I matured as a developer, I realized that in the same way the quality of my equipment is important for music, it's also important to have an ideal instrument for my computer.

While I wasn’t yet into yoga or similar practices, I instinctively knew that being able to sit with my shoulders fully retracted in my chair would likely be better than the constant protraction most of us find ourselves in, causing tension and postural collapse at our neck and shoulders.

I have spent the equivalent of many workdays, possibly even work weeks, configuring my Moonlander's settings and shortcuts. ZSA reached out to have me create a tour for my layout.

I still use the QWERTY layout, since it was drilled into my head from an early age, but I have moved around several of the default Moonlander key positions based on my needs. I have a “mouse” in my right hand, grouping all mouse-related operations in the thumb keys and bottom row. I have a backup mouse tucked away on my desk, but I primarily use the keyboard mouse controls.

I use the Cherry Silent Red switches after having tried very clicky switches for a while, and there are individuals in my life who would disagree with this, but I enjoy the subtle smooth quiet motion, even if they aren't theoretically the best for what I use them for primarily. Despite what you may assume based on the rest of my writing, I'm not actually very particular about mechanical keyboard details such as these (yet).

My configuration contains a large number of shortcuts for the browser, desktop window management, launching applications I use commonly, my terminal shell, VSCode, and more. I have a fun mode that I can activate for using the musical buzzer mode that is available on the keyboard, which turns the keys into a chromatic scale, and for a while I thought I might try to learn “Flight of the Bumblebee” arranged for the ZSA Moonlander, but I haven't followed through on that (yet).

What would be your dream setup?

I am a big fan of having a lot of screen real estate. I already have my four-monitor setup that takes up nearly my whole visual field with two stacked monitors and a vertical monitor on each side, which are ideal for horizontally compact long text.

I use all these monitors regularly, especially when I am developing, and I even further use my KWin scripts to grid and tile windows in various layouts within each monitor, and I further take advantage of several virtual desktops I can swap between for another high level of window grouping. The only reasons I don't have more monitors are hardware limitations and practicality.

Because of this, I have a fantasy of the future of AR, where screens can all be virtualized by something like AR glasses, so that perhaps an office would only need to have a variety of blank white shapes upon which screens can be dynamically rendered as needed.

This could allow for a variety of creative new shapes for interfaces that wouldn't be possible with physical monitors, and screen real estate would be much more scalable without as much physical limitation and cabling. I say this as a frontend-leaning web developer, so some might consider me a traitor to my own kind for wanting an increase in the number of different screens we'll have to consider.

I don't know how soon or viable this future is, but I am already this far in my mad-scientist/pretend-space-captain setup that spawned merely from the desire to enhance my productivity without hurting my hands, so I might as well take it to the next stage once possible.

Portrait photo credit: Emilio Mesa

I’m Brad, a builder. Currently I’m working on a Phlex on Rails video course. It’s my first video course and if it works out commercially, I’m hoping to create more that teach people how to build enterprise apps with SAML, SCIM, etc., how to integrate AI into Rails apps, use Sitepress for content management, etc. I’ve found that lately I really enjoy teaching people about things I’d like to see advance in the Ruby ecosystem that I think are hidden gems. Pun intended.

Before that I founded and bootstrapped Poll Everywhere into $10m+ ARR.

Outside of work, most of my time is spent being a dad to three girls and being present at all the stuff they love doing. On the rare chance I have time to myself, I enjoy outdoor activities like kayaking, backpacking, etc. I think the reason I’ve started to combine hiking with working is so I get the best of both worlds.

What hardware do you use?

I have several workstations and three Moonlander keywords, two with The Platform and one with a Tripod kit.

Since I have many workstations, I find it’s important to network them all together, so I built out a UniFi network to keep things in sync including a 48 TB NAS and a 10 GB switch to link it all together.

Let’s check out the workstations.

Indoor workstation

My primary workstation is an M1 Mac Studio with 32 GB RAM and a 1 TB SSD, which I have hidden in a box out of sight beneath my desk. Connected to it are three 27” Apple Studio Displays that float above my desk with LCD Arms.

I don’t like a lot of stuff on my desk, so I always have cable management boxes beneath it to hide my workstations and all the wires.

Outdoor workstation

My secondary workstation is outside in the summer beneath an oak tree. It’s an M2 Mac mini with 16 GB RAM and a 1 TB SSD.

When it’s not in use, I cover it with waterproof BBQ covers.

In the winter I keep it in my garage because it rains for a few months in northern California.

Ultraportable hiking workstation

Since I live in California where it’s sunny most of the year and the weather is 20-25C/60-80F, I built a hiking rig so I can get exercise and fresh air when I code.

I wrote an article that goes into the details of each component.

Sports practice workstation

My last and final workstation is another M2 MacBook Air that I keep in a much smaller pack to take to kids' practices so I can be productive on smaller tasks.

And what software?

I run macOS on all of my desktops and am really deep into the Apple ecosystem, for better or worse. I spend most of my time coding and writing with Zed & iTerm, creating videos with Screen Studio, and asking lots of questions to ChatGPT via the Chat UI. I haven’t found agentic coding to be that useful yet since I rarely work on projects that require lots of boilerplate.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

My keyboard setup is a weird hybrid between Mac & Moonlander defaults for the first layer.

The outer keys are set up to have shortcuts, like pulling up the Emoji picker.

I have the second layer keys mapped to two things:

1. The left side I moves the mouse cursor around the screen and clicks on things. This surprised me the most when using the Moonlander—I found that I prefer to use the mouse via the keyboard since I can keep my hands on the keyboard. I still keep a Magic Trackpad between my keyboard halves for when I need to pinch to zoom, scroll, or do something when my hands leave the keyboard.
2. The right side is mapped to macOS shortcuts like launching Spotlight, switching between apps, enabling Exposé, etc.

I don’t consider myself a leet keyboard user, which is why I’ve been surprised at how much I prefer using it to interact with GUIs over other methods. I call it “Ewwy GUI.”

What would be your dream setup?

An iPad Pro running macOS. Since the keyboards suck on Apple laptops and kill my wrists, I dream about a day where I can plug a Moonlander into an iPad and run Zed & iTerm for my writing and code.

I’m tempted to hook a Voyager up to my ultraportable hiking rig, but I worry I’d fall for that and end up buying three more for my other workstations.

My name is Alexia: hedgehog lover; lifelong learner; terminally online.

I’m the technology lead at a midsize charity in the UK, which means finding solutions to problems that we can ill afford. They range from creating Excel templates with Power Queries and Macros, to writing bespoke web apps to extend our CRM’s capabilities, to spinning up Docker containers on our $10/mo VPS. Mostly it means I’m good at googling for answers.

I also translate technical jargon into English for my colleagues, and stop companies from exploiting charities’ ignorance of what technology they actually need (happens far more often than it should).

When not problem-solving at work, I like to solve problems at climbing gyms’ walls. I also jump from hobby to hobby thanks to a desperately short attention span—from video gaming to digital painting, to photography to online streaming, to bingeing leftist video essays to Reddit commenting. My next obsession is probably going to be DIY/woodworking.

And yes, there was a brief period when I was obsessed with custom keyboards, until the Voyager actually became my endgame and probably saved me hundreds of £££s!

I love learning new skills and obsessively researching my latest hobbies, which is great for honing my imposter syndrome, but sometimes helpful to others sharing the same hobbies and interests, such as users in r/zsaVoyager!

What hardware do you use?

My latest acquisition is a Little Giant Ladder Veloci... oh wait, you meant computer hardware!

My daily driver is either my MacBook Air that follows me around, my MacBook Pro that stays at my desk, or my iPad Pro that lives on our couch.

At my desk is my ZSA Voyager and Magic Trackpad sitting in front of a new Samsung Neo G9 57" monitor and a pair of Donner Studio Monitor Speakers. I also keep an Apple Magic Keyboard around solely for the Touch ID, until I'm finally brave enough to gut it for the Touch ID module or if Apple ever releases Face ID for desktops; whichever happens first!

Having spent the last 2+ years working in bed, I've gone from missing my old multimonitor setup to embracing the single-monitor workflow. More importantly, I've had plenty of time to research (queuing up YouTube videos) and ultimately deciding to go with an ultra-ultrawide setup.

The Neo G9 is kind of the dream monitor for me, with the huge screen estate, high pixel density, and plenty of headroom with a maximum 240hz refresh rate!

Picture-by-Picture mode solves the bad aspect ratio problem when screen sharing with colleagues, but I've also been using it for improved automatic windows management with Amethyst! I can have six apps on my “left screen” and my focus on the “right screen,” which still has a wider aspect ratio!

Of course, as a gamer I do have a gaming PC hiding under my desk, sporting a Ryzen 3800X with 32 GB RAM and an RTX 3090, which honestly struggles to get anywhere near my monitor's full potential.

Beyond my office I have started building up my homelab with some UniFi equipment driving my network, a Mac mini hosting some Docker containers and a Beelink Mini PC running Proxmox that I haven’t started playing with, all hiding inside my secret bedroom cupboard! In fact, I just managed to run my first cable through the loft today before submitting this interview!

And what software?

Oh boy, this will be a long list!

Firstly, shout out my MVPs: Karabiner-Elements, Raycast, Amethyst and Arc (note: I'm on macOS).

Karabiner allows me to do things like create dual-function keys on the laptop keyboard, e.g. Capslock = Esc / Super Key; auto-toggle Function keys vs Media keys based on focused app; and - Fn + HJKL for Vim-like navigation. But my favourite modification is my homebrewed “Layered Shortcuts,” where Super + Letter initiates a shortcut layer, and the next keypress launches the app or runs the command I assigned. I can jump to whichever app I want to instantly without knowing which screen, workspace, or when I last focused on it.

Raycast is basically a supercharged version of Spotlight, which I prefer over Alfred, especially with its massive ecosystem of extensions. My favourite feature is probably the calendar command, which brings my upcoming appointment to focus when triggered, and I'm already joining my meeting by hitting Enter next.

My favourite Raycast extension is probably Salesforce Search—letting me quick search contacts or opportunities without leaving my current app!

Oh and another amazing feature is that pretty much every command can be accessed in shell via a deeplink, which in turn makes them accessible via Karabiner or anything that can run shell scripts or commands!

Next up is Amethyst—which would take a full-hour session to fully cover, but basically it emulates Linux windows managers —i.e. automatically resizing my windows to keep everything visible on screen. It's by no means perfect but lands in the sweet spot of ease of use and customisability, particularly useful on an ultrawide monitor!

Finally we've got the Arc Browser, which is sadly no longer being actively developed, after making waves with their innovative Sidebar for Tabs design and arguably the most useful feature: seamless navigation between Workspaces in conjunction with Profiles.

I can switch between my personal and work workspaces with a quick shortcut, separating not only my tabs but also cookies and logins sessions completely. No more accidentally opening your personal YouTube account during a work call or fighting Salesforce login sessions when you're playing with sandboxes!

I have yet to find an imitator that fulfills all my needs (Zen is the closest but still has little niggles), but I really should switch before Arc stops getting maintained at all!

Beyond that, I use Parallels daily to access the all-important Windows version of Excel (Mac version sucks!) for work (shout out to their coherence mode); 1Password for all my credentials (shoutout to their ssh agent!); Shortcat and Superkey to add additional keyboard shortcuts in lieu of mouse movements; Texts.com (and more recently Beeper for messaging. Warp ended up being my terminal of choice (with AI features off) since it has a lot of QoL features out-the-box without any complicated config!

The rest I can't live without are probably Tailscale, Amphetamine, CleanShot X , Proton Suite, Spark, Obsidian, Aliento, AltTab, Ice, LinearMouse, Pushover, and Reeder Classic.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

I don't have a particularly impressive setup here, as mentioned in the hardware section. Just my trusty Voyager (with minimum tilts from the magnetic feet) and a Trackpad. I have a trackball somewhere but it means giving up macOS trackpad gestures, also I have no idea which of the moving boxes it’s in!

The Voyager was my first foray into ergo keyboards, and despite the rather deep rabbit hole ergo keyboards lead to, my wallet was very relieved that the Voyager was able to satisfy all my needs!

That said, I did eventually strip the top rows and outer columns from the board as I started limiting my finger movements to a single row from the home row, as well as reducing the use of my pinkies. Thank you, Robin, for letting me know about the Key Covers without having to pay for the full Moonlander Zip Kit!!

Whilst I was very excited to hit 90WPM (down from my average 130, and only on Monkey Type) on my first day, I soon decided to ditch the qwerty layout in favour of Graphite for two reasons.

• I wanted the full ergo experience, and qwerty is simply not it, and
• I was fed up with confusing the muscle memory when switching between the Voyager and my laptop.

Graphite has slowed down my typing speed significantly, but hopefully it's something I can regain in time.

Beyond Graphite, I was very excited to explore what layers and dual-function keys could offer. I began studying other people's layouts and watching Ben Vallack's videos before even receiving my Voyager. By the end of the first month of ownership, I'd gone through 80 layout revisions, experimenting with changes large and small, including QMK modifications such as magic keycodes and repeat keys.

If there's one piece of advice I would give, it's to iterate fast and iterate often at the beginning. I stuck with a particular thumb keys layout early on—which meant I'd developed muscle memories by the time I changed them, and it meant more time to redevelop my muscle memories again!

This is what I've settled with after about two months and 132 revisions. I'd put a lot of time into explaining my rationale behind the layout, and I hope it's valuable to some! I haven’t switched over to Chordal Hold yet, as I’ve got Achordion working exactly how I like it, but I know there’s been various updates that I should definitely check out when I can pull myself away from the latest DIY project!

Another thing that happened was that I started developing pain on my right thumb, probably from holding the thumb key frequently for the mouse layer, which I choc chalked up to the Kailh Brown switches being particularly heavy. After some research and experiments I settled on the much lighter and linear Ambient Nocturnal (20±5 gf) switches for the thumb keys, and Ambient Twilight switches for the remaining keys—despite being a diehard tactile fan for years!

I also experimented with clamping the keyboards on my armrest, but found my shoulders and arms feeling stiff after a long day’s work. Plus using it on my desk now means easier access to my trackpad, which proves invaluable, especially on a 57" monitor!

Finally, I got a foot pedal working as a layer switcher (another shout out to Robin for alerting me to Kontroll). I was going to use that to activate my mouse layer to ease my thumb pain but ended up not needing it once the pain eased off.

What would be your dream setup?

I think I've been very lucky with my current setup already, especially after blowing my savings on a Secretlab Magnus desk, dual UHD monitor, and Herman Miller chair!

So far my focus has been very functionality-based, and the aesthetics are next. That said, I do have a shopping list.

• Rollerblade casters for a smoother time rolling on my chair;
• An E ink display (maybe the TRMNL?) to keep an eye on my homelab and smart home devices;
• A second desk for my art and craft projects;
• Integrating the Touch ID and battery into the Voyager;
• Some bookshelves for my knickknacks; and finally:
• Decorating my office with a coat of paint, some mood lighting and putting up my art collection!

I’ll also be focusing on my UniFi set up with additional cameras, switches, new NAS, redundancy etc.!

Hi, I'm Lily! I'm a senior software engineer working primarily with Java. I'm also quite fond of Kotlin, Python, and Bash. Recently I've also started to learn some Svelte and I really like how succinct the syntax is. I'm very interested in automation, so I always try to come up with little scripts to automate mundane tasks, both for work or outside.

Outside of work, I play videogames and I also try to explore my creativity by doing fun side projects. One side project that I'm currently working on is kittypoker.org, a planning poker app with a beautiful Catppuccin color palette. It's still in early stages at the time of writing.

Aside from that, I like to play around with makeup and photo/video editing every now and then, and I have a too-big-to-handle list of random interests that I will, probably, someday, get back to, at some point in time, definitely. 🙈😊💄

What hardware do you use?

I use a MacBook Pro 16-inch for work (though I wish it was a 14-inch model, I hate carrying this heavy laptop to the office once a week), and a personal desktop PC with Ryzen 5800x3D CPU, 64 GB of DDR4 RAM and an RTX 4080 Super GPU. I currently use two 27-inch monitors; both are 1440p and support 144hz+ refresh rate. I normally have the work computer connected to one of the displays, while the other is always connected to my desktop PC.

Two Planck EZs make my typing smooth and comfy every day, and I use a Logitech Lift mouse and a Razer Basilisk V3. I use an Elgato Key Light Mini for meetings and videos. I also have an Insta360 X3 camera sitting on the extended arm, though I mostly use it when I go skiing.

I also have a 14-inch MacBook Pro, but I don't use it nearly as much as the desktop PC these days.

After building my desktop PC, I sent a few pics to a friend and he called me “saint mama of cable management.” Not sure if I'm worthy of the title, so we can let the readers decide.

And what software?

I use macOS for work, and in my desktop I use Windows with WSL2 for development. I have a few pieces of software always installed on my machines to improve my productivity.

For macOS, I use Alfred Powerpack for clipboard management and automating a lot of tasks. Ice Menu Bar is a must! CleanShot X does the job on screenshots and OCR, and Numi is my calculator. KeepingYouAwake prevents the Mac from going to sleep.

For Windows, I use WSL2 and Microsoft PowerToys. Advanced Renamer handles batch renaming of files/folders with regular expression support, and Ditto is my clipboard manager. I use Image2PDF and PDFsam for PDF manipulation, because I prefer when this kind of task runs locally when possible.

For all systems I use VS Code for working with most projects, a terminal configured with ZSH, Powerlevel10k, Zellij, and Catppuccin-Macchiato color palette on almost everything. I also use IntelliJ IDEA for Java/Kotlin projects.

I have a lot of custom aliases to help me be more productive on the terminal, but the list would be too big to add here. Whenever I find time to clean them up and put them in a public repo, I'll share it in my GitHub.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

My main keyboard is a Planck EZ that I absolutely love! I like it so much I actually own two of them, usually one stays connected to my work computer while the other is connected to my personal desktop PC. I use Colemak-DHm as the base layout, and many other layers that you can check on in ZSA's configurator tool.

I also go deeper over the details of how I use the Planck EZ as a software engineer on a blog post I recently wrote.

I have Epomaker Nude Pink switches on one of the Plancks and Epomaker Flamingo switches on the other.

Keyboards in the picture: ZSA Planck EZ (two of them!), Corne v4, Keychron Q1 HE, and Redragon K621. Also in the picture: a 16-key macropad and a few prototype PCBs for something I'm slowly bringing to life as a passion project.

The Corne keyboard is quite fun and it's my first split keyboard. While I like it, I do miss having a few extra keys. Maybe in the future I'll get to try ZSA's Voyager 👀

What would be your dream setup?

I'm quite happy with the setup so far, but there are two improvement ideas that always sit in the back of my mind, waiting for the right time for me to put them into practice.

The first idea would be to either replace one of the 27-inch monitors with a 32-inch OLED one, or try an ultrawide OLED display, though I'm not quite sure how well that would play with my limited desk space.

The second idea I keep thinking about is to get a smaller and lighter laptop, maybe a 12-inch one that could fit into my purse, such as the Framework 12, or something like a GPD Win Max 2.

Come to think of it, maybe a dedicated microphone to improve my audio on calls could also be a nice way to improve my setup.

I’m David Wake, an “eclectic” writer; which means a) I use semicolons outside of programming, b) I write in all sorts of genres (science fiction, fantasy, adventure, satire, comedy, cosy mystery, samurai Japan, and a novel about a pub crawl), and c) I’m difficult to market. With 14 novels and quite a few in the pipeline, it’s “What do you like to read, ’cos I’ve probably written something you’d like.”

I’m an indie author who co-runs a collective of indies, New Street Authors, here in the UK, and I’ve even co-written a nonfiction book on why and exactly how to self-publish, Punk Publishing.

Oh, and I invented the Drabble, which is a story of exactly 100 words, and I live in the UK within smelling distance of a chocolate factory.

As for outside of work, I like writing, so I do that. That’s not really sensible, I know.

What hardware do you use?

I don’t care.

Seriously, I know interviewees on this newsletter go on about their setups to Star Trek technobabble levels, but I genuinely don’t care. I could look it up, I suppose, but why? What does it matter? These days, it would be difficult to buy a PC that wasn’t up to the job of writing novels. Once it’s powerful enough to edit video, then I’m happy. (A definition of “happy” that includes swearing at the damned thing when it decides to save, taking forever, when I was in the zone!) So, my PC is old, ancient, and bloated with all sorts of things that have been installed over the years. I ought to upgrade, but every time I’ve done this, some useful pieces of software have stopped working.

For a man who has a software engineering science degree, used to work in computer science research (we were trying to invent the internet, but didn’t), has written four technological near-future SF novels and does so in a one-to-one scale starship, I am more of a Luddite than I ought to be.

I have a left-handed vertical mouse, an Aurtec. I spent a while finding one that fit my hand nicely. This one, which I just turned over to read the printing there and so dazzled myself with the laser, is the third I’ve had of these.

I’ve an ErgoDox EZ. I have to turn this one over every time Oryx asks me if it has a logo or not. It does.

I did make my own wooden tenting kit. When I bought the keyboard, I didn’t get any legs, so, after using paperbacks to find the right angle, I found two door knobs that gave just the right tilt for me. My kit has blobs of thermoplastic that I moulded—“Ow, ow!”—to my palms, so I know when I’m in the right place for typing. I do need to redo these, as they’ve slowly worn smooth and my hands have started sliding off.

And what software?

For writing, I use Word (with OpenOffice in the background for when Microsoft mess things up and stop me using what I’ve paid outright for). Other than that, it’s Excel (accounts, tracking progress), Lazarus (an open-source Delphi clone with Pascal as its backend), Adobe Photoshop Elements 10 (book covers, etc.) and Adobe Premiere Elements 10 (video editing, which I used to do and don’t want to give up).

And Mozilla Thunderbird for email and Mozilla Firefox for internet browsing.

And WordWeb, which is a marvellous thesaurus program I heartily recommend.

And AutoHotKey!

I’ve also written a couple of programs, like my Write Click, using Lazarus to help me organise myself and my writing, and to convert documents to the .epub ebook format.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

I use a custom layout with custom keycaps (and I have loads of other keycaps in a chocolates tub).

As I use Word more than twice as much as Excel, Photoshop, Lazarus, Firefox, etc., put together, it made sense to prioritise that. So, if it’s slightly tricky to press, say, “=”, then so be it—I don’t use an equals sign in my fiction. This is, to my mind, the key (Editor: That’s a dreadful pun)(Copy edit query: Is this really you?) to customising your keyboard: fingers on the easy keys to reach for the common stuff and if I have to move my hands for those once-in-a-blue-moon symbols, then fine.

But it was hard to work out.

It’s like a Fifteen Puzzle game, shuffling the tiles around and getting nowhere as there isn’t enough space to sort things. In the end, I got myself a huge macropad and took everything off the ErgoDox. Then, when I needed something, I brought it back onto the ErgoDox. Starting a novel with “Once upon a time...” I realised I needed an “o”... and a Shift key, and an “n” and “c”, “e” and so on. That’s an exaggeration; I knew I needed the qwerty keys, of course, and the numbers, but with the others, it really was like that. Putting the Shift key under my thumb (aren’t thumb clusters great) freed two other keys, and moving Backslash meant I could get the cursor keys in the proper shape and so on and on. It’s always going to be a work in progress. For example, there’s a yellow key just here with an X on it that doesn’t do anything at all.

Before I bought an ErgoDox, I used a Logitech K350, which is slightly ergonomically curved—a great keyboard, I won’t hear anything said against it; I’ve written novels on it. Anyway, I’d been using all its function keys for shortcuts and I took this approach over to the ErgoDox. So I have dedicated keys for italics, copy, paste, WordWeb, and my own program.

I’m left-handed with the mouse, as I developed a strain injury in my right hand. This change altered the way my imagination worked, which was very odd, and I guess it sparked my interest in ergonomic keyboards. So, with the mouse, I highlight something and then I have individual keys on the right hand for copy, paste and delete.

I have a lot of function keys on my layout, and these are mapped by AutoHotKey to generate other keystrokes, mouse movements, and even whole phrases. For example, I created a menu button (red square), so Menu, then “d” gives me the date. I don’t think I’ve typed my email address in years: menu, “e”—done.

I also put the apostrophe under my right little finger as I use dialogue far more than a semicolon, and then I thought, a semicolon is really just a big comma, so Shift-Comma is a semicolon and Ctrl-Comma is a left angle bracket. I use an em-dash all the time, so I’ve a dedicated key for that. Or rather, Dash, Shift-Dash for em-dash and Ctrl-Dash for interrupted speech.

“Can you give me an example of interrupted speech, because–”

“There you go.”

“Thanks.”

It goes back to my playwriting days, when interrupted dialogue was my thing.

I think one key (Editor: That dreadful pun again)(Copy editor: Are we really going to let him put words in your mouth?)(Editor: They’re good words, so sure) to switch (Editor: Oh, honestly)(Copy editor: …?)(Editor: One more, and I’m cutting him off) things up is deciding at what level to customise. As I’ve said, I use em-dash a lot, so I’ve a dedicated key for it. One of my heroines is called Earnestine, so in Word “e#” is autoreplaced to “Earnestine.” However, my indie collective “New Street Authors” is something I write in emails as well, so that’s Menu, “n” via AutoHotKey.

It all gets very complicated to explain. I try, but people’s eyes glaze over.

A lot of this AutoHotKey business could be replaced by Oryx now that it has long macros, but it doesn’t do today’s date.

I only have two layers, one for writing and the other for a combination of web browsing on the left and Photoshop on the right. There’s also vague attempt at a numeric keypad. I’ve preferred to stack stuff on the main layer and use Shift and Control, rather than having other layers.

It’s all a rabbit hole, of course.

I really like having keys that tell me what the key is. The idea of blank keycaps seems strange to me, but then a chocolate box of keycaps probably seems strange to you. I recently had a problem of my little finger hitting Cursor Up instead of the apostrophe. When I had to Shift-Apostrophe for double-quotes and missed, I was suddenly at the top of the document, typing away in the wrong place. So, I got some Sugru and moulded a keycap with a wall that my finger would have to jump over to hit the wrong key. It looks ugly; I need to spray-paint it, but it works really well. (I wonder if I can use this idea to justify buying a 3D printer.)

What would be your dream setup?

The Dexterity App from my novel, I, Phone, is a system whereby you wave your hands in front of you and make complex finger positions and hand movements. No, no, wait, that was a comedy; and you’d have to memorise 1,024 positions, you’d get RSI and you’d tie your fingers in a knot.

The main issue I have is that I move from keyboard to mouse to keyboard and back again. So, I’d like a mouse built into the keyboard. There are some around—KeyMouse, for example—but that seems to have too many keys, looks heavy, and it’s expensive. I’d like something that uses the Microwriter/Cykey codes. They do appear difficult to learn, but it was easy, and my muscle memory is still there despite not using one for decades. The Microwriter was a six-key device invented by Cy Enfield on location when he was directing Michael Caine’s breakthrough film Zulu. Spock uses something with a similar keyboard layout in Star Trek: The Voyage Home.

A mouse, or rather two mice, with those keys built in, would be amazing.

I so want this that I’ve started building one. Unfortunately, hardware is not my forte. Why can’t ZSA make one? Come on, guys, I’ve got all the ideas and plans ready.

(Copy editor: That was fun!)(Editor: Yes, but make sure to strike all our chatter from the final.)

I'm a professor in the field of information science at Drexel University in Philadelphia. I also did my PhD at Drexel, so Philadelphia feels quite like home at this point. (All the more so since my husband and I bought our first house just over a year ago.) I’m originally from the Milwaukee area in Wisconsin.

At work, my main role is teaching in our human–computer interaction and user experience program, though I do some research, most of which is about understanding how people interact with digital systems and generating design insights for improving those systems, especially from an ethical perspective. My official title is Associate Teaching Professor, which indicates that my job is teaching-centered and that I’m midcareer.

I write a lot in my work—emails, lesson plans, papers—so typing and word processing are the primary things I do on the computer.

Outside of work, one of my biggest hobbies is writing novels, which also involves a lot of typing. (I'm not so romantic as to write a novel by hand, though for early-stage idea generation I do prefer paper.) I have several novels in the proverbial desk drawer at this point; someday you'll find my work in a bookstore.

Off the computer, I am an ultra-distance runner.

I never did any sports growing up—in fact I was quite overweight for my first twenty years. Then my mom signed up my whole family for a local 5K race, and I fell in love with the training. I ran marathons for a few years, then was drawn to even longer races. Now every year I run one or two 100-mile races, plus some shorter distance events.

My most recent 100-mile race was the Western States Endurance Run (which I had been trying to get into for nearly a decade!). My training involes about ten hours of running each week, plus time lifting weights and swimming.

I also practice classical guitar (though not as much as I'd like during busy training seasons), and I take care of a growing orchid collection (twenty and counting, from nine different genera). And I do a lot of traveling!

What hardware do you use?

My main computer is a 14-inch MacBook Pro that I carry back and forth to campus every day. When I'm at home (where I do most of my typing), I plug it into my Apple Studio Display, which is connected to my ErgoDox EZ.

I use a Logitech MX Ergo wireless trackball mouse and an Uplift height-adjustable standing desk.

And what software?

I type into TextMate probably more than any other piece of software. It's a simple but powerful plain text editor that I've been using since 2007, when I got my first Mac. Using TextMate, I write all my lesson plans in Markdown, and I write my research papers in LaTeX.

If I am working in Markdown and need a WYSIWYG editor for some reason, I love Typora.

If I need a word processor, I gravitate toward Apple Pages. I try to use Microsoft Word as little as possible, though since my university is a Microsoft 365 subscriber, I have to use it for many things at work.

For fiction, I write in Scrivener, a kitchen-sink app for managing large writing projects.

And for my personal notes, I use Bear. For many years I used Evernote, but the software got too bloated for me, and I didn't need all the new features they were adding. For me, Bear is perfect, not least because it uses Markdown!

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

I used to use a Microsoft ergonomic keyboard, but the one I had for many years conked out after the news came out that Microsoft was discontinuing their ergonomic keyboards, so I explored other options (and upgrades).

Meanwhile, I had switched to typing in the Colemak keyboard layout in 2017. My brother had switched to Dvorak the year before and was saying how great it was, so I did some reading about keyboard layouts and naturally decided that Colemak was better. It took a few months to make the switch, and I haven’t looked back. Anyway, it was a plus for me to be able to have a keyboard whose keys were physically arranged in Colemak.

Enter the ErgoDox EZ. Because most of my computer work is typing—nothing too fancy—I don't make use of all the capabilities the ErgoDox offers, but it's still been well worth it. I mostly use a single layer, though I have a second layer set up for things like controlling the key backlighting and a numpad.

My favorite feature of the keyboard is having Backspace where most keyboards have Caps Lock, as suggested in the getting started documentation. Besides that, I have a single key assigned to launch Spotlight with my left index finger or thumb. I also have two keys assigned to 5 and 6 to let me hit those buttons with either my left or right hand, depending on the situation, since I'm apparently not that disciplined a typist.

What would be your dream setup?

What I have is pretty close! Sometimes I'd like a nicer chair—I use a wobbly stool that came with my Uplift desk. But the thing is, I like how my somewhat uncomfortable seat prompts me to stand up after a while. If the chair were too comfy, I'd just be sitting all the time! I would love a second Studio Display, though!

I’m Aditi Basu, a former oil engineer turned effective altruist (EA) focused on reducing as much animal suffering as possible. A few months ago, I left the corporate grind to focus fully on solving the problem of animal suffering (including farmed animals). I’ve spent these months doing “cheap tests” to figure out my niche in this space. I currently spend my days building a project called “Amplify for Animals” that aims to help people help animals in the most cost-effective ways possible. I also run the Effective Altruism chapter in Melbourne, Australia.

Outside of work, you’ll find me cuddling and talking in baby language to my three cat babies. They’re such a bundle of joy, and I never cease to take in just how adorable they are.

I'm also in the process of rekindling my love affair with climbing after a brief fling with Brazilian jiu-jitsu (BJJ). But after a broken nose, wonky finger, and a perpetually cracking ankle, I'm now back on the wall, trying to remember how to crimp without crying. I'm also lacing up my running shoes again after a seven-year hiatus!

Off the wall, you’ll find me nose-deep in nonfiction books—my favourite topics are productivity and behaviour science. I also spend a lot of time with my three cat babies.

I love being out in nature—through camping, hiking, or climbing. I'll admit, I've been slacking on my outdoor time lately, but I'm plotting my grand return to the wilderness!

What hardware do you use?

My desk consists of the ZSA Voyager keyboard, a Lenovo Yoga laptop, a Lenovo external screen, an ASUS webcam, Shokz bone conduction headphones, and an HP USB-C Dock G5 to connect everything up. I also use a Bonelk laptop raiser to make my screens somewhat level.

Contrast this to a year ago, when I only had my laptop and external screen. I had a really hard time trying to get myself to do any work in my study, even though I really wanted to. So I went on a mission to make my study as inviting as possible, and I went and did just that. I even have a scented candle to keep my study smelling amazing.

And what software?

My “productivity suite” includes Trello, Notion, Flocus, and Freedom. These are apps that support my work and keep me focused and make me a tad bit more efficient in my work.

Trello is what I use to manage all my tasks. Honestly, I can’t remember or imagine my life without Trello now, or maybe my memory has just gotten worse with age. Every morning, I set up my to-do list for the day on Trello before heading out on my morning walk. After my walk, I’ll sit down with a cup of tea and start working through this list. The satisfaction of that green tick keeps me going. I also use a “Capture” list within Trello to capture all tasks that pop up in my head while I’m doing other productive work.

Notion is where I store literally all my notes—meeting notes, productivity hacks, podcast reviews, book reviews, projects, etc. It’s my one-stop shop for…life that’s not admin! Its partner Notion Calendar is super user-friendly, and I use it to schedule all my meetings and events.

Flocus is great for Pomodoros. I usually use this when I’m co-working with friends. On days that I feel a little distracted, I use Freedom—during a working session, it blocks all the sites that I find distracting, such as social media and messaging apps like WhatsApp.

On days I feel like I need a little pick-me-up, I’ll put on some music on Spotify.

On the days my mind feels a little busy, I do a bit of journaling on Day One.

Brave was my bleak attempt at rebelling against Google targeted ads. I don’t feel the difference 95% of the time, but I do prefer Google’s search engine in terms of the quality of search results.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

I use a custom QWERTY layout.

What would be your dream setup?

I think I’m quite content with my desk setup! The only thing I would add (if it was free!) is a height adjustable desk, but this is more a nice-to-have rather than a must-have.

I’m Taz, an Enterprise Agile Coach, Kanban Practitioner, Organizational Agility Strategist, and trainer with over two decades of experience in IT infrastructure, agile transformations, and technical coaching. My passion lies in helping teams and organizations achieve hyperperformance by blending modern agile methodologies with emotional intelligence and cutting-edge technology. I’m also an advocate for fostering innovation, continuous improvement, and impactful leadership through tailored coaching solutions.

Beyond my professional endeavors, I’m an author of three books, channeling my experiences and insights into writing. When I’m not coaching, training, or writing, you’ll often find me exploring new tech gadgets, engaging in philosophical discussions, or crafting systems to enhance productivity and creativity.

What hardware do you use?

My workspace is a harmonious blend of digital efficiency and analog charm. For computers, I use a small form factor desktop running the latest Ubuntu version for development tasks, and a 14-inch MacBook Pro with M4 Max chip for writing and design projects. A 55-inch curved monitor’s immersive visuals are complemented by dual 27-inch Apple Studio Displays, each equipped with attached lighting to reduce eyestrain. My input devices are the Logitech MX Master 3S in Pale Gray, with its ergonomic design and precision, alongside an Apple Magic Trackpad for versatile navigation. An electric standing desk allows for adjustable working positions, and a desk mount securely holds my 13-inch iPad Pro (M4) for easy access and optimal viewing angles.

A Shure SM7dB Dynamic Vocal Microphone with a distinctive orange pop filter ensures crisp audio quality and is connected through a white RØDE RØDECaster Duo Compact All-in-One Audio Production Solution. An Elgato Prompter paired with the black Voyager, featuring custom yellow and blue cables from a specialized Etsy shop, adds a personalized touch.

For on-the-go productivity, I utilize the white Voyager Portable Work Station, which offers a compact and efficient solution for my mobile workspace needs. I employ the Ratta Supernote Manta for projects, consulting, and coaching. Its natural writing experience and durable design make it ideal for capturing ideas and organizing thoughts.

And what software?

To stay organized and innovative, I utilize a suite of powerful tools. Scrivener is my go-to for manuscript development, offering a comprehensive platform to structure and compose my books. Zoom, Microsoft Teams, WhatsApp, and Slack facilitate communication with clients and teams across the globe.

Obsidian aids in Zettelkasten-based knowledge management, Todoist keeps my tasks organized, and eazyBI provides advanced analytics.

For structuring my training classes, I utilize the Atelier app on the Supernote Manta, which offers intuitive mind mapping capabilities to organize content effectively. Adobe Creative Cloud serves my design needs, and Airtime enhances my presentations and training sessions.

I leverage ChatGPT by OpenAI, Claude by Anthropic, and Google’s NotebookLM to enhance productivity and provide insights.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

My keyboard is more than a tool—it’s the centerpiece of my productivity. I use a ZSA split keyboard with a custom ergonomic layout designed to minimize hand movement and maximize efficiency. The coiled cable adds a personal aesthetic touch, while the RGB backlighting sets the mood for deep work. My keycaps are a blend of sleek design and functionality, tailored to fit my unique workflow.

I’m an analog enthusiast at heart and love journaling with high-quality notebooks and fountain pens. Onion skin notebooks and notebooks with Tomoe River paper are my go-to for their ability to handle fountain pen ink beautifully. I have a growing collection of fountain pens, ranging from the iconic Montblanc Meisterstück 149 to the exquisite Pilot Custom Urushi Vermillion.

What would be your dream setup?

I pretty much have my dream setup already. Though I would like to have a 32-inch Apple XDR display with a monitor arm so I can use it vertically to fully complete it.

I’m Magda. I work as a software developer, mainly focusing on the backend side. At home, I code to solve trivial problems—"the MFA authenticator application is slow, I will code myself a better one!”—and also do some more serious projects with friends. Besides that, I enjoy playing video games (A Short Hike and Plague Tale being my favorite ones), and although I wouldn’t call myself an artist, I have always loved fiber arts like crochet, knitting, and sewing. I make lots of scarves for friends and sew clothes for myself.

What hardware do you use?

The main machine is an Asus ROG Zephyrus G14 with an Asus TUF curved monitor—both hiding a mess of cables behind. For input devices I use the Voyager keyboard and Logitech Lift mouse. Since I listen to music a lot while working, there is also a JBL speaker and Beats Fit earbuds. At the office, I switch to whatever hardware is there but bring my Lift mouse and BM40 keyboard.

As the base I use an Ikea desk that is 140 cm wide and provides enough space for an all-purpose setup. When needed, I can put the sewing machine there. Recently I also started doing some painting, and the chair reclines so I can relax and play video games with the Xbox controller connected to the laptop.

And what software?

VSCode does most of the heavy lifting, with Windows Terminal running on a small screen all the time. I use Firefox at home and Arc browser at work because it’s great for organizing all the open tabs. For debugging I still prefer Firefox and its DevTools. Insomnia is a must-have for all API-related tasks, and Beekeeper for databases. Unless I’m writing some Markdown, I use kSuite for documents and Excalidraw for quick charts.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

At base it’s a standard QWERTY layout, but everything around it is a constant work in progress. I use a Voyager at home and a BM40 at work, and trying to get a similar layout working on these two has been quite a challenge. Having layer keys in the thumb cluster on the Voyager allowed me to move arrows one position to the left and have the Enter key on the bottom—but on the BM40, the Enter key is on the upper column, so often on Monday mornings I press Right Arrow expecting to hit Enter. The layout has a numpad on a left-hand layer with corresponding shift characters at the same positions on a separate layer. Under the right half I have all brackets, quotation marks, and numerical symbols. For some keys that are in the rightmost column, like Enter and Backspace, there is a layer shortcut symmetrical on the left hand so when using the mouse I don’t need to constantly move the hand just to press Backspace.

The only modification I did with the Voyager was lubing the switches. The BM40 has lubed and taped switches, foam under the board and under the top plate, and also sound-dampened screws. I purchased a Ducky blank keycap set recently and previously had been using some random one from AliExpress.

What would be your dream setup?

There is some cable management to improve, but mainly I would love to get the keyboard layout working on both Voyager and BM40, so there is less friction when switching between them.

I'm Arturo. I do app development for a living. Mostly frontend these days, but I also dabble in backend and data analysis. At my day job, I focus on developing the Roku and Android TV and Mobile apps for a company called Haystack News.

Outside of work, I like to get obsessed with different art forms. I've spent the last three years reading Brandon Sanderson's Stormlight Archive, although the last book was not what I was expecting, so I'm dialing back from his works to read some classics. I just finished 1984 and I'm about to start Perfume. I've also started writing my own stories, but consistency is an issue for me.

I love watching movies and shows that allow me to connect with parts of the human experience that I wouldn't otherwise experience in real life. I also love rewatching them to understand the storytelling tools the authors use to foreshadow and enhance the impact of an ending. Recent favorites of mine have been The Substance and Pantheon (TV show).

I also like coding for fun and learning tools that I wouldn't be able to use at work. My latest side project has been writing an app that scans your Spotify library and tells you which songs you can find on Bandcamp, an alternative music platform that pays its artists way better. By working on this project, I've finally been able to properly get into tools that have interested me for a long time, like Go, HTMX, templ, and server-sent events. At its core, this is a simple web scraper, but the challenge has been making it faster (scanning in parallel) and as accurate as possible.

The motivation for that project was that I've recently decided to depend less on streaming services in general and platforms with terrible privacy policies in particular. So I'm interested in owning my music, my e-books, hosting a home server for my shared files and photos, having a local media server to watch movies, etc.

Last but definitely not least, I'm a fan of wearing Crocs everywhere. I wear them at home, at the office, on walks, on dates, at the beach, at the store... Wearing Crocs all the time is the most “me” thing I've done in recent years, and for that I'm proud.

What hardware do you use?

I'm not a hard-core video game fan, an audiophile, or a 4K-only purist. Most of my time in front of the computer involves editing text files and running programs, so my setup focuses on that and isn't very fancy. I have a single 1080p ASUS monitor that sits on top of a thick, abandoned copy of Les Misérables (to bring it to eye level) and is connected to a computer that I bought from a friend, which runs on an Intel i9 CPU and a GTX 1080 graphics card.

I'm a Logitech fan, so I have the classic G432 headset and G502 HERO mouse. I also have a Vizio TV sitting next to my monitor for when I need to debug the TV apps I work on, though it's mostly off.

I used to own a mechanical Logitech keyboard, but I gave it to my dad after I purchased the ErgoDox EZ from ZSA. I made the switch because after years of working and playing computer games, my wrists and fingers started feeling a lot of strain. I have a friend with carpal tunnel syndrome who scared me into taking my wrist health very seriously. So, as soon as I started feeling pain, I looked into purchasing a split keyboard. I chose ZSA because I also think wired-yes devices are superior, both for their commitment to right-to-repair and because I think their designs are sick.

Having never owned a split keyboard before, the ErgoDox seemed like the safe choice for me. I got it with the tiny standing arms and wrist rests. Thanks to the online tool, I was able to get used to it and regain my regular typing speed within a couple of weeks. I haven’t felt any pain in my fingers or arms ever since, even when typing for long periods of time.

And what software?

For development, I have to use VSCode for Roku projects and Android Studio for... well, Android. These two are very slow, but I depend on them because of their specific platform tooling. When I work on personal projects, I use the Zed editor, which I like way more, and Vim for quick file edits.

My setup runs on Pop!_OS, which I switched to from Ubuntu after I messed up my setup by trying to install the drivers from my Nvidia graphics card. My computer wouldn’t turn on after that, and since it was the middle of the week I decided to just wipe everything and get back to work ASAP instead of getting to the bottom of the problem.

For day-to-day browsing, I use Firefox and the Startpage search engine, both focused on privacy, although I'm thinking of migrating to Librewolf after Mozilla's latest statements. I use Proton Mail for email and calendar, VLC for media, and Obsidian for note-taking and story writing. I keep everything synced across devices using Syncthing, and I use Bitwarden as my password manager.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

My setup is pretty straightforward. Since I wanted to get used to the keyboard as soon as possible, I remapped the sides of the keyboard to have the usual Left Ctrl, Shift, and Alt on the left side, and backslash, quotes, and equal on the right side. I also mapped the vertical keys in the middle (Meh and Super) to the shortcuts used for opening terminals on my home desktop and my work laptop, respectively.

Pretty vanilla, but gets the job done :)

What would be your dream setup?

I think the next step for me will be to get a standing desk. My company got us some for the office, and I really miss it when I'm working from home. I'd also like to upgrade my monitor, because I constantly get a screen-tearing effect when watching videos or playing games. Finally, I’m a fan of using a computer headset, but it becomes unbearable as the temperature rises in summer. I’d like to have a pair of desktop speakers and a standing microphone, which would easily fit in the middle of my split keyboard!

My name is Amanda, and I am a young woman trying to figure out who she is and what she’ll do. I live with my little family, which is me, my husband, and our two male cats, Wally and JJ. I am about to graduate again with my master’s degree in criminology and criminal justice, and I have no idea what I’ll do with my degree or in general. I don’t currently have a job, but I am considering freelance editing since I’m skilled in writing. I have also considered freelance photography on the side since I have photography experience and my own Fujifilm camera.

Outside of school, I enjoy playing a plethora of video games, many on my computer, but I also enjoy playing on consoles. I’m not particularly loyal to computer gaming or a certain console; most are good to me, especially classic consoles! One specific thing I like is optimizing and modding old games on my computer, such as The Sims games and The Elder Scrolls games. I also enjoy painting, Dungeons & Dragons, learning fantasy lore, fashion and styling, and the art of makeup. I love cats, I love traveling, and I think it’d be fun to try making scented wax.

What hardware do you use?

I chose each part for my build and put it together with the help of my husband, and I often have a lot of fun putting builds together. I even have one planned for my sister at the moment!

My PC’s current parts list goes as follows:

• Fractal Design Meshify C ATX mid-tower case,
• Gigabyte X470 Aorus Gaming 7 WiFi ATX AM4 motherboard,
• AMD Ryzen 5 2600X six-core processor (this is the next part to be replaced),
• G.SKILL Sniper X 16 GB (2 x 8 GB) DDR4-3200 CL16 memory,
• Seagate BarraCuda 4 TB 3.5" 5400 RPM internal hard drive,
• Samsung 870 Evo 1 TB 2.5" solid state drive, and
• XFX Speedster QICK 319 Radeon RX 7800 XT core 16 GB video card.

I don’t remember what power supply I have; at some point, my husband and I switched power supplies, and I lost track.

Besides parts, I have the following peripherals and accessories: LG 29WL500-B 29.0" 2560 x 1080 75 Hz Monitor, Logitech MX Vertical wireless optical mouse, Logitech Z323 30 W 2.1-channel speakers, Logitech BRIO STREAM webcam, EPOS | Sennheiser GSP 601 gaming headset, Razer Wolverine V2 Chroma gamepad—and, of course, my ZSA Moonlander keyboard!

And what software?

I realized I don’t use a lot of specialized software, but do I use my computer often! I run Microsoft Windows 10, and I use Microsoft Word for my schoolwork. I haven’t decided on one editing software program for photos, so I have a few of them, plus multiple game launchers and mod managers.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

My Moonlander keyboard has been with me for almost a year now, and I love it every day. I don’t have a specific layout; I’ve been mostly using the default layout since I’m familiar with that. This is my first customizable mechanical keyboard, so it’s still new to me. I was drawn to the ergonomics and customization options, especially choosing my own switches. I would love to add some custom keycaps to this keyboard in the future.

What would be your dream setup?

My current build is close to my dream setup; I always wanted something that could easily play any game I wanted to play. I’d probably install a more powerful processor for editing and processing photos, upgrade my monitor, and add a decent second monitor. I also have this idea of building a custom wooden desktop to install on a sit-stand desk frame with some adjustable monitor arms to create lots of desk space. The idea is an adjustable, versatile workspace.

Thanks for reading!

I’m Bruce Byfield, a freelance writer on free and open source software and the people who make it. I am also in the process of working with an agent and editor to prepare The Bone Ransom, my first novel, for publication. In my spare time, I collect First Nations art from the Pacific Northwest and give a scholarship at the Freda Diesing School of Northwest Coast Art. At home, I am kept entertained by two small rescue parrots.

What hardware do you use?

I use a workstation and a System76 laptop. The workstation is the latest machine custom-built by a local computer store. I’ve always used alternate operating systems, but even though Linux support is routine these days, I still like to choose exactly what I work with. The store I frequent is especially good at finding cases with great airflow. My current one never gets above 34 degrees Celsius, even on the hottest day of summer.

Instead of a mouse, I use a Wacom tablet on my workstation, which is far more ergonomic; using the stylus is like holding a pen. I fill the gap between the halves of my keyboard with a macropad raised on a box for arrow keys, which frees up keys on my Moonlander for more customization and puts the arrow keys in the most accessible spot. I wouldn’t dare put my coffee cup in the gap—I’m clumsy enough that such an arrangement would be a soggy disaster waiting to happen.

I also invested in a Herman Miller Sayl chair with lumbar support. As you can see, my Moonlander is part of my quest for ergonomic relief from my long daily hours on the computer.

A guilty confession: On the workstation, I sometimes alternate between a Moonlander and a Keyboardio Model 100 keyboard. Both are innovative in their engineering, and they're the top ergonomic keyboards for my purposes. The Moonlander is the easier of the two for beginners, but both have the added bonus of aesthetic design. The Moonlander has a science fiction vibe and would be at home in a spaceship’s control center.

On both keyboards, I favor keyswitches with light activation force and lesser travel time. They’re another ergonomic feature, one often overlooked.

And what software?

I’m a longtime Debian/GNU Linux user and was once employed by Ian Murdock. I use Bluefish editor for articles, and LibreOffice Writer for fiction. I use GIMP and Inkscape for editing images, but I keep telling myself that one of these days I’ll master Krita.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

My Moonlander is laid out for editing and writing in LibreOffice. Its layout is mostly on Layer 0, with some navigation features on Layer 3. Layers 2 &3 are the default Oryx layers, kept in case I need them for a reference. To navigate the layers, I use the number keys, which makes keeping track of the layers easier. One day I might do other layers for other LibreOffice modules, but I don’t use them much.

What would be your dream setup?

More or less what I have now. It emphasizes ergonomics. It’s expensive, but permits hours each day on a computer without many stress injuries.

Hi.

My name is Tobias Lidman-Strauss and I’m not cut out to be interviewed about this at all. Because I’m not a pro. I’m an enthusiast when it comes to all the things split-keyboard wizards ordinarily know. So, why am I invited to this particular party? I mean, I even predominantly work with a mouse.

See, I am an architect. And we don’t type, we draw. Luckily, since I’m one of the new school of architects that can’t even draw properly with a pen (even if I do own an old Wacom and do like to purchase stationery), at least I work with a mouse. And to tell you the truth, I can’t even touch type. I mean, I’d rather die than watch my keyboard when writing, but I have a peculiar style where my left index finger takes care of many more letters than it should. Etc. But I type around 80 words per minute. And I do love to type.

So. I’m an architect. I mostly design apartment buildings. I am from Sweden, and this is where I ply my trade. Since I mostly click things at work (except for writing all those emails), the keyboard is reduced to firing of shortcuts for functions (though not to be sniffed at, Autodesk Revit shortcuts are hardly Vim motions!). But that brings me to who I am and why I wound up on a ZSA blog. I am a person who doesn’t value productivity (Tell that to my boss!). But I do value, well, is frictionlessness a word? I subscribe to the idea that to grow into a tool and merge with it is one of the most amazing feelings you can have. It not only is the gift that keeps on giving, with small dopamine hits of satisfaction every time something works exactly the way you want it to, but even if that feeling was to stop— You’d still have a tool that you are very produc. . . oh.

But for me it’s important to clarify that I never ever wanted to become more productive. I’m a socialist from Sweden, after all! I just want my computer to do exactly what I want, or preferably, think. And to this day, I’ve not found a better way to do that than with a keyboard. See, ZSA, you should never have doubted me. I got there in the end.

Outside of work I do have an amazing daughter whom I have yet to introduce to computers and keyboards, which means she is yet another kid that will grow up understanding touchscreens before they understand the keyboard. A new world. I also have a wife who is wiser, kinder, more empathetic, more intelligent, and sexier than me. She is however, less adept than me at typing. So, that’s something at least.

Hobbies? Oh, boy. Here we go: I go on deep dives regularly. Not into the sea, mind you. Into new areas I previously knew nothing about. And in a sad turn for my paycheck, mostly stuff that doesn’t improve my—say it with me—productivity at work. And often ends up with me spending money. I’ve always been interested in programming (but not to help me design buildings, sadly), I’ve always read books (but not about architecture, sadly), I do make music. . . sound. . . well, noise on synthesizers (mostly hardware, but also via programming) at times. I recently learned to fly a kite. Also to repair pants with sashiko. Drill somewhat straight. Use a gas stove in the woods. I love to visit a good spa.

For being hugely into experimental music, I’m also quite adept at singing quite a lot of famous songs from musicals, if singing could be described as “remembering half the lyrics and reciting them off-key.” I like organizing things. I love boxes. Shelving. Fits well with the interests in drilling. I’m a sucker for all kinds of folders (digital or analog). Cooking was more fun before kids. Sake is more fun after (the) kids (go to bed). Tabletop RPGs and board games are great hobbies. I love a good waxed jacket, but also a suit. And old Carhartt replicas. Ties deserve to be around your neck, and not around your head (I say without pretty much ever wearing one).

History is fun. What food did they cook during the Renaissance? When did the first elevator make tall buildings a thing? Who is Robert Moses? (Do read The Power Broker by Robert Caro! It’s almost about architecture). When I was young, I thought I’d learn how to fly single-seater airplanes. I didn’t. I own several cameras, and part of me thinks I am as good as my grandfather, who used to be a photojournalist. Most parts know I’m not.

I like to run! As far and as slowly as possible. I must admit I do have a fondness for the occult (As Alan Moore always says, there is a reason why a magical Spell is spelled spell. And the spells are found in a Grimoire, i.e. grammar). And we are back to writing. The power of writing, and how it can change the world. I fucking love to write. As far and as quickly as possible.

See, I told you I am an enthusiast, not a pro. You just can’t be good at all this. At least I can’t.

What hardware do you use?

I use a computer. I don’t mean to sound snotty, and I’m particular about many things, but not computers. I’m too fascinated by them to care too much which one. I want them all.

And I’m on the long road of making computers feel less like objects and more like an extension of me. That has never meant using 3D glasses, or having a huge screen or the like. “Extension of me” means precision, not immersiveness. And even though I do enjoy the physical parts of computing (chunky bits of plastic and metal, the clacking of a keyboard, HARDWARE), I think after so many years pretending I’ll learn electronics and soldering any day, I have just realized I don’t care too much about the hardware as long as it’s amazing to touch and just works.

So yeah, I use a Macbook Pro. Never heard the fans spin, it doesn’t get hot, and I love the battery as much as any man can love a battery. I will probably move to a Framework running Linux at some point, as soon as they can provide me with an ARM variant of their right-to-repair laptops.

Other than that, I quite often use an external USB-C screen. An amazing product: Whip it out, connect one cable, you have another screen. Fold it again, put it on top of some books in the bookcase, and your tiny desk is no longer a mess of cords, but rather a place to do scrapbooking with your daughter. A small cheap panel such as the one I’ve got does not have the best color rendition, and the refresh rate is not on par with modern gaming screens. But it doubles the screen size of my laptop and requires just a single cable and no extra power brick. I do have a black cordless mouse from some gaming peripheral company (Steelseries?), which was their only product without tons of branding and blinking lights. It’s great, but their firmware doesn’t work on the Mac anyways, so I can’t set up macros for the keys.

I do have a Voyager Keyboard. The reason that I’m here. Other than that, I use a modular synthesizer (again, nice hardware that is all about workflow, and not at all about being productive or getting things done—for those who know, modular synths are the perfect analogy for my whole philosophy), and other strange synths like the Ciat-Lonbarde Cocoquantus. And pens. Pens are awesome.

And what software?

All of it. Many diverse interests have led to diverse software use. Proprietary and FOSS. Windows, Mac, Linux. I’m slowly circling back to more Linux, more FOSS, more configurable systems. And to be frank—mostly I want a system that changes when I want it to change, and not before and not without asking.

Right now my MacBook Pro runs AeroSpace as a tiling window manager, Karabiner-Elements to remap my built-in keyboard with home row mods and a few other things, JankyBorders to mark which window is active, and Homerow.app to enable me to use my keyboard for the odd mouse click when I’m lying on a sofa with my computer in an unergonomic position on my stomach.

I’m on Brave when it comes to browsers, because it’s good at randomizing fingerprints, which just feels like something everyone should do. I’m not paranoid, I know I’m not important, I just want to own my own data. I can freely share much about me (like in this interview), but it should be my choice.

At work I use a Windows computer because it’s needed for Revit, which I design in. Of course I can’t escape Excel (no one can, and people who say they never use it lie). This is not a comprehensive list, but now we come to the most important part of my setup.

“So, Tobias,” you ask, “what do you write this in?”

Emacs. Yes. Emacs. Why? Because it is the closest I’ve come to feeling connected to my hardware. Because you never need to think about how to connect files, programs, and activities (that is not true; you think about it a lot, because suddenly you can do it). If you keep everything in plain text files, anything can operate on them. Writing notes during work, journaling, emails, personal notes, sprinkling in to-dos in the middle of the text, being able to scrape them out, and syncing them to the phone as an actionable item is a completely new feeling. Well. 1970s new. Since everything is a text buffer, and everything is coded using Elisp, it removes barriers and everything is connected. And you can always try new stuff, because pretty much everything is compatible with plain text.

The downside is, as has been joked about for fifty years now, that you end up losing copious amounts of time because you want to configure it to be just right. But remember, I’ve already said I’m not interested in productivity, so that doesn’t bother me. Having 90% of my interaction with the computer in Emacs or the browser just makes me finally feel connected to the hardware. In Emacs, I use evil mode, which means Vim keybindings. They are better, and you will find them more commonly in other software, so again it makes more parts of the whole behave in the same way.

Try it!

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

I quickly learned when I started using the Voyager that home row mods are essential. Which made my life in my built-in keyboard miserable. So I’m now using Karabiner to get them right on my built-in keyboard as well. Took a while to get them to chord well and get the timings right. I’d almost say that is the best thing my Voyager has given me—a kick in the butt to start modifying my built-in keyboard as well.

It’s always a bit more of a hassle to get a non-English keyboard layout to work well than an English one, since many default shortcuts and macros are made for an English layout. That means that many standard configs will conflict with a Swedish layout. You also need to deal with å, ä and ö on a regular basis, and those added keys make me happy that the Voyager isn’t too minimalistic.

I use blank keycaps because I don’t like keycaps to give me false information, and they would because that is just what happens when you customize your keyboard. At least that is the official story. It’s probably because when I was 13, I knew a guy who spray-painted his keyboard black and understood FreeBSD. And I wanted to be him. I started with clicky white switches, because of the sound. I have now switched to a mix of Kailh Twilight (silent linear 35 g) around the stronger fingers and Kailh Nocturnal (silent linear 20 g) out by the pinkies. Also because of the sound.

I really have not much to add. I’m constantly tinkering. Everyone just needs to find their own way.

What would be your dream setup?

My dream setup would be to have a very quiet repairable laptop running Linux with a perfectly set-up tiling window manager, with a 13-inch screen and great battery life for daily use. That computer would be me.

I do already use an E ink device for books, but I’d like a larger one with a color screen to take notes during meetings. It would also have to be hackable so I could sync my entire life to it in plain text files and run Emacs on it, at least over SSH.

I would also love to have a desktop computer and a proper workspace at home. Right now, I’ve just decided it takes up too much space. Two large screens (well enough, as a window manager makes any more a tad superfluous for most uses), and a more ergonomic mouse. I used to be a gamer back in the day, so I just can’t find a way to accept an ergonomic mouse, but at some point I will probably just have to when muscle problems start creeping in.

The desk should be huge, I would love to be able to work on other more analogue projects next to the computer. Mostly I want to have a proper office/hobby room, where I can leave stuff ready to go, and get started quickly on a project when I get spare time—the dream of many a parent.

So. I actually mostly need an additional room. I guess I should call an architect. . .

[Editor's note: You can connect with Tobias through his site here. ]

I’m kind of an Odd Job sort of guy who grew up in a family of entrepreneurs. I don’t really have a title because I wear a few different hats. I do accounting and finance work, a little bit of website building and IT support for our business, and investment research for our family investment office. Outside of those professional adventures, I love to read novels, go on slow and easy long runs, and play whatever crazy games my kiddo invents for me. In what little spare time I have after all that, I tinker with my keyboard collection.

What hardware do you use?

I’m firmly planted in the Apple walled garden despite basically all my work requiring Microsoft Office software, so I’m typically found with my sticker-bombed MacBook Pro and iPad Pro. The two combined make for a nice and mobile two-monitor setup when I’m going back and forth between the office and home.

I’m rocking the ZSA Voyager after having used a number of other ortho boards (like the Keyboardio Atreus, the Keyboardio Model 100, Corneish Zen, and the ZSA Planck EZ) and use a Logitech MX Master as my main pointing device.

And what software?

Luckily for me, I don’t have to use too much specialized software—Microsoft Office for most of my work, a little bit of Notion, and a dab of VS Code every now and then. The only specialized software I use is Bloomberg for investment research and portfolio management. Because Bloomberg has no native Mac app, I end up running it in Parallels, which gets the job done for running Windows on a Mac.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

Like most people in this niche hobby, I’m constantly tinkering. For now, I’m settled on the Voyager with the Pro Red switches, though I have been eyeing the Sunset Tactile Choc switches for a more tactile feel. My layout is currently pretty simple, just three layers, because my use cases are also pretty simple.

I do a lot of work in Excel, lots of word processing, emailing, and just a little bit of web development. So, my layers are simply a main QWERTY layer (can’t teach this old dog new layouts), a numpad and navigation layer, and a mouse/media layer. I’ve got a few tricks using either double-taps or combos or held behaviors to help me get around more easily. I’m probably most proud of the double-tap behavior for the “special paste” on macOS, which is crucial for moving files around in the Finder (something I find myself doing all the time).

What would be your dream setup?

After now several years of tinkering, I’m lucky enough to say that I think I’ve got my dream setup down for the most part. I’m a fan of the minimalist approach, so I keep my workspace small and limited (as you can see in the photos) to encourage focus when I’m working and to help reinforce the idea that work is just a small facet of my life. Everything sits in a corner in my bedroom. I got a little desk that’s height-adjustable and allows me to stand and sit when the mood strikes.

Having a keyboard that can put my arms at shoulder’s width was a real game changer for me—it’s allowed me to get my laptop screen up and at eye level (with a secondary monitor that can either sit beside or above). I’ve avoided a lot of pain with this kind of setup. My job doesn’t require lots of screens, so I’m good with what I have, especially since it allows me to take my “dream setup” wherever I go. Those are the best kinds of dreams, right, the ones that follow you around?

Hello! My name is Juan, and I'm a father, husband, and controls engineer. I work at a company that creates custom automated machines for various industries. The machines can vary from a robot that unstacks pallets of large spaghetti sauce to a fully automated assembly station that can pick and place parts, weld, drive screws, and perform inspections through various lasers or vision systems. As a controls engineer I create the electrical layout and drawings/schematics. I also program the various components so a machine can do its intended task.

I live on the west side of Michigan. Outside of work, I enjoy spending time with my wife, six-year-old daughter, and Einstein, our eight-year-old labradoodle. We like most outdoor activities, including camping, hiking, boating, traveling, swimming, and biking. When we are indoors, we like to play board games, build Legos, read, and have family movie nights. In my free time I like to swim, watch soccer, exercise, and mess with my Home Assistant home automation setup.

What hardware do you use?

My desk starts with a Craftsman rolling toolbox on which a five-foot laminate desktop has been attached using 8020 aluminum extrusion.

I work on a Dell Precision 5690 that is mostly docked except when I travel to customer sites or attend meetings where I need my computer. When docked, the PC stays on the toolbox beneath my desktop to free up desk space.

For displays, I have two Dell UltraSharp 27 4K USB-C monitors on ergo monitor stands and a 15.6-inch portable monitor. For a mouse, I use a Logitech Lift vertical ergo mouse. My keyboard is a black Voyager with blank keycaps.

I can use this setup for either standing or sitting on a raised office chair. With this desk setup, I can move around the shop floor and close to any machine I am currently working on.

And what software?

Most of my time these days is spent in Eplan. This is the software I use to create electrical prints. That is where I lay out each electrical component on a machine and show the corresponding wiring that connects these devices. When researching how to wire components, I use Chrome and Adobe Acrobat.

On the programming side, most of our machines use Allen-Bradley PLCs (programming logic controllers) and HMI (human machine interface) displays, which are programmed in Studio 5000 Logix Designer and View Designer respectively. Throughout the programming phase, I will use various device-specific software to integrate robots, servos, and sensors as needed by individual machines.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

I have a black Voyager with blank keycaps. The blank keycaps took a minute to get used to. But I love them now. Plus, they elicit great reactions from people when they first see the board.

I have a small keyboard stand made of 8020 aluminum extrusion. To that stand I have added camera mount clamps and some MagSafe tripod adaptors that hold my keyboard halves.

I currently have a steep tenting angle. I keep playing with this angle as I chase my perfect ergonomic position. The mounts make it easy to change the position of the keyboard.

My layout has been customized to be left-hand-heavy. This allows me to keep my right hand on the mouse while accessing a number pad, navigation keys, Delete, Backspace, and Enter, as well as Microsoft and program-specific shortcut keys with my left hand. The layout also limits reach through the use of many layers.

What would be your dream setup?

Hardware-wise, I am really happy with what I have. Maybe add a zip kit to cap some of the switches I never use on my Voyager. I am sure that I will continue to tweak my layout for shortcuts. My full dream would be to work as a home/remote controls engineer and to build a workstation into our travel trailer. That way we could work remotely from home and from wherever the road takes us.

I'm Himesh, and I'm an actuarial analyst / data scientist at an actuarial consulting firm based in Australia. Most of my day-to-day work involves product development, analytics, and automation design. I've also recently been involved in AI R&D, which has been very fun to mess around with.

Since I aim to be a fully qualified actuary, I also study while working four days a week—these exams are no joke!

Outside of work, I love playing guitar and recording music. I find it a great way to get myself away from the technical, number-heavy work I do—although I play math rock, so maybe not as far away as I would hope! Still, there's no better feeling than jamming along with my favourite prog rock / jazz fusion tracks.

I also spend plenty of time with my dogs, Zeus and Pluto. Zeus is a 65 kg Great Dane x Mastiff, and Pluto is a Great Dane taller than myself on two legs, so it would be kind of hard to avoid them even if I tried.

What hardware do you use?

At the moment, I have a Mac M2 Ultra and a 32" 4K monitor for my at-home setup. I also have an iPad Pro, which I primarily use for study.

For my mouse and keyboard, I use the ZSA Voyager and Logitech MX Master 3S. I'm a big fan of the 3S because it has a silent click, which pairs nicely with my keyboard's silent switches (more on that below).

When it comes to music, I use the Arturia MiniFuse as my audio interface (I run my guitar through virtual amps) and have my PRS Mark Holcomb seven-string guitar as my workhorse.

When I feel like relaxing, I also have my Animal Crossing Nintendo Switch at the ready.

I also use mounts to secure my Mac and audio interface on the underside of the desk to increase desk space. I'm a big advocate for minimising desk clutter, as I find it much easier to focus.

And what software?

My primary software for notetaking is Obsidian (with Vim motions). I'm a huge fan of how minimal it can be, plus having all my notes saved in a transparent Markdown format is a huge bonus. I've also become an avid user of the LaTeX Suite plugin, which has allowed me to type up math faster than I can write it.

For coding, I use Positron, a VSCode fork by the folks behind RStudio. I mostly code in Python nowadays, but I also use R for stats-heavy work. I tend to be pretty picky with my theming (Gruvbox Material anyone?) but try to keep it consistent across all my software.

I use Zen browser, along with the Vimium extension to minimise my mouse usage. I find myself switching browsers often, although I always prefer ones that allow me to hide all the UI components to keep everything as clean as possible.

For music, I use Logic with Neural DSP plugins as my virtual amps.

In general, I choose / set up my software to maximise keyboard usage. I'm the type of person to spend forever learning all the different keyboard shortcuts —but I feel like it's paid off so far!

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

I've fitted my Voyager with Ambients Twilight silent linear switches. I really enjoy the feel (even more than the switches I had back in my standard mech keeb days) and would be keen to experiment with the Ambients Nocturnals (which are lighter).

I've actually removed the keycaps for the top ten keys and have left the stock red linears in. They aren't actually mapped to anything, but I like to fidget with them every now and then. The remaining keys have the stock blank keycaps.

I actually spent quite a lot of time coming up with / designing my keyboard layout —well before I actually bought the Voyager. Initially, I tried doing a complex layout that had no chording, but required you to remember which layer you were on (Ben Vallack had a video on something similar to this), but I found the cognitive overhead too much. Plus when I first brought the keyboard into the office, my workmates laughed at me because I failed to enter my password three times in a row...

In the end, I decided on a layout that has some light chording, although it is primarily designed so that opposite hands are used simultaneously (inspired by the Miryoku layout). I also use home-row mods which definitely took a while to get used to, but using modifiers like this has been significantly more comfortable—which is especially important since I constantly use shortcuts. In layers, I also keep the modifiers in the home row on the same hand that the layer key is pressed. I have these set up as a one-shot layer and sticky modifiers to reduce chording. My symbols layer was designed with coding in mind, and my navigation layer has been a huge time-saver when doing things in Excel / typing emails.

What would be your dream setup?

Honestly, I don't think my dream setup is too far off from what I currently have. While there's a couple of minor adjustments I would make (such as a better-quality monitor arm), I'm very happy with what I have. Of course getting my cable management sorted out would be lovely, but I always find a way to procrastinate.

P.S. If ZSA decides to release a 36-key low-profile keyboard, I would be keen to give it a shot!

Hey, my name is Sam and I am a software engineer based in Australia. Most recently I have been working remotely at a software scale-up building a web-based platform that uses machine learning and other modelling techniques for electrical grid design and analytics (primarily transmission and subtransmission—think geospatial data related to the long powerlines + lattice towers you see in outer city areas). I also have a personal consulting business that helps larger businesses get started on their machine learning processes—i.e. iteration with data collection, synthetic data generation and model training or fine-tuning for specific use cases.

Previously, I have worked in hardware control, orchestration, and data processing for companies in defence and science contexts. One of the coolest places I have worked is at a synchrotron facility, which is like a large timeshare microscope that generates light by bending electron paths for various types of imaging.

Outside of work my main passions are rock climbing, 3D printing, virtual reality, and electronics.

I think rock climbing as a hobby overselects engineers, particularly bouldering, which is very focused on creative problem-solving. If you’re reading this and have moved to a new city or are feeling lonely, I can’t recommend indoor bouldering enough for making new friends—or if you are an engineer, meeting even more engineers. Bouldering communities are generally extremely social and inclusive to newcomers.

I have been into 3D printing for over a decade (I got my first printer in 2012), with a focus on functional prints, and watching the progress over the last decade has been awesome. We have gone from building printers ourselves, babysitting prints, and neurotically re-levelling print beds to massive economies of scale, whereas a modern printer hardly breaks the bank, levels itself, and prints 10x faster than its predecessors. One less positive note on this is that the long-standing industry great, PRUSA Research, has been struggling to keep up with the aggressive competition it faces from market disruptors Bambu Lab, who focus on an easy user experience at the cost of openness. I own printers from both companies, but this is sad for me as a believer in open source and consumer-first practices, so I hope PRUSA’s latest printer improves their outlook and sells well—I plan to pick one up if Bambu continues to lock down their firmware.

Lastly, on VR: I love playing new VR games and experimenting with applications as they come out, seeing what’s possible and where the technology is headed. I’ve owned both the Apple Vision Pro and the Quest 3, and even as a bit of a VR zealot it seems obvious to me that we are fairly far away from it being a technology that will gain mass adoption. It’s just so hard to get the ergonomics where they need to be, particularly for immersive experiences that induce motion sickness in a large number of people. AR glasses are much better from this perspective and are rapidly improving, so I am excited for what we’ll see on that front in the coming years.

What hardware do you use?

I use a MacBook Pro for most standard dev work, and a dual boot desktop with a hefty GPU for VR and ML. For mousing, I use a Logitech G502 X Plus mouse; for keyboard, ZSA Voyager and some custom keyboards I had designed when I pursued a different form factor. My 3D printers are an original PRUSA MKIIIS and a Bambu Lab P1S.

My usual headphones are Focal Clear over-ears, but I also have some Thieaudio IEMs for when I need something lighter and portable. JDS Labs Atom stack has me covered for DAC and amp. My VR headset is a Meta Quest 3, connected via a Wi-Fi 6E wireless link.

I also have a few favourite hobbyist electronics tools. Omnifixo is an excellent soldering stand, and Saleae Logic Pro 8 helps me with debugging.

And what software?

The OSes I run are MacOS, Windows 11, and Ubuntu Linux. Raycast, Yazi, and AeroSpace up my productivity on macOS.

Previously I used Fusion 360 for mechanical CAD, but recently I’ve switched to Onshape. My PCB CAD go-to is KiCAD. My VR 3D modelling application is Shapelab. For non-engineering 3D modelling, Blender is the open source G.O.A.T.

Depending on context, the IDE I’m using is Cursor/VS Code, WebStorm, or Neovim. My preferred shell is Zsh.

For local audio transcription, I use whisper.cpp. For communications, it’s Discord and Signal.

My favourite (word)-le game is redactle.net, and my favorite VR game is HL Alyx. VR hardware support is the only thing keeping me hanging on with Windows 11.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

My most-used keyboard is the ZSA Voyager with a tenting angle achieved using some magnetic phone stands that I saw recommended in this YouTube video. I was using a Mistel Barocco MD770 previously because I have always liked split keyboards, but it’s just a regular QWERTY keyboard chopped in half. When I switched to the Voyager I adopted a custom layout because that was one of the major value propositions of the product (shoutout to Robin Leinonen for great postpurchase support) and I wanted to challenge myself in learning a new layout.

I thought if you’re going to go non-QWERTY, why not go full niche? I found this repo for the Recurva layout—I thought it looked good and liked that it was named after an Australian tree species, so I made a layout based on it with home row mods and some considerations for programming symbol layouts.

I also have a fallback layer to QWERTY for games that don’t support key rebinding. That was around ten months ago, and I have loved the experience of learning a new layout and tweaking as I go—the version control built into Oryx is awesome. I have two Voyagers since I like to have backups of items I am fairly dependent on.

Overall, I love what ZSA has done with the Voyager, and there is only one use case I have found that made me feel that an accessory, or some specialisation might be needed: laptops on the go! Sometimes working with a laptop can be more dynamic than you expect, e.g. you’re at a hackathon and moving around a room to collaborate, or picking up your laptop to run off to a meeting room. In these cases I think the Voyager could benefit from a 3D-printed casing + wiring + magnetic latch that allows for the keyboard to be quickly attached/interfaced to a laptop such that users could quickly transition to this “mode” and use the keyboard effectively while moving frequently. I have designed my own thin keyboard inspired by the Voyager that is specialised for this, but I am also working on a prototype 3D-printed chassis case that would support the Voyager with a 14-inch MacBook Pro. I’ll share it with the folks at ZSA if I find it useful when it’s more complete.

What would be your dream setup?

I am not that obsessed with dream setups, and what I have already leaves me pretty satisfied (I wish KVMs had better support for high refresh rates, and they were better with switching between computers/peripherals), but I do regularly experiment with new ways of doing things. I am very interested in using “spatial computing” to achieve the ideal portable travel setup, so I am always trying out new VR headsets and applications to see whether it’s becoming more viable to ditch “real monitors,” but as I mentioned earlier, the ergonomics—namely for weight and eyestrain—just aren’t there.

I am Patrick Emerson McCormick, a data privacy and cybersecurity attorney with a background in commercial litigation. I advise clients on all manner of regulatory compliance, data and security management, and preparations for all things that might go wrong in those areas. This is why my answers here could be interpreted as “terse.” I took a circuitous route to the law, first majoring in broadcast production, working at a news station, and pursuing a masters in filmmaking before dropping out to go to law school.

I live in the Sonoran Desert with my wife and three kids. We spend a lot of time enjoying the natural beauty, museums, and parks in Southern Arizona, on foot or on two wheels. I read a lot of literary fiction, with the occasional sci-fi thrown in. My wife and I are always crafting cocktails at home and have the stocked bar to prove it.

I'm in the nascent stages of setting up my own self-hosting system. I've enjoyed tinkering with Home Assistant and, as a data privacy attorney, want to move more of my digital interactions to something that's more fun and less invasive. I'm also constantly tinkering with an idea for a word processor built for attorneys.

What hardware do you use?

Being an attorney with limited technical know-how, my hardware setup is pretty standard. The vast majority of my days are spent on my firm's unremarkable Dell laptop. I have a personal laptop and an old (2012-ish?) Lenovo ThinkStation to which I gave new life and installed Mint. I plan on turning the desktop into our home server. Both work and home have dual monitors of whatever was provided or most cost-effective at the time.

At home, I use a Logitech vertical mouse, and at my office I have a Kensington trackball mouse, each positioned between the halves of its respective keyboard.

Growing up, my grandpa was a professional electrician, my dad a professionally trained carpenter, and my mom a professionally trained landscape architect, so I have more in the way of that kind of hardware than electronic hardware. I try to fix just about everything in our house that doesn't require specialized tools, especially if it's electrical. I'll try the plumbing stuff, too, but I'm going to be grumpy about it the whole time.

And what software?

Again, not exciting. I spend the vast majority of my workdays in Chrome and MS Office products, especially Outlook and Word (hence, my desire to create a better word processor for attorneys).

At home, I use Home Assistant to slowly automate things around the house. I have enjoyed using WiiM to create a home sound system. And never Chrome.

I know a lot of people who answer these questions provide a whole catalogue of the things they need to do their job or their hobby, but if I gave any more detail here, it would put everyone to sleep.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

I bought a ZSA Moonlander for my work office years ago and loved it so much that I bought another off of eBay for my home office. I've tried Red, Silver, and lubed Yellow switches, and have settled on the lubed yellows. They have enough resistance so as not to feel mealy, they're smooth all the way through, and they're quiet enough that the noise doesn't seem to bother my family or colleagues.

I also have a Voyager. I'm so accustomed to my Moonlander layout now that using my laptop's stock keyboard while traveling was slowing me down. On the Voyager, I have Blue switches, which are satisfying but prevent me from using it sometimes, like when I'm sharing a hotel room with my family (for example).

My keycaps are all stock. There are a lot of pretty keycap sets and keyboards out there, and I cannot become a collector.

My layout is what got me hooked on these keyboards. I've made 69 revisions to my Moonlander layout over the years. You can tour my full-board layout.

I'm trying to shrink the number of keys I use so that my layout between my Moonlander and Voyager is as close as possible, so I have a fork that will someday hopefully get down to 52 keys.

I use home row modifiers, with a slight modification, thanks to my brother-in-law, who makes his own keyboards.

What would be your dream setup?

I would love to set up my desk and chair to mount my board to my armrests, with a trackball near each hand. Or a standing desk where the entire desk rises. I also think a fingerprint reader in my keyboard, and a trackpoint near my index finger on each side, would be nice.

But really, I'm pretty happy with my setup. Everything is where I like it, nothing feels uncomfortable, and I never get any pains from extended use anymore.

Thanks to ZSA for making great keyboards, and for featuring me this week!

I am Mikayla Hageman, a 21-year-old accounting clerk at Selkirk Sport, where I focus on bookkeeping tasks such as data entry, data organization, and financial record-keeping. Due to a repetitive stress injury from typing, I transitioned to using the Moonlander MK I keyboard for improved ergonomics.

Outside of work, I enjoy PC gaming, reading, creative writing, drawing, and playing Dungeons & Dragons every other week. I also travel to attend Renaissance fairs in the summer and local conventions throughout the year.

What hardware do you use?

For work, I run macOS on a MacBook with two external monitors and the Moonlander MK keyboard. For personal use, I have a Microsoft tower.

And what software?

I use common apps such as Google Apps and Excel, plus business apps Brightpearl and Zendesk.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

My Moonlander MK I keyboard setup has three layers to mimic a normal keyboard, including a dedicated ten-key pad. I ignore brightness and volume controls, since my MacBook is always open.

I’ve also replaced some keycaps with the Minimalist Keyset kit for better readability.

What would be your dream setup?

I’m considering getting a personal Moonlander MK I keyboard for gaming and writing, as my current one is dedicated to work.

For my work setup, I’d like to streamline it to just two layers, with colors programmed to reflect the active layer. Additionally, I want to create a layout that allows me to perform some of my daily tasks with just one hand, improving efficiency and ease of use.

Hi! I’m Cal, a software engineer, digital/film photographer, and Onewheel builder based in Baltimore, MD.

My development experience is primarily as a full-stack developer, building scalable enterprise full-stack web-based applications in React and Go. However, I find that life is more interesting when I can throw myself into the deep end of something I know nothing about once in a while, either personally or professionally. With this philosophy, I’ve been able to accumulate a broad range of experience from developing macOS/iOS applications, prototyping IoT systems, writing and modifying firmware for a variety of devices, or learning some DevOps to iron out some of the wrinkles my team might be facing. Learning is a skill that I make every effort to keep sharp!

Off the clock, you can find me cruising around Baltimore or its surrounding trail systems on my Onewheel. Combining my technical skillset and my lifelong passion for skateboarding, the Onewheel was my perfect storm—a crazy electric skateboard driven by a computer that is completely kinesthetically controlled and is probably the closest thing I’ll ever have to a true hoverboard. I fell in love with the sense of freedom it gives you when exploring the city as well as the technical challenge of building, modding, and upgrading the board. My current board is a fully custom build—an absolute off-road 84V ripper running on open-source VESC firmware. 🤙🏼

What hardware do you use?

My workstation is constantly in flux, and designed to be that way. I stick to one screen and keep my peripherals small and easy to push out of the way if I am using my desk for something else, like film scanning or a quick solder repair. I don’t have a massive amount of room at my disposal, but I’ve set things up to make good multipurpose use of the space I have.

I find multiple screens distracting, so I run one big 32” monitor, the Alienware AW3225QF QD-OLED monitor. It’s the most gorgeous screen I’ve ever used—photography, movies, games, and even code editors look stunning on this thing. It can push absolutely absurd refresh rates for buttery-smooth interaction, which is very important to me—the hedonic treadmill pushes ever-onwards, and 120Hz is the new 60Hz! The screen is flanked by my Vanatoo T0 speakers for a great soundscape when I need to lock in and focus.

I currently have two 14” MacBook Pros: one for work, one personal. I’ve always preferred the smaller laptops in the lineup, as they’re just easier to travel with. I usually have a Linux gaming PC on the desk as well, but this is currently in upgrade limbo after my GPU died.

It would be unfair to not give a shoutout to my Ember mug here. I was given one of these as a gift because it was one of those things that seemed too absurd to buy for myself (come on, a coffee cup with an app?) but I use it literally every single day. Sipping away at coffee over the course of an hour and having it stay precisely at your favorite temperature is a luxury I didn’t know I needed. Also, Ember has solid no-nonsense customer support, so you can count on them if something goes wrong with your mug.

And what software?

I try to keep things simple when it comes to software. With a few exceptions, I start with the built-in tools and only branch out when the user experience or functionality falls short of what I need. I have a strong appreciation for FOSS, so I lean that way when I can, but I won’t deprive myself of the best tools for the job just because they’re paid.

I mostly develop in VSCode, but I will use GoLand for Go since it’s a pretty powerful editor (just be prepared to give it all your RAM). I also like to build websites in Remix, a great framework that keeps the original behavior of the web intact—I built my personal site calmoody.com with it and am using it professionally as well. If you’re in need of a modern web framework that gives you the good parts of React without abandoning the time-tested standards of the web, give it a shot!

For photography, I use Capture One, which I prefer to Lightroom because they still have the option to buy the software without a subscription. I also shoot with a Fujifilm X-T5, and Capture One has a slight edge in the colors of Fuji RAW files over Lightroom.

For CAD modeling and 3D printing, I use Shapr3D on my iPad and print with a BambuLab P1S 3D printer, which I use to make custom parts for my Onewheel builds. These are some of my more expensive tools, but they work so seamlessly that I find it’s worth the cost.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

For several years I used Zealpc Zilent switches on the ZSA EZ Planck, a keyboard that I initially bought as a meme when talking with a coworker, but then accidentally fell in love with 😅. Designing a functional layout that didn’t alienate my normal laptop keyboard was a fun challenge.

Although I loved that keyboard to death, the ergonomics of the small keyboard led to a lot of shoulder-hunching throughout the day, and my cat Bean developed a habit of sprawling out on my desk, which led to the keyboard usually being off to one side. I had been considering a ZSA Moonlander, but it seemed too large for what I wanted on my desk. When the ZSA Voyager launched, I felt like ZSA had designed it specifically for me! Now, with the split design, Bean can lounge right in the middle of the desk if she so pleases.

That being said, I had a pretty difficult time adjusting to the Voyager. Cracking the code on a layout that felt intuitive was more of a challenge than it had been for the Planck, mostly due to the two-button thumb clusters. I kept finding myself pigeonholed with the modifiers I needed, and I took a break from the Voyager for a few months. Revisiting the layout with fresh eyes and a determination to make it work, I designed the Seven of Nine layout, which was recently featured by ZSA. This layout allowed me to finally click with the Voyager, and it is now my favorite keyboard and daily driver. Check it out if you want something that feels like a “regular keyboard, supercharged” with a cool game mode—or if you just like Star Trek!

I am running my Voyager with the Seven of Nine layout and stock keycaps. I tried loads of different switches, trying to recreate that Zealpc Zilent feel that I loved on my Planck, but nothing was quite satisfying enough until I discovered Sunset Tactile Choc switches. If you like thick tactile switches, these are the best on the market. (Hey ZSA, can you add these as an option for the Voyager during checkout? 😉)

What would be your dream setup?

Using one screen means that I don’t have to shift my mental model when I am working away from my desk on my laptop. There are a few things I want to add to my setup, though—a Thunderbolt dock to streamline cable management would be nice. I am also in the process of repurposing my old gaming PC into a homelab server so I can self-host some services like my website, a Pi-hole for DNS-level ad blocking, Hoarder for bookmark sharing, a NAS for my rapidly growing photo library (40 megapixel images take up a lotta space!), and possibly some personal Fediverse instances such as Mastodon.

This is about a dream setup though—so I’ll think outside the box for a moment. A future hope I have is that devices like the Apple Vision Pro and XR display glasses are the first iterations of an eventual “spatial computing developer environment” where you can have as many screens as you like positioned all around you, perfect resolution and refresh rate, all in a comfortable form factor that isn’t so “wired in” as it is today. Humans think spatially, and I suspect there is a whole ocean of new and interesting design to explore with a system like that. If that’s the future we want, we gotta build it!

Hi! I'm Victoria. I currently do embedded development at an autonomous vehicle startup. Prior to pivoting to firmware, I spent a few years working on distributed systems, such as a strongly consistent, distributed key-value store where I mostly focused on garbage collection. I've also contributed to various miscellany around scheduling and dispatch in a distributed compute library for parallelizing Python workloads, a task that until recently had been impossible to do within the language itself, due to the presence of the global interpreter lock. I am really excited to have once written Haskell in an internship, and to notice later that Simon Marlow touched a file I had worked on, for marshalling chained byte buffers between Haskell and C++.

Outside of computer stuff, I primarily figure skate, but I do like to read, write, and walk up mountains when I get the chance. In general, I enjoy experiencing different cultures (especially the mundane), gazing at nature, gazing at buildings, and walking a few 10K steps a day— all, or perhaps the only, things I do when I travel. At rest, I demonstrate surprising interest in tea, language, architecture, and Slavic culture.

Growing up, our household consisted exclusively of Taiwanese hardware. My family has since relaxed that constraint (in any case, my parents no longer have jurisdiction over my hardware), but I still appreciate that ZSA makes your keyboards in Taiwan. Coincidentally, another Taiwanese-American friend of mine who also grew up in a Taiwanese-hardware-only household was the first to bring the Moonlander to my attention. Maybe she will appear in a future interview!

What hardware do you use?

Waking up every day to the prospect of using my Moonlander is so exciting that I keep one at my office and another at home, of different colors. To the joint dismay of everyone in my life, I recently and completely superfluously purchased a curved Alienware 32 4K OLED monitor which I now use at home, occasionally with a vertical Dell UltraSharp 27 QHD on the side. Most of the time, the machine ends up being the ThinkPad X1 I requested for work, though sometimes it is my personal Dell XPS 13 (my next laptop purchase will absolutely be a ThinkPad), or the Lego project downstairs that I spec’d out with a Threadripper, dual RTX 3090s + NVLink, and an obscene quantity of RAM and NVMe, to remain undisclosed. I also bought her a Noctua fan.

At the office, I also use dual monitors with the side monitor vertical, connected to a company-provided desktop, as well as whatever board and JTAG debugger I'm currently developing on. I can't speak to any particular conscious choice of mouse: Depending on the weather, I may reach for the trackpad, the trackpoint, the Moonlander mouse layer, or the physical mouse lying around my office desk, which I suspect to be Logitech. In case of gaming, I keep a single wireless Xbox controller to fight over at home. All my desks are some form of sit-stand.

I do own a decrepit set of Bose 700s for audio, and also for cancelling the noise of my clicky keys.

And what software?

My default distro and window manager are Fedora and i3 + dmenu, with urxvt as terminal and VS Code with Vim keybindings as editor, plus clangd, GitLens, and Copilot among the more useful extensions. For shell, I stick with Zsh and its default emacs bindings, then slap on fzf, zsh-git-prompt, and zsh-syntax-highlighting. Mosh + tmux remain invaluable for remoting, and of course there is always GDB for debugging and Git for version control. The browser is any Chromium-like with the Vimium, uBlock, and password manager plugins. I have a few.

I'm very curious about NixOS, but I haven't gotten around to playing with it. I used to use Arch in undergrad, but it became too much of a hassle at the most inconvenient times. You'll notice a general theme in my choices of highly configurable tools that work reasonably well out of the box. I do have an XMonad configuration from an experimental few weeks; maybe someday I'll go back. I will probably switch to Sway when people stop claiming that Wayland breaks everything. Regarding llm-integrated editors: I should eventually try Cursor, but I don't feel the need for it in my current work.

My notes are a combination of Obsidian and Google Keep.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

I just use the default blank keycaps on both Moonlanders. For aesthetic reasons, I've fully swapped the caps between my two boards on the right half, and half-swapped them in a checkerboard pattern on the left. As cool as tenting looks, my hands work better with the thumb clusters tilted up and infrequently used functionality mapped to the red keys. There are a few other keys like the bottom-row pinky that I generally don't map important keys to because I find them hard to reach. My layout includes an unreachable reference layer color-coded by difficulty to reach on one side, and relative actuation force bucket on the other (inversely correlated with reachability). Unsurprisingly, the set of most reachable keys looks a lot like a Voyager.

My favorite switch for limited use is still the Kailh Box Navy, but for the amount of time that I spend typing, I've found the Box Jade much more sustainable, with Cherry Browns on the alphabetic keys to rate-limit clicking. I would say that the fun of mixed switches outweighs the inconvenience of uneven feedback.

Out of a sense of self-preservation, masked as consideration for my colleagues, I've outfitted the office Moonlander with mostly Gateron Silent Browns and a few Kailh Silvers.

Layout-wise, I've largely stuck to the standard QWERTY on the base layer to maintain compatibility with debugging on other people's machines, or working on my laptop when I take it around. I also only know how to touch-type Cyrillic in QWERTY, so if I changed the alpha layout too much, I would have to add another layer just for Russian, which I don't use frequently enough to justify relearning. I would also have to remap the Vim navigation-derived shortcuts to the new home row in every single software config I have, which wouldn't actually take that long, but would be annoying by virtue of necessarily missing one or two configs the first iteration through, and having to special case for whether an external keyboard is even connected.

As the layout evolves, I've converged on a few basic principles to abide by. I already mentioned assigning cold functionality to the awkward or distant keys. It obviously also makes sense to optimize for average keypresses in my typical workflow. Since there aren't that many keys on a keyboard and switching to another layer already requires one keypress, two keypresses is generally the best you can do. But with the right assignment of modifiers, layer switches, macros, and double-tap and hold mappings, two is generally the worst you need to do. For instance, as of the day I was informed of this interview, I have macros for vim write, vim write and quit, and gdb tui toggle, while my tmux prefix is a base-layer hold.

Because I often carry laptops without an external keyboard, I try to keep a lot of shortcuts and mappings on the computer rather than the keyboard. For instance, I don't really make use of combos on Oryx because I would like to assign them in a keyboard-independent way.

Due to severe LED allergy, I keep the base layer dark with a purple Reactive Cross animation, and apply colors for semantic highlighting on the remaining layers. All photos I’ve furnished with backlit keyboards are staged. The only other animations I've enabled are Typing Heatmap, Reactive Nexus, and Breathing.

What would be your dream setup?

At this point I'm the limiting factor, not my setup. But I will admit to eyeing the Voyager.

Hi! My name is Stuart (he/him), and I’m a self-taught typeface designer based in the picturesque landscapes of Northern Ireland. For the past eight years, I’ve dedicated myself to releasing my typefaces under my independent foundry. It’s been an incredibly fulfilling journey, blending creativity, technical precision, and my passion for design. Before venturing out on my own, I worked at Apple and Monotype/MyFonts, gaining valuable experience in the industry.

Outside of work, I’ve recently fallen into the immersive world of Warhammer 40K, which has been a blast. I’m learning to paint my army of Adepta Sororitas (Sisters of Battle). It’s challenging but incredibly satisfying to see my miniatures come to life!

When I’m not diving into Warhammer, I enjoy unwinding with a good book or connecting with friends through online gaming sessions. Lately, I’ve been playing a lot of Call of Duty: Warzone. Let’s just say my performance is more “entertaining” than “impressive” (translation: I’m pretty rubbish!).

I also enjoy buying and building LEGO sets, but I’ve had to check myself as that can become an expensive hobby—especially since my Warhammer obsession already takes up that slot!

What hardware do you use?

My hardware setup has remained largely consistent over the years, centred around my M1 Pro MacBook Pro 14-inch. With 32 GB of RAM and one TB of storage, it’s more than capable of handling the demanding tasks of type design and other creative work.

I extend my workspace using a CalDigit TS3 Plus Dock connected to an Apple Studio Display. While the display’s visuals are stunning, the built-in webcam is surprisingly subpar—especially considering the price tag! To compensate, I use a Sony ZV-E10 for crisp, professional-quality video. Admittedly, the Sony is overkill as a webcam, but it gets the job done beautifully.

For peripherals, I rely on an MX Master 3S mouse and a ZSA Voyager keyboard. The Voyager replaced my ErgoDox EZ, which served me faithfully for nearly four years. My audio setup includes a RODE PodMic, paired with an Audient iD4 MKII USB Audio Interface and a Cloud Microphones Cloudlifter CL-1 for that extra gain.

I also use an 11-inch iPad Pro (4th generation) with an Apple Pencil. While I originally bought it for type sketching and digital proofing, it’s become my go-to device for streaming Twitch while I cook. I’m especially hooked on the Software Development category, where I enjoy watching streamers work on indie video games.

To top it all off, protecting my hardware is The Ronin from Star Wars: Visions—because why not?

And what software?

My work revolves around a combination of type design, creative tools, and utilities to stay organized. Here’s a quick rundown of my most-used apps.

GlyphsApp is the backbone of my type design work. Several other specialized programs help out: Typeface, my trusted font manager; FontGoggles, which is perfect for font proofing; Font Proofer, as the name suggests, also used for font proofing; Eagle, excellent for organizing design files; and DTL OTMaster, great for quality control of typefaces.

These programs may not make most people think of fonts, but it's true: I use VMWare Fusion to run Windows to test typefaces, and iTerm is useful for working with font tools. VSCode is essential for coding tasks, and Fork's a handy Git client.

Affinity Suite is my go-to for creating visual assets for my foundry, and Sketch is a newer addition for designing materials for my typefaces. Ivory makes my time in Mastodon look beautiful. I use Final Cut Pro for editing Instagram videos and helping my daughter create Minecraft videos—a fun collaboration!

Then there are the apps of the kinds every business needs. 1Password keeps passwords secure and accessible, iA Writer keeps my documents neat and organized, and eM Client helps keep my business email tidy and separate. Fantastical is my trusted app for managing life and work schedules. For personal and business spreadsheet management, I use Numbers.

The software I hope to explore further in 2025 includes RoboFont, which serves as an alternative to GlyphsApp; and NeoVim, a substitute for VSCode, suited for the adventurous! (Just joking!)

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

My ZSA ErgoDox EZ featured Brown switches and the default layout—a solid choice for years. However, my newer Voyager keyboard uses White switches, which are slightly louder but not an issue since I work from home (no coworkers to annoy!). I’ve also opted for blank keycaps on the Voyager, adding a fun challenge.

At first, I stuck to the default layout for an easier transition, but I’m planning to tweak it soon to incorporate the home row mod. I think it’ll make a practical upgrade and further improve my efficiency.

What would be your dream setup?

As a Mac user since 2002 (my first was an eMac), I’ve appreciated both desktop and laptop setups over the years. However, I’ve always been intrigued by the idea of switching to Linux. A System76 or Framework laptop is especially tempting, but sadly, GlyphsApp—the cornerstone of my work—lacks a comparable Linux alternative. For now, this remains just a dream.

A more realistic goal is upgrading to the M4 MacBook Pro 14-inch or possibly an updated Mac Studio. Another item on my wish list is the Moonlander keyboard. Completing the ZSA split keyboard trilogy would be cool, and I occasionally miss the larger thumb cluster from the ErgoDox when using the Voyager.

I hope you enjoyed this read! You can connect with me at Mastodon, Instagram, and my website.

My name is Kaydee West, and I work as support staff in a large nonprofit institution of higher education in the United States. I've hopped around a bit within that broad category for the last decade and really enjoy my work and the impact I can make on folks pursuing their educational goals.

Outside of work, I want absolutely nothing to do with my computer and am away from screens as much as possible. I joke that I enjoy cosplaying as a millennial homesteader by raising chickens and rabbits. I have a sourdough starter named Betty Jean that I have successfully shared with some friends, and I really enjoy mindful photography and jigsaw puzzles.

I'll start off by saying too that I am likely an atypical ErgoDox EZ user. I do not consider myself particularly tech-savvy, and I have never customized a keyboard before. I found ErgoDox EZ because my Microsoft Sculpt keyboard I'd used for the five years or so broke and had been discontinued. At the time, I was having some really severe, near-constant wrist and hand pain. After an ergonomic assessment, I realized I had to make some changes and decided to invest in a keyboard. My shoulders are a bit broad, and even my split keyboard had me constantly reaching my wrists across my body at an odd angle to type because it had a fixed width.

I'll be honest, the price point of my ErgoDox gave me pause, but I spend eight hours a day at my computer at least five days a week. Ultimately, I decided I was desperate enough to try just about anything to dull the aching in my hands and wrists. So, I spent several hundred dollars on my keyboard; I have absolutely no regrets and consider that money well spent. I haven't had any wrist or hand pain since making the swap to this board.

What hardware do you use?

I have a Lenovo IdeaPad with AMD Ryzen™ 7 8840HS (1920 x 1200) (eight-core) processor, 14" touchscreen IPS WUXGA (1920 x 1200) display, Wi-Fi 6 (2x2/160) Gig+ with Bluetooth 5.1, my ErgoDox EZ, and a Logitech MX Master 3.

And what software?

I use a mix of proprietary software specific to my employer and higher ed tech tools (student information systems, etc.). Plus the generic Microsoft Office suite.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

My board is customized a pretty good deal. I have keycaps from one of my partner's old mechanical keyboards along the top row so I can have both symbols and numbers on the keys. I also have some cute little frog keycaps on several of my keys mostly because they are adorable—a little because they are additional landmarks to help me orient my hands when typing.

In terms of layout, I have customized keys so that I can use complex keyboard shortcuts within the software I use by clicking only one button on my keyboard. I am transitioning to using a screen reader more frequently due to some eye fatigue issues, and I'm excited about how I can continue to customize my board's layout to fit my needs as they change. I have had absolutely no issues using my keyboard in any of my work's complex environments, and that's another reason why I love it.

What would be your dream setup?

Honestly, the only thing I'd really change about my setup is swapping my sit-to-stand adapter to an actual sit-to-stand desk. I also really would like to customize my keycaps more with cute little animals or something similar, since I find that adds a touch of fun and whimsy to my day.

If you were to ask my wife, she will tell you that I am a romantic. Others may suggest “curmudgeon” as a better adjective, but for her, to leave your old country behind and spend fourteen years working to become an American citizen, for love, is romantic.

To earn a crust, I work as a customer enterprise architect for kyndryl. Born out of IBM, we design, build, manage, and modernize the world’s critical technology systems. My role is to listen to our clients and help them solve their next challenge. Whether that is moving from a legacy data centre into the cloud, tackling the hidden costs of dark data, or responsibly embracing the pervasive explosion of generative AI, I’ll qualify the undertaking and collaborate with our teams to deliver a solution that delights our client.

I can often be found in the kitchen when not in the office. England, where I am originally from, has a strong tradition in butchery, and I regularly make my own sausage and cure my own bacon.

For Christmas this year, I put a chicken inside of a duck, which in turn fitted neatly into a turkey, to make what is commonly referred to as a turducken. It was a great success, and we all gathered around the carving table to witness the cross-section. It is a lot of meat, however, and we worked on the leftovers for weeks!

I’m also a keen diarist, having kept one since I was seven years of age. I prefer to use pen and paper and find the process calming and cathartic. It is also a great way to relax, reflect, and get away from the computer.

I think one of my first entries when I was seven ran something like “Today, Mummy cut my toenails.” These days, whilst I’m no Samuel Pepys, I would like to think I have progressed to something slightly more literary.

When opportunity presents itself, my wife and I are also keen travellers, and we like to explore the US as much as we can. Of course, coming from a very small country such as England, it is still sometimes hard for me to understand the sheer scale of the US or my own state of Texas, which, if the internet is to be believed, is four and a half times the size of Great Britain. The British consider a long drive to be three hours, whereas here, in America, that is just a quick trip to the shops! Consequently, as neither my wife nor I enjoy flying, we’ve learned to appreciate the joys of the Lone Star State more acutely.

What hardware do you use?

I am a contracted home worker. For ten years, I have worked at a plastic-and-metal trestle table and a fifty-dollar Walmart chair that I had inherited from my father-in-law. Did this contribute to the poor posture I’d inherited from a life of deskbound jobs? Perhaps, but a couple of years ago, my body finally said "enough!" and two of my cervical disks ruptured! To anyone suffering from back pain, know that I feel your pain. I spent four months flat on my back, working with my laptop perched on my chest. Since then, sexy CPUs have taken a back seat to ergonomics, comfort, and health, which have taken centre stage.

Kyndryl was very supportive during this time and arranged to install an Uplift Standing Desk (80" x 30") with a Big Ultra-Thin Keyboard Tray and a MoonTower Six Arm Monitor Stand, which mounts six monitors.

Three of the monitors are 28 inches, one is 24 inches, and two are 21 inches. They are all pretty cheap and nothing to speak of except for the Apple Thunderbolt Display, which I bought secondhand from a friend for $400. At the time he wasn’t using it, which was a travesty. Of course, nobody can work on just six monitors these days, so I also have three Crestview Single Monitor Arms, two of which have the laptop mount attached to hold a MacBook Pro M1 and an iPad Pro, and the last one has another 24" Dell monitor, just for good measure.

Typically, I stand at the desk when I am in meetings, but when I sit, I do so in a Herman Miller Aeron ergonomic chair, which was one of the few chairs available in something other than a one-size-fits-all. As someone with a bit of heft to them, I was pleased to find that this chair comes in three sizes, the largest of which accommodates my substance with grace and aplomb. The armrests are particularly notable for their adjustability and allow me to lean back whilst my hands are presented to the Voyager in a "Kirk-esque" fashion.

In this way, my neck is always coddled, as I can stand if I need to, sit when I want, and, because of a nifty little foot hammock attached to the underside of the desk, I can work almost horizontally! Everything works in combination to deliver a superior level of comfort, but the Voyager is a keystone component. Without it, I couldn’t open my chest, allowing my arms to rest by my sides so they are always supported, taking most of the strain from my trapezoidal muscles so I don’t hunch and instead, relax.

The Voyager, tented on two Manfrotto Pocket Tripods, surrounds an Apple Magic Trackpad and an Kensington Expert Trackball Mouse. Having tried all manner of pointing devices, I’ve learned only trackballs seem to cope with multiple monitors. Casting the mouse pointer onto a faraway screen with a quick flick of the finger as opposed to the endless scraping of mouse over mousepad is liberating. The trackpad was donated by a friend, and I use it exclusively for two-finger swiping to navigate large canvases such as architecture diagrams or vast datasets in a spreadsheet.

External storage is predominantly delivered by a Cenmate 8 Bay Hard Drive Enclosure and OpenZFS, which delivers the RAID5 missing from native macOS.

RAID is not backup, so I have a variety of naked spinning disks ripped out of various defunct machines providing my backup infrastructure and an assortment of old machines repurposed to run Linux (SUSE & Mint) acting as bastions, firewalls, and project machines.

Most of my audio is delivered through some Apple AirPods Max, which despite being rather heavy and needing to be stashed in the freezer on occasion to restore the Bluetooth connection, work well. If I do need to rock out the show, I have some Logitech speakers that are fifteen years old if they are a day, but they can still belt out the music with a level of fidelity beyond my old ears’ ability to detect any flaw.

I know I said that sexy CPUs rather take a back seat these days; however, I do run an Apple Mac Studio Ultra (M1), which cost a small fortune. For the life of me, I can’t get it above 20% CPU utilisation.

It shone too brightly when it was first launched, and the money leapt right out of my pocket before I had time to realise what I was doing. Without looking too hard, you’ll find a moral here.

To address the elephant in the room: Are nine monitors too many?

A question each person must answer for themselves. What I will say is that running this amount of screen real estate takes time; the transition took several years. Why I have so many screens stems from a role in operations and a philosophy of processing as much information as possible. Today, I’m an architect, but for many years, I was in operations supporting multiple customers. Consequently, I would have tmux sessions, Remote Desktop connections, SQL Server Management Studio, and Oracle SQL Developer connecting me to several databases, incident management, and monitoring dashboards all open and requiring my regular attention. I needed to see emails and instant messages so that customers, teammates, and bosses had their needs met and most important of all, my calendar, where I could track my time and make sure I wasn’t late for the fifty million meetings we are all inevitably invited to.

My strategy, therefore, was, rather than continually poll through multiple, overlapping windows, to instead have every application visible at all times. Sometimes, in the case of email and calendar, that means one-app-one-screen, and sometimes two applications could coexist on the same monitor, side by side. Then, all the information was there, where I could see it.

When I added a fourth screen, I realised that this approach was naive. My brain hurt. I couldn’t take it in! Three screens, not a problem, but the fourth? I needed to ease into it. I had to practice widening my perception to read the extra data through my peripheral vision. It took about three months to become proficient, and each new monitor thereafter required a settling-in period whilst my brain grew to accommodate it.

Originally, I had all the monitors connected to a single device leveraging DisplayLink Hubs to deal with the fact that most desktops can’t support so many screens. Now, I have them split between my work laptop, which supports two monitors, and my personal machine, which supports five, natively, and I can switch between the two using a KVM.

And what software?

With nine screens, window management is critical. Were I looking for a solution today, I might choose Raycast, as besides window management, it offers powerful automation in a low-code package, but when I was first looking for a solution, I found Hammerspoon, and it is too deeply integrated into my workflow for me to change now.

Hammerspoon allows you to write lua code that interacts with macOS APIs to control almost any aspect of the operating system. I use it for window management and have functions that control how each application lays out on each screen. In this way I can arrange my windows with a single key press, and this really unlocks the power of the Voyager and layers. I have functions that can resize individual windows or move them from one screen to another, say from the very bottom left to the very top right, in a single action. Other functions move applications to halves or quadrants of the screen. Tying what are about 37 window management functions to individual keys gives me ultimate control over my screen real estate without having to leave the keyboard.

I have moved away from VS Code to Neovim and have evolved from markdown to asciidoc, replacing any need for MS Word. Firefox and Safari are my two main browsers, that with the Vimium and Vimari extensions enable Vim motions so that I no longer need to use my mouse. I’m also playing around with Shortcat, which is like Vimari on steroids and brings the same Vim-like motions to all my other applications.

I’ve really come to appreciate declarative tools such as Ansible and Terraform that allow you to define the world as code, so Homebrew, which allows me to define my software packages in a Brewfile, has made maintaining my software configurations much faster and simpler; particularly useful when reinstalling software onto a new or recovered machine.

Coming from the days of green screens and the CP/M operating system, I’ve always had a terminal open on my screen and do a lot of my day-to-day from it—I’m writing this in asciidoc through Neovim, right now! With the introduction of more modern command-line tools, I have found fzf, zoxide, bat, and Yazi can really up your terminal game. An excellent fuzzy finder, fzf will massively speed up your file navigation and modernise your command history with an easy-to-use TUI. Zoxide supercharges cd so you can jump to your most commonly used directories with just a few keystrokes. Yazi is a command-line file manager. I don’t use it much, but it does image preview in a terminal, so …

I’m not a ricer, I don’t need my terminal to do a lot, so I’ve moved to Ghostty, a new terminal emulator which works straight out of the box. Starship gives me a little terminal beautification, and tmux provides my session management.

The Mac’s file manager needs work—it’s the one thing I prefer on Windows—therefore, I use a third-party replacement called Path Finder. This is the Swiss Army knife of file management, and I’m sure I use only a fraction of its capabilities. Its compelling feature is that you can have a split window and drag and drop files between two locations much more simply than in the native app.

Writing the same bits of text over and over, whether it’s my email address, a code header, or my latest use case—generative AI prompts—gets old! Textexpander is a snippet manager that allows me to store all my commonly used text in a database which I can access by typing a shortcut like ;date for today’s date or ;adoc to add my favourite asciidoc document attributes to the beginning of a new document. I use it all the time; it saves me hours, I’m sure.

Brainstorming and note-taking cannot be done better, in my opinion, than by using a mind map. For over fifteen years, I’ve been using MindManager. It’s very keyboard-centric, making it an excellent tool for taking real-time meeting notes. You can also jazz those notes up to quickly become a presentation, and it has some wickedly powerful project management chops which can model agile as well as traditional, more Gantt-style approaches. Great for people who have to straddle a kanban board for the software development teams but still need a succinct, one-page view for the executive.

When I’m working with databases, I am working with three apps. DBeaver is a great, open-source database IDE that can interface with almost any flavour of database when you need to dig in and look at the data structures. Azure Data Studio makes for a lightweight tool to run your queries against, do your SQL development, and—if you are using MS SQL Server—run a nifty Database-as-Code pipeline. You can also load the VS Code Vim extension that brings Vim Motions to the editor (although I still tend to use Neovim for most of the code composition).

And of course, whilst I try to keep away from it as much as possible, you can’t work in a corporation without coming up against Microsoft Office, but even with the Voyager and Hammerspoon, I don’t seem to make the MS Office experience any faster!

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

I have a pretty customised layout. I like to use the custom RGB settings to colour each layer differently and to also group keys that have similar functions to the same colour. In this way, if I need to ever glance down, I get a subtle hint to what I should be looking for.

I’ve recently retired the numbers row for everyday typing and am working hard to ensure none of my fingers need to move more than one key position from the home row. To achieve this, I have three main layers which I use continually just to type.

Layer 0: Main Layer

This is the alphanumeric layer and is pretty stock. I’ve moved Shift, Return, Space, and Delete to the thumb clusters, and this is also where most of my momentary layer switches go for the long hold so that it’s easy to hit any key with my other fingers when on another layer.

I’m not a fan of adding additional functionality like home row mods to this layer because the Mac has a really cool feature where if you hold down a key, you get a list of all the diacritics for that letter. For example, if you wish to write an “è," you simply hold down the e key, and a little menu pops up, and you can select è by pressing 1. I use that quite a bit, and putting a hold function on any of those keys screws that up.

As I’ve retired the numbers row, I’ve got a few more keys to play with. I am starting to add less-used functions to these keys and have just added app screen assignments to the left-hand top row.

Layer 1: Symbols & Numbers

I have moved all my symbols to a dedicated layer to bring them closer to the home position. Even after almost a year, I am still learning my Voyager layout, and one of my luxuries is having a single screen dedicated to the Keymapp application. There, I can glance quickly if I’ve momentarily forgotten where I’ve put a symbol. And the heatmap feature, which tracks your key presses showing your most commonly used keys, helped me make sure that my most commonly used characters are on my home rows and under my index fingers. I’ve also laid out my brackets on either side of my left index finger so that they are easily accessible but at the same time don’t get in the way of my power fingers.

My keypad, which is on the right, is slightly unconventional, with 1 under my middle finger so that I could keep my popular symbols under my index. It’s been a hard slog to train myself that finger two = 1, but practice makes perfect, and I need more practice.

Layer 2: Navigation

This could easily be called the Hammerspoon layer because, as I’ve said, I use it to help navigate and position all my applications. The navigation layer is where I configure all the key combos that Hammerspoon is listening for; mostly hypers.

The exception to this is that I’ve recently moved the Escape key to my left index finger, one above the home row. Since I’ve moved to Neovim, I hit the Escape like a demented telegraph operator, so I had to bring it in from the cold, and now everyone is much happier.

I’ve then got some lesser-used layers.

Layer 3: Keyboard Controls

This is almost stock, and I hardly ever use it. I have custom RGB setups so don’t use the built-in sequences, pretty as they are. I have added a screen capture key and volume controls here and use them, but rarely.

Layers 4 & 5: One-Handed Operations

One of the few drawbacks of using a split keyboard is that it is very difficult to use one-handed, say when you have a sandwich in the other hand. Now, I know it probably goes against the laws of etiquette to eat your lunch whilst working at your computer, but I have to admit my guilt to this uncouth practice and quickly discovered I’d have to create some new layers if I was going to continue my indelicate behaviour. So, I use layers four and five to flip the QWERTY layout between the boards. In this way, with a single, layer key, either board can deliver all the letters and numbers to either hand, no matter where your sandwich is.

This is where I am at today, and it seems to work well. Tomorrow, it could be totally different.

I love the Voyager. I spend a third of my life in front of a computer, and my keyboard is the tool by which I do my job. Therefore, it is no exaggeration to say that the Voyager has changed my life. What is unexpected is that outside of the health benefits, it’s made my cyber-life fun again. Workflow is no longer a bottleneck so long as I have the imagination to solve for it.

What would be your dream setup?

I already have it.

Hi! My name is Axel Rafn. I am a 45-year-old GenX’er who was born in Iceland but moved to Spain just over a year ago with my wife. Before we moved to Spain, we lived in a self-converted camper/bus (MB Sprinter 412D, 1998 model) for over a year and traveled all over Iceland.

I am a certified systems admin and work as a Linux systems admin, full stack developer, and more as my day job for a communications company back in Iceland, which I work remotely from. There we mainly offer VoIP and SIP services over our satellite system for Icelandic fishing boats and trawlers. But we do other things as well, where I also develop server software for various tasks aboard the boats and on land. My main priorities are maintaining servers as well as setting up new servers with Proxmox, OPNSense, Debian, and Ubuntu, as well as programming in BASH, PHP, Python, and JavaScript.

In my spare time, I run a homelab with various machines and services. I also have my own hosting servers with Linode and Hetzner and even run a Mastodon instance.

I love photography and I am a professional photographer by trade as well.

What hardware do you use?

First of all, my ZSA Voyager, which I love. It goes with me wherever I go when traveling as well.

Then I have a few machines I use daily at my desk. Both my desktop machines are connected to my two MSI G24C4 E2 23.6" 180Hz monitors, and I just switch inputs on the monitors to switch machines.

My main Linux machine is a Ryzen 9 7900 with 32GB RAM, 1TB m.2 NVME and an AMD Radeon RX 6600 graphics card. On it I do most of my software development, all my work for my day job, and even game! I mainly play World of Warcraft, but I do have a big backlog on my Steam account for games to play.

My desktop Mac is a Mac mini M4 with 512GB storage and 16GB Unified Memory. I use it more for my artistic purposes such as video editing, image editing, and writing. But I do also use it for some development for iOS software.

And finally my laptop is a 13" M1 MacBook Pro with 16GB unified memory. On it I also do mostly artistic things, but mainly when I either travel or want to work outside the home on weekends and holidays.

The homelab includes several computers, including two Beelink S12 Pro machines with a N100 CPU—one running Jellyfin for me and the family, and the other a staging machine for yet another project I am working on called Skuld. I run a Beelink EQR5 as a Proxmox host with various virtual machines such as Pi-hole, Homepage, Uptime Kuma, a Ubuntu machine for Docker projects, and more. It has an AMD Ryzen 5 PRO 5650U CPU (6c/12t) and 32GB RAM, 2x 1TB m.2 NVME. I also use an older HP Z420 workstation as a Proxmox host. It has a Xeon E5-2680 v2 CPU (10c/20t), 64GB ECC RAM, and a 1TB SSD.

Then there’s a dedicated TrueNAS SCALE machine running on an AMD Ryzen 3 3200G with 16GB of RAM, and in it currently I have 4x 4TB SATA disks in a RAIDz1. I designed the machine so I can add eight more 3.5" drives to it, so when I have more money I plan to buy some new and used disks in the 12-18TB range to fill out the rest of the case.

I also have a 3D printer, a Bambu Lab P1S with an AMS on top. I have not upgraded the hotend to a hardened steel one yet, but plan to do so later this year to be able to print with more exotic filaments.

And what software?

Each machine has different software according to its OS and uses. First, the PCs: Browser-wise I use Firefox for personal things, but Chromium for work-related things at my day job. I use Zed as my main IDE/code editor, since I’m trying to get away from VSCode. Lately I’ve moved to Warp terminal from the others I normally use (iTerm2 and Konsole). I have ZSH installed on all machines as well as Oh My Zsh for theming and plugins.

For video work I solely use DaVinci Resolve, and for images and photos I have been trying out the Affinity suite and plan to buy a license once my trial ends. I was using the photographer subscription from Adobe, but due to their actions and plans with AI, I just didn’t want to be a client of theirs anymore—and simply put, I don’t trust them.

On the Linux machine I run Fedora 41 currently with KDE Plasma as my DE, but I also have Hyprland installed for when I need some extra eye candy and minimalism.

On the Macs, I just run macOS.

As for the servers, I have two physical boxes with Hetzner. The first is a Nextcloud server running on Debian stable, to use for everything and anything, sharing documents, images, photos, and more. I also use it to back up photos from all smart devices we have (phones and tablets) regardless of type, OS, or preferences.

My hosting server is running Ubuntu server, Apache, PHP, and such. The classic LAMP setup, so to speak. This is where I host most of my websites and quite a few for friends and family.

I then also have VPS machines with Linode, where I host a Mastodon server running on Debian Stable, a small server running Gitea as my personal Git server, and a few smaller test servers that run Debian stable, for various projects I am making or involved with. One of those projects is an open source multistreaming tool that will help people stream to Twitch, YouTube, OwnCast, and many more systems that offer live video streaming.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

I haven’t modified the default too much, since this was also my first ortholinear keyboard. I have made small changes here and there to make the keyboard flow better with my input language (Icelandic) and make keys be at the place I expect them to be. But I plan to delve deeper into the lore of keyboards and what is the best way to do things like homerows and such.

What would be your dream setup?

Desktop-wise I think I am quite happy where I am. The only thing I could possibly add to my setup, other than better cable management, is to have a KVM switch for three machines so I don’t have to manually unplug and replug the keyboard in to the other computer like I do now.

I do have dreams for a bigger and more powerful homelab, but that is a dream I can still just dream.

My name is James Eapen, and I’m a PhD candidate in a lab studying ovarian cancer. My work focuses on the taxonomy of Fallopian tube cells and involves analyzing or writing software for genomic data analysis. Outside of work I like to play video games, go on walks, and keep my pocket and kitchen knives sharp.

What hardware do you use?

My lab bought me a Lenovo ThinkPad P16 Gen2 with 64GB of RAM, which comes in handy since I work with large genomic datasets. They also provided me with two Dell 4K monitors. I keep my one monitor horizontal as my primary display and the other vertical for email, Slack, and my SSH session on our HPC. I also have a MacBook Pro from 2020 that I use when I don’t want to carry the rather heavy ThinkPad around.

On my laptop screen you can see my wallpaper, which is updated with the latest image from NOAA every 30 minutes.

And what software?

I run Ubuntu with the i3 window manager, which lets me use keybindings for almost everything and reduces my need for a mouse. I have a script modelled after the macOS Spotlight app that launches the fzf selector in a terminal emulator window. This lets me browse my filesystem, copy paths as well as select, and then drag and drop files into GUI applications with xdragon. Using similar scripts, I can query the Firefox and Zotero SQLite databases to find and launch web bookmarks and look for journal articles in my Zotero library and search their PDFs for text.

Together, ripgrep-all and fzf allow me to use regex to find specific patterns in PDFs (in the picture I’m searching for articles that mention a gene count between 5000 and 8000, with or without a comma in the number)—a functionality I haven’t yet seen in any reference manager.

For package management, I’ve switched from the APT system to the Nix package manager. Being able to declare both software and their configurations in a file has made managing my system more convenient, although with a steep learning curve. I find Nix shell environments particularly useful for quickly setting up data analysis environments across multiple devices.

Most of my time is spent writing either code, documentation, or papers. I primarily code in R, C++, and Python and write in Markdown or Latex. All my writing is done in Neovim. The editor and the language servers for the programming languages I use are installed together using Nix. For prose, I use the Goyo plugin for a clean writing interface and set up spell check with a mapping to autocorrect the last misspelled word. Once I started using Vim bindings I had to have them everywhere, so I try to find plugins or alternative software that let me carry the Vim muscle memory across my system.

For communications, I run neomutt with isync and msmtp (set up with mutt-wizard) for email, which lets me write email in Neovim and navigate between my mail folders and organize emails using fzf. My lab uses Slack for communication, and I use WeeChat with the wee-slack plugin as a TUI alternative to the app.

For web browsing, I use Firefox with Vimium for Vim keybindings and firenvim, a Neovim plugin that transforms any web text input into a Neovim buffer with all plugins and settings loaded.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

I use the ErgoDox EZ Glow with blank sculpted keycaps, which raises a lot of questions every time someone sees the split and the blank keycaps for the first time. I like a somewhat aggressive tent level, and my chair armrests extend forward, allowing me to float my hands over the keyboard at an angle that feels like a natural resting position.

I started with the Cherry MX Brown switches and eventually switched to the Glorious Pandas for stronger tactile feedback.

During the pandemic in 2020, I switched from QWERTY to Colemak. Unlearning the muscle memory took around three months and sometimes gave me a headache.

Since I spend most of my time in the terminal, I got used to the Emacs bindings in the shell prompt. My keyboard settings have a couple of Emacs layers that allow me to bring those bindings everywhere—the ability to create such layouts is one of the reasons I got the ErgoDox. Given a line of text, in a browser URL bar for example, I can hold a thumb cluster key which acts as the Emacs control/Meta and access Emacs-like functionality: delete the full line (U), delete the whole previous word (W), delete from cursor to the end of the line (K), or go to the beginning or end of the line (A, E). The I and M keys provide Tab and Return characters. The right side acts as a number or symbol pad when holding T or S down.

I like having a mouse layer, since that lets me quickly make small cursor movements without having to move my hand to the mouse. I have macros for typing R assign arrows (<-) and pipes (|>) and Vim search-and-replace (:%s/) command. When I don’t have access to my keyboard, I use kmonad to get a very similar layout on my laptop keyboard.

What would be your dream setup?

My many scripts make my work a lot smoother, but they have certain inconvenient edge cases I’d like to fix. I’m looking to switch to NixOS so the entire operating system can be described in text files. With my keyboard, I want to find a way to mount my ErgoDox to my desk and free up some desk space. Alternatively, I’d like to get a chair where the armrests are long enough to mount my keyboard to the armrests. This would let me rotate or move the chair without losing the alignment between my arms and the keyboard. I’m also interested in padding the keyboard to see if dampening would produce nicer typing sounds.

My name is Carmen Owens, and I’m an environmental engineer. I spend most of my time cleaning up contaminated sites. Think of a gas station with underground storage tanks that leak. After contractors have stopped the leak and fixed the tank, I come in and coordinate the longer-term cleanup of deeper soil and groundwater. I grew up playing in the woods, watching Captain Planet, and wanting to save the Earth. So being able to say that I contribute to “taking pollution down to zero” in my real-life adult job is pretty awesome. Someday I’d like to work for a public agency and be the one who “puts asunder bad guys who like to loot and plunder” (if you did not grow up in the United States in the 1980s, see link for Captain Planet references).

My favorite thing to do outside of work is hang out with my family, which includes my wife, my ten-year-old twins, and our two dogs. I also like to do projects to fix up my 130-year-old house, volunteer at our local queer advocacy center, and talk to anyone and everyone. I do as many social and networking activities as possible, so my wife doesn’t have to hear me talk all the time.

As a family, we love to travel. We lived in an RV for two years and traveled the United States from 2020-2022. My wife and I hope to get back to full-time traveling someday but have noticed our preteens are not as excited to spend time with us as they used to be. We may wait until they like us again or until they move out, whichever comes first.

What hardware do you use?

I work remotely, and so does my wife. Because of my love of talking, no one can get work done when we’re both at home, so I work out of the house. I also have a hard time sitting still, so I bike everywhere. Biking makes it possible for me to sit down and work, so it’s one of my most important pieces of hardware. I get restless working at the same place every day, so my desk is whatever table I’m in front of.

I’m pretty creative at finding places to work. I am a regular at many coffee shops, but I also use campus buildings at the local university, the grocery store, the bank, and the recreation center. I use libraries if I need a quiet, professional-looking space for a client meeting, but otherwise they are too quiet for me and my mechanical keyboard.

I had to look up what kind of computer I have. It’s the one I was issued last time I was eligible for a computer upgrade at work – it’s a Dell Latitude 5420. It works fine for how I use it.

I have a Mobile Pixels Duex Plus monitor attached to my laptop. It’s my favorite hardware addition to my setup (no offense, ZSA!). I don’t remember how I used to work with just one screen. I use a Posturite Penguin Mouse. This mouse gets horrendous reviews online, but I love it and haven’t been able to find another vertical ergonomic mouse that's ambidextrous. I just got a pair of Epos Impact 1060T headphones, and they work exceptionally well. The microphone does not pick up any background noise, even my two very large dogs barking right next to me.

I have the ZSA Voyager keyboard. I originally bought a Moonlander because I wanted the built-in wrist rests and extra keys, but it was just too bulky for some of the small tables I was working at, and I didn’t use it. The switch to the Voyager was the right move

And what software?

I use the Microsoft Office suite since it’s already loaded on my work computer. I’m not able to download most types of software without preapproval from IT. I had to go through a lengthy approval process for a special exception to use Keymapp. I don’t love the Office suite, but I am a big fan of a free computer loaded with software and built-in IT support, so I’ll stick with this for now.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

I have the standard QWERTY layout and have added custom keys for some of the key combinations I use the most. I spend lots of time on spreadsheets and PDFs, so I have lots of page navigation buttons built in. I’ve got multiple functions on most of my keys and have almost everything I use regularly on one layer. I’m still building up to harnessing the power of layers.

The main reason I wanted a programmable keyboard was because I have rheumatoid arthritis. An ergonomic setup will most certainly help prevent soreness, but the most useful thing I can do with this keyboard is to move keys around as needed. Rheumatoid arthritis pain comes and goes, it’s different every day. My pinkies and thumbs are the fingers that are sore the most often. On these days, I can move the Enter key from the thumb cluster to an external row or vice versa. Or if both are sore, I can only use my three internal fingers and move all the keys I need to the center using multiple layers. This is the power of the programmable keyboard for me. It makes typing more accessible to people with disabilities.

What would be your dream setup?

I’m pretty happy with my current setup. My next addition will be some type of laptop stand. Right now, I put my computer on a small book to make room for my keyboard and its cords. I really don’t want another separate piece of equipment I have to set up every time I move work locations. What I really want is legs attached to my laptop that fold down when I’m not using them. They need to be light, sturdy enough to hold my second screen, fold down relatively flat, and have space underneath for the keyboard and cords. This doesn’t seem to exist, so I’m trying to build it for myself. Maybe starting with a plastic hinge with a 90 degree stop? Miniature folding table legs? I haven’t figured it out yet, so if anyone has any ideas, please send them my way!

Hello, my name is Cynthia, and I am a recovering Binge Coder.

I sit and think and
type until the pain is extreme:
this is binge coding.

I began my career as a professional software engineer in 1998, at the peak of the dot-com boom, just after getting my master's degree in Library Science. I fell deeply in love with writing code while in grad school. The first language I learned was Prolog, but in those days, Java was taking the world by storm, allowing software to run in browsers. I translated the application I had developed in Prolog for class into a Java applet, and I was hooked. Four years later, in February 2002, I became a Sun Certified Architect for the Java 2 Platform Enterprise Edition. I earned my most recent professional certification, as an AWS Certified Cloud Practitioner, in April, 2024.

As a graduate student, I wrote code for fun. As a professional, I wrote code for work, and what did I do for fun outside of work? I still wrote code.

Fourteen years later, my right shoulder began to complain. I had been using a normal keyboard and reaching for a mouse without taking enough breaks because I was having way too much fun building stuff, getting dopamine spikes every time a bug was fixed or a feature implemented.

In 2014 I started typing with my left hand only on the left side of my keyboard using an AutoHotKey script that mirrored my keyboard, so hitting the letter 'A' and the space bar at the same time produced a semicolon; hitting the letter 'S' and the space bar produced the letter 'L', etc. I also began using Contour Design's RollerMouse, which sits at the base of a keyboard and looks like a mini rolling pin.

I also saw a lot of doctors; had ergonomics experts evaluate my work station, posture, and habits; but by 2017, my left arm was starting to complain too.

In early 2018, I purchased tapwithus.com's first version of the Tap Strap and also TekGear's Twiddler. The Tap Strap looks a bit like flexible brass knuckles and senses finger movement to produce characters.

The Twiddler is a handheld device that looks a bit like a TV remote control and is somewhat like playing a guitar. It has a tiny joystick operated with your thumb which moves the mouse. Both the Tap Strap and the Twiddler are programmable, but in the end, I chose to use the Twiddler because the mousing was better and it was easy to use with my arm hanging at my side.

I credit the Twiddler with saving my career. I could type again without pain. By the end of 2023, though, I knew I had to replace the Twiddler with something more reliable. Twiddler is guaranteed for one million key presses (and has excellent tech support) but I would blow through that limit pretty quickly, literally wearing down the plastic. I purchased many replacement Twiddlers over the years.

By 2023 Tap had come out with a wrist-worn device, so I purchased that, but found that it is still not really up to the task with mousing and connects only via Bluetooth, which drops too frequently. I love that Voyager is connected by USB.

Eventually, I found ZSA's Voyager. I've been using it for a year now, for both work and play. I haven't worn out the keys yet, but I love that the keyswitches and keycaps are both replaceable with standard components.

Today, I do still write code both professionally and for fun. I also knit and write the occasional haiku. My latest “just for fun” project is knit.NimbleWands.com, an online database of customizable knit stitch patterns. I also wrote EmptyStrings.com for haiku.

What hardware do you use?

At the heart of my setup is my ZSA Voyager keyboard. To be more precise, it is just the left side of the Voyager. The right side remains in the box and has never been programmed. I type and move the mouse with just my left hand, with my arm hanging straight by my side, my elbow at roughly a 180-degree angle, as opposed to the more conventional (but to me, more painful) angle of 90 degrees.

To achieve this position, I have mounted the Voyager keyboard to a tripod using ZSA's magnetic tripod mount connected to a standard tripod L-bracket. This works wonderfully when I type while standing. To accommodate sitting, I have added a standard tripod C-clamp and L-bracket to the lower portion of the tripod. The L-bracket there has the other ZSA magnetic tripod mount (they come in a pack of two). When I change position from standing to sitting, I simply pull the keyboard off of the magnet on the top of the tripod and snap it onto the magnet lower down.

To provide extra stability, I have a weighted counterbalance draped over the leg of the tripod opposite from the keyboard. (The counterbalance is a microwaveable heated shawl. The heat is great for my shoulder, and eventually I wear through the fabric beyond what is patchable, so I buy a lot of replacement shawls and had an older, much patched, one to use as the counterbalance.)

I share the Voyager keyboard, via a switch, between my work machine (a Lenovo ThinkPad), my primary home development machine (a Dell XPS 13 9310 running Ubuntu), and a Microsoft Surface Pro 6 running Windows. I use two Dell P2418HT 23.8" Touch Monitors, one for work and another for home (sharing the home monitor between the Linux and Windows machines with a KVM switch).

I use a DOIO KB16-02 macropad for frequently used strings that have more characters than Voyager's macros can handle, for example, "----- >>> LEFT OFF HERE <<< -----" and "----- >>> THIS IS WHERE THE MAGIC FAILS TO HAPPEN <<< -----". It has a layer devoted to SQL commands, but I use those less frequently now that I have the IntelliSense tool SQL-Prompt installed in SQL Server Management Studio at work. Those DOIO KB16-02 sql short-cuts are still handy when I'm working in MySql for projects I write for fun.

All of this sits on an adjustable height desk from UPLIFT Desk.

And what software?

At work I spend a lot of time in SQL Server Management Studio, Visual Studio (for C#) and Visual Studio Code (for Python). At home, I use Visual Studio Code for HTML, Javascript, CSS, and Node.js. I use MySql Workbench to access the NimbleWands.com database deployed on AWS, and phpMyAdmin to access a local, development version of that db. On my Windows Surface Pro, I use CreateStudio to create YouTube videos explaining NimbleWands.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

I use a custom layout configured so I can use just the left side of the Voyager as both a keyboard and a mouse.

I use nine keys on three layers under my three strongest fingers for letters of the alphabet. I rarely use my pinkie. The layout was very much inspired by my Twiddler layout, which also does not use the pinkie much. My Voyager layout makes extensive use of double-clicking and click-and-hold to keep common commands (save, copy, paste, etc.) within easy reach of those nine keys. The keycap under my middle finger has a bump, which helps keep me oriented. There is another keycap with a bump on the top row, second key in from the left to make it easy for me to find “Save,” “New File,” and “Caps Lock.” When I switch to the mouse layer, I move my fingers so that the middle key cap with the bump is under my ring finger to make Alt-Tab and Ctrl-Tab navigation easier to reach.

I make extensive use of the LED lighting to make it easy to find the nine main keys used by my three strongest fingers and to identify which layer is active. With the keyboard mounted vertically, I look down to see its “bottom” edge, but the different color lighting makes it easy to see at a glance when the keyboard is on a mousing/navigation layer vs. a character-producing layer. I've found that I use the color cues less frequently than when I first started to use this layout. Instead, if I am uncertain which layer I am on, I hold the large thumb key to get back to layer one, and from there easily find the key that moves the layout into mouse mode (or whichever layer I am aiming for like numbers, symbols, or FN keys).

What would be your dream setup?

I love being able to walk up to my tripod-mounted keyboard and start working, but I did love the feel and small size of the handheld Twiddler. I would love to have the best of both worlds: the robust build and easy-to-replace switches and keycaps of Voyager, but the convenience of Twiddler not needing a tripod or desktop.

I'm Sasoon Sarkisian, and I'm a fully remote web developer working out of a rural suburb in Australia. In my spare time I love making 2D/3D hybrid animation using Blender, playing games (currently on Path of Exile 2) and watching anime (currently watching Dandadan and Blue Lock.

What hardware do you use?

I run a custom-built PC and a Legion Slim 5.

Peripherals include Pixel Buds; Logitech MX Master 3S mouse for travel; Ploopy Adept/Swiftpoint Z2 for desktop use; and the Voyager, which is tented using the magnetic ZSA pucks and two Neewer tripod heads.

And what software?

I use Cursor, GitHub, Obsidian, Docker, and Windows Terminal, all inside WSL. Currently developing a plugin to sync Obsidian Tasks to Google Calendar :)

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

My home layout layer shifts everything up one row.

I have specific layers for Blender, gaming, numbers/symbols and nav. Definitely could be optimised haha, and I do want to move away from QWERTY eventually. Love combos for copy/paste and some obscure Blender commands.

What would be your dream setup?

I’d love a wireless Voyager-esque board with an integrated pointing device. I hate breaking immersion by switching between keyboard and mouse. I've got my eye on the Svalboard and Naya Create as an all-in-one input device.

I am Sophia Wood (aka fractal kitty). I love photography, birdwatching, fiber arts, gardening, running, and hiking.

I am a math and creative coding enthusiast and spend a lot of time at the intersections of math and art. I love to make interactive poetry and coded poems.

What hardware do you use?

I have a Voyager named Wanda, and she is hooked into whatever Mac I am working on, from a 13” Air to a mini with a Studio Display.

My mouse is a Logitech Lift. I use my iPad a lot for art and ideation.

Next to my desk I also keep an AxiDraw and Cricut for pen-plotting and a sewing machine for bringing ideas and code to cloth. I use a Bambu Lab printer to prototype in 3D in the room adjacent to my office.

And what software?

I use Panic Nova, Procreate, Affinity Design, Notion, Obsidian, Safari, Logic Pro, and sometimes Adobe products. A lot of what I do is in-browser.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

My config isn’t anything special—I have some colors that I started with to help me remember where things are, and it has just kinda stuck.

I recently added a couple of shortcuts. When I hold down V—screen snippet, L—launchpad, and a QW combo when I want to shut things down. I use the caps it came with.

What would be your dream setup?

I really have what I need. I work from home, so my Voyager was a must for ergo—same with a lot of the other equipment. I’m very content.

My name's Jon Niehof, and I guess I'm still figuring out who I am. Work-wise, I'm best described as a research software engineer: I have a Ph.D. in astronomy and spend most of my time developing software and systems to process and analyze scientific data, rather than writing a lot of first-author papers. Currently I'm working on Parker Solar Probe and the upcoming Interstellar Mapping and Acceleration Probe and HelioSwarm missions. In support of those efforts, I'm one of the main developers of the SpacePy package.

Beyond work, I spend my time active outside as much as possible, mostly hiking and running but also cycling. I volunteer for a regional outdoors club, both leading trips and instructing new leaders. And I volunteer for the local search and rescue team.

What hardware do you use?

My home and travel machine is a ThinkPad X1 Carbon and my in-office machine is an aging ThinkPad T460.

I don't need a lot of heavy iron. The office monitors are a stacked pair left over from integration of a previous instrument. The ZSA Moonlander is my main “luxury” item, since quality input is so important. I had a former student recommend since it had greatly reduced his neck and shoulder pain and what do you know, it actually works.

Most everything else is what I can easily get my hands on. The stand-sit desk and kneeling chair let me cycle through positions regularly so I don't spend too long cramped up in any one position. The reMarkable 2 tablet is my other “luxury”; it's replaced a lab notebook, several attempts at note-taking apps, and a pile of scratch paper.

Do not underestimate the importance of the debugging ducky.

And what software?

I've been using Linux as my daily driver for 25+ years now, and Ubuntu for most of that. XFCE is my desktop, which largely exists to hold a bunch of xterms and emacs windows. The vast majority of my code uses the scientific Python stack, including numpy and scipy.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

I use a custom layout that was based on the default with a few additions. I figured I'd get adjusted to the keyboard and then do a large from-scratch design. That never happened—I just did a few cycles of fixing what annoyed me and found that iterated to a pretty good solution.

I use the default keycaps, which means a lot of remembering what all the little line keys mean, but it's not like I look at the keyboard much. I never thought I'd care about RGB lighting, but the “splash” pattern just makes me happy while I'm working away.

What would be your dream setup?

I'm not picky. If I got used to anything too nice, I'd be annoyed when I'm on the road and stuck with a laptop (for longer trips I do bring the Moonlander and split it across the laptop keyboard, a bit wide but doable). I enjoy the stacked monitors rather than a single large monitor, since it provides a little bit of structure. I wish somebody would come up with a good alternative to reaching for the mouse—I hate trackpads, and the ThinkPad trackpoint is so far the best of a bad lot.

My name is Wendel Topper, and I am a husband, father, and audio/video editor. I spent 20 years working in pest control, and then changed careers completely in 2016. Since then I have been doing audio and video editing for podcasts and managing YouTube channels. And I am completely self-taught, so I have to say a big thank you to YouTube University. 🙂

I’ve had the honor of working with a lot of amazing people over the years, from small niche podcasters to some of the largest companies in the world. My main focus for the last few years has been taking care of all of the audio and video content for The White Coat Investor, which promotes financial literacy to its listeners/readers/viewers. I’m grateful to The White Coat Investor for giving me the creative freedom and autonomy that make my job so much fun!

Outside of work, I enjoy spending time with my loved ones and travelling. One big perk of digital/remote work is the ability to work from anywhere. My wife and I have definitely taken advantage of this in the form of eight cross-country trips, all while bringing work with us. And we’re planning some more “work-cations” in the coming year!

What hardware do you use?

My current setup is a Mac Studio M2 Max with 32GB unified memory and 3x1TB SSDs. I use a 42” 4K Samsung monitor for lots of screen real estate, with a 23” LG monitor on the side. I also have a Shure MV7+ microphone and a pair of PreSonus Eris 3.5” studio reference monitors. Rounding out my hardware are a Logitech Brio 500 camera, MX Keys S keyboard, and MX Master 3S for Mac mouse. And, of course, my ZSA Halfmoon (which is half of a Moonlander). And all of this sits on an Uplift standing desk.

And what software?

I’m an Adobe CC guy, so I use Adobe Audition for audio editing and Premiere Pro, After Effects, and Photoshop for video creation. I also use iZotope RX and Levelator for audio postproduction. Other apps that I find useful include the following:

• OBS for recording video,
• WorkingHours—great for time tracking,
• Mp3tag for editing ID3 tags,
• Freeze for access to Amazon S3 storage,
• LastPass for managing passwords,
• Pandora for music,
• Zoom for video meetings,
• Slack for communications, and
• CopyLess 2, a great clipboard manager for Mac.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

My Logitech MX Keys S keyboard is great for the little bit of typing that I do, but my workflow for editing audio & video has always been to use a good mouse in my right hand and a one-handed programmable keyboard in my left hand. I started out with a one-handed keyboard that I already had for gaming, the Logitech G13. This was a great option for me… until I wore out some of the actuators. So I bought another one, this time used since Logitech had stopped making them. And then I wore that one out… So I started looking for a replacement and finally stumbled across the Halfmoon. What a great keyboard! I love this thing! I’ve got it set up the same way as my old Logitech G13, so my fingers didn’t have to relearn the key positions, and I can easily change or add commands any time I feel like it. I’ve also travelled with it, which works perfectly.

I did have one issue with programming the Halfmoon when I first got it, so I emailed support. You know what it’s like to email support at most places… I was expecting an unhelpful response in 48 hours, then a forever back-and-forth. Instead, I received a very quick reply from an actual human who fixed my problem. AMAZING! A BIG Thank You to the ZSA team for being awesome!

What would be your dream setup?

My current setup is my dream setup. I’ve been crafting my ideal workspace slowly over the years and I’m really happy with it as is, but I’m sure some cool thing will eventually come to my attention that I’ll just have to add to my setup.

I'm Adrian, a frontend web developer, a DJ, and a language-learning enthusiast (quite terrible at it, unfortunately).

I help guide product design and do frontend (and sometimes backend) development work in a small team at a software development/consulting company called Makhongele.

I primarily work in the JavaScript/React.js/Node ecosystem, a powerful stack for building modern web applications today.

I hold a B.Eng degree in Computer Science from Ocean University of China. Initially, when I started out, I intended to be a mobile/iOS developer, but I fell in love with the openness and flexibility of the web ecosystem and never looked back.

A music enthusiast at heart, I generally listen to a variety of genres including pop, hip-hop, house, Afro-beats, and EDM, and I'm usually open to exploring unfamiliar genres.

In the DJ space, I'm known as @dj_a.drivoe (or DJ A.D.), and I generally play music that is closely aligned with the genres I listen to, with a heavy emphasis on Amapiano as of late.

I'm also decently conversational in Chinese (Mandarin, aka 中文, 普通话), which I picked up during my time living in Qingdao (青岛) and have been fascinated by the process of language learning ever since. I've been trying to teach myself Italian in my spare time (on and off) and I am always curious about the similarities and differences of language constructs and cultural perspectives across different languages and cultures.

What hardware do you use?

I own a very minimal yet effective hardware setup. For a long time, I was using a mid-2014 Apple MacBook Pro 6th gen Intel (a testament to Apple's great hardware and software optimization), and recently switched to a 2021 M1 Pro MacBook Pro and have been happy with how well it performs whilst staying cool and silent (I've yet to hear its fan spin). Pair that with a single 27" 1080p Samsung LS27C... display, and not forgetting the ZSA Moonlander, my very first split mechanical ergonomic keyboard (more on that later). I also got myself a Rayswitch 360 laptop stand that raises my laptop to eye level when working on the desk, reducing the strain on my neck.

For my DJing setup, I primarily use a Numark Mixtrack Pro FX, a compact controller that packs a mean punch when it comes to features whilst still being portable and lightweight, which I usually connect to my older 2014 MacBook Pro, as it is not a standalone controller. The last crucial piece of my setup is my trusty EcoFlow River Pro 712 kWh UPS, which has been a lifesaver on certain days when we experience power interruptions.

And what software?

I use Alacritty terminal in place of the default Mac terminal. I've been daily driving Vim (classic Vim) as my IDE of choice for about 2½ years now and have been happy with my config overall. I'm also experimenting with my new Neovim config, but making that switch has taken a while, and I will probably continue using Vim until I can get my Neovim config to full feature parity with my current classic Vim config.

A few of the pillars of my Vim config:

• vim-fugitive for resolving commits and other Git-related tasks;
• Vimspector for debugging;
• Tokyo Night (for Vim), a beautiful theme (repo has been archived though);
• fzf for all my fuzzy-finding needs;
• and lastly, coc.nvim, a plug-in that acts as the default manager for all my language servers, linters, and formatters, and comes with its own ecosystem of extensions for nearly all programming languages.

And since I use Vim, it means I generally use the keyboard way more than the mouse/touchpad. After a couple of hours of typing on a laptop/regular keyboard, I start to feel pain in my wrists. This is what led me to get the ZSA Moonlander, which has been a game changer for me when working for long hours at my desk. The ortholinear keyboard layout helped me correct a lot of bad typing habits I had picked up from years of using a normal staggered-layout keyboard. The split nature of the Moonlander means I can position each half at the right spot and angle that allows me to type without extending my wrists. I think a lot more people should be thinking about getting split ergonomic keyboards (there are far more people in other fields who do more typing than I do).

I recently switched from Chrome to the Arc browser and will probably never go back. Specifically, the Spaces feature replaced the need for tab groups, which I had been using in Chrome. Moreover, it archives tabs (in each of those Spaces) that I haven't used after a couple of days, reducing the chances of having a thousand tabs open (like most people still using Chrome do). Since the tabs appear on the sidebar, it's much easier to read tab titles and find the exact tab I'm looking for within each Space. And whilst I'm working within a tab, the sidebar moves out of the way and auto-hides, leaving me with a distraction-free, spacious browsing experience.

I use Raycast as my launcher of choice, and it comes packed with lots of useful features like window management and snippets. I use Vimwiki (Vim plug-in) and Apple Notes for my note-taking needs. I generally lean towards Serato DJ Pro for DJing. It's fast, clean, and intuitive—and it gives the best DJing experience, in my opinion. It also happens to be the software that works with my current controller. I only use rekordbox if I'm preparing my music to play at a venue that uses Pioneer DJ hardware. It is the software used by most world-class DJs and events.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

When I got my ZSA Moonlander, I chose to stick with the default printed keycaps and went with the Cherry MX Brown key switches, which have been great so far.

I also decided to start with the default ZSA Moonlander layout layers and gradually changed small parts of the layout to suit my needs. A few highlights from my custom layout include replacing the Caps Lock key with the equal sign, as I use that symbol a lot in JavaScript programming. I moved the Escape key to my right red thumb key and relocated other commonly used keys to my thumb clusters, removing all the strain that my pinkie fingers have to deal with on a normal keyboard.

What would be your dream setup?

My dream setup would probably include the following:

• A monitor with 4K resolution or higher, e.g., the Apple Studio Display, to match my MacBook's color profile;
• A Framework laptop for tinkering with Linux;
• A tenting kit for my ZSA Moonlander;
• Some LED strips or Philips Hue bulbs to add some background light behind the screen and balance the contrast in dark conditions;
• A Magic Trackpad to use when I'm working at my desk (it's a bit of a pain to move my hand from the Moonlander onto my laptop's trackpad on the laptop stand). I would probably put this between my two keyboard halves.

I wouldn't mind getting an M2 MacBook Air to handle my DJing needs, and would definitely like owning a Pioneer XDJ-RX3, one of the best all-in-one professional DJ controllers out there.

Hi, I'm Sky. I'm a student, content creator, and self-taught developer. I study IT in college, making content focusing on programming and my journey to become a better developer. I primarily code in Go or Typescript.

Outside of my work I enjoy spending time with friends, taking my dogs out for walks, reading, discussing politics, and discussing various other topics such as TV shows and movies.

What hardware do you use?

The center of attraction on my desk is my dual monitors, a 32" MSI monitor and a 27" LG monitor. Both screens are connected to my Thunderbolt dock, which connects to my Lenovo laptop.

Although the laptop is normally just kept at my desk and used as a desktop, it's too big, heavy, and noisy to take out. When I leave the house, I take out my Asus Zenbook 14. But no matter if I'm at my desk or out and about, I normally have my Moonlander with me. Using a normal keyboard without my custom layout feels archaic now, and my Moonlander helps me to get work done much quicker. For my mouse, I use the Razer Viper. I also have a BENQ Halo lamp to help light up my desk and behind my monitor when I'm working at night or early winter mornings.

And what software?

Most software I use is free and open source, so it should come as no shock that I daily drive Linux. My flavour of choice is Nix. The reasoning behind this is that I like the declarative nature; I don't have to worry about keeping my two computers in sync, and it's so much better than how I did things before. I use a variety of other tools inside of Linux itself that enable me to get my work done.

• Obsidian—I've tried out almost every form of note-taking software, and I've found that Obsidian does everything I need while also keeping things in plain Markdown, which helps to keep things simple if Obsidian ever goes and also makes writing scripts around Obsidian simple.
• Neovim—I don't normally use the Obsidian app itself; instead I prefer to use Neovim and use the obsidian.nvim plugin to interact with Obsidian. I also use Neovim for all my coding, as I enjoy its keyboard-driven design and how I can customise every little bit to fit my needs.
• DaVinci Resolve—I've not got too much to say about Resolve other than it works great and allows me to get my work done.
• GIMP—Same can be said about GIMP as Resolve: It just works and allows me to get my work done.

If you want to find more information about my software, you can find it on my .dotfiles repo.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

Before I even got my Moonlander I had been using a custom version of Dvorak, and as it's integrated into my muscle memory, I carried the layout over to my Moonlander. The layout is called Real Programmers Dvorak, and it differs from normal Programmer Dvorak by placing some keys in a position I find much more logical. I had issues getting this layout to work on my Moonlander originally, as with Oryx I couldn't assign a key to have a different behaviour when pressing shift, so I had to use QMK and flash it to the board.

You can find my layout on GitHub. While it may look complicated, once you've read the docs and looked around it for a few minutes, it's not too hard to understand what's going on.

What would be your dream setup?

If you asked me this a few years ago I would have given you 500 ideas, but honestly I'm not sure what else I would like to add right now. The main thing I can think of is a proper desktop PC that I've built myself. I'd also love to try out the Voyager—the small design seems super cool and sounds like a dream for travel. But other than that, hardware-wise I'm quite happy with things at the moment.

Software-wise I would love to see more apps come to Linux, and a tighter integration between apps that I can easily script to make my life easier. But I'm mostly happy with things right now.

Hi, my name is Andres Diaz. I'm a software engineer from Guatemala, music enthusiast, and kind of a gym rat? I work as a full stack developer for a startup in the US.

I'm someone who gets invested in things really fast and jumps from one thing to another, constantly changing what my interests are.

I started as a web developer and later on moved to hybrid mobile development using Flutter and React Native, which is part of what I currently work on. Recently I've been learning Go and C, since I would like to start getting more involved in other areas of tech such as open source and operating systems, and try some self-hosting in the future.

On my own time when I'm not on my computer doing other stuff, most likely I'm at the gym. It's something that I picked up three years ago and that has been really fun and engaging. I try to be really consistent with it, or as well as I can.

From time to time I like to pretend I know how to cook, so I'll search up a recipe and try to make it. This usually doesn't go as expected, but it's always fun.

I'm also trying to learn a new language, Japanese, which has not been going as great as I'd expected, but there's some progress.

I like a good story, so searching for new games, series, anime, and books is something I like to do in my free time and maybe have a good watch or read during the weekend. Lately I made the jump to Linux, and it has been really fun just messing with my whole system and configuring it the way I like it, breaking everything and trying to fix it. It's been really time-consuming, but also I've managed to learn a lot, which I really love.

What hardware do you use?

For my work I have a MacBook Pro M1, which despite my not-so-much appreciation for Apple, I can't praise enough. It has been really amazing; it manages to take everything I throw at it without any issue.

For my personal PC, I have a custom build with the following specs:

• AMD Ryzen 7 5800x
• B550 Gigabyte Vision D-P Motherboard
• 32 GB of DDR4 @ 3600 MT/s G.Skill Trident Z
• Asus ROG Strix 3080 Ti
• Two 1440p@165hz M27Q P Gigabyte monitors

For my peripherals, with the help of a KVM switch in the monitors, I use a Logitech G502 and my ZSA Moonlander for work and also gaming. That's why I have the wrist rest only on the right side, which makes playing games a bit more comfortable.

For audio, I have a pair of Audeze Maxwell headphones and a JBL soundbar. I got the Audeze since I wanted to try something more on the audiophile side of things without having to compromise on the utility of having a mic and a wireless pair of headphones, and so far they have been really good. And the soundbar is really useful when I just don't feel like having the headset on every time.

And what software?

For work and just on my day-to-day, I use the following software:

• Kitty as my terminal emulator. Can't go wrong with this one, it's fast and has a lot of features that I really like. It has tons of customization.
• Neovim as my text editor. I started using Vim this year, and since that decision I've made lots of changes to my workflow and just my life in general. I started looking into split keyboards because of Neovim. I changed operating systems because of Neovim, and that has led me to a different path just trying to learn more about the tools I use. Also, as a person I see that now I'm more interested in everything related to computers and tech, programing and such, things I wasn't really that interested in before.
• tmux as my terminal multiplexer. I use it to split my terminal into different panes. It's really useful when I'm working on multiple things at the same time, when I have to run a server and a client.
• DBeaver for my database client. I don't really work that much with databases, so this takes care of everything I need. It's really simple and easy to use.
• Lately I've been using a new browser called Zen Browser, which is based on Firefox, which was what I used to use. But Zen has been amazing so far, really fast and has a lot of features I like. Since it's based on Firefox, not much in my workflow has changed.

This is what I use in my day-to-day, aside from other software that's more of a necessity than a choice, like Steam for games or Slack for work-related conversations, Spotify for music, etc.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

As of right now, my keyboard is basically stock. Like I mentioned previously, this whole thing about getting into keyboards started this year, so I'm really just trying stuff out first. I've been really happy with the Moonlander and just recently started looking into some mods I could apply to it and change my keycaps to something without the letters, and for the switches I'm also planning on changing them to something quieter or "thunkier," but I'm still looking into that.

What would be your dream setup?

I think as far as my dream setup…I don't know I think I pretty much already have everything I need. I don't think I would change much right now. Maybe I'll get an OLED monitor down the line and a turntable to listen to some music, but for now I think I'm good and really happy with what I have.

I’m Jenna—just Jenna. I'm not fond of nicknames. Goodness knows there are enough Jens in the world already without adding me to the mix, and can anyone really justify the use of “Jenny” as a nickname for Jenna? I’m a sort of generic nerd at an alarm company in New England that has very much outgrown its “small” designation in the last few years. I am a database squirreller, IoT guru, RF network manager, help-desk tech, herder of managed mobile devices, and sworn enemy of all peripherals with paper trays. I've been in various roles in this industry for a bit over ten years now, and while this one has some downsides—mostly just printers, if I’m being honest—it feels like a happy place. One shouldn't define oneself by the job they do, but here we are. I spend most of my time at a keyboard, by choice.

When I get home I park at another computer, but to do more fun things—mostly games and/or bingeing Star Trek. The house desk is the superior desk because it sometimes includes a cat.

Most of my free time lately has been spent coaxing my teenager to clean his room and convincing the kitten that she wants to be an adventure cat. Neither is going especially well at this point. When the weather and my schedule allow for it, I'll happily enjoy a quiet afternoon in a kayak. Non-Adventure Cat is not invited.

What hardware do you use?

At work, an ErgoDox EZ with Kailh Coppers and an MX Ergo Plus drive my workspace. The keys are pretty quiet on their own plus have a double layer of O-rings so I’m not being That Guy in the office. They've saved my hands over the last few years, and the keyboard has the bonus of adding a layer of “security through obscurity” to my workstation: Nobody touches it because they can't figure out how to log in.

My home PC is a relatively recent DIY project, decently spec'd for a casual gamer. I’m thinking about cramming all of its guts into a much smaller case as a winter project. Again, the input devices are more interesting than the machine itself though: a Voyager with Kailh Choc Reds and another MX Ergo Plus live there. Two, actually—I wore out the left-click switch in my original mouse, so replacing that is also on the project list. I occasionally swap the Voyager out for a Moonlander (Kailh Silvers) if I’m doing worky stuff at the house. More keys more better, sometimes. I have small hands, though, and generally find the petite Voyager is more comfortable for casual use. It’s just so darn pleasant to type on. The available horizontal space is pretty tight, so the mouse usually ends up resting on my leg. Admittedly it's not the most ergo-friendly setup—but there's no HR rep to get judgy about it at the house, so it's fine!

Scattered all around both of my desks like confetti are an assortment of Raspberry Pis and ESP boards, sensors, power supplies... They're so hard to keep organized. Free-range electronics are probably happier electronics anyway.

Laptops with E Ink lids sounded like a total gimmick until we accidentally ordered one at work. As someone who routinely needs to reference equipment manuals while working on the go, though, this has actually been great! The Voyager and MX Ergo from home travel with me, and I use an iPad Air as a second monitor when I need one. With how small the Voyager packs up, I can fit an entire functional workstation in a very small bag. Gotta love a carry-on friendly setup.

And what software?

“Out of sight, out of mind” is a way of life for me. I split related functions into separate desktops so I can conveniently “forget” that email and Teams exist when I'm trying to focus on something else.

PowerShell, 365 management, and other admin-type things have their own dedicated desktop at work.

Azure Data Studio (dark mode yay) and SSMS (no dark mode bleh), MySQL Workbench, and Metabase have their own desktop as well.

Google Calendar drives my life and spans every desktop and device I have—I’d miss every appointment and task without it.

Google Earth occupies a fair amount of my time both for work and for funsies. It's wild what information exists in KMZ form, and being able to aggregate many different things into a single view is neat.

Star Trek Fleet Command is the software equivalent of a fidget spinner: It’s something to click at when I need to distract my hands while I’m thinking, so it’s usually open somewhere.

Keymapp has come in handy for more than just reflashing boards—I use it as a cheat sheet when I forget where I stuck seldom-used keys, usually to discover that I removed them completely at some point.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

For all of my keyboards, the base layer is pretty close to stock. I originally switched to positionable splits because the strain of typing on standard keyboards at work was making my hands go numb, and I got most of what I needed from these boards just in the shape of them. The customizability is a neat bonus, and I do still occasionally tweak them.

The ErgoDox has some minor quality-of-life tweaks: Ctrl-Alt-Del and -End double taps, a tap-hold Windows+L, and desktop left-rights to make switching between Windows desktops faster.

All three keyboards also have a Colemak layer because I will eventually learn it well enough to switch from QWERTY permanently.

I've experimented a bit with adding chording to a layer on the Voyager because chording keyboards are just plain cool. The configurator made it pretty easy to load up—PEBKAC errors prevent me from using it effectively though, I think.

What would be your dream setup?

As far as peripherals go I’m most partial to the ErgoDox, so I may eventually pick up a second one for home. Maybe. I’m typing this on the Voyager, thinking perhaps I could find a way to recreate this exact feel on the ErgoDox for the extra keys, and that would be perfect. Otherwise, I’ve already made my desks as comfortable as I can since I spend so much time at them.

I’m Ming Thein, cofounder of Horologer MING—one of the very few high-end watch brands in Asia, and probably the only one in SE Asia. Most of the team is based out of Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, and we also have a production facility in Switzerland. I’m responsible for the creative side—that is to say product design, engineering, photography, packaging design, collateral, etc. Unfortunately it is also my name on the dial, as my fellow cofounders insisted that I take responsibility for my children. In my previous life, I was a professional photographer, with adjunct roles as chief of strategy at Hasselblad, advisory board of DJI, and a bunch of stuff with other industry companies. In ancient history, I was in finance.

“Outside work” is a tricky question, as increasingly those things became work—first photography, then watches. I stop there, because I also learned that doing something professionally is very different from doing it as an amateur—you spend more time around the other pragmatic and less enjoyable elements of the business than the actual fun part. Fortunately, I see no way to make eating or cycling into a profession, though I am very far down the rabbit hole of customisation with both of those things—and coincidentally, also how I got into watches.

What hardware do you use?

I assume this is computing hardware —for the heavy lifting, I have one of the last Intel Xeon Mac Pros running a 27” Wacom Cintiq Pro. It has an obscene (224GB) amount of RAM for high-resolution stacking and rendering, and an SSD and NAS stack attached. This is hooked up to a black Moonlander that’s lost its palm rests and some of its feet, has superfluous keys blanked off with plugs I 3D-printed, Kailh Box Navy switches, and Cerakey caps. I love the heavy clicky feel this combination provides.

I actually do most of my work at home, so the office has an M2 MacBook Air and Studio Display, which is connected to a white Voyager. It too has an unusual configuration—the two halves are permanently connected and tented with a 3D-printed base I designed (I want to be able to move it around and keep the perfect orientation and spacing). I removed the bottom covers and screwed both halves of the board directly to the 3D printed base. The caps are CNC aluminium, also of a custom design, with holes in the middle to be able to see the LEDs—these serve as color mnemonics for my modifier, number, and homing keys. Since these caps are also heavy, I changed the switches to the low-profile Kailh Choc Navies. I’m not very good at leaving things stock…once I get into something, I tend to go down the rabbit hole. It also doesn’t help when you have the tools to make exactly what you want...

And what software?

Other than the usual boring browsers and enterprise stuff—most of my life is spent in Photoshop and Onshape. And of course Oryx…without that it’s impossible to make so few keys work.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

The Moonlander and Voyager layouts are almost identical, but for the addition of an arrow cluster on the right side and dedicated control and option keys on the left. There are a couple of layers, but to be honest the long-press and autoshift functions are so useful I no longer use them. I’d never have thought I could actually make something with so few keys not just work, but work in a really efficient way!

What would be your dream setup?

I’m pretty close, I think. Achievable dreams, unified metal housings for the current boards; I’m a product designer and unashamed about my preferences for tactility and haptics. It’s one of the reasons I landed up with the current keycaps. One step further would be wireless, and with an integrated 3DX six-axis mouse for CAD work and a nice large trackball. I find this much easier for CAD work than a mouse to precisely fix a location with.

After earning a degree in Physics and spending a year traveling the world, I began an unexpected career in South Florida as a dive officer for a large scientific diving program. I trained students, staff, and faculty not only in safe diving techniques, but also in ways to optimize their efficiency underwater. In the diving world, every minute counts—not only to stay within decompression limitations but also to maintain your breathing gas supply. Teaching divers to collect data efficiently meant they could gather more information in fewer dives, use fewer resources, and ultimately save considerable time and money by reducing the need for repeated trips out on the water. Even small gains in efficiency can lead to significant long-term benefits. Sound familiar to anyone’s keyboard journey? Maximizing efficiency in underwater data collection is achieved through building comfort, confidence, and competence; for about ten years, I specialized in this, leading in-person classes, teaching skills in and under the water, and creating eLearning modules so students could master the theory behind the practice.

I was drawn to technology (with help, I completed my first two PC builds during my time in that job), but being at a computer was only a portion of what I did on a daily basis.

Deep into the pandemic, a personnel shakeup eliminated my opportunities for upward mobility, so I decided to make a career change. With 1,500 logged dives and experience in various specialized projects (like rebreathers, caves, trimix, scooters, and staged decompression, to name a few), I left the diving field and discovered Instructional Design.

Without a dedicated home office, I, like many other founders of promising startups, set up shop in the garage. My work grew, life developed, and so, too, grew the mess all around me. Although my green screen made it seem like my workspace was very nice to everyone else, I was drowning. I spent about three years in the garage before a serious home renovation project allowed me to be promoted into the actual house with a dedicated (and properly air-conditioned) space. Pictured here is how it looked about halfway through my time in the garage.

I didn’t know what instructional design was, but it turned out I had already been doing the work of an instructional designer for years through the hybrid lessons I was designing and developing. I launched my own business to create eLearning experiences for clients across diverse industries. Although it’s less adventurous than my previous career, it offers better pay, flexibility, and exposure to a wide range of people and fields. So far, I’ve designed training for sectors including real estate, banking, finance, healthcare, cybersecurity, and sales, to name a few.

That’s what I do. Who I am is a devoted father of two who loves playing music, cycling, and serving as a church leader. I believe in systems and structure, sometimes get lost in the details, and have a long list of local sports and cultural activities I’d love to try if only I had more time. The saying “what is right is not always popular, and what is popular is not always right” is woven into my personality beyond the traditional interpretation of the saying. It helps me think outside the box, not care about what society does or thinks, and make my own decisions. Whether it’s dismantling and rebuilding my bed back in my college dorm room to have my desk lofted above the bed, biking two kids to school when everyone else drives their kids by car, using a Voyager instead of a traditional keyboard, or creating a custom chair mount for said keyboard, I challenge norms.

What hardware do you use?

Because I spend so much time at my desk now and because quality work (including video and audio) is part of what I do, I created a sound-treated office in a recent home renovation. My work is completed using a custom-built PC (Ryzen 9 3950X, 64GB RAM, 2x 990 Pro SSDs, NVIDIA GTX1660 Super) displayed on a 43” monitor. The framework of my system is a 6ft wide standing desk I got secondhand for a steal.

I have a mirrorless camera set up for videos and conference calls along with a choice of a dynamic and pencil condenser microphones, with output coming from studio monitors, all run through a Focusrite Scarlett audio interface mounted under the desk. To reduce clutter, my MacBook Air is also mounted under the surface of the desk. All critical components are run through a UPS tucked out of view behind a bookshelf, and files are all backed up on a Synology NAS in another room of the house. Both the UPS and NAS have bailed me out more than once.

I control everything through a combination of my Voyager, a Kensington SlimBlade, an Elgato Stream Deck + and Elgato pedal. I can’t eliminate cables altogether, but an hour or two devoted to cable management helped me achieve an acceptable level of minimalism. Cable management is slightly more complicated for us standing-desk folks; while it’s no cable management masterpiece by any means, I’m satisfied with how everything is routed.

And what software?

For building eLearning experiences, I specialize in Articulate Storyline. To help make the content more engaging, I tap into the Adobe suite (Photoshop, Lightroom, Acrobat, Illustrator, Premiere Pro, After Effects, Aero, and Audition). All of my video, whether a live call or recording, is run through vMix and NDI. The Microsoft Office suite rounds out the rest of the software I regularly rely on. There are others I use, but if I don’t use them at least once a week, I didn’t include them here.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

I went directly from a 104+key keyboard to the Voyager. I didn’t want to ease into anything. I heavily considered ditching QWERTY, but ultimately decided I didn’t have good enough reasons to justify it. After a few months of using the Voyager, I find that I get everything done with four layers.

Layer 0: This is my default QWERTY layout with a few key adjustments. The left thumb controls space (left) and tab (right). Holding space activates Layer 1, and holding tab gives me Ctrl. The right thumb controls backspace (right) and enter (left); holding backspace activates Layer 2, while holding enter enables shift. Some other notable tweaks:

• Holding 4 closes a browser tab (Ctrl+F4).
• Tap+hold 4 closes a window (Alt+F4).
• Holding Forward Slash previews selected slides in Storyline.
• Holding Comma acts as Delete.
• Tapping and holding the lower left button puts the computer to sleep.

Layer 1: This layer is dedicated to numbers and symbols. I shifted the layout up to align the 7, 8, and 9 keys with a traditional numpad, placing 0 below 1 and keeping Delete, Period, and Backspace where they are on the base layer (and incidentally also keeping 7, 8, and 9 as they are on the base layer). Otherwise, this layer mostly follows the default setup.

Layer 2: Here I have media, light, and navigation controls. After so many iterations, I’m not sure what’s default versus custom at this point. My Arrow cluster matches a traditional layout: index finger for Left, middle finger for Down, ring finger for Right, all on the home row, and Up is positioned on the middle finger above the down Arrow. Home and End are above the Left and Right Arrows, respectively. The left column on the right hand contains Page Up, Page Down, Wheel Up, and Wheel Down. For lateral scrolling, Wheel Left and Right are set to my right index and middle fingers all the way at the top.

Layer 3: This is my least-used layer, set up for mouse control. It’s the only layer that toggles rather than requiring a key hold. I rarely use it, but it includes all the essential mouse movements, acceleration modes, and wheel controls.

What’s perhaps most unique about my setup isn’t the keyboard layout but my chair mount configuration. Within a month of getting the Voyager, I built a chair mount, which I’m using to type this message.

Here’s how it’s set up: The keyboard is attached to a ZSA tripod mount that’s affixed to a tripod ball head for easy tilting. The tripod head is mounted to an HDPE plate I cut to fit, which then attaches to a VESA mount on each arm of my SecretLab Titan chair. I keep one TRRS cable on the desk and another mounted permanently under the chair (you can see them dangling down in a previous photo – the fact that they hang might bother some, but they’re not in my way and they are always at the ready). I cut the HDPE plate specifically to accommodate a trackball on either side, allowing me to switch hands easily. When not in use, the mount swivels out of the way. The setup works great, and I can move the keyboard from the chair mount to the desk faster than it takes the desk to go from sitting to standing.

What would be your dream setup?

I’m very blessed to say that this is as much of a dream setup as I ever imagined. The only tweaks I have are these:

Trackball Adjustment: I'd like to raise the trackball on the chair mount to match the height of my keyboard. Currently, the tripod mount lifts the Voyager to the perfect level, but the trackball sits directly on the HDPE, which isn’t ideal. Although it works, I end up keeping the trackball on the desk about 75% of the time. I’m considering mounting it on its own tripod to elevate it, then trimming any excess material on the HDPE plate for a tighter, minimal look.

Enhanced Lighting: I’d love to add some LED strips behind the monitor and my audio dampening panel to improve the ambient lighting in the office.

Sound Dampening Improvements: While I’ve invested in soundproofing and sound dampening, including custom-building the big sound panel on the wall behind my chair, there’s still more to be done with sound control. One panel isn’t quite enough for the reverberations, so I plan to make more panels. I’m also working on getting custom imagery printed on acoustically transparent fabric to wrap the panel. For now, I wrapped it in green fabric, allowing me to set the background virtually thanks to vMix. It gets the job done, but I would prefer to have a real image behind me instead of a green screen.

I'm Michael, a software developer who ended up as a tech CEO. While working as a head of AI/ML and teaching postgraduate students about machine learning, I got pulled into the business world through a series of “I guess it's useless, but so cool” projects. My favorite was a project my wife and I created together: a natural language processing system that reads the internet in real time, organizing millions of daily mentions into a searchable knowledge graph of over 1.5 billion interconnected facts—imagine Google, but with structured queries for understanding how events, people, and places connect and unfold over time.

I co-founded a software company to develop distributed systems (well, it's corporate blockchains), computer vision, and natural language processing solutions. I guess investors would have been confused by a pitch of “we basically build anything complex enough to be interesting,” so we grew organically to a team of 50 people. This led to some fascinating projects, like handling the technological side of ecological monitoring in the Arctic, including a computer vision system for identifying and tracking individually distinctive animals like whales.

For the past few years, I've been living a nomadic lifestyle moving across countries with my family, including my two kids, who were just toddlers when we started. Central Asia, Armenia, Georgia, Greece, Turkey, and even UAE and Qatar—this journey taught me more about communication, culture, and product design than my entire education. When you live in different countries, you quickly learn the ways and eliminate lots of cultural assumptions. Of course, every piece of equipment needs to justify its space in limited luggage, which has shaped my personal workspace decisions.

What hardware do you use?

My workplace evolved in three key steps, each with its own distinctive flavor of tech.

The first setup was essentially an Apple orchard, although I hesitated giving up Android phones. The core was MacBook Pro 13 (Intel i7 and T2 chip, 32 GB RAM, 1 TB SSD) paired with an MSI Prestige PS341WU 5K ultrawide monitor. Also, I had a supplementary MacBook and a 12.9" iPad Pro with a Magic Keyboard for iPad case.

Sometimes I had to turn my desk into a paper kingdom to go through stacks of research materials or documents awaiting signatures. Plus, I frequently interviewed potential teammates in my office space. This shaped my desire to keep a pristine desk where devices could vanish in seconds. Relocating with my laptop to partners or contractors also required seamless detaching. That's why I pursued an all-wireless setup: just an Apple Magic Trackpad, Magic Keyboard, Harman Kardon Aura Studio speaker, and non-Pro AirPods Gen 3, which I still prefer over the Pro models and other headphones for calls.

Ultrawide was a must-have for working with spreadsheets: cash flow forecasting, resource allocation matrices, multi-entity budget consolidation, project-specific cost attribution and tax planning, and other C-suite financial “artistry.” Side-by-side comparisons are also streamlined with wide monitors.

The second workplace was at the apartment's balcony when I lived in Kyrgyzstan for a year. It was not intended for visits, so it started to drift in a geekier and more personal direction. I used the Dell U3417W—an ultrawide curved 34-inch monitor running at 3440x1440. Like many laptop users, I preferred low-profile keys and was looking for a chance to get a portable 75% wireless keyboard. I landed on a Keychron K3 Ultra-slim with red low-profile Gateron switches, accompanied by a Razer Overwatch Deathadder Elite mouse.

Soon, I finally gave up on wireless. It wasn't just about checked luggage restrictions (lithium batteries must go in carry-on)—my hand-carried bags were already cramped with an iPad and two MacBooks. Just throwing a keyboard in a backpack is a sure way to damage it, so I had to carry the Keychron in its original bag. To top it off, often I had to take it out at security checkpoints just like a laptop.

One of the best things about programmable keyboards is how they encapsulate customization—plug into any machine and you get the same experience (sans language layout support). Back then, I found split keyboards intriguing, but impractical for mobile use. I couldn't let my setup “overfit” to a specific place at the cost of its “generalization ability.” When ZSA Voyager hit the market, it checked all my boxes: no battery, wired, QMK-compatible with easy flashing, portable, and even included a soft travel case. It gave me that “resistance is futile, just buy it already” feeling.

So, the second workspace evolved with an addition of a ZSA Voyager. My geeky drift came to a logical conclusion when I ordered a ThinkPad T14s Gen 4 AMD (Ryzen 7 PRO 7840U, 32 GB RAM, 1 TB SSD, low-power matte 14" screen). By the way, its fingerprint sensor works flawlessly on Linux systems with fprint.

My current workspace is at home and it's not transient, so I finally let myself get a standing desk and a minimal homelab setup. The core is a ThinkPad T14s in clamshell mode. When I need macOS software, I put my MacBook in a soft case on top of it and just switch cables to it.

For a monitor, I finally did an actual analysis instead of just grabbing the biggest ultrawide in a $2,000 budget. Considering PPD/PPI, angular resolution, viewing distance, and software scaling issues, I found out that 27" WQHD should be optimal. Acer Nitro XV271U was the cheapest match, and—surprise—it perfectly fit my needs. I run it at 144 Hz 2560x1440 with 125% scaling. Aside from AirPods, which I prefer for calls, I also have wireless JBL Tune and wired Koss Porta Pro on-ear headphones.

The mouse is a Razer DeathAdder, and the keyboard is ZSA Voyager—which proved great for stationary use too. Here's a fun story: My toddler daughter loves to secretly and forcefully extract all keycaps with her bare hands. With a regular keyboard, this would be a disaster, but with Voyager I just pop the keycaps back where they belong. Once she managed to pull out and break both a switch and its keycap—that's why there's a blank keycap in place of "B" in the photo. Thankfully, Voyager ships with switch samples and a set of alternative keycaps (including blank ones), so I could replace both damaged parts.

Behind the TV sits the first seed of my homelab—a Beelink SER8 Mini PC (Ryzen 7 8845HS, 64 GB RAM, 1 TB + 2 TB SSD) running Proxmox.

And what software?

My first setup was macOS-driven, with Linux or BSD systems on remote machines. This choice was driven by necessity—some organizations I worked with had strict documentation standards that demanded perfect Microsoft Office compatibility.

During my second workspace setup, the scaling on Dell U3417W monitor became the final straw in my macOS fatigue, as it was impossible to achieve ideal scaling for both screens. To enliven my experience, I installed Arch Linux alongside macOS on my MacBook Pro. Arch felt transparent and customizable—you understand exactly what happens, why, and how to modify it. I wanted to explore capabilities of modern desktop Linux and implemented a minimal desktop environment based on Sway tiling window manager.

The next chapter began with a ThinkPad T14s running Void Linux and dwm window manager. I loved dwm's approach: thorough keybinding ideas, dedicated workspaces for different tasks, combining workspaces on a single screen, and completely mouse-free workflow. I invested time to smooth some rough edges like forking slstatus to add PulseAudio and PipeWire support (it used OSS/ALSA mixer files, so I just implemented PulseAudio C API). However, it was frustrating to use IntelliJ and apps that rely on spawning many pop-ups and floating windows. It can be customized, but to retain work productivity, I just switched to KDE Plasma 6 (without KDE apps). Unlike Plasma 5, the new version impressed me with its polish. It even used less power than dwm, likely due to its Wayland-first implementation.

I've recreated essential parts of my dwm workflow in Plasma 6. as it offers virtual desktops, activities, arbitrary key bindings, basic built-in tiling, and JS scripting. If desired, the new Krohnkite fork can transform it into a proper tiling window manager.

MacOS has its place in my workflow—it's indispensable for iOS development, Xcode projects, and macOS testing. While I've mostly switched to Linux-friendly Krita and RawTherapee for graphics, I keep Adobe Photoshop and Illustrator for their AI capabilities. Some habits are also hard to give up: I use Photos app and Keynote remains my go-to for crafting polished presentations. For document editing, I've migrated to ONLYOFFICE everywhere, as I don't have strict requirements anymore.

On all systems I also have Obsidian for notes, VS Code, Android Studio, IntelliJ IDEA and CLion, draw.io for diagramming, Figma's app, and a bunch of communication apps like Telegram, Discord, and Zoom. Some tools stay despite their flaws—Cryptomator's performance and UX leave much to be desired, but its cross-platform encrypted containers (Android, iOS, macOS, Linux) make it a necessary compromise. I don't customize Safari a lot, but for Firefox on Linux I hide everything I can and rely on an aesthetic expandable vertical tab tree.

I prefer terminal apps: Navigating with zoxide + fzf + standard Linux commands is far more efficient than GUI file manager, as an example. I also couldn't resist jumping on some fashionable “Rewrite it in Rust” replacements like bat, fd, and rigpreg, and often prefer fzf over grep for filtering logs.

My favorite “bigger” terminal apps are Lazygit, Neovim, and tmux. My Neovim config evolved into EdenVim, a distribution intended to be used a starting point in creating your own personal development environment. It's designed to be forked and crafted into your own setup. No untouchable core parts or abstractions, just a linear explicit code that also happens to be Nix-friendly. In tmux, plugins like fingers and open reduce mouse dependency: For example, a single keybinding marks screen elements (numbers, hashes, paths, kubernetes resources) with letters, letting you copy or insert them by pressing the corresponding letter.

In current workspace, I use NixOS on a ThinkPad. It had a steep learning curve, and I even jumped back to Arch once, but then I got the feeling “Nix and NixOS is ugly, but now I feel like alternatives are even worse,” invested some time to learn Nix ecosystem, and now it's a game changer for me. For those interested in 2024, I recommend NixOS and Flake basics as a gentle introduction.

I use Nix as a package manager on my MacBook—it manages everything from App Store applications like Xcode to Brew Cask apps (like Obsidian, Kitty, or Chrome) and CLI tools. I also use home-manager and nix-darwin to declaratively set up my system and the environment: As I rarely use macOS, it also serves as a living documentation when I forget something.

For development, I switched from language environment tools like pyenv/pipenv and npm/fnm to Nix shells with direnv. Conceptually it's close to vscode-devcontainers or Vagrant. I get a partially encapsulated development environment for each project, with fixed dependencies up to a specific glibc version. When I do AI stuff with specific CUDA versions and mix-match of native dependencies, or target for embedded environments, it's especially hard to beat.

Surprisingly, I've found a valid use-case for the controversial MacBook Touch Bar: It serves as a single-touch switcher for eight virtual desktops with wide, unmissable buttons. It's enough for my macOS encounters, but if I needed to spend more time on macOS, I would use AeroSpace—it provides a solid i3/Sway-like experience that I find superior to alternatives like yabai and Amethyst.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

I just use ZSA Voyager, and I believe it's the best choice for travel-friendly programmable split keyboards. I use it at home connecting it to MacBook or ThinkPad, and I've also connected it to other devices like local KVM switch and an iPad—that's a very convenient way to make your habits portable.

My keyboard layout has six layers, one being just for handling Ctrl+C/V vs Cmd+C/V on macOS for my very special secret copy-paste button. Oryx's layout search proved crucial for adaptation, helping me discover how others solved challenges like mapping frequent Cyrillic letters 'хз' that live on bracket keys and are dropped out by default due to reduced 52-key layout.

And the keyboard is QMK-compatible—I've put up a working demo of how easy it is to generate layout files with Oryx and use them to create a custom QMK firmware, meaning there's no vendor lock-in.

Being focused on terminal apps and mouse-free workflow, I value efficient typing and keybindings. Programmable keyboards offer an edge here. I use home-row mods to access modifier keys without stretching, and my tmux prefix key is a single keystroke. For navigation, I have a dedicated layer with things like vim's hjkl mapped to arrow keys. For application switching, I've bound held digits to "Meta + Digit", making it smooth to switch between apps. Combined with an extra modifier like Shift or Alt, I use them to switch workspaces, arrange windows across virtual desktops, and more.

While this setup is popular among developers, it's valuable for any workflow involving multiple apps and contexts. As a CEO, I organized different workspaces for each area: product and analytics, legal and financials, HR and general communications, technical research and development. Before this setup, especially on stock macOS, switching between these contexts was a mess—imagine juggling several browser windows and Excel spreadsheets, each dedicated to different tasks.

For people who code, QWERTY puts more load on the right hand (brackets, equals, semicolon, dot, etc). While layouts like programmer's Dvorak address this, I opted to create a separate symbol layer. In retrospect, I think it was safe to try learning Colemak or Dvorak specifically for the Voyager while keeping QWERTY for laptop keyboards—this clear separation might have been easier than relearning new QWERTY positions.

Speaking of adaptability: My son chose ZSA Voyager over a Keychron K3 for Minecraft, leading me to create a gaming layer that uses just the left half with closer key placement for his small hand. And the mouse fits perfectly in place of the right half. I even experimented with key combos for entering game commands—a way to simplify his typing needs. Though according to him, the best feature of a split keyboard is the ability to put a cup between the parts.

What would be your dream setup?

Now that my workspace is more permanent, I'm tempted to indulge in some git pull customization and even embrace a bit of “productive bloat.” My primary interest is expanding the homelab setup—it's become an enjoyable hobby, especially as an antidote to marathon Zoom sessions. Having a safe environment to experiment with new technologies without risking production systems is also invaluable, at least that's what I keep saying to myself.

I’m also curious about exploring more of ZSA’s lineup, particularly the Moonlander. I’m currently test-driving a Bose QuietComfort headset and the MX Ergo trackball mouse, but I doubt I’ll incorporate them into my regular workflow. Given how well my current setup serves my needs, I’m taking a measured approach to upgrades.

I'm Jozef, and I do 3D modelling, animation, rendering, and everything in between.

I used to be an artist/animator for Pixel Federation, a Bratislava-based mobile game company, which I then swapped for a mobile game startup (as you do). There, I got to experience more involvement by being an art director, but ultimately even more ideological dissonance. I’m not a huge fan of predatory sales tactics, crypto, and similar “innovations,” which unfortunately often plague this market.

Nowadays I mostly freelance, which allows me to find a much better balance of developing and deploying my skill set, together with feeling less cross about the outcomes.

Other than work, I can’t get enough of gizmos, thingies, and niche interests, which all extremely neatly fit into the world of custom mechanical keyboards. I also enjoy good audio, books, games, and sometimes, against all odds, my girlfriend even manages to pull me outside.

What hardware do you use?

The unfortunate reality of doing 3D is the need for as much computer as is monetarily viable, which currently means this 12900K, 64GB RAM, and a 3080 Ti in a Torrent case I built a couple of years back. Even though it’s far from a slouch, I’m constantly reminded of its limitations.

I have a work mouse, the G502 X (the extra buttons come in clutch), and an everything-else mouse, the DeathAdder. The Noctua desk mat dampens vibrations, fits well, and makes for a complementary color contrast with the surrounding plants. The RE320 and the Yamaha HS5 studio monitors are plugged into a Steinberg UR22 DAC, paired with an iFi Zen CAN amplifier to provide juice for the Takstar HF 580 planar magnetic headphones. For those gaming sessions, I lately enjoy the GuliKit KK3 MAX controller, which seems to be holding up much better than the few previously owned Xbox ones.

The pen tablet doubles as a massive touchpad for smooth scrolling and gesture control. I previously tried running a Cintiq pen display, which taught me how sometimes less really is more. The vast majority of usage still went through my primary display, and due to its positioning, it wasn’t long until I felt my neck or my arm (or both) straining during the rare occasions I really used it. So I rolled back to the good old Intuos Pro M. Similarly, as someone easily distracted, I found that after giving a dual-screen setup a thorough go, having just a single monitor, with ideally one thing open at a time, seems to work best.

And what software?

Blender is love, Blender is life. I got my start and consequently spent over a decade in Maya. After so long, coming over to such a capable, free, and open-source project, with such a dedicated community, both reignited the spark and felt like a great weight had been lifted off my chest by finally being able to fully ditch Autodesk.

By that same token, I recently yeeted Adobe Suite off of my system and replaced it with DaVinci Resolve, Affinity Photo, and the Affinity Designer. Any remnants of said weight lifted yet again. And for the real-time stuff I use Unreal Engine.

Honorable mentions: PureRef is, of course, a must for any artsy person, and EmberGen almost feels like cheating for any volumetric simulations. Though not exactly software—just a website—as an avid reader, typing enjoyer, and concentration lacker, TypeLit is where I've spent more hours retyping books than I’m willing to admit.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

I have a white Voyager. I started with the Kailh Choc Reds (50g), which felt a bit heavy for the whole low-profile/comfort concept, so I later landed at Ambients Nocturnal (20g) switches. On other occasions, these lighter types of switches don’t usually tickle my fancy, but it somehow fits the Voyager.

I was successfully using Colemak DH for about five years, with a somewhat respectable WPM (~120), and only a few days ago switched to a completely new layout, thanks to this wonderful video by Ben Vallack (don’t watch).

I’m now flying through these lines with the Graphite layout (by StronglyTyped) at the blistering speeds of 18 WPM. Good training, though.

Other than the alphas and the usual navigation/symbol layers, I really enjoy having one which horizontally flips the layout. This, in combination with a symmetrical keyboard, enables immediate one-handed access to all the keys, with the ability to replace the other side with a mouse/tablet. Perfect for doing art and 3D.

I also have a Keychron Q10, which was my first step on the journey from the world of custom mechanical keyboards towards ergonomics, and a Preonic, which quenches my thirst for evil experiments. It's visible in the earlier pictures—in a state which conveys more than mere words.

What would be your dream setup?

There’s simply never enough VRAM for GPU rendering. An RTX 4090 would be a great start, but I also need it to have a yottabyte of VRAM. Modern OLED monitors seem to be living through leaps and strides in improvement this year, so I wouldn’t mind one of those. A better/healthier chair would be nice (but those cost a fortune, which I’d much rather throw at the GPU), and of course one of those adjustable standing desks with presets.

In terms of keyboards, listen up, ZSA. Real talk. I need something like the Voyager, but with a creamy thock. I’m talking gasket mounts, weights, foams, deliberate plate material choices, flex cuts... Something like the Lofree Flow, which is both very low-profile and also marvelous-sounding—but in a Voyager form, with the ease and elegance of Oryx config. This is what’s holding society back.

Imagine what we could achieve with creamy thock.

My name is Jeff Gelwix. I'm a serial “pivoter” (i.e., one who frequently pivots), a CPA turned burger flipper turned tech geek, and a dad to two beautiful twin girls.

I packed a lot into that last line, so I'll expand.

I am a restless individual with a few crossed wires, which leads me on an endless pursuit of learning new skills and taking on new hobbies. I've always overextended myself both at and away from work, which is likely the reason that I've become obsessed with efficiency, productivity, and automation. Inadvertently, through this progression, I've similarly become obsessed with technology.

I grew up in San Diego, CA, went to school in Colorado, moved to Israel for a couple of years, then to Vegas, and finally back home to Southern California (restless). I studied accounting, got my CPA license, and spent six years at a big public accounting firm.

In 2007, my dad, who gave me the restless gene, became the first Sonic Drive-In franchisee in San Diego. He grew the business from one location to fifteen between 2007 and 2016, from twenty to six hundred employees. Their business experienced an unexpected departure of their controller at a time when I was ready to move on from the fraternity that is public accounting, so my girlfriend-now-wife and I left the desert and moved to San Diego.

After spending a few years learning the business of operating Sonic Drive-In restaurants and taking on additional responsibility, I found that we needed about twenty more people with twenty different skill sets to join our back-office team, and I only needed about 5-10 hours of their time each week. As this wasn't realistic, I turned to no-code/low-code automation. I spent multiple years learning everything I could about the Make (formerly known as Integromat) platform and general API usage to leverage automation within our business. We're not flipping burgers with API calls, but we have greatly improved our business’s back office and operational oversight capabilities through these automation efforts, which has been a game changer for us; all the while, our headcount hasn't changed.

The automation journey led me to discover a fair amount of new technology, which led me to ZSA. I have been extremely impressed by ZSA/Erez's focus on not only building top-notch high-quality hardware but also fostering the creation of a community, building personal relationships with customers (i.e., how I arrived at writing this), and being comfortable with open-sourcing their proprietary and one-of-a-kind creations. I am thrilled to have found ZSA!

Outside of work, I enjoy spending as much time as possible with my wife and our twin girls, playing golf, and 3D printing/modeling.

What hardware do you use?

I use a MacBook Pro with two Asus ProArt monitors, ZSA Moonlander keyboard, Logitech G502 mouse, SpaceMouse (for 3D modeling), a clunky 10-key as I am still an accountant at heart, and an Elgato Stream Deck MK.2 because the more buttons, the better (I have never streamed anything…).

And what software?

It's a long list, but the notable mentions are keymapp, of course; and Raycast; Arc; Superhuman; Keyboard Maestro; Snagit; Command-Tab Plus; Parallels, Fusion 360; Warp; Fantastical; Grammarly; MacDown; and Raindrop.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

Before moving to a Moonlander, I had never used customized keyboard layouts. As I've only been at it for about a year, I still find myself tweaking my layout a fair amount. I suspect no one will say it is ever "just right," so this might be normal.

My layout is a mix of traditional keyboard layout, macros/shortcuts, some Windows keys for use in Parallels, and the very clutch addition of “Reset,” so I don't need to track down an object to get to the bootloader button.

I am a big fan of the ZSA keycaps, so the only physical change I made was to the two rows of function keys in the middle of the board (not sure if that is the correct terminology). I added metal keycaps with a different texture/size as training wheels to get used to these new keys, and I have yet to remove them.

After using my Moonlander for a few months, I decided to add on The Platform. ZSA's directions (i.e., don't go nuts with the angles at first) was great advice. The Platform is great!

What would be your dream setup?

I think I have it! I am pretty happy with my setup at the moment. Until ZSA shows me the next thing that I am “missing”...

I'm Bodie! I'm a psychology student looking to find a specific path within that field, it being a longtime interest of mine. My work doesn't fall in line with that interest yet though, as currently to tide myself over I have a part-time job at our local surgery as a dispensary assistant, though that’s not to imply I don’t enjoy it! There's no shortage of friendly faces there, and it's nice helping people in that small way.

Beyond that I love art, reading, cooking, baking, annoyingly obscure music (though I don’t have the brain to make it myself), and gaming; chiefly of which I spend far too much time with Ultrakill (cyber grind mostly). I'm sure if you spend much time in the game's Discord, you'll find me clip dumping.

Cooking-wise I love basically anything Eastern. Don't get me wrong, I love some good Italian just as much as the next person, but I far more enjoy the “throw everything in a pot with herbs and spices” approach to meals. Sticky chilli beef, despite taking like five hours, is my favourite of my own dishes to make. As for baking, loaves are my tried-and-true format. Cinnamon swirl, lemon drizzle, chocolate chip banana bread, anything I can put in a tin and have rise.

For reading I love existential-focused pieces. Some of my favourites include Osamu Dazai's No Longer Human, C.M. Kösemen's All Tomorrows and Mark Z. Danielewski's House of Leaves. Music is a similar rabbit hole as well; stranger projects like Patricia Taxxon’s TECHDOG come to mind (I seriously recommend it if you have 12 hours to spare), though generally I enjoy a lot of experimental electronic music in the realm of speed/splittercore.

As for art, it's easiest to show. I'm no professional, but I do love it for a hobby. Below is probably my favourite drawing as of now.

What hardware do you use?

Too much if I'm honest, but living out in the sticks there’s not much to spend on in terms of experiences, so I have fewer barriers to putting it all into expensive interests. My PC holds an AMD Ryzen 9 5900X, 32GB of RAM, and 10TB of storage split between a 6TB hard drive and two 2TB M.2 Samsung SSDs—which is far more than I'll ever need—and an RTX 3060. To top it off I recently got my hands on a TV I've hooked up to my desktop to really fill out my little loft space, some sort of LG thing.

For peripherals, I have two 27-inch 144hz MSI 27-inch 144Hz MSI G271ss, a random old Philips monitor I was given by a friend, and an XP-Pen Innovator 16 for my drawing tablet, a nice bite-sized thing. A set of Edifier R1280DB bookshelf speakers fill out my audio and make my hours of digging for music a lot more enjoyable, and for my mouse I have a Logitech G502 that has served me incredibly well so far, besides me pushing the scroll wheel side buttons a bit too hard. Now for the most interesting part, my keyboard. Apologies for the open-heart surgery on the ErgoDox, I ripped the switches off of that for my Moonlander and haven’t gotten around to replacing them.

I've recently come to settle on the Moonlander for my primary board after testing the waters with an ErgoDox about a year ago now, a board I absolutely loved and one that single-handedly got me into the keyboard enthusiast scene, but the tenting options of the Moonlander platform with its better wrist rests ended up being too tempting, leading to its recent replacement. Only shortly after buying my ErgoDox, though, did I feel the cold-water shock of going back to normal keyboards for laptop work in school, and so I also have a Voyager under my belt for travelling work! The full ZSA collection at this point, bar the Planck. I love all of them, the amount of usability I've crammed into these things has entirely changed my computer experience, and their ergonomics have been huge for helping with my arm problems. Not sure entirely what's wrong, but it was enough to make handwriting nonviable for schoolwork, so these have been game changers for me. If only I could find a vertical mouse as similarly decked out with extra buttons as my G502.

And what software?

Software is quite up in the air right now, as I've recently moved to Linux—Fedora 40's KDE spin to be exact. Never had any experience with the OS beforehand, but Windows was seriously starting to get on my nerves. My hardware was clunky, there was so much stuff I didn’t want getting in the way, and god forbid I open file explorer, as for whatever reason that thing was a coin flip on if it would work for more than 30 seconds or not. Linux being so trimmed-down and minimalist is refreshing. It actually feels like I'm using what I paid for, and as I have too much time on my hands, I don’t mind the more tedious parts of it.

Discord is a mainstay for me of course, always pulled up in some form or another. Firefox is my go-to browser, no particular reason other than it's just not Google. As mentioned previously, KDE is my desktop environment. I like the extensive yet more classic customisation it offers, as I've never been one for Apple-like UI.

Kdenlive is my current video editor, as obviously Adobe is a no-go this side of the fence. Not its biggest fan, and I do want to start using DaVinci soon, but something about how I record my videos doesn't agree with it. For art, Clip Studio is my baby, very familiar and incredibly versatile. I haven't gotten it fully up and running just yet—the program itself isn’t recognising my pen pressure as it refuses to come out of WinTAB mode—but every other aspect of it works 100% so I'm very excited for when I get that hurdle figured out. I spent a lot of time making that Art layout for it.

Other than that, my only other big workhorse is Steam, which is home to basically my entire library, though with the amount of modding I do R2, HedgeMod, and Modrinth are almost always accompanying it. A fairly scant list, but I'm still exploring a lot of programs, being fresh into the Linux world. Besides, I'm no programmer so specifics like Vim or project management apps fly right over my head.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

My keyboard layout is one that grew on the ErgoDox that I have just kind of ported over to my other two boards. I'm still on QWERTY; I've considered switching but I haven't found the time to rewrite all my muscle memory as of yet. I've mapped some extra keys that are near to the middle split like G's and T's, as I'm so used to typing those with whichever hand comes naturally at the time that I wanted to keep them as options for either. Similarly, I can't get behind curling my hands to hit the bottom numbers in the numpad layer, so I just opted to mirror it on either side with the right being upside-down so I can type whatever number I want with whichever hand is more comfortable.

Besides that, my general philosophy is keeping my most general functions as close to wasd (and subsequently ijkl on the right half) as I can, as that's where my hands are always resting. I stole the idea for some punctuation macros off of one Oryx layout tour I came across when I first got my ErgoDox—sadly I forget who it was, but it's a fantastic idea: one key-press types openings and closings for things like quotes or brackets and then puts your cursor in the middle, ready to type away.

Also, having a dedicated Ultrakill layout that makes media control as easy as possible has been a huge QOL feature for those long cyber grind stints. You can't afford any break without either dying or ruining your frame of mind, so controlling my music as seamlessly as possible has saved me countless runs. That media control made its way over to my art layer as well, as I am basically never sitting in silence, so being able to control volume and which video is playing quickly and easily is a big focus of my layouts.

I'm finding that tenting for me is most comfortable basically bang on halfway—sometimes I go higher, but it really depends what I'm doing—though I'm adoring having something as flexible as the platform as part of my setup now. As for keycaps, just a nice mix of black and white PBT's. I'm a sucker for greyscale and so I'm thinking about buying some kind of gradient set sometime down the line and maybe a special artisan or two if I find anything I like.

I'm also very much a tactile kinda person when it comes to switches. After trying out some Kailh Box Blacks, classic Cherry Browns and Cherry Reds, I've come to love the MX Ergo Clears on my main board right now. Though I'm still curious about trying out a set of Zealio 67g switches switches someday, I'm very content with my typing experience on these. My Voyager switches are similarly tactile. I absolutely adore the Choc Sunsets I bought a while ago, haven't looked back since fitting those.

What would be your dream setup?

I'm in no position to want more than my current setup, it's absolute heaven, but selfishly I do have a few things on the list for the future.

At the top of that: more monitors. Another two 27-inch screens to be exact, one to replace that old Philips screen I'm currently running and another to add onto the left, both angled vertically, leaving me with two portrait screens flanking either side of my main landscape one. Considering how I always have at least two screens taken up by Discord and YouTube, the extra and more varied real estate would get good use.

Other than that, a GPU upgrade would be nice. The 3060 is a fantastic card, but I do stretch it thin sometimes (Distant Horizons mod for Minecraft is a primary offender). And a similarly nice set of speakers for my TV would be great, as the built-in ones are rather tinny when compared to my desktop experience. Beyond that, I don't think there's anything more I could even think to ask for—I pretty much have my dream right now. A cat would be great though. Maybe someday.

I’m Leon, known online as @leonsilicon (a play on my full name—“Si” is the chemical symbol for silicon :) ) I’m a full-time developer who’s also a short-form content creator on the side.

I grew up in Canada and started learning programming in high school. After a friend introduced me to my first hackathon in sophomore year, I loved the experience so much that I went on to attend 26 more hackathons that year (and won prizes at over half of them!)

These hackathons taught me how to build apps from scratch; so after graduating high school in 2022 and having been rejected by all my dream colleges in the US, I decided to take a gap year to hack on a side-project-turned-startup with two friends I’d met at an online hackathon. Several months later, we got accepted into the Neo Accelerator and managed to raise over $1 million in funding, at which point I decided to work full-time on my startup instead of going to college.

I was primarily the “CTO” of the startup, which mostly involved writing (a lot of) code, developing new features, and ensuring the product was stable. My co-founders and I were building a bug reporting tool for companies, and I was responsible for the infrastructure and backend. But after spending a year and a half struggling to find product-market fit, we unfortunately ended up winding down the company and returned the money to investors.

However, during my time at my startup, I started posting content, thanks to a friend I’d met during the Neo Accelerator who makes videos about AI on TikTok for over 200K followers. He convinced me to try creating short-form content for developers. After two weeks of posting a video a day on TikTok, one of the videos featuring me typing code on the Moonlander went viral, boosting me from <100 followers at the time to 1K+ within a week.

By the end of the month, I had over 10K followers, and many of my most viral videos to this day showcase the Moonlander (which definitely played a huge part in my rapid growth!) Currently, my most-viewed video is a video of me controlling my computer with just my keyboard, which somehow surpassed 25 million views on Instagram!

What hardware do you use?

First off, my laptop: I use a 16-inch M2 Max MacBook Pro with 64GB RAM. This machine is a beast for cruising through my day-to-day software development tasks, especially compared to my previous M1 MacBook Air, which slowed to a crawl whenever I opened my code editor. In fact, this MacBook Pro has since replaced both my Air and my Hackintosh I’d custom-built a few years back; it’s now the only computer I use, which I’ve found quite convenient.

At my co-working space (which I find easier to call an office), my MacBook sits on top of a 9.25” wide OMOTON foldable laptop stand—the shortest one I found on Amazon. This stand itself is raised by a BoYata Monitor Stand so that my MacBook screen stays at eye level.

My office setup uses all three of my MacBook’s USB-C ports—which still wasn’t enough; I had to buy a 4-Port Satechi USB-C Hub after I’d received my Logitech MX Brio Webcam and realized there weren’t any ports left for it. One of the ports is for my Moonlander, the keyboard that’s served me faithfully for nearly a year now. I used to use an ErgoDox EZ, but eventually needed the Moonlander’s better portability and USB-C support. I’ve also attached The Platform to my Moonlander as I’ve found that a slight tent makes it even more comfortable to type on.

Next to my keyboard is my odd-looking mouse, which is the Kensington SlimBlade Pro Trackball. I started experimenting with a trackball mouse around a year ago after hearing about its ergonomic benefits. Since then, I’ve never looked back (okay, well, except when playing the occasional mouse-heavy game); I find swiping my fingers across a trackball less tedious than physically sliding a conventional mouse around on my desk.

The monitor I use at the office isn’t anything too special; it’s a Dell 27-inch 4K Monitor I got on sale and I haven’t really had any complaints with it. The display next to it is the ASUS ZenScreen 15.6-inch 1080P Portable Monitor, which I usually use during meetings and for viewing screenshares. To the right of it, there’s my box of ZSA Cards that I like to shuffle, admire, and read through while I wait for code to finish compiling. There’s also an adorable goose plushie I got while visiting my friends at the University of Waterloo (which is where I’d be right now if I hadn’t taken a gap year).

I wear a pair of Sony WH-1000XM5 headphones for most of the workday to listen to lo-fi music while coding, and I use its top-tier microphone during meetings. I also carry around a pair of 2nd Gen AirPods Pro, which I wear when I’m out for my daily run/walk. To track these runs, I use a 2nd Gen Apple Watch SE with Cellular so I don’t have to run with my bulky iPhone 15 Pro in my pocket.

Finally, I’ve got to shout out my backpack. The Nomatic 20L Travel Pack is the only reason why my portable setup is pretty much the same as my office setup, minus the 27-inch monitor and the monitor stands. Even with all that, it still has space to fit a 26800mAh Zendure SuperTank Pro power bank, a dozen Apple braided USB-C cables, a CrazyCap UV Purifying Water Bottle, a notebook, a portable tripod, and the Hollyland LARK M2 mini mics for recording short-form videos.

And what software?

I usually start off my workday by opening the same three apps: my terminal, Warp; my code editor, Cursor (it’s like VSCode but with some incredible AI features); and my browser, Arc. My terminal usually lives on my MacBook screen, while VSCode takes up the right two-thirds of my monitor with Arc on the left third. I use a tiling window manager called Yabai that makes it easy to arrange and navigate between windows with just my keyboard, along with a custom Yabai “plugin” I made that always arranges the windows into two columns (a layout inspired by dwm from back when I used to use Linux).

To set global keyboard shortcuts for my window manager, I use skhd and Karabiner-Elements alongside GokuRakuJoudo, a tool that makes writing the configuration file for Karabiner much less tedious. I created a GitHub repo containing all my macOS shortcuts and configurations, which serves as a convenient source of truth and reference for when I want to create a new shortcut.

One of my most used keyboard shortcuts is Command+Space, which activates Raycast, a powerful app and workflow launcher. If you couldn’t already tell, I’m a huge shortcut power user, and many of these shortcuts are assigned to apps I downloaded via Setapp, which is a $10/month subscription that gives me full access to a ton of apps that would otherwise require individual onetime purchases. I’ve discovered many cool new apps via Setapp that I now use quite often, my favorites being CleanShot X for taking screenshots and recordings, Bartender for customizing the macOS menu bar, uBar for making the macOS Dock actually useful, and PixelSnap for measuring distances between elements on the screen—super useful as I’m learning design!

I also use a ton of productivity apps: Slack for communicating with my co-founder in the US, Linear for our startup’s task management, 1Password for managing passwords and OTPs (my favorite feature), Spark Mail for emails, Structured for timeblocking my day, Notion (and Notion Calendar) for note-taking and organization, Toggl Track for logging my time, and Forfeit, a mobile app that lets me create commitments like “show up to the office every day by 8:00 a.m., verified by GPS or else get charged $50” (which works surprisingly well!)

Unlike most developers, I tend to use light mode across my apps, specifically the Gruvbox Light theme for my code editor and terminal. I was pretty much forced to switch to light mode because the desk at my co-working space is right next to giant curtainless windows that cause a huge glare in dark mode. But after using light mode for a few months now, I must say I’ve gotten pretty used to it and honestly prefer the ability to work under suboptimal lighting conditions. As for music, I usually have lo-fi music playing using Lofi Garden (via Setapp), but for occasions when I need an extra boost of energy, I’ve also created a huge Spotify playlist containing over 4,000 Monstercat songs that I auto-populated using a custom script.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

I ordered my Moonlander with Cherry MX Silent Red keyswitches, as they were the quietest option available and I wanted to use my Moonlander in volume-sensitive settings like working from a library or typing notes during a virtual meeting.

I chose to get blank keycaps since I use a custom keyboard layout called Programmer Dvorak, which extends the Dvorak keyboard layout by replacing the numbers row with common programming symbols (to type numbers, I now have to hold down Shift). Initially, I kept the default QWERTY Moonlander layout and used software to remap the keys by creating a custom Programmer Dvorak keyboard layout for macOS using Ukelele. I’d select my custom layout from the Input Sources menu bar, and this method worked pretty reliably for quite some time.

However, I’ve since learned that my Moonlander works on my iPhone, and I also plan to eventually buy an iPad to help with content creation. Wanting to use the Programmer Dvorak layout on i(Pad)OS (e.g. for replying to comments faster), I re-created the layout in Oryx so it’d be saved on the Moonlander itself.

Unfortunately, it wasn’t as simple as copying over the keys, due to a quirk with Programmer Dvorak: The “Shift pairings” of many keys differ from those in QWERTY, so using just the default Shift modifier key wasn’t enough. For example, Shift+[ outputs “{” on QWERTY, but on Programmer Dvorak, it should output “7”.

Luckily, Oryx made it easy to “change” the default behavior of the Shift key using Layers. I created a Momentary Layer Toggle + Modifier key in place of the default Shift key and made it activate a layer called shift that contains the new “shifted” keys. In this layer, I used the numpad number keys, as they wouldn’t be affected by the Shift modifier. I did have to make one slight deviation in my layout: Vanilla Programmer Dvorak needs you to hold Shift+# to type the backtick key (`). However, the backtick doesn’t use Shift on QWERTY, and since there’s no reliable way to “disable” Shift for a single keypress while on the shift layer, I ended up just flipping the hashtag-backtick shift pairing so that the backtick is on the base layer and Shift+` outputs the hashtag instead.

Another quirk with Programmer Dvorak is that certain keys that need Shift on QWERTY are typed without Shift on Programmer Dvorak (for example, typing the asterisk on Programmer Dvorak is the equivalent of just pressing “7” on QWERTY). Fortunately, Oryx makes it possible to send a modifier key alongside a normal key, though I did have to “wrap” these keys in a single-key macro—without the macro, the additional Shift modifier would sometimes “bleed through” to a key I pressed instantly after.

I placed all my modifier keys across the bottommost row of my layout (which is typically called the “spacebar row,” but that doesn’t really fit the Moonlander layout; maybe we should call it the “modifier row” instead?) The Fn keys on the bottom corners of my Moonlander are actually F22 keys, which are remapped to the real macOS (🌐) Fn key using Karabiner-Elements. I also put an extra Shift key on this row to make it easier to press modifier key combinations that include Shift.

For my thumb clusters, I’ve got the Space key on my left thumb cluster, and the Escape key on the right, which has been incredibly convenient when using VSCode Neovim. Then, the middle thumb cluster keys are what I dub the “Super” key, which combines the Control, Option, and Command modifier keys. I didn’t use the Hyper or Meh keys because they include Shift in their combination, and I wanted the ability to use Shift as an additional modifier on top of the “Super” key’s modifier combo. This made certain “complementary” shortcuts more intuitive—for example, I can press Super+. to focus my previous display and Super+Shift+, to move the active window to my previous display.

The bottom thumb cluster keys are Layer Tap-Toggle keys that activate the nav Layer, which lets me use the QWERTY “ESDF” keys as arrow keys. The nav layer also contains mouse movement keys on the right half of the Moonlander that I never really use, but I kept them to make the layout look more symmetrical. Finally, the Moonlander’s launch keys are Layer Tap-Toggle keys that activate the fn layer, which houses the F1-F12 keys across the number row. For situations when I’m away from my Moonlander–which is pretty rare since it’s quite portable, so I usually bring it with me–I’ve also created a “virtual” keyboard layout by using Karabiner-Elements to remap each QWERTY key on my MacBook keyboard to the corresponding key in Programmer Dvorak (and only on my MacBook keyboard so that my Moonlander still works with Karabiner enabled).

What would be your dream setup?

In terms of hardware and software, my current setup is pretty close to my (current) dream setup. Though, if I had the budget, I'd be kinda tempted to swap my Space Gray MacBook for a Space Black one just for the cooler-looking color 😎

However, it’s a different story with my desk setup; the customization options for my desk at my co-working space are pretty limited. Luckily, I recently got approved for an O-1 visa (🥳), and I'm gonna be moving to San Francisco!

I’ve got a few vague ideas for the dream setup I’m hoping to build once I move in—more decoration, a standing desk, and lots of RGB lights. I’ll definitely be continually improving my setup over time, the latest of which will always be featured over on my Instagram and TikTok if you’re interested in giving those a follow ;)

My name is Guilherme Forton Viotti, but you can call me 'Guil' :) I am a software developer, project manager, and sustainability advocate from Brazil who has lived in the UK since 2020. I like to build things digitally using Django as a main web framework and tangible, interesting things using my trusted 3D printer and Arduino/Raspberry Pi components and sensors.

I also play drums and am a photographer (I worked in both areas before). For fun, I enjoy climbing and playing PS5.

What hardware do you use?

I have a MacBook Pro M1 Max and I use XREAL glasses to extend it to three virtual monitors. The Moonlander is attached to both arms of my office chair (I 3D-printed some tripod sockets I found online to see if it would work, and when I confirmed it would be useful, I bought the tripod kit from ZSA website).

Recently I placed an Apple Touchpad on the right side of my right hand so I have quick access to scrolling and clicking, but this is a work in progress at the moment.

And what software?

Everything runs on macOS. For coding, I use PyCharm.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

I customized my layout in a way that is not far from a regular keyboard layout, with a version for Mac and one for Windows (a slight change in mouse sensitivity). That way I can easily go back and forth between any computer I need to jump on and my Moonlander chair setup. I am still trying to optimize some keys at the bottom-pinky sides, but so far the setup is very useful. I completely dropped the mouse and use only the mouse layer of the keyboard.

The keycaps are the ones that came with my Moonlander.

What would be your dream setup?

It would be the current setup with slightly better keymapping (always a work in progress, but slowly as I rely on the setup for work), a small touchpad close to my thumbs for quick navigation perhaps, and a sturdier clamp on the armchair. A kind of hot-swap on the tripod-keyboard connection (maybe something magnetic so I could quickly travel with the keyboard without needing to remove the screws) and a bigger and heavier chair with broader armrests. In a nutshell, something to make Morpheus’s Nebuchadnezzar chairs blush.

I'm Inga, an astrophysics researcher in Stockholm, Sweden. I'm part of a team that studies supernova explosions and what happens after them. Right now, my main job is to look for early signals from these explosions, but I'm also interested in neutron stars, which are superdense objects left behind after a supernova. I love exploring the processes in our universe using different methods and learning new things all the time, which is pretty cool!

Aside from my scientific pursuits, I love to run all year round, though I'm not into competing or setting records. I just enjoy being outdoors and having some time to myself. I also enjoy gravel biking in the summer and snowboarding in the winter.

In my spare time, I like to dabble in simple vector graphic illustration, video editing, and 2D frame-by-frame animation on my iPad. It's a fun way for me to be creative and express myself.

What hardware do you use?

I have two setups: one at home and one at work, so most of my equipment has to be portable. The only things that remain stationary are my monitors—one at home and one at work. At work I use a 15-inch MacBook Air, and for personal stuff I've got another 13-inch MacBook Air. For note-taking and creative things, I use a 12-inch iPad Pro with the second-generation Apple Pencil.

During my PhD, I started having a lot of arm problems from typing too much. It got so bad that even taping my wrists didn't help much. That's when I discovered split keyboards and ordered the ZSA Moonlander. Combined with the Logitech Ergo mouse, the pain went away (although it comes back when I just use the laptop's keyboard and trackpad). I usually leave the keyboard and mouse in the office, but take them home most weekends to be able to work on my personal projects.

And what software?

I rely on a few key software applications to keep me organised and productive. For notes and my personal encyclopaedia, I use Obsidian. For email and scheduling, I use Apple's native Mail and Calendar apps. At work, I use Slack for communication and Python and VS Code for coding and data analysis on supernovae. To get in the zone, I listen to music in the Music app. For handwritten notes and teaching, I use GoodNotes 5 on my iPad. Both my iPad and MacBook have the Affinity Suite Designer, Publisher, and Photo (all version 2). I use Affinity Designer 2 for most of my vector graphics work and Publisher 2 for tasks like creating conference posters. Finally, on my iPad, I like to use Procreate and Callipeg for my creative projects.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

I started with the standard keyboard layout, but made a few changes to suit my needs, such as putting spacebars and backspaces on either side of the thumb cluster. I tried to keep it mostly familiar. Honestly, there's still room for improvement, but I haven't found the right time to tweak it further and get used to the changes. But all in all, I am happy with the way it is already.

What would be your dream setup?

There's a lot I'd like to improve in my setup, but I haven't been actively working on it. For example, I'm interested in trying the Voyager keyboard because of its lower profile—I think it could help my arms even more. I'd also like to have a similar screen at home that I have at work. Also, better cable management and a monitor stand would make everything look a lot tidier.

I'm Ben Swift—I'm an academic computer scientist and cybernetician for my day job, and a guitarist, soccer player, and dad of three outside of work.

What hardware do you use?

My main driver is an M1 MacBook Pro which is a couple of years old, but still does the job fine. I also remotely bounce around several different local and cloud dev boxes as part of my AI software development work, which are usually running some flavour of Linux. Honestly, as long as it has a nice display and can run full-screen Emacs I'm happy.

When I'm at my (standing) desk I hook it up to an Apple Studio Display monitor. I prefer to have one really nice (and big-ish, but not crazy) screen, and then to run apps fullscreen wherever I can. If I have too much other stuff in my field of view I get distracted.

For audio I have a Shure SM7B on a short mic stand, which sits nicely between the left and right halves of my keyboard (and I can still see the screen over the top). It's way overkill for Zoom calls, but it's a good conversation-starter.

And what software?

Like I said, I do as much as possible in Emacs. I'm a Lisper, and it just fits my brain. Looking back through my dotfiles, they're now almost 20 years old, and my journey has been Aquamacs (briefly) -> Vanilla GNU -> Spacemacs -> Doom. I do often consider declaring Emacs bankruptcy and starting again with a slim, vanilla-ish config (although obviously with evil and other mod cons I now can't live without) but the Doom folks do a pretty good job of that anyway, and I try not to yak-shave too much these days.

I manage all my programming languages & tools with Homebrew. I work with multiple different languages & tools week to week, depending on the project I'm working on. I've been loving the Elixir/Phoenix combo for full stack interactive web stuff recently, but honestly, I just try and use the best tool for the job.

Outside of that, most of the software I use is web-based. Again, I like to keep things OS-agnostic when I can because I do have to jump around a bit, and I'd rather not get locked in if I can help it.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

For a long time I used a Keyboardio Atreus, which I really liked. I like to work in cafes as well as at my desk, so a portable mechanical keyboard is a high priority for me. However, about three years ago I switched to a ZSA Moonlander with a custom keymap based on the Atreus Layout. I could still deal with an Atreus number of keys, but the ability to split the hands is much more comfortable.

What would be your dream setup?

Something like I have right now is pretty close. I wouldn't mind a slightly larger (e.g. 32") main display, but only if it was at the same dpi as my current display. And obviously I could always use a laptop that would be faster/lighter/longer battery, but honestly these Apple silicon MBPs are pretty good, so I don't have much to complain about right now.

Hello, I’m Eben Haber. Yes, that Eben Haber. Or, well, the only Eben Haber I’ve ever been able to find, since as far as I can tell my parents gave me a GUID as a name. Thus, anything your favorite search engine turns up concerning “Eben Haber” is almost certainly about me, and as true as anything else on the internet.

At work I’m a front-end generalist. Over the years my work has included UI and interaction design, implementation, and user studies, including some really fun work doing ethnographic field studies of IT workers. There’s nothing like following people around for days or weeks to understand their tools, work practices, and what makes their jobs easy or hard. Lately I’ve been spending lots of time creating database user interfaces in TypeScript and Svelte, in order to make a complex database system comprehensible and manageable. The title on my business card includes the phrase “User Advocate,” since I aim to bring a better understanding of the user into front-end engineering. Without that understanding, it’s really hard to create good tools for users. The majority of my work time is at the computer, hence my interest in keyboards and other input devices.

I live in a rural area on the outskirts of the SF Bay Area, with ducks and horses in the yard and an infinite number of outdoor projects to draw me away from the computer when I need a break. I’m a HAM radio operator, which is useful in a location with no wireless phone coverage, and the possibility of wildfires, mudslides, and floods. Or just hiking in the woods when my wife wants to know when I’m coming in for lunch. I have an ex-racehorse who I took on as a rehabilitation project during the pandemic. He’s very friendly and great to work with. Horses are among the least practical pets you can imagine, but I do love them! I also spend lots of time volunteering with a nonprofit that teaches kids and adults all aspects of horse care and horsemanship.

What hardware do you use?

I’ll start with my input devices, given the focus of this site.

The short story is that I can’t type on a flat keyboard without significant wrist pain. The long story of my various keyboards over the years can be found at the bottom of this page.

For the past few years I’ve been looking for a new mobile keyboard. When a coworker pointed out the ZSA Voyager, it looked like just what I needed: tiny, with real keyboard switches, programmable, and tentable. I created the tent using 1/16” acrylic sections with plastic hinges on top, and adhesive Velcro on the bottom. The tent has large rare earth magnets glued to it, which hold the Voyager sections in place. I put some grip tape on the bottom of the Voyager to provide just the right amount of friction: The sections are stable, but can be adjusted when needed. In total, barely $10 in materials. TAP Plastics is a great source for fabricating stuff like this.

For the bottom of the tent, I initially tried using the Voyager case, but the case is barely large enough to hold the Voyager, and that left me nowhere to hold the tent. My second tent-bottom is a section of denim from deconstructed worn-out jeans. That denim folds up with the tent, and the whole thing fits in a small neoprene case.

The Voyager has proved to be an excellent keyboard for use while traveling, sitting in a coffee shop, or even getting away from my desk and enjoying the window seat at home with a view of the forest.

Using a mouse definitely contributed to my tendonitis. For many years my solution was a Kensington trackball, though I still needed to angle it with a block of foam to keep my wrist happy (see the photo of my office setup, where one is still in use). The trackball with its scroll ring is really nice, but lately I’ve been using an Apple Magic Trackpad because it allows a lighter touch, and it’s actually portable. Adhesive Velcro on the trackpad connects it to my cloth keyboard base, and gives it just the right angle to keep my wrist happy.

My laptop is a 14” MacBook Pro M1 Max. The standard engineering laptop at my employer is the 16” model, but since I bicycle to work most of the time, I really appreciate the smaller size and lighter weight of the 14”. Both at work and home I have external monitors, so the slightly smaller screen isn’t a problem.

My main external screen at home is a 27” LG HDR 4K. I really like how bright and sharp it is. At work I have an old vertical Dell display for coding (it’s so nice to be able to see so much of the code at once) and ten-year-old Thunderbolt Apple external display (showing its age in the bigger pixels, but the brightness and color really are quite nice).

Monitor height is crucial to keeping my neck and shoulders happy. The LG monitor has a great telescoping stand, but for everything else I have a variety of stands to get everything just right: plastic risers, an old textbook, and even a homebuilt wooden cube that once supported my original Macintosh 128K back in the day.

I have sit-stand desks both at work and home. I do sit more of the time, but the standing mode is really nice when I start to get stiff or sore from sitting too long. For me, my arms are happiest when my elbows are at 90 degrees and the keyboard is almost in my lap, so on both desks I installed keyboard trays to keep the keyboard lower and allow me to fine-tune the keyboard height. At home I also have a standing pad to keep my feet happy when standing.

Music really helps me focus. At work I need to listen to music with headphones (Etymotic HF3 in-ear, since over-the-ear phones leave my ears complaining after an hour or two). At home I send high-def music from my phone via AirPlay 2 to a WiiM Pro, then via fiber-optic to an OSD Audio Nero XD2 amp (nice feature—it attaches to the underside of desktop), and then via copper to a pair of 25-year-old Cambridge SoundWorks bookshelf speakers located just behind my monitors. The sound is very clean and detailed, with a surprisingly good sound stage, probably because I’m sitting in the sweet spot for the speakers. And it’s not too loud for when my wife is also working at home!

My home network uses a variety of Asus wireless routers, which support a really nice mesh with Ethernet links inside the house and wireless links to the barn.

Since all the computer gear needs electricity, I have several CyberPower UPS units to keep the networking gear going if the power blinks, and a Generac propane generator to keep the house going during extended outages (which seem to occur every month or two out here in the sticks!).

And what software?

In one of my first jobs as a high school student, I was programming on a DEC-20 using Emacs. Since then, the Emacs key mappings have been engraved in my brain, so any tool I want to use needs to support those. These days, for coding I use JetBrains WebStorm, but I always keep some version of Emacs around in case I need to do automation using keyboard macros. For testing and debugging code, I spend lots of time with Chrome and Safari.

Figma is impossible to avoid these days, though I still need to learn strategies to avoid getting lost as the designs get more complex. My employer requires me to use Outlook, Slack, and Zoom, but I wouldn’t miss them if they got swapped out for other similar tools. For re-encoding videos to smaller sizes for sharing with others, HandBrake is an absolutely fabulous and efficient tool—it can make a standard Mac screen recording 40x smaller.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

Many years ago I went through the process of learning the Dvorak mapping, which was an extraordinarily painful few weeks of remapping my brain. Once I was done, however, I was suddenly a pretty good touch typist, since looking at the keys no longer helped! I can usually swap back and forth between QWERTY and Dvorak, but I’m more comfortable with the latter, so that’s what I implemented with my Voyager.

There were some challenges, though! For my coding (especially with Emacs mappings) I need the full array of modifier keys, which is difficult with the small size of the Voyager. I ended up using regular keys for Command, Ctrl, and Shift, with a long press by my right thumb for Option. I do miss having direct access to Tab, Esc, and brackets/braces, but that’s a fair tradeoff for portability. I’m not making much use of layer 1 beyond those, so I am sure that I’ll do more optimization of the layout over time. I’m using the ZSA keycaps (and kudos to ZSA for including Dvorak-appropriate home row bumps for the U and H keys), though I may get tempted by some of the cool keycaps out there.

What would be your dream setup?

I really love the vertical monitor at my work, it’s so nice for editing code. I think my dream setup would have a 4K or 5K vertical monitor for code editing, and another one horizontal for testing, debugging, email, etc. I think you can never have too many pixels at your beck and call.

More practically, my ancient Comfort Keyboard at work is feeling pretty mushy due to its age, and probably should be replaced with a Moonlander sometime soon. The accompanying Kensington trackball is also pretty old, and it may need to get replaced with a Magic Trackpad.

Appendix: A discussion of my history with tendonitis, keyboards, and pointing devices

Thanks for reading this far! Here are more details on my exploration of the world of keyboards over the years.

I’ve been using computers since around 1980, going way back to terminals like the VT100, which wasn’t terribly ergonomic, but from what I remember the keyboard feel was actually fairly good.

I started getting tendonitis from keyboarding and mousing in the 1990s. I tried a variety of remedies (including mousing with my left hand, switching to Dvorak, wrist rests, keyboard trays, physical therapy, etc.). Nothing helped for any length of time, until I found that the company I worked for had a keyboard library, where you could check out a variety of ergonomic keyboards for a week at a time. This was essential, because “ergonomic” isn’t universal—what works for me may not work for you—and you really need to try a keyboard for an extended period to see how your body reacts to it. I initially tried a bunch of keyboards from the library, and was surprised by the range of features and feel.

The keyboard that really worked (for me) was a “Comfort Keyboard,” which had a very clever mechanical mechanism that allowed the two halves of the keyboard to be positioned at any angle from flat to 90 degrees. It seems that my wrists really don’t like typing unless the keyboard is tented between 30 and 45 degrees. The other great feature was that the keyboard was programmable (pretty good for the 90s), so I could make the left space bar the backspace key. I think that reaching for the backspace key with my right pinkie finger was definitely contributing to the tendonitis—I do use backspace a lot. I had several Comfort Keyboards over the years—they are nice but super heavy and not mobile at all. My last working Comfort is at my desk at work, still hanging on, but perhaps to be replaced by a Moonlander one of these days.

In the early 2000s I started working at a company that gave me a laptop, but at that point I couldn’t type longer than five minutes on a flat keyboard before my wrists started hurting. I needed a portable solution, which I found in the form of this crazy split keyboard from FingerWorks. It uses two large multitouch panels for both typing and mousing tasks (one finger down is a keystroke, two is a mouse tap, three is click and drag, four on the home row is ignored as a centering action). It took a bit to learn, but actually works well. It is the most natural device I have ever used for transitioning between mousing and typing, though the lack of tactile feedback makes it less good for typing than a regular keyboard.

It is super light and portable, though. Twenty years (and many ribbon cable replacements) later, it is still working. Alas, the FingerWorks company is no more, having been bought by Apple in 2006 because Apple wanted multitouch technology patents for some reason. Note that the FingerWorks keyboard originally came with a metal tenting support for desktop use, I made it foldable and portable by creating a tent from two pieces of 1/16” acrylic with plastic hinges, adhesive Velcro, and denim from a worn-out pair of blue jeans.

In the past few years, with my Comfort Keyboards failing, I needed a new desktop keyboard. I ended up with the Kinesis Freestyle Pro, which is fully programmable and has the nice feel of Cherry key switches. I made another hinged plastic tent so I can fold it up for travel. However, the keyboard weighs as much as my laptop and is too big and heavy for travel unless there is no other option. It works nicely in my home office.

Hi, I’m Rajiv (he/him)! I do a lot of things, both in my job in strategy for a US-based food delivery company and in my personal time. At work, I write a lot of docs for leadership around how we grow the company, how we can build tools to enable sales teams, and how to continually improve our operations.

In my personal time, I have a lot of very different hobbies. I have been getting more into aerial circus, specifically aerial straps, because of my partner. It’s been a great way to get a sneaky workout while learning some cool skills.

I’ve also been teaching myself piano using a few music books. This was not a pandemic project, I should add; I play a few other instruments. It’s been a lot easier to pick things up (outside of not having any technique), and I really like that you don’t have to tune a digital piano.

One other big thing I do: I am a part of an organization called Queer Sober Social (QSS). We’re a group of LGBT+ folks who wanted to have a social life outside of drinking. We have in-person events for those who live in and around Chicago, and Zoom-based social events for those who do not. In addition to the events, I cohost a QSS podcast with my friend Carly. We write, record, and edit everything ourselves.

Otherwise, I enjoy taking photos and playing both video and board games.

What hardware do you use?

For play/personal things, I have my own PC that I built in 2021 (bad time for my old GPU to go bad) with some RGB lights because I liked them. Some key specs: Ryzen 9 5900X CPU, 32GB Vengeance RGB Pro RAM, Corsair 5000D Airflow case, Noctua NH-U12S Chromax black cooler, and RTX 3080 GPU.

Around my computer, in addition to using my ZSA Moonlander, I use a Logitech MX Master 3S mouse, rest with a HandStands wrist protector beanbag, look at an LG 40WP95C-W 40" UltraWide (5K2K resolution), have a pair of Kanto YU4 speakers, sit on a Steelcase Leap chair, and work at an Uplift standing desk. I have a wooden kitchen island that I use for the desk surface.

I sit in our living room, so there’s a lot of plants nearby, and a couple of cats (Kira and Bashir). They’re a sort of hardware, I think. Or maybe fur(m)wear?

For work, I have a company-issued MacBook Pro (M1). I have to reorganize my desk layout to fit the laptop in there, because I prefer to use the fingerprint reader and camera for work stuff.

For podcasting, I use a BEACN USB microphone. For gaming, I use my PC and a Steam Deck OLED. As you can see, I have a sort of white, black, and wood theme going on.

And what software?

Most of my time is spent at work, where I use some pretty normal, corporate things: Google Workspace for docs, sheets, and decks; Slack for instant messaging; Mode for some light SQL.

I use Adobe Lightroom for my artsy photography work. I’ve been using it for almost a decade, when I got my first DSLR.

I also use a Linux Mint virtual machine. It’s the first time I’m using Linux and I’m liking how the operating system works. Still learning a ton about the ethos of Linux, though. Free Open Source Software (FOSS) and programs that do one thing well are interesting concepts. Maybe in the future, I’ll switch places and have a Windows virtual machine and use Linux as my primary OS. Maybe I’ll dual-boot, who knows?

Of course, I can’t forget to talk about how I’ve been dabbling with game design and mild programming. I decided I’d learn a little bit of Godot, a popular game engine that is, importantly, free to use.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

If you look closely, you’ll notice my bad typing habits in this version of my layout. I have 2 Ys! That’s the nice thing about a keyboard like this, though. I think I’ll eventually learn to type properly.

Thanks to Erez, I basically use software to keep the same Layer 1 whether I’m using a Mac or PC (or Linux). Knowing me, I’ll likely change up this layout again in a few weeks when I think of something else to try. I need to use more layers more often outside of having a num pad.

I got the Zip Kit when I first got my Moonlander because I knew I would want to add a few more keys with symbols. Even though I’ve been typing with this layout for a while, I still can’t always remember what each key does. Yes, yes, I know there’s a training tool.

Physically, I have mostly stock Cherry MX Brown switches except for the orange keys (apparently they’re called Costars!). I got a few switch sampler packs and had two Gateron Greens, so put those in for a satisfying click. I also added thin O-rings for each key to help with noise / the feel of the keys.

What would be your dream setup?

In my dreams, I have separate setups for different uses in my life, but, alas, I live in a major city, so that space is not likely going to happen.

However, since this is fantasy, I would want a portable setup (maybe a Voyager?) that I could take with me whenever I travel for work. The Moonlander is plenty portable, but there’s something about low-profile keys that just seems to make sense to me.

I’d love a monitor that was ultrawide, but also high res; IPA for color accuracy; with a high refresh rate for gaming, physical KVM, picture-in-picture, and multiple Thunderbolt ports so I could connect my computers / systems in pretty easily. What I have is pretty close, but not perfect.

I’m a freelance writer, which means I type thousands of words every week. I primarily handle communications for nonprofits that work on biking and walking, public transit, transportation justice, affordable housing, and climate change. It’s fantastic work! I also write about personal finance for Business Insider, write blog posts and web pages for midsized enterprises, and I’m working on launching myself as a fiction author.

My work goes beyond writing, especially for my smaller clients. I build web pages, help with art direction, manage media requests, assist with data analysis, and help wherever they need me.

Outside of work, I like to swim and bike. I’m an avid knitter and reader, and I love cooking.

What hardware do you use?

I have a MacBook Pro, and my office setup includes an Omni curved gaming monitor. I love the space a bigger monitor gives me to spread out. I use a ZSA Moonlander and a Kensington trackball mouse. I also have a Jarvis sit/stand desk. I have a Brother laser printer that I still use occasionally.

The focus of my setup is ergonomics. I used to be an artist and screen printer, and I’ve used my hands a lot throughout my career. I’ve had tendonitis and shoulder problems, and a standard keyboard-and-mouse setup don’t work for me. I have some arthritis in my fingers and I got a glial cyst a couple of years ago from typing on my laptop keyboard too much. It was surprisingly painful.

I used Adesso ergonomic keyboards for years because mousing with my right hand kills me and I liked the trackpad in the center. However, the newer Adesso models weren’t working well with my Mac. I couldn’t find another ergonomic keyboard with a center trackpad, so a split keyboard with a trackball in the center was the logical option.

I’ve tried voice dictation, but I’ve been touch typing since I was a teenager, and my fingers are an extension of my brain. Protecting my ability to type and function at my computer is critical to me, which is why I put such emphasis on ergonomics.

I want to include a plug for ZSA’s customer support. The Moonlander is the most expensive keyboard I’ve purchased, and there were a lot of technical details to understand. I knew I needed a mechanical keyboard with quiet keys since I take a lot of notes on Zoom meetings or when I interview someone. I got answers to all my questions before I chose which keys I wanted. When I was struggling to reach the keys on the little wings with my thumbs, someone from ZSA suggested tilting them up to shorten the reach, and that fixed the problem.

And what software?

I use WordPress and Wix to manage client websites. I use the MS Office suite and Google Docs suite, as well as email, Slack, Asana, and Toggl. I use Salsa and EveryAction to create actions and send emails for my nonprofit clients and Whova for conference registration and promotion.

I use Scrivener for my fiction projects. I used to do some FileMaker programming; I don’t do that for clients anymore (please don't ask me!), but I still use my own custom FileMaker apps to manage my invoices and track time and expenses.

I use focus@will when I need to block out the world and zero in on writing, and an app called Time Out that reminds me to take breaks.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

I was excited and a little intimidated by the ability to program my Moonlander, but I’ve run with it! I’ve changed my setup many times as I figured out what worked for me. My goal is a configuration that makes the keyboard actions I take most often more accessible and faster while keeping the layout close enough to a standard keyboard that I can still type on my laptop or iPad without looking.

I prefer keyboard commands to the mouse, so I’ve programmed most of my letter keys to add Command when held. My favorite new one is paste unformatted by double tapping V, which is a godsend in Google and Salsa forms. I also shortened the time to recognize a held key. I made it too short at first, so when I put my fingers on the keyboard, all sorts of commands started firing. It was hysterical!

I’ve also programmed characters I use a lot, like (), —, and “, to be more accessible and not need a shift of multiple keys pressed at once. I love being able to experiment and refine.

One of the things I love about being able to program the Moonlander is the iterative nature of it. My computer keyboard is my main work tool, and it’s great to be able to refine how it works, to change key functions and locations if I find I’m repeatedly hitting the wrong key or having a hard time keying in a certain character.

Typing is my second language, and I was worried I’d have difficulty adapting to my customizations, but I got comfortable faster than I expected. I appreciated the training modules; those helped me create new neural pathways, especially for the characters I rarely use. A keyboard layout designed around my work is a real feeling of power.

What would be your dream setup?

I almost exclusively use my top layer. I am fast on a 10-key, but I usually have to switch back and forth between words and numbers, so toggling to the second layer to access the number pad isn’t ideal. Maybe I’ll figure out a way to program the 10-key into my top layer, but I’d love to have a dedicated number pad.

I’d also like a second monitor. My current MacBook doesn’t support that; I’ll be looking for it in my next computer.

One part of my dream setup is not having to do much typing on my laptop keyboard, even when working from home or being a digital nomad. I love how portable the Moonlander is; I plan to take it with me to Mexico in a few weeks for a working vacation.

I'm Sarah, and I found my niche in coding only recently. I spent a decade in finance before I decided to get started with a career, and I signed up for a boot camp! I started out in JavaScript/React, translated that into several other languages as I began my job search journey, and landed at a Drupal company last spring. I love coding, and I tend to lose hours buried in puzzles.

I am also an extremely active person; I get up early every day to do yoga, then I walk my dogs (and the neighbors' dogs), then I wake up my kids and get them off to school before starting my workday. I work at a stand-up desk with an antifatigue balance board, and I usually take a midday break to do something outdoors (go running with a dog, mow the lawn, whatever will get me out).

I also love cooking and reading, but I usually have limited time for anything, since my wife and I adopted our three kids a couple years ago. We added a fourth kid, her nephew, last year, so we have our hands full!

What hardware do you use?

I was a lifelong Windows user until I started this coding journey, and now I've made the switch to a MacBook Pro.

I have always been the type of person who will figure out a way to make do with what I have and only upgrade if I have an urgent reason. Our house was under construction for a year and just finished last fall, so I was trying to work from home from my bedroom while we were all crammed into a very small space. I had to compress everything and found a temporary keyboard and mouse that fit within the size limits, but unfortunately my body suffered from being hunched forward and forced to bring my hands so close together all day.

As soon as our space expanded, I asked around for new keyboard and mouse recommendations, and a coworker sent me a link to the Moonlander. I bought it that day, and I've been happily using it ever since with no more body pain! I also got a Logitech mouse to help with ergonomics.

And what software?

I am not sure I could survive without my Google Calendar. If it's not on my calendar or in my Notes app on my phone, then it didn't happen and won't happen. We use the Google Suite at work as well, so it would be tough for me to transition away.

Even though I am immersed in a PHP culture, I am clinging for dear life to my VSCode. I learned Java on IntelliJ IDEA, and I disliked both the language and the IDE so much (I was working on a crappy PC with 8GB of memory that was already stuffed full, and the app crashed constantly) that I've had trouble making the switch to PhpStorm. Maybe someday.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

I used the prefab layout straight out of the gate so I could get used to the split keyboard typing, and now I've just become complacent. Someday soon I will customize my keys, but like I said earlier, I tend to just make do with what I have until I have a reason to make the change. I do keep my keyboard with full rainbow lights at all times, and I can't wait to make the rainbow lights dance along to my music eventually. Someday. Spare time is sparse with four kids aged 4-15.

What would be your dream setup?

My dream setup would be a desk that adjusts to me as I move—not just up and down, but follows me around all over. My entire office floor would be antifatigue (we've had a concrete floor since 2015, and it lost its charm to walk on long ago), the lighting would be either natural or soft, and I would have plants everywhere. A sound system would keep beats pumping all day, but I would have a pillow-like headset for meetings. I'm a simple person, so I wouldn't add anything more to my screens, and if we are sticking to reality, then my setup would be pretty close to what it is now, with the addition of perhaps an underdesk treadmill or stationary bike.

I'm Sage LaTorra, and I'm a senior engineering manager at Google. Currently I lead a few engineering productivity teams that develop tools, infrastructure, testing frameworks, and processes that help make our codebases easy to change, hard to break, and efficient to ship.

Outside of work I'm also a tabletop game designer—or at least I have been one. As my day job and family have grown, I've had less time for game design. My most notable work was co-designing Dungeon World, and I also have several smaller games of my own, including Catch The Devil and The Doomed.

As you might expect of a game designer, I spend a lot of time outside of work playing games, as well as reading. I'm pretty omnivorous when it comes to media, as I've often found useful ideas come from cross-pollination. One night a week I play videogames with friends (mostly 4X, but currently cooperative Rogue Trader), and one night a week I play RPGs (currently The One Ring Second Edition). My oldest daughter recently picked up trading card games, so we've been playing a lot of Pokémon, Magic, and Lorcana. I keep up with numerous comics, but I'm particularly enjoying the end of Kieron Gillen's time on X-Men and the start of Tom King on Wonder Woman. And on top of that, I'm reading Jon Peterson's excellent The Elusive Shift about how roleplaying games started to be thought of as something other than wargames.

Basically, I'm a committed generalist, and I really enjoy considering and thinking about a wide range of topics to see how they might inform each other.

What hardware do you use?

My most consistent piece of hardware across those interests is actually my Moonlander. Or, I guess I should say, Moonlanders—I keep one on my desk at home and one on my desk at work and connect them to whatever laptop or desktop I'm using at the moment. I also have a Voyager for travel, which is part of my job.

I'm also a bit of an audiophile, so I have an almost-too-complex setup where I use external digital-to-analog converters to get the output of whatever laptop I have connected to my dock and my gaming PC mixed together with the output from my record player and fed into an amp. I mostly use Schiit equipment, which hits my price point, plus a U-Turn turntable and some Dan Clark Æon headphones.

I guess if you consider "hardware" broadly enough, I'd also count my pen and notebook. I use pen and paper for journaling as a way to keep my mind focused on the current thing I'm doing.

And what software?

My most consistent software is probably OmniFocus for task tracking, plus a good Markdown editor for my copious digital notes (currently iA Writer).

OmniFocus has been huge for me as a task power user. The ability to defer tasks (setting the date/time at which the task can start) is critical to my workflow. I track so much in OmniFocus that I need a way to trim down my working set to the things I can do now, so deferring is a key part of how I manage my tasks.

I use Markdown for a lot of personal notes, since I've found the process of turning my thoughts into something concrete helps me to stay present and engage with things I like. I've tried various fancy and complex apps, but I keep coming back to plain ol’ Markdown in part because it gives me control and I don't have to worry about the app going away, as I'm pretty sure I'll always be able to find something that can edit plaintext.

I take more structured notes around things I read, things I watch, and beers I drink. I've developed specific extra formatting rules for each to keep things consistent and draw me towards the things I care about—thinking about the world around me and the things I choose to consume. I've considered publishing my notes (they'd naturally fit into Jekyll with some wikilink handling), but that project hasn't seemed as useful to me. I do publish the notes I take for our current The One Ring game, though.

When using a Mac, I'm also a big fan of Raycast and Superkey as ways to optimize my keyboard usage.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

I use a lightly customized layout mostly around adding dedicated keys for a few important things. One of the conceptual topics I've gone back and forth on is dedicated keys for modal activities. Currently I have dedicated keys for Raycast/search, Superkey, and OmniFocus, but each of these takes focus away from wherever else I might be typing. They're generally useful, but they can mean a high cost to a missed keystroke, as now my input is going elsewhere. I may go to holds for those keys, but then I need to decide what tap will do on them.

My base layout is still QWERTY, which I feel slightly ashamed of. One of these days I'll learn a better layout, but as someone who only truly learned to touch type fairly recently, I kept it easy for now. I'd made it through years of college and work with a messy half-learned mostly-touch-but-some-looking typing style until I finally decided to really learn typing. My Moonlander was actually a big part of that.

I always keep a dedicated mouse layer so that my keyboard can be an all-purpose input when I need it to be. Since I mostly use Bluetooth mice, this has been really useful when setting up a new machine. It's also helpful at work when I have my laptop at my desk, since the battery in my mouse died almost a year ago and I haven't bothered to charge it: Instead I try to do everything on my keyboard, mostly through shortcuts, some Superkey, but falling back to keyboard-as-mouse when needed.

I'd say my layout is still definitely a work in progress, but I think that's pretty common.

I've also opted to stay with the default keycaps in sticking with the fairly minimal setup of my desk. I do have some Lord of the Rings keycaps from Drop, but at this point I think they'll be for my kids (who recently started using laptops at school and are now excited about keyboards).

What would be your dream setup?

I think I already have it! Or at least pretty close to it. I wouldn't mind moving over to OLED monitors, but beyond that I'd be looking at major remodeling like adding a window behind and above my monitors.

When I started working from home in 2023 almost everything about my setup was different, but with small tweaks over time I've reached a pretty optimal setup. At the moment I think it's about as good as it's going to get on currently available hardware.

Hello, I am Sreedev Kodichath. I'm a Senior Software Engineer from India, currently living in Brooklyn, New York. I work at TuneCore, a music distribution company. I specialize in building large data-processing pipelines, finance & taxation systems, and legal compliance software. Even though I mostly use Ruby and JavaScript at work, I've been using Rust, Elixir, and TypeScript extensively in my open source projects.

Outside of work, I go on food-exploration drives with a friend of mine to different places in and around New York, where we try out different cuisines and restaurants or grab a beer and play pool or go bowling with a few friends within the city.

I am also an amateur radio operator (callsigns: KD2ZWB & VU2JWE). I don't go on the air a lot these days, but I do some shortwave listening once in a while.

Most of my time is spent on learning new languages & abstract mathematics, and contributing to open source software. I love working with microcontrollers, writing drivers, hardware abstraction layers, etc., mostly in C/C++ and Rust (more recently Zig). I also share things I learn on Medium or my blog, Devtechnica.

What hardware do you use?

My primary machine is a Dell Precision laptop with the following specs: Intel® 12th Gen Core™ i7-12800H processor, NVIDIA RTX A1000 Mobile (4 GB) GPU, and 32GB RAM.

I also run a home server on a Mini PC with an Intel® 12th Gen Core™ i5-12450H processor and 16GB RAM.

I am planning on building a workstation PC soon. But haven't started the work yet. Some of the other hardware and accessories I use include a HUION 420X graphics tablet, a Logitech F710 game controller, and a Raspberry Pi 4B (primarily to run a DNS server for my local network).

And what software?

There are far too many open source software and tools I rely on to list. But I'll list some tools here that have a significant impact on day-to-day operations.

The operating system I daily drive is ArchLinux (btw). On my home server, I run NixOS with all hosted apps containerized using Docker. I use Neovim (also btw) for text editing and will talk about my 1400+ lines of Lua config every chance I get (I regret nothing). Desktop environments are bloat, so I use the i3wm window manager and sometimes switch to dwm just to apply some patches, break the build, and switch back to i3.

Alacritty with tmux and zsh offers the peak terminal experience. The newer alternatives to these software do intrigue me sometimes, maybe I'll give Zellij and Nushell a try someday.

Firefox with some security hardening is my web browser of choice. I do want to try the Ladybird browser once figure out what's causing the build to break on my computer.

In no particular order, here are some more tools that make life easier: Taskwarrior, Vim (R.I.P Bram), Newsboat, csvlens, Bat, Dust, fzf, jq, Zoxide, and zathura.

On my server, I run around 75 different services, but the software I rely on and appreciate the most on my server are OpenZFS, Grafana, Podman, and PhotoPrism.

I have a meticulously maintained dotfiles repository for all of the tools I use.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

I own four keyboards and no, I don't have a problem (help). I actively use two of them. The ZSA Voyager with Kailh Brown low-profile switches (QWERTY layout) is the primary keyboard that I carry around along with my laptop. The other keyboard is a Keychron Q2 Pro with Kailh Brown switches. I use it with the home server primarily. Even though I use the QWERTY layout with my Voyager, I have remapped a few keys to make things easier for me.

I do eventually want to switch to the Dvorak layout, but doing that would mean remapping shortcuts on all the keyboard-first software I use, like i3wm & (neo)vim, and I am not ready for that kind of commitment at the moment.

What would be your dream setup?

Since I've been experimenting with self-hosted LLMs and other machine learning models, the limitations of the hardware I own have only been amplified. So the simple answer to this question is MORE POWER!!! Something like a 96-core AMD Ryzen™ Threadripper™ PRO 7995WX for my CPU with unreasonable amounts of RAM (I am talking 256GB+). For the GPU, I can settle for an Nvidia H100 80GB (/s).

For the home server, I hope to have a rack with 5 ARM servers running a Kubernetes cluster all declaratively configured (maybe using nix & k3s).

Even though my primary workflows are all minimal, the more recent developments in large language models that I have been experimenting with have been resource-consuming beasts. The real dream is to have enough compute to tackle all the problems and experiments I throw at my workstation. The dream specs are very much reflective of that.

In terms of the aesthetics, Stable Diffusion was able to capture the essence for the most part.

My name is Sebastián Villamizar Santamaría. I am currently an editor at Nature Cities, a new journal from the Nature portfolio focusing on urban research. Before that, I did a PhD in sociology at the CUNY Graduate Center and worked as a freelance editor, copy editor, and translator in Spanish and English for a variety of human rights practitioners. Outside of work, I enjoy biking, desserts, yoga, and walking around in the city.

What hardware do you use?

My desk is a standing desk by Fully, which unfortunately are not around anymore. I really like my chair, which is a HÅG Capisco. I bought both during a period of peak remote work in the pandemic, and they were a big but welcomed investment. I have a Mac mini M2 that I’ve used for a while and I have a work-issued 13” Lenovo ThinkPad. I have a 34” monitor, which changed my surface area so much (both physically and digitally), and my job gave me a 24” monitor that I have in a vertical angle. I have two mice, a Corsair for gaming and a very nice Swiftpoint mouse that I can take anywhere.

In terms of keyboards, I used a Moonlander for a few months and I liked it so much. Then, with my new full-time job at the journal I commute to the office once a week, so I tried to carry it, but it was too cumbersome. That’s why I got a now-retired Planck EZ, to carry around. I missed the split layout of the Moonlander and the portability of the Planck, and somehow you ended up presenting the Voyager and it seemed to be the best of both worlds. I gave my brother the Moonlander and the Planck, as he doesn’t have to commute as much, and he’s been enjoying them too.

I have a bunch of toys and mementos from different times of my life as decoration, including some Pokémon keycaps my brother gave me last Christmas. Last but not least, I have four plants on my desk, which is a really nice way to be in touch with nonhuman life, especially during the winters in NYC.

And what software?

I’ve had many hats, and each required different software. When I was doing my PhD, I used to write a lot on Scrivener (my dissertation was made possible because of it!) and did a heavy use of Zotero to manage the citations for everything. I also used stats software like SPSS and R, and mapping stuff like QGIS and ArcGIS, and Adobe Illustrator, Inkscape, and GIMP to make them look nicer. Microsoft Word was the bread and butter too, especially in my work as freelance editor. I took some classes on Word for editors, and they were very useful—I didn’t know half the things I learned in them.

Now as an editor for a scientific journal, I don’t write that much but read a lot, so Acrobat/Preview are the way to go, as well as Google Docs for note-taking and sharing stuff with colleagues. My default browser is Firefox—I have it installed everywhere and can’t use anything else.

My gaming platform has switched from the computer to a PlayStation 5 and Nintendo Switch, but I play World of Warcraft and Baldur’s Gate 3 sometimes.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

My setup has been the result of a lot of trial and error, as many here. My work and personal lives are bilingual, so I had to have access to accents, etc. And when I got the Moonlander, I thought “What a great idea it would be to learn a new keyboard layout.” After reading a lot about it, I chose Dvorak because it also works in both languages (pretty much). So here I was learning how to type again after 30 years with a QWERTY keyboard. That not being enough, I use many shortcuts (my fellow editors would know how great it is to type an em dash through the key shortcut, or moving the cursor through words/sentences instead of letters), which I had to program through Oryx. Once I got the hang of it all and programmed everything I needed, I started the new job and they only use Windows, so I had to duplicate many of these but with Ctrl instead of Cmd.

I got inspired by many people doing Windows/Mac work, but sadly there were not many editors nor Spanish users available, so I hope this will help others trying to do a bilingual setup with many layers with shortcuts.

What would be your dream setup?

Frankly, I don’t know if I need anything new or have anything I would like to replace. My job doesn’t require lots of processing power, and the M2 runs the games I play well enough. I thought of trying the ErgoDox, but I’m very happy with the Voyager. Maybe more plants? I don’t know, that would be nice.

My name is David, and I am both the director and designer of a mechanical design and drafting company I have been operating for going on ten years.

Outside of work I frequent the gym to stay fit, and I enjoy meeting up with mates and eating good food as well as jumping on my motorbike and going for early morning rides/hikes.

What hardware do you use?

The setup I use is reasonably basic—I have gone through my career learning to operate CAD programs with shortcuts and to be as efficient as possible. For the most part, a full-size mechanical keyboard has done the job along with an ambidextrous mouse. We also introduced a Moonlander MK I to allow us to exchange handing (right or left mouse).

And what software?

The company I operate specializes in mechanical/structural design where we use SolidWorks and AutoCAD for the core of the work we perform. On the side I have also been learning Blender and aiming to incorporate this into what we do.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

I mainly use one half of the Moonlander MKI at a time. We have compacted our key assignments to be able to use one hand to operate 90% of the common commands used and allow the other hand on the mouse. Being able to swap hands has greatly helped control ergonomics and posture rather than being stuck in the same position all day. I use standard printed keycaps and use the lighting to help recreate custom key groups.

The layout is most likely unique in the sense we use the modifier keys Alt, Ctrl & Shift in combination with the numpad and home area keys to provide a multitude of keyboard shortcuts which can be operated with one hand, at the same time not needing to lift that hand up too much. It was designed for what we felt was efficient for our CAD usage. We would also modify the keyboard assignments in our CAD programs to suit (e.g. L would normally select the line command, where we program this to Shift-Insert).

What would be your dream setup?

I have always been a fan of wireless setups which could also be modular and dock easily together. Being able to have something like wireless wall-mounted displays combined with a wireless and modular keyboard would provide great flexibility to create an awesome setup. The idea of being able to purchase and dock different modules together would be great to create my own customizations.

My name is Alex. I’m originally from Portland, Oregon in the United States. I’m 37 (no way I’m that old! ugh) and married. I’ve got two German Shorthaired Pointers and currently live in Berlin working as the team lead and lead data engineer for SmartBroker+. I’m on Threads (R.I.P. Twitter) @alex.narayan and Mastodon as @gigatexal.

I enjoy walking. I enjoy taking walks with my wife and my dogs and just walking the relatively flat city of Berlin. I don’t read much, except for work. I do like binging good TV; currently I’m in the second season of Halo from Paramount+. Other than that (man, this really sounds like a dating profile, which I’ve not had to care about for almost eight years now), I just like enjoying time tinkering with computers and hacking away at my Linux workstation and talking tech with friends.

What hardware do you use?

Though it’s a bit out of date: Fedora’s been upgraded to Fedora 39, and I’ve swapped the Nvidia hardware out for an AMD 6800 non-XT GPU. This setup works beautifully with Wayland.

I have a Dell 3221QS, which I thought was a steal for 400 euros some three years or so ago—so much so that I started a YouTube channel about it. And my newest and most prized monitor is the LG 28MQ780—a square beast you can see on the left in the photos.

Of course I rock a ZSA Moonlander, as you can see in the photos. One day I was fed up with my beloved but uninteresting mechanical keyboard I bought on Amazon. It’s nice but boring, and my wrists and hands were starting to hurt. So, on a whim, and needing a bit of retail therapy, I made a purchase for a ZSA Moonlander on the website and then told the other keyboard nerds in my company’s Slack all about it. The chat was pretty split between custom, from-scratch keyboard hackers, the Kinesis Advantage360 crowd (which I did end up buying locally from a retailer because waiting for the Moonlander was taking forever, trying it out for a few hours, and then promptly returning it, as it was just too far a jump for me to make), and the ZSA Moonlander folks. We geeked out about keyboards in that channel for some 100s of replies. And then I waited and waited and waited. Eventually we found the right ritual animal sacrifice and keywords to utter to get DHL/German customs to release the keyboard to me and for me to pay them and get my keyboard.

And what software?

I use Fedora 39, LunarVim (a framework that turns Neovim into a really nice VSCode replacement), Sway (i3-like tiling window manager for Linux, but for Wayland), and i3 when using X11 (window/screen sharing is just so much easier but then I have to live with tearing … it’s a whole thing), and I mostly use Git, SQL, Python, and Google’s BigQuery at work.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

It’s a pretty stock setup. I got the metal base as an accessory and a few more feet. Other than that, it’s pretty clickety—can’t remember what keys I got—but it’s definitely not safe for work. It’s far too loud. I like it that way. I love the key travel and how if the elbow rests on my Steelcase chair are at the right level, my wrists feel like they’re floating, and I just dance on the keys.

Using a tiling window manager means I hardly ever use the mouse. Even Chrome and Firefox have the Vim plugin installed so I can filter through webpages using key bindings from my favorite editor.

My keyboard setup isn't fancy. I am still very much learning. I use maybe 10% of the smarts of this keyboard, so it’ll only get cooler the more I learn. I just got to a point where I’m productive and then stopped hacking on the configs.

What would be your dream setup?

It’d be Ben Chatelain’s setup. I used to be a huge Mac guy, and my next laptop will probably be a M-series one. All that screen real estate and double the RAM of my workstation! I’m very jealous. Simply wow.

Hi, I'm Brian. I'm a software engineer currently working at one of the startups in Australia. I write code, solve a lot of problems, and build meaningful products. Outside of work, I enjoy any physical activities like running, hiking, and obviously going to the gym. Apart from that, I also code outside of work. That might sound weird, but coding is my profession and also my hobby.

What hardware do you use?

Currently my main daily driver is Ryzen 5 5600G with 32GB of RAM. It's a beast, considering my routine tasks. My main monitor is an LG 38” UltraWide together with a Dell 27” 4K vertically sitting on my side. And of course the one and only Moonlander. For my audio, I have Audio-Technica AT2040 dynamic microphone with AKG K52 headphones, both of them hooked to audio interface Focusrite Scarlett Solo 3.

And what software?

My most used software are all related to software development. These include Visual Studio Code, Visual Studio, Postman, Docker, Vim, Chrome, and other bunches of IDE.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

I use OG keycaps, they are already awesome. I have my custom layout for a specific purpose. I use navigation a lot when editing code, so my custom layout is designed for coding in mind. I have four layers, which switch by toggle. The first layer is the main one, the second is symbols, the third is navigation (arrows), and the last one is numbers.

I want to explain a bit about my layout: Originally I customized my layout to serve Vim navigation, but with the benefit of the layers, I customized my arrows to separate layers which are similar to the original location of Vim. These allow me to turn Vim on/off when I need to. The reason is that Vim key binding interferes with the IDE default shortcuts, and sometimes I need to use those shortcuts.

What would be your dream setup?

I could say that my current setup is pretty dope. But in the future, if I had a chance I would upgrade my monitor to be 5K2K, which is an LG UltraWide 4K monitor or two of the 27” 4K UltraSharp. The rest I'm already happy with—even when I think that I want them, I don't need them (which is Mac Pro—that’ll cost you half of the price of the car that you drive).

I’m Quan (pronounced “kwan”). I’m a NYC-based software engineer working at MSK, helping build a collaborative platform that centralizes cancer research data from various pipelines and streamlines cancer research processes. I previously interned at a machine learning software startup called BentoML.

On a part-time basis, I’m a master’s student in the MCIT program at Penn Engineering and a teaching assistant at CodePath. In my free time, I enjoy spending time with my wife, building side projects, reading manga, and learning to live healthier mentally and physically.

Before software development, I spent some time on the business side, where I worked in a strategic finance capacity and helped an e-commerce startup with going public and, afterwards, in a chief-of-staff capacity at a Series A debugging software startup.

What hardware do you use?

My main laptop is a 16-inch MacBook Pro M1 Max with 32GB of RAM. It usually sits in clamshell mode while being connected to two Dell P series monitors, one of which I oriented vertically for programming and for how cool it looks.

My computer accessories include an MX Vertical mouse mouse, a Brio webcam, and a Yeti microphone (I didn’t realize I was a Logitech fanboy until now). All this equipment sits on top of an XL Autonomous Pro standing desk.

I also own a pre-loved Herman Miller Aeron chair that has done wonders for my lower back pain. Ergonomics is something I like optimizing for because I spend a lot of time at my desk for work, school, and other activities—if you’re reading this and have recommendations, I’d love to hear about them.

And what software?

I use Arc as my main browser to keep up with the cool kids and for their delightful UX. Most of my programming work is done in VS Code with the Vim Motions extension and an integrated iTerm2 terminal.

My current favorite productivity tool is Raycast for its lightning-fast navigation, instant access to GPT, and being an overall better replacement for Spotlight. I also use Things 3 for tracking to-dos, Obsidian and Goodnotes for note-taking, and Focusmate for accountability buddies.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

My setup consists of the Moonlander keyboard paired with the recently added Platform, which made my wrists much more comfortable and alleviated my carpal tunnel. I use a QWERTY-like layout with a few modifications, such as the Caps Lock replacing Esc for a smoother Vim experience. In terms of keycaps, I use a few of SPKeyboards’ switch blockers for unused keys and a Squirtle keycap on top of the Esc key to match with my wife’s Bulbasaur one.

What would be your dream setup?

I’m happy with my current setup, but my internal perfectionist would love better cable management with fewer cables in view. In the future, I’m curious about experimenting with using the LG DualUp Monitor as my only monitor, and integrating VR headsets such as the new Apple Vision Pro into my setup and workflows.

At the heart of my universe, I'm a full-time single mom, hand-in-hand with my nine-year-old son on our shared adventure through neurodiversity. Our world is vibrant, challenging, and endlessly rewarding, shaping our days with unique perspectives and heartfelt discoveries.

Parallel to this, my life is interwoven with academia's demanding threads. For the past five years, I've navigated the realms of full-time study and part-time work (20–30 hours weekly), all while maintaining a GPA that oscillates between 3.5 and 3.7. This balancing act is more than just juggling—it's a performance that seems to give potential employers the illusion that I have excellent time management skills. I’m not sure how I manage it all, but I think it’s more about luck than time management!

Nestled in the tri-state area of southwestern Iowa, my roots trace back to a small South Dakota town, a mere ten-minute interstate journey away. I’m an ’80s/’90s kid who grew up in a cul-de-sac with other kids, riding our bikes or rollerblading wherever we wanted, traipsing through our neighbors’ back yards or climbing their fences to get to our friends’. We never checked in with our parents throughout the day, we didn’t have phones or wear trackers, and we had one rule: Come home when the street lights turn on (the super late ones, not the ones at like, 8:00 p.m.). In the winter, it had to snow about thirty feet before school got cancelled (not the case nowadays!). We’d spend the entire day outside building mansion snow forts and tunnels to China. Winter was about nine months long during those days.

From early grade school through my late twenties, I was a dedicated performer as a singer and actor. In my teens, I was even scouted a few times at local establishments for opportunities in professional singing, modeling, and acting. When I was seventeen, I won a competition that gave me the honor of singing at the Tommy Bolin festival. I was the hometown NYC-bound star. Now, I’m an accountant. If you’re scratching your head, wondering how that worked out, don’t worry – I still do that too.

I actually fell in love with accounting when I was fifteen. I’d visit my aunt, an accountant, every summer and stay the length. She’d take me to work with her because I always thought what she did was super exciting. I sometimes even helped her with some of the basics. I thought calculating numbers all day was some kind of magical concept. Plus, tapping all day on an adding machine and getting to shred paper seemed pretty legit.

Now, I don’t wanna burst any bubbles, here, but I gotta tell you – that’s not at all what accounting is like in real life!!

The sudden thrust into single motherhood when my son was just eighteen months old was a major turning point for me. I had shifted away from performing long before that time and anyway, part of growing up is learning a bit more about reality. I utilized every resource I could find and was able to get funded for community college, to get my associate’s degree. I was barely a semester in before I decided I didn’t want any closed doors in this field, so I resolved to get my bachelor’s and CPA. I’m studying for the first part of the CPA exam now. I also learned, in that first semester, that ADHD had been my silent co-star for about five years prior. Getting that under control was pivotal for my educational journey, as well as a lot of other aspects of my personal life.

This is where I use the term “neurodivergent.” When you say you have ADD/ADHD, most people think they have a general idea about it, which is usually super wrong. Using the term “neurodiversity” instead of using diagnoses is, to me, like having an umbrella that actually keeps you dry. Not because it simply “works,” but because it’s covering all the space it should. Neurodiversity for my son looks a lot different than it does for me, but the context is the same. His presents as sensory challenges, social barriers, spectral mannerisms and behavior, and academic advancement. He’s extraordinarily artistically creative, but he’s also very scientific. It’s never uncommon to find his toys taken apart, screws misplaced and parts strewn about. Before I understood this about him, it would make me a little angry, mostly from the financial aspect. I had to tell myself that I needed to learn to accept this about him, and that anything I buy – at any price – is with the knowledge that there is a high likelihood it will be destroyed shortly after ownership. With little or no income at times, on state and federal aid, that was extremely difficult for me. I’ve managed to keep that struggle internalized for the most part, and my reward was that I no longer found the screws and missing parts under his bed. Instead, they’re in plain sight. :/ I do recognize that the true reward is that he feels comfortable sharing with me his discoveries and seeing his open enthusiasm is just…so worth it.

I’ve also been able to hone my learning skills. Typing and formatting notes—changing the fonts, colors, arrangement – it not only gives me constant exposure, but I can remember things much easier when I can recall their font and color. This shouldn’t be misinterpreted as a photographic memory, because I definitely do not have that gift! When I need to recall something, my memory can dredge up a general recall of layout, font, and color all squished into one blob, and that will trigger the sparks. Sometimes, it’s remembering if I had the information on the left, right, or middle of the page. Was it in a text box, and what color border did it have? Sometimes I spend hours or days formatting notes only to delete some parts because I know I can remember them without them being in the document. Other times, I feel a need to write. This isn’t often, as the permanent damage from carpal tunnel and De Quervain’s has made this awkward. My handwriting is no longer my own unless I write very slowly, so you can see how having a keyboard capable of magic is extremely helpful in this situation!

I share this in such detail because it’s the core of who I am, how I function, and how I think. I’ve changed into almost a completely new person through my academic journey, and that primarily is due to an acceptance and understanding of myself. I’ve put in a great deal of time and training to accomplish this. I know what I can’t change, I’m comfortable with that, and I’m completely open about this with my employer or in interviews. I’m not ashamed or embarrassed. I know very well that I overcomplicate concepts that are too easy, but wouldn’t you know that constantly being told that by anyone and everyone hasn’t actually changed that? Odd, isn’t it? I’m a thinker. I have to study, observe, and theorize. People assume this means I’m more one side of the brain than the other, but that’s an incorrect assumption. This is where I sum myself up in three words: I’m a hybrid! I’m a split of just about everything you can think of. I need both, want both, prefer both…whatever the thing is, I long ago discovered I’m never one or the other. This should not be taken out of context that I’m greedy—it just means that I have conflicting thoughts about both options, and I don’t think just the one or the other accurately describe me. I’m a Virgo-Libra. Balance is extremely vital to my existence.

I currently work remotely for a state-funded program based out of Nebraska. If you don’t know lots about accounting, there are two kinds: Accounting, and Governmental Accounting. They are two separate universes! That was my second most difficult class, and we all hated it. It was confusing, confounding, and we were all annoyed that very little of the basics of accounting applied. Imagine my shock when I fell into it through a prior internship, and discovered I loved it. It fulfills my need for working and thinking on a complex level. I do lots and lots of budget work, deal with property tax receipts, lease contract analyses, forecasting, do tons of evaluations for the council, etc. And yes, I realize how boring that sounds even as it’s coming out of my mouth, but this is my jam, you guys!

The program helps parents who couldn’t finish high school get their degree. The program’s motto is that if you educate the first generation, they can help the second (their children). It’s all free. They have childcare, they do parenting classes in the evenings, they provide transportation, they have grants for those who want to move to higher education, etc. My Forensic Accounting class taught me that governmental and nonprofit organizations are the most vulnerable to financial fraud. I have deep protective instincts, and with all I’ve seen in this industry, I vowed to only use my powers for good, and that’s what I feel like I’m doing here.

As for hobbies, right now the biggest is carpentry. This started with a need for a small console table, and a refusal to spend $300 on some Wayfair piece of junk. I thought back to my stage time and the forced participation in strike. After the last show, we all had to help dismantle the set and clean. Well, I can definitely tell you I was racing for the dressing rooms so I could be a 1950s cliché, because set deconstruction was boring as heck. But cleaning always went too quickly, and we’d soon find ourselves unwilling participants in strike. I can appreciate the irony, here.

So, I built my console table, and the empowerment and accomplishment I felt after that was roaring. I started diving into more projects, learning from the old dudes at the hardware stores, and my Home Depot people.

Which brings me to the 411 on HD (Home Depot): I'm like an unofficial guide at HD, pointing lost souls to the light (or the aisle they can't seem to find). HD and I have done some serious academic bonding, and their moral compass doesn't seem to be stuck in the Bermuda Triangle. This is a top reason I’ve been such a diehard loyalist for the past seven years or so. I’m a Pro X customer, and I like to stalk their financial statements and stock prices, so I have EDGAR and WSJ on speed dial in my bookmarks bar.

I could never cover all the things I’ve built, but most notable for me are the numerous variations of a loft bed with a swing underneath for my son, and my 3’ x 4’ ottoman that we call The Island (I tell my son he goes inside that sucker during a tornado, cuz that thing is indestructible!). I’m good at what I do. I brainstorm projects, and I never feel unsure if I can execute them and that confidence feels so nice. Ironically, just the other day at HD, a Gen Z’er associate assumed I needed a husband’s advice on my project. Newsflash: no. And in 2024, are we seriously still speculating about women wielding power tools without a Y chromosome?

For the record, I do rock sparkly cowboy boots, adore dresses, and yes, I’m all about that unicorn and mermaid life. I care a lot about my hair, get jelly over the shoes they make only for little girls, and despite my legit efforts to not be a cliché, pink is indeed my favorite color. So this isn’t a case of masculine feminism or whatever silly label the small-minded people want to place on it. This hobby started with a basic need for something, no money, and a determination to figure out how to get what I needed. Now carpentry isn’t just a hobby; it’s my zen. After my first wrist surgery, the moment I could fire up my sander again was like the grand finale at a rock concert. It's not just about making stuff; it’s also about the peace and creativity it unleashes. I just happen to find that zen in the buzz of the tools.

I’ve also tackled a couple restoration projects: a wardrobe trunk, c. 1940, a trunk, c. late 1700s, early 1800s, and a mail sorting desk from 1942 that I was extremely lucky to score. Its underside was in pristine condition, so the branding in the wood was easy to read. It’s #124 and it’s from Corbin Cabinet Lock Co in New Britain, CT in 1942. It came from Post Office #2059. I’m pretty proud of how it turned out and that I have such an awesome piece of history in my home. I put in a lot of time and research to learn how to maintain the integrity of whatever I’m trying to revive. I can honestly swear that I’ve never used screws in any of my trunk restorations. Instead, I learned the extremely difficult method of nail clinching, an activity that inspires much cursing.

I also sew, craft with broken china and teacups, reinvent or create jewelry, but am still trying to master the bologna of soldering, taught myself Photoshop, and recently started dabbling in Python and learning about APIs. I’m also learning how to pour resin. Over a 3x5’ piece of plexiglass. I’m not sure how it’s going, but I’m still “tinkering” with it. It’s been excruciatingly expensive, time-consuming, and despairing at times, but I am learning. It won’t have straight edges, and there are going to be parts that are messy, but I figure, hey, it’s just like my life right now! :D

What hardware do you use?

I need a lot of things open to work, and it boils my blood to waste time flipping between tabs, trying to find the app you need. I’m actually contemplating a third 49” monitor to put above the existing two, but that’s still in the decision-making stage. Mounting gets as expensive as the monitor sometimes.

I made my desk chair from one that was very old, and very, very hard. It has a metal seat. I drilled holes through the metal to create the kind of foundation I needed for my seat, the back is all my own making and rigging, and the canvas material is all glued together rather than sewn. The idea was that I'd sew the cover that was going to go over it. I decided to abandon that idea, because as you can see, the ropes are for keeping the back piece stable and strong, so it can sit upright, or I can loosen the ropes if I want more slack. I sewed little belt loops so the ropes would have a point for tension stability. So that's my super high-tech chair: homemade, a little messy-looking, but perfectly suited to my exact needs, postures, and ergonomics.

And what software?

My work laptop runs MS, but my school computer is Mac. My docking station doesn’t jibe well with my Mac, so I can only use one of the big monitors when I study. The one thing I cannot abide when I have to be at a computer all day, is not having enough real estate for all the junk I need open. It’s one of those triggers, like how road rage gets people into a boiling rage. I have to have a separate desktop open to access the accounting software as a remote worker, and I can’t drag anything onto that screen. I don’t use it constantly, but frequently enough that it needs its own space. My layout now allows me to use the larger monitors for spreadsheet-palooza and Adobe docs only. I need Teams and Outlook open, which is a hindrance, in my opinion, but that’s usually what I’d shove onto the laptop screen.

We’re currently researching new accounting software because what we have is antiquated and can’t do a lot of what we need. Thus, the spreadsheets.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

I use the Moonlander keyboard, which has been a huge game changer for my pain levels. I had surgery to solve my carpal tunnel and De Quervain’s, but I needed an additional surgery on my left wrist to scrape out inflammation. Tenting the keyboard has sometimes been vital to me even continuing my shift some days.

I haven't had time to get into the grit of what my keyboard can do yet—I'm extremely interested in the Macros concept—so I only have two layers right now. Sad, I know. It took me a couple weeks to even open the box when I got it, I'm so stupid busy.

What would be your dream setup?

So, here I am, a far cry from daydreams of the stage, but now I use those talents to sing my son to sleep or jam out in the car, where my stage charisma has taught my son to sing with courage and the intent of being heard. I demonstrate with my own strength and determination what it means to be brave, how to problem-solve, and how to have a sense of humor. When he’s down and out about his lack of friendships, I tell him – and I quote: “Don’t worry about those other guys, because you know who’s makin’ a bajillion dollars in this world? The kids who got stuck hangin’ out by themselves because they were too smart for the other kids who thought they were weirdos. So trust me when I tell you, whatever those kids think about you is completely irrelevant to who you are and the awesome s*** you’re gonna do.” And when I walked that stage in May to close this grueling, but triumphant five-year chapter, it was as much his accomplishment as mine. It’s our ticket into the life I dreamed of for us, and we both have a very clear image of what the next chapters are going to look like. But don’t forget, when I’m working numbers, it’s probably in sparkly cowboy boots, because I’ve also vowed that I wasn’t going to be the accountant with the boring shoes.

As for the new dreams: After doing this, I would want a setup where cords either magically vanish, or at the very least, a more strategic method for hiding them. Very, very annoying. Probably my biggest pet peeve after not having enough real estate for spreadsheets.

In my imagination, if I envision two more 49" monitors stacked above the two I already have, that'd be pretty awesome. I'd also want a monitor just for my separate desktop. Oh, and I'd like a chair with my keyboard attached, that reclines and my monitors would be like, above me. If I didn't feel like reclining, I'd be able to like, IDK, use a remote or something to rearrange my monitors. Like their mounts would be motorized. And my chair would be made specifically for my spinal needs, so my hips would never ever go numb from sitting in it all day. I'd have Dragon, too, to do a lot of my navigating.

I'm probably veering off into fantasyland with that, but that pretty much covers my dream layout if money and space weren't an object. And inventions, evidently. My desk has legs to raise and lower, so I'm pretty close to my dream layout in ergonomic terms. But I think kickin’ back in a chair with my monitors all right there—that'd be pretty sweet.

My name is Adam Ranjo (it’s like banjo but with an R). I’m a former addictions and mental health therapist who now has a fantastic job working in a public library. It’s everything I want in that it lets me help people daily and flex some of my listening skills, while also keeping me more active, as I’m not trapped behind a desk anymore. I’m back in a master’s program for the second time. I have a Master’s in Counseling and am currently in my second semester at the University of Tennessee for a Master’s in Library and Information Sciences.

Outside of work and classes I am a run-of-the-mill nerd. I play Magic: The Gathering with friends both in person and online, I go to conventions with my wife—primarily Dragon Con in Atlanta, which is an absolute blast—and I love to read. I primarily read fantasy books but also pick up fun autobiographies, the most recent being Baggage by Alan Cumming. My favorite authors are Brandon Sanderson and Patrick Rothfuss, among many others. I prefer character-driven story over epics or drama, but I do like to mix it up as well.

When I’m not doing any of the above, I’ll probably either be listening to records, playing video games with friends, or obsessing over coffee. I dabble in roasting coffee but my current setup for it doesn’t allow for as much experimenting as I would prefer, so I mostly do it when I need more and don’t feel like making a stop at the local coffee shop that I love.

What hardware do you use?

I’ve been building my own PC since I was a teen after a friend showed me how easy it was to do (provided you aren’t impatient like I was and wreck your CPU because you just wanted to get it in there). So I am, and always have been, a desktop person. My current rig has 2TB of storage, 32GB of RAM, and an NVIDIA 4060 graphics card. I have a Logitech G502 X mouse, an Elgato Facecam, a Blue Yeti microphone, and a Sennheiser Game Zero. I also use a foot pedal for Discord and in-game chat so that I can keep my mouse and keyboard free.

Most importantly, I have a Herman Miller Mirra chair (so comfortable), FlexiSpot standing desk, a long arm for the microphone, and an Ergotron monitor arm for one of my two monitors (the other monitor needs to be upgraded in the near future, and then that too will get an Ergotron). I value those pieces over most anything in my setup because they pair so well with my Moonlander. I do so many things at my desk that I wanted the ability to move everything and create as much space on the desktop as I needed at any given time. Sometimes my monitor will be completely turned to the side, others it will be at the back, and sometimes it’s right in my face. My microphone needed the same flexibility, which is why it also has a swivel arm.

I really value that flexibility, which is one of the many reasons I landed on the Moon…lander. I started looking into ergonomic keyboards because of wrist and elbow pain. I never thought about split keyboards at first, but the better shoulder width along with the ability to move the sides apart or only use one side, such as when I’m gaming, made it an easy choice. The ZSA culture was the clinching deal. It's been a complete game changer. I feel better and more comfortable, and I have a better setup as a whole.

And what software?

Bitwarden is my most-used software, and it’s been well worth it. But there will never be a piece of software that I talk about more than YNAB (You Need a Budget). It may not be for everyone, but it has been a godsend in terms of helping my wife and me to better discuss where we’re at and where we’re we are heading. It’s taken almost all of the stress out of finances for us, and I don’t think I will ever stop singing their praises.

Outside of that I’ve been trying to get more familiar with Gimp, Inkscape, and Silhouette Studio, as they are all programs that feature heavily in the Makerspace at our library and they are tools I want to use more frequently. Steam and Discord obviously feature heavily in my usage. I’m currently joining the rest of people playing Baldur’s Gate 3 and will eventually jump on to Palworld when I get more time to do so.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

My Moonlander setup is fairly basic. I chose the Kailh Silver and I love them. They have the exact sound and feel I wanted. I don’t have any custom keycaps. I love the stock caps these came with and if I ever went custom, I’d feel the need to do the whole board for consistency’s sake.

As for my layout, it’s fairly stock as well. I paid attention to the zen typing guides and found the ideal spot for my Space (left hand cluster closest to the keys), Backspace (next to space), and Enter (right hand cluster closest to keys). I made some minor alterations to punctuation, but outside of that I mostly used the training tools and got familiar with the stock layout. I did turn the left and right arrow keys into copy and paste functions, which is a nice convenience to have, and I have one layer added in for playing Valorant with my buddy, but that isn’t as much unique as it is making sure anything I need from the right side of the board is accessible or otherwise turned off. Mostly, I bought this keyboard for its physical comforts and design, and I have yet to take advantage of its impressive software to the level it deserves.

What would be your dream setup?

My dream setup would mostly be to the physical space, as the room my computer is in not only doubles as the guest bedroom but also my wife’s craft room. None of this is an issue, but it leaves me with less space for as many personal touches as I’d like, such as more shelves and things hanging from the wall. As for the computer itself, I’d like to get a better camera arm, as the one I have works but doesn’t provide as much flexibility as I’d like. I’d like to upgrade my second monitor, and I’d like to get better lighting in the room as a whole. If I had a babbling brook outside the window that I could listen to at times, well, that would just be pure perfection. Better speakers are also a desire, as I don’t like using headphones for long periods of time but my current speakers were pretty cheap. Finally, my ideal setup would probably include someone who would do cable management for me because it is a skill I severely lack but strongly admire.

Finally, I'd like to leave everyone with a quote from one of my favorite movies, Everything Everywhere All At Once: "Please Be Kind, especially when we don't know what's going on."

My name is Simon, and I'm 28. In college I started out at an art school for illustration, then transferred to a different school and did civil engineering, then changed majors to psychology (and also music composition). I worked in a lab while in school and got to have my music performed by some really talented people. But while in school, I got really into 3D modeling and used my CAD knowledge from engineering to get into designing imaginary structures and eventually got a job doing architectural design. I then went to grad school for city planning, where I got my master's degree.

I am a freelance architect and vice president of planning and development at an affordable housing development consulting firm (I help companies design and get funding to build affordable housing) in the United States. My goals are to create housing for people who can no longer afford decent housing in their cities and to make old dilapidated structures cool again!

I live with my girlfriend, who's a costume designer for theater, and our cute little doggo named Crumpet—who's professionally adorable! I like rock climbing, running, drawing, writing music, trying new restaurants, and playing tennis in my free time.

What hardware do you use?

I use two setups.

My work/home stationary setup includes the Moonlander, Apple trackpad, a Logitech vertical mouse, 43" 144HZ monitor, a high-spec Mac mini, an Audient iD4 interface, Yamaha HS5 speakers, the Yeti mic everyone has, an old iPhone 12 as a webcam, and a Novation 61SL MkIII as the MIDI keyboard for writing some tunes. The desk is a 72x30 Fully Jarvis standing desk, and my chair is a Steelcase Gesture.

My home setup is a 16” 2019 MacBook Pro, a 12.9” iPad Pro m2 that I use mostly as a second monitor, another Magic Trackpad, another Logitech vertical mouse, Moonlander mounted vertically to the desk with smallrig clamps and extenders, Desky Dual Mini Sit Stand desk, Lifelong laptop stand, Artisan Hien small mousepad, and an Odosola iPad stand.

And what software?

I use Autodesk CAD, RStudio, Excel, a bunch of Adobe programs (that I wish weren't a subscription service), Ableton for music stuff, Octane for nice renders, VSCode and GitHub for ZMK, and Procreate for drawing on my iPad.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

I use Colemak as my layout. All other keys, aside from alphas, are moved around for my convenience, though. My layout might look remarkably terrible to other people, but the nice part of the software is that it's adjustable to whatever you need. Trying a few minimal layouts as well. Home row mods are interesting, but they seem to glitch out when typing above 150-170 wpm. I love the idea of a 36-key layout, but I haven't figured out the hold times for my typing speed, so I don't really use it at the moment.

I use a similar layout for my Corne keyboard.

What would be your dream setup?

I can’t wait for a future that does not require screens.

I do not know what form this would come in, but AR glasses that are light and comfortable is probably the answer. I know I will be waiting a long time for that lol. While screens are still required, I am actually quite happy with what I have.

I’m Angie Chiraz, a software engineer based in NYC. I’ve worked across the stack but mostly specialize in the front end for web applications. Currently, I work for Chapter, a Medicare and retirement navigation platform. My team is building a mobile app that helps seniors take full advantage of the benefits that come with their health insurance.

I love dancing with Mint Dance Company, a community dance team in NYC, but I’ve been a dance hobbyist since I was three years old. My older sister and I grew up competing in the Long Island dance scene, and our mom worked the front desk at our dance studio in order to cover tuition costs (even when it meant bringing my little brother as a newborn!). I was a very shy and nerdy kid, but I was able to express other parts of my personality through dance.

The dance lifestyle was never conducive to an ideal work setup—for academics or dancing. As a kid, I was accustomed to doing my homework sitting on the floors of school hallways and dance studio lobbies during breaks before and during multiple dance team practices. Then, I’d get home at 10:00 p.m. to eat dinner and finish my work on the kitchen counter without waking up my family.

Fast forward to adulthood, and joint pain became a reality. My knees would crack if I skipped one night of stretching after dancing, and my back would ache if I worked in a hunched position. My wrists were constantly sore from typing all day. One of my dance teachers even pointed out that my wrists were relatively inflexible. Around the same time, my most consistent college dance friend started dancing less due to chronic knee pain, and another dance friend had to get hip replacement surgery in his mid-twenties. These wild occurrences, combined with working from home due to the pandemic, were the wakeup call that I needed.

Prior to COVID, I had invested next to nothing in my home setup because I’d always go to an office or café. Luckily, I had a work-from-home budget and a manager who recommended I go for an ErgoDox. And after a month of getting used to the split setup, I never looked back! I love my shortcuts and haven’t experienced any wrist pain due to coding since. I definitely type faster on my ErgoDox EZ than on my laptop at this point, too. In 2023, I switched to a hybrid work environment, but I feel spoiled in that I actually have another EZ at the office!

Outside of coding and dancing, I love to journal, work out, travel, stretch while half-watching TV, style my own nails, babysit my one-year-old nephew, squat at cafes, read, and hang at my friend’s dance studio, Modega (which has some of the best sprung wood dance floors in the city!).

What hardware do you use?

I have a 2021 16” MacBook Pro with a 27” LG 27BN88U-B Ergo IPS UHD 4K Ultrafine™ Monitor and Logitech MX Master 3 Wireless Mouse. I use a Hiearcool USB C Multi-port Adapter to connect my ErgoDox to my laptop, which is perched on a laptop stand. My keyboard and mouse are on an Aothia Leather Desk Pad Protector, and my desk is a 53 x 29 bamboo Autonomous SmartDesk Pro. I connect all of my desk hardware (including my desk) to a Tripp Lite TLP1208TELTV 12 Outlet Surge Protector Power Strip.

I stuck two Yoousoo Drawer organizers under my desk for the clutter I don’t need every day. The drawers typically have paper clips to flash my firmware, backup earphones, a notepad, and a pack of gum for when I am in crunch mode. I sit in a Steelcase Series Air 2 chair with a 3D Microknit back, four-way adjustable arms, wheels for hard floors, a mesh headrest, and additional lumbar support. If I’m taking video calls when other folks are around, I use my AirPods Pro (second generation).

I always have a few journals handy at my desk. I use a spiral notebook that has built-in sticky notes when I am wireframing. I like using Post-Its because I can draw widgets and easily move them around on my fake screens, and the flag stickies are great for explanations if I’m sharing pictures of the wires. It’s like Figma for dummies. More recently, I started using Blackwing pencils for wireframing, too.

My other notebook is more of a dance journal for rehearsal notes or staging formations, which I prefer doing at my desk with the rehearsal videos playing on the monitor. Dance staging is a fun, but surprisingly difficult, optimization task. For a given section of the routine, you need to consider who is comfortable with what style of dance, who needs more time to shine in the overall set, and who might be too exhausted to execute the section given how much they’ve danced in the rest of the set. Once I have it loosely mapped out, I then consider height symmetry and visibility for the short folks in a given formation, feasibility of travel distance for each person during a formation change, and where people may need to be for the upcoming section.

For fitness, I recently started wearing a Whoop band after some coworkers convinced me to give it a shot. It has mostly helped me realize that dance is a relatively high-strain activity even when I don’t feel that it is, and that I need more sleep.

And what software?

For coding I spend most of my time in VS Code and the terminal. Outside of the VS Code extensions used by my team, I use Jest Runner and Auto Rename Tag. I mostly use Chrome. I use the Mac Notes app for to-do lists (work and life) and to jot down ideas before I’m ready to structure them in a team workspace. I use QuickTime Player to screen record UI progress updates that I want to share, and I currently use Sequel Ace to see what’s up with our database at work.

Figma is the tool I would marry if I had to pick. I started using it at a previous job when we did not have a designer, so I would actually use it to design components and screens that needed to be higher fidelity than my journal post-it drawings for scoping and handoff. But I mostly use it to intake and inspect sweet designs made by legitimate designers.

For work communication and socializing, I use Slack. Most importantly, I use https://slackmojis.com/ to get new emojis to add to our workspace—I am convinced a company’s Slack workspace emoji catalog has a major impact on work culture. For personal life socializing, I use Discord for close friend group chats and to keep tabs on engineers or projects I follow (mostly Kent C. Dodds), Instagram, and Signal for family group chats.

As mentioned, I use the Whoop app for fitness and sleep tracking. I have logged in my Whoop Journal almost every day since getting the band! Most surprising discovery was that there is a positive correlation between eating dairy and my recovery score. I also use the Nike Training Club app when I want to work out but don’t have access to a gym.

I use Spotify for music, which is super important to my workflow, mostly because I hate working in silence. I have four main playlists: one with songs I would choreograph to, one mondo playlist that has everything that I want to listen to again except the songs on the choreograph playlist so I don’t hear them while locked in, one that has music SFW, and one that has music I would hypothetically play at a party. I rarely need to edit music, but when I do, I use Audacity. And if I’m teaching choreography and the musicality is difficult to count or verbalize, I use Tempo SlowMo to change the tempo and loop the music.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

My keyboard setup is really just Mac QWERTY with some cool shortcuts sprinkled in. Because I do a lot of UI work, my favorite shortcuts are my screenshot shortcut and the shortcuts to start and stop QuickTime screen recordings. I used to code for work in Amazon WorkSpaces, so some of my other shortcuts are still optimized for working in Linux—I just got so used to using them and haven’t readjusted yet.

I have Cherry MX Browns switches on my home keyboard, but I have Cherry MX Reds on my work keyboard. I went for the reds for the slight difference in volume—after being remote for 2+ years I was self-conscious of how noisy my typing would be in an office. I was even self-conscious of what people would think of me for bringing in an ErgoDox in general…like wow she is extra. But I was relieved when another coworker whipped out their Moonlander. We actually inspired someone from the marketing team to get a Moonlander!

I swapped in some peach, yellow, pink, and green keycaps on my home keyboard and some pink and gray keycaps on my work keyboard. The gray 2u keycaps on my black work keyboard are literally the original thumb keys I swapped out of my home ErgoDox. I would definitely go all out if custom keycaps were less expensive…maybe some floral keycaps for my home keyboard and then full graffiti keycaps for the work keyboard. Been meaning to read up on how to make them!

What would be your dream setup?

I prefer working around people and with noise, so my ideal setup would actually be to have some button I could press at cafés that would instantaneously transport my home setup. Because that won’t happen any time soon, here are some other ideas:

• More automation—mostly, it would be nice if my AirPods could automatically switch from being connected to my laptop to being connected to my phone when I finish a video meeting. Also, I currently only use a white noise machine for sleeping, but if my white noise machine could start playing when I join a video call (apparently I talk really loudly during virtual meetings), that would be sick!
• Space for another desk with another monitor, so friends and family could more comfortably co-work
• An add-on to my chair that allows me to sit pretzel-style more easily
• Better cable management, starting with a coiled cable to attach my EZ halves
• More things to fidget with on my desk (maybe even an ErgoDox Satellite!)
• More custom keycaps that reflect my style
• A better case for my EZ—currently I use a GoPro case with the foam inserts cut out. I know the Moonlander is easier to transport, but I just love the extra thumb keys on the EZ!

Greetings. I am Kentaro Yaji, an associate professor at the Department of Mechanical Engineering, Osaka University in Japan. My research is in topology optimization, which has the potential to generate innovative structures by using mathematical optimization theory and high-performance computing. The following video shows an optimization process of the so-called compliant gripper that is composed of a single-piece structure without any joints and is used for microscale manipulation, medical applications, and so forth. You can see other interesting results on my website.

The optimization process of a compliant gripper in which input force is applied at the center of the left boundary, and then it can grip a workpiece in the right space.

Outside of work, I love to see and do rowing. I had been rowing for over fifteen years, since I was ten. Also, I have been watching the races before I was born because my mother went to cheer for my father every year, even when she was pregnant. Thanks to their passionate education, I could join the U18 and U23 world rowing championships as a national team member.

What hardware do you use?

I have been using Mac hardware since 2012. My recent PCs are Mac Studio and MacBook Pro. Also, I use Linux machines with many cores of AMD processors for large-scale computing. My favorite mouse is the Logitech MX Master 3S because the wheel can scroll very quickly, which is useful for reading papers and web browsing. I love the Mac displays, namely Studio Display and Pro Display XDR, which are beautiful, and I use them as a dual display.

I have two desks at my office, and one of them is a height-adjustable desk. Sometimes, I work standing and believe that this refreshing way is effective for the creativity of my research.

And what software?

I use standard software such as Microsoft Office 365 for general tasks. For my research, I like using MATLAB, COMSOL, and open-source software for scientific computation. For writing code for Python, Fortran, C++, etc., I use emacs and VS Code.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

I have two Moonlanders and a Voyager. I love clicky keyswitches, especially Kailh Box White. For the office work, I use a Moonlander with the platform for adjusting the boards to the best angle.

As seen in my layout, my keyboard setup is not so complex. Anyway, I want to emphasize that the thumb’s red keys are handy for non-English users. In my case, I need to change the languages between Japanese and English frequently. I don’t use custom keycaps, but I am interested in using them on the keyboard in the near future.

What would be your dream setup?

Since topology optimization is compatible with 3D printing, I would like to set up a compact and quiet 3D printer on my desk and break the barrier between the virtual and physical space as much as possible. Let me know if you can mathematically define the comfort of keycaps and keyswitches. I would love to optimize and print their shape and topology!

I'm Actus, a fantasy author in a slightly niche genre called Progression Fantasy & LitRPG, which can basically be boiled down to fantasy stories where there's a big focus on the main character getting stronger. I have quite a few stories, but my main one is about man who died and got reincarnated into the body of a professor at a magical academy. The story follows him as he tries to BS his way through teaching magic to students that hate him whilst trying to figure out how magic works himself.

The novel is currently a webserial, which is a book that is posted chapter-by-chapter to an online platform entirely for free. It's got over 10 million views and was released on Amazon in early March.

I also have several other series on my Amazon page, some of which are completed and some are still in progress. One of my series, My Best Friend is an Eldritch Horror, is getting an original comic on Webtoon in the coming months, which I'm really excited for. Writing honestly takes up the vast majority of my day, but as of recent times, I've started traveling to see the world and get more inspiration. I'm currently in Barcelona!

What hardware do you use?

I actually use two different ZSA products. I originally got a Moonlander about a year or two back for my desktop setup. It took me a little while to get used to the keyboard, but once it clicked for me I was hooked. It vastly increased my writing speed, and I had considerably less wrist pain and discomfort as well. It's by far the best keyboard I've ever used, and I still suggest it to just about anyone else that will listen to me today. I believe I've convinced around seven or eight other authors to get it as well.

As of late, since I've been traveling more, I've been using the Voyager. I bought it the day ZSA released it, as I loved the idea of a more portable version of the Moonlander and I'm incredibly happy with it. It obviously lacks the wrist support and customization that the Moonlander has for positioning, but it's a great "in-between" keyboard. It's got ergo support, feels great to work with, and is overall just a fantastic keyboard. I've been using it more than the Moonlander, as it's just much easier to fit into my bag and take to a coffee shop or the like.

And what software?

I use Microsoft Word for around 90% of my work, with the other 10% going into OneNote. I generally try to get up around 6:00 a.m. to write so I can get a lot of it done early in the day. On normal workdays, I aim for around 6,000 to 8,000 words a day, so it takes a pretty hefty chunk of time and I'm usually writing until around 2:00 or 3:00 p.m. A lot of the work is in brainstorming where I want the plot of the novel to go, as I type very quickly (partially thanks to the Moonlander saving my wrists from dying after sitting in one spot and typing for hours on end).

Once I've got my general plot figured out and I know where I want to take the novel, the work tends to go pretty quickly and I can write around 1,500 to 2,000 words an hour.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

My current setup is pictured above. It's pretty basic as I'm out traveling right now, and the only thing missing is my headphones. I'm a bit lame—I don't use any custom layouts or keycaps, though I did swap the position of the : and the " keys, as I use quotation marks a lot more than colons and wanted to be able to access them easier.

What would be your dream setup?

Honestly, my dream setup is hard to answer. I already have the Moonlander for my desktop and the Voyager for travel. I absolutely love both, and the only thing I really need to write beyond them is a computer that doesn't crash when I open up my 2,000 page word document. If ZSA ever comes out with a new keyboard that somehow fills a niche I didn't know of, I'll probably be the first one waiting to buy it. Overall, I'm honestly pretty content with how things are. Maybe I'd add some form of wrist rests into the mix at some point if I found any I liked, but aside from that, everything is great.

As the founder of Theta Vision, an AI startup that's pushing the boundaries of computer vision, mathematical modeling, and data analysis, I'm driven by a profound fascination with the transformative power of technology. My journey into the world of AI began with my doctoral research in endoscopic imaging, where I witnessed firsthand the extraordinary potential of AI to revolutionize healthcare and other fields. However, I also recognized the significant hurdles faced in translating these groundbreaking advancements into practical applications. This realization sparked my determination to bridge the gap between cutting-edge AI research and its real-world impact.

In just two short years, Theta Vision has started working on several very exciting projects, attracting a small team of exceptionally talented individuals who share my unwavering commitment to making AI accessible and impactful. Our mission is to leverage the power of AI to solve real-world problems and enhance human capabilities across diverse domains.

Besides the fancy title of founder, my own responsibilities within Theta Vision encompass a broad spectrum of tasks, including software architecture design, project management, and experiment design. I'm deeply invested in ensuring that our AI solutions are not only innovative, but also seamlessly integrated into existing workflows.

Beyond Theta Vision, I'm also collaborating with Quartz AV, a new company that provides high-end audio-visual custom integration solutions, to develop a custom sound wall configurator. This exciting project allows me to combine my software development expertise with my passion for music and sound to create immersive audio experiences for discerning clients.

Away from the demanding world of AI and technology, I find immense fulfillment in my role as a husband and as father to three vibrant children. I have a daughter who just started school and twin boys who are just learning to talk, so there is never a dull moment! When fleeting moments of free time emerge, I like to blow off steam through music. Music has always been a big part of my life, and I find immense joy in expressing myself through my two-piece band, Elephant Atlas.

In essence, I embody the spirit of a passionate technologist, a dedicated family man, and a creative soul who thrives on staying engaged and exploring new horizons. My journey is far from over, and I eagerly anticipate the opportunities that lie ahead, where technology and human ingenuity converge to create a brighter future.

What hardware do you use?

As an avid technology user and someone who spends countless hours at the computer, I've spent some time crafting my hardware setup to prioritize comfort, productivity, and creativity.

My ErgoDox EZ keyboard has transformed my typing experience. Its split design and customizable layout have significantly reduced strain and discomfort, allowing me to work for extended periods without compromising my physical well-being. One other noteworthy fact about my keyboard setup is that I flipped the keycaps of four keys in the bottom row so I could more easily use them with my thumb—very handy! Since the ErgoDox has such an unconventional layout, it often elicits curious and intrigued reactions from onlookers. I enjoy this attention, as it provides an opportunity to introduce others to the world of ergonomic keyboards and share my passion for optimizing my workspace.

To maximize workspace and streamline my workflow, I've also embraced a multimonitor setup, utilizing three screens to organize my tasks effectively. The primary monitor serves as my central hub, while the two others provide ample space for reference materials, code editing, or music production. The vertical screen is especially nice for documentation and referencing code. This expansive setup allows me to seamlessly switch between different projects and maintain a clear overview of my work, boosting my productivity and efficiency.

Other than that, I don't have any special hardware. I have a simple Logitech mouse, which I try to use as little as possible (yay Vim) with some additional buttons.

And what software?

In the realm of software, I might throw you a curveball considering my background, but I still use Windows. It might not align with the stereotypical preferences, but it suits my workflow seamlessly, especially with the addition of WSL, the transition to Linux does not seem worth it.

When it comes to coding, my go-to tool is Visual Studio Code. Its customizability and the extensive array of plugins catering to practically any use case make it an indispensable ally. A standout among these plugins is the Vim plugin. Admittedly, it takes a bit to acclimate, but once you're in sync with Vim keybinds, it's hard to imagine working in a text editor without them.

For the development side of things, especially in crafting the sound wall configurator for Quartz AV, Godot takes center stage. It's not just a game engine; it's an open-source powerhouse capable of far more than gaming pursuits. The versatility it brings to the table has me contemplating its use in Theta Vision as well, particularly for designing user interfaces.

On the organizational front, I rely on Todoist to keep my tasks in check. It's a fantastic program that integrates Vim-like keybinds, aligning with my penchant for efficiency and streamlined workflows.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

My keyboard layout reflects my preference for comfort, efficiency, and a focus on function over form. As an avid typist and programmer, I've opted for a Dvorak base layout, known for its ergonomics and improved typing speed. This layout places the most frequently used keys in a more natural position, reducing strain and fatigue. To maintain consistency and enhance my coding workflow, I've created a customized coding layer that provides easy access to frequently used symbols and shortcuts.

While I considered using custom keycaps, I ultimately decided to stick with plain black keycaps. This choice was driven by my belief that visual aesthetics should not compromise the primary purpose of a keyboard: efficient typing and programming. Additionally, I opted against backlighting, as I find it unnecessary and distracting. Instead, I rely on the natural light in my workspace, which provides ample illumination for my typing tasks.

In summary, my keyboard setup prioritizes comfort, efficiency, and a focus on function over form. The Dvorak layout promotes ergonomic typing, the customized coding layer streamlines my programming workflow, and the plain black keycaps and lack of backlighting minimize distractions and maintain a clean, focused workspace.

What would be your dream setup?

In my home office, I currently have no space for stacked monitors due to a slanted roof, so that is one thing that would be nice to have, as I often feel I don’t have enough screen space, even with three screens. In the same vein, I think a standing desk would not be a bad addition, as I do worry I might spend too much time sitting down. Unfortunately, this is not possible for the same reason. Theta Vision is planning to move to a new office space soon, so maybe it might be time to make this setup a reality while we're moving anyway.

Hi! I'm a senior developer who has been building software systems and applications, mainly in the web space with Rails, for just over ten years. I hail from the open plains of Kansas originally but moved to the East Coast several years ago to build a positive energetic shift into my life. After working for thoughtbot, a development consultancy, I joined a small startup building software to increase the productivity and happiness of clinical research teams.

Working from home full-time has been rough for me the past few years, but recently I've started to find a more sustainable work practice by incorporating a time-blocking planner approach. This has helped tremendously with the litany of distractions that come from fielding your work and your life from the same space.

Perhaps even more influential in my holistic personal growth has been the discovery of sculpture. I attend a weekly stone sculpture studio and have found the patient hands-on work has affected a contextual shift in my perspective on life and happiness. I've struggled with finding the meaningfulness in the constant churn of much of the software development industry, and slow-building beautiful physical objects for the sake of the practice itself has been a welcome tonic. Above all, I find deep satisfaction in the practice of craft and creative restoration. In sculpture, I've found a way to do that which I deeply know will stay with me for the rest of my life.

Here is pictured a year of progress:

Also, I love coffee. Adore the stuff. I've been home brewing better and better cups for myself over the years, and the next thing I'm looking to is to start home-roasting. My partner keeps telling me I would do very well starting a small coffee pop-up, and maybe that's something I will get to this year.

I also know I would like to write more, but never can find it in me to generate momentum in this department.

Okay, and also I like biking and exploring national parks...

What hardware do you use?

Computer: M1 14-inch MacBook Pro. I feel that Apple built something right here. The size and form factor is perfect, the battery life is better than ever, and typing on it is a decent experience.

Monitor: I use a single 27-inch 4K monitor. I mostly focus on a single window at a time and rely on key bindings to change my viewing context. If I find myself needing more than a single split side-by-side, it raises a question for me about whether I am following the right process and using the right tools.

Keyboard: Currently I've been running with the ZSA Voyager. I love this thing!

Mouse: I use the MX Vertical. It tracks well enough for a Bluetooth mouse and has an ergonomic upright position. I have found corded mice track much smoother, but the tension on the cord running to the back of my desk was far too noticeable when moving the mouse.

Dock: CalDigit TS4 dock. This thing is incredible, and I can't believe I had to figure out how to manage connecting peripherals before it.

Desk: Fully Jarvis. Sturdy build, thoughtful design. No complaints. I stand far less than I thought I would.

Microphone: Blue Yeti with boom arm. I found that having a quality microphone feed made a big difference while listening to someone over Zoom calls during the pandemic, so I try to give those I meet the same thoughtfulness.

Webcam: Razer KIYO. I purchased this during the pandemic when it was impossible to find a good webcam in stock. This was the best option I was able to find at the time, and it has been good enough for me the past few years.

And what software?

• Vim (Neovim): IYKYK. I tried Vim out when I first started my career and have never looked back. Many people hype the Vim modal editing experience, and while that is certainly great, having a fast, scriptable editor core has kept me using it through the years.
• WezTerm: A sensible GPU-rendered terminal emulator written in Rust. Has multiplexing built in, so I've not needed to use tmux.
• Unix: Learn the Unix toolset; it unlocks your ability to make your tools work for you rather than depending on an external company.
• Dash: Offline documentation search. I try to hone my usage of documentation.
• Arc: A new startup doing some interesting experiments in the browser space. Curious to see where this goes.
• Obsidian: This is a recent discovery for me. I'm not very good at using it, but I have started to record notes here. Ideally, I would write atomic notes and build up a knowledge graph, but I haven't found the energy or discipline to do so yet.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

I started using the ErgoDox last year, and my main issue was the number of keys and their height. The Voyager solves so many of those pain points for me: a Goldilocks amount of low-profile keys, a travel-ready frame size, and very simple tenting. I lubed and taped the Choc Brown switches, which improved the hollow sound they made while typing. I haven't needed to change much in terms of layout so far, though I needed to modify the per-key tapping term to adjust to how quickly I would chord certain key combinations.

What would be your dream setup?

If I could get proficient, figuring out a way to mount the Voyager pieces on my chair armrests. The extra desk space would unlock new heights of minimalism and ergonomic benefits. Other than that, having the time, money, and energy to design an asthetically pleasing and uniform desk setup with mood lighting would be fun, but ultimately hasn't been a priority for me. I want to get a small form-factor Linux PC at some point.

I'm a software engineer, street photography aficionado, and music listener/player. Because backend programming can feel so intangible at times, outside of work I enjoy doing things with my hands, like gardening, playing bass guitar, and building things. I got really into building keyboards, but after my Redox's Arduino port broke, I got a ZSA Moonlander, and it really feels like my endgame. I also enjoy running, which is a great way to balance out having a job that requires so little physical activity.

What hardware do you use?

Right now I use an M1 MacBook Pro, a three-year-old Dell monitor, my Moonlander, and I switch between my AirPods and a Sony WH-1000XM4 headset, depending on whether I'm working from home or working from a café (where the noise-cancelling really shines). I try to keep distractions and multitasking to a minimum, so I could never do those impressive multiscreen NASA-command-center setups I see in other folks' profiles and on Twitter.

I have a Steelcase Gesture chair, which is super adjustable and comfortable, and an Uplift standing desk, which is super sturdy and works great to keep focus before coffee. If you wanna be an engineer for many years, you gotta pay attention to ergonomics! That's one of the many reasons I like the Moonlander. It really helps you keep an open-shoulder posture, and you can set the tenting to whatever height works for your hands.

As for my hobbies: I've used a Fuji XT-3 with an f1.4 35mm Fujinon lens for the last three years. It's black and it looks like a film camera, so no one bats an eye when I use it on the street. I hope it lasts forever.

And what software?

Mostly VSCode, Slack, and Spotify haha. I tried the whole Emacs/Vim thing and I got to a pretty good level of productivity, but I found myself trying to troubleshoot plugins more often than I'd like. So eventually I gave up and gave in to Code. It just works, and I wanna keep my focus on writing and designing software, not on configuring my editor. Every once in a while, I'll also fire up Lightroom to edit some pics.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

I have a Moonlander with maximum tenting. Before I ordered I was on the fence about blank vs. printed keycaps. I ultimately went with the blank ones, and the boost in my WPM was noticeable. I set both sides about 30cm apart, which helps a lot with my posture.

What would be your dream setup?

Honestly, I think this is it for now. Pretty boring, I know! But I just don't think I need professional podcaster equipment for my day-to-day tasks. The only thing I'd add would be one of those little hooks to hang my headset.

Hi! My name is Julie. I'm 25 years old, and I graduated from university in Korean Studies. I currently work as a freelance translator. I translate webtoons and web novels from Korean to French. I also happened to graduate from a baking school, and while I didn't pursue this career for health reasons, I still bake and make pastries at home.

Outside of work, I read a lot in the three languages I can speak (English, Korean, and French), mostly young adult literature, manga, and comics. I like anime, and this year I want to start building my own mini Gundam. I already have a Gundam model kit, I just need the motivation to start it! Video games have also been a part of my life since I was a kid. I started with the Game Boy Advance and now use a Nintendo Switch and a PlayStation 4 to play mostly one-player games, from cozy games like Animal Crossing to visual novels like the Ace Attorney games. The latter one in particular since I started playing them in middle school, and I will forever be grateful for these, since I owe my English proficiency to the fifth game, Ace Attorney Investigations, not being translated into French. I remember spending my two months of summer vacation playing this game on my Nintendo DS with a very heavy English dictionary.

Last year, I started to learn crochet. My grandmother gave me many tips and old books, so I hope that I will be able to crochet more this year. I also have a huge collection of pins, which you can partly see in the pictures as they are on display on the wall behind my computer.

What hardware do you use?

I currently use a laptop and an Android tablet when I work outside, which doesn't happen a lot since I would rather work from home with my mechanical keyboard.

The computer is a Lenovo Yoga 7 14ITL5, which is tactile and can rotate at 180° so that I only use the screen (see pictures). I have an Intel Core™ i7 processor and Mesa Intel® Xe Graphics. It has 1TB of storage and 16GB of RAM.

My tablet is a Samsung Tab S8. I bought it last year to replace my old Samsung Galaxy Note 10.1 GT-N8010. The old one is the 2012 model with 16GB of storage, and it still worked with a custom Android 9 OS, but they officially stopped providing updates after Android 4.5—which is a shame, considering what it can still do with a much more recent version. My Moonlander works without problem on both my computer and my current tablet.

There is also a projector on top of my office! I use it to watch movies and play video games on my Switch. It is the MiProjM05.

And what software?

My computer is on dual boot. It came with Windows pre-installed (now Windows 11) but I barely use it, mostly for the video games I play on the computer. When I bought this laptop, I told myself that I would give one last chance to Microsoft but ended up installing a Linux distro alongside it after a few months. I knew this was going to happen; that's why I chose a computer with a lot of storage.

I changed OS a few times, but I currently use KDE neon 5.27 (an OS based on Ubuntu) with the KDE Plasma environment.

The very first computer I had was on Ubuntu 8 (Hardy Heron!), the Dell Inspiron Mini 9 910. I still have it. Technically it works—it's on Lubuntu 18, the last LTS which supports 32-bit architecture—but there's not much you can do with a computer with only 1GB of RAM. So yeah, I've been using Linux (mostly Ubuntu) for a long time, and I have a lot of interest in computers and keyboards. I didn’t learn to code, and my studies had nothing to do with computers, but I had to learn how to use a terminal and the basic commands to get around on my own at a young age.

For work, I rely mostly on the LibreOffice suite and Okular. As a freelance translator, I am not paid by the hour, so I automated the most time-consuming tasks like creating and naming files, extracting folders, and converting images into PDFs, and sending simple confirmation emails, with scripts made with Kate. It allows me to focus entirely on my translations while not worrying about losing time on boring but necessary tasks.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

I use the keycaps provided with the Moonlander, except the ones for the thumbs. These are from two different sets from KBDfans: the 1950s set and the Crayon in milky white set. Both have an NP profile (no different rows, close to XDA) and I bought them a while ago, so I don’t know if they are still available. The main reason I have these is that there was a Hangul (the Korean alphabet) QWERTY version. I used them before I got the Moonlander since my older keyboard didn’t have backlights. However, I now use the backlights to indicate which layer I am using, so I absolutely want see-through keycaps.

I also changed the switches (I bought the Kailh Silver ones to try, but I ended hating them so much they didn’t last a full day on my keyboard). Instead, I got the Epomaker Flamingo switches (Linear Type with 35gf Initial Force) that I was using on my Numpad (Epomaker TH21). I like typing with them, and the sound is very pleasant to the ears. They’re transparent, so it’s perfect for the backlight—and they’re pink (very important too!).

For the layout, I started with the default one and went on to modifying it to fit my needs. I also use the Numpad layer, but I wanted to use it with my left hand, so I switched both sides. I have several layers dedicated to my work as a webtoon translator, mainly for SFX. I used macros to record the most common ones (about 50 per layer!) as well as shortcuts for typing in LibreOffice.

Also, for video games, I started playing the Sims 4 again recently on my computer, and I intend to make a layer just for that. It’s on my to-do list. Other than that, I just like to experiment a lot with my keyboard, so I also made a BÉPO layout (similar to Dvorak but for French), but it’s still at the beginning of the process. I only know how to type in French using AZERTY and QWERTY, and it feels like starting from 0 again, so I lack motivation at the moment.

What would be your dream setup?

An extra-large monitor would be convenient to open several windows at the same time while working instead of relying on my tablet for a second screen, and to watch movies in my leisure time. A gaming console like the ROG Ally, which runs on Windows, so I can finally completely remove it from my computer (only reason it’s still here is because I use it for a few video games, but I like playing with a controller more than a keyboard, so a different machine just for the video games I don’t play on my Switch would be perfect for me). An overall better computer I can use to have fun on Blender without it sounding like it’s going to die. And finally, an integrated DVD/Blu-ray player because I still use these, and I miss the time when integrated DVD players were a thing.

For the keyboard, my dream keycaps would be XDA or NP profile, see-through like the pudding keycaps, white for the letters and pink for the modifiers. I wouldn’t mind them being Korean QWERTY because I’m still slower when typing in Korean without seeing where each of the letters are. And since my imagination will never know something such as “enough keys,” I wouldn't mind an extra square mini-keyboard, kind of like the Planck you used to make, in between my Moonlander halves.

I also dream of just being able to bring my whole setup everywhere, so I can work from any place with the same comfort from home, but I am probably asking too much since my scoliosis already finds my 14-inch laptop too heavy.

I graduated from an French engineering school (equivalent to something like a master’s degree in engineering), with an electricity, electronic, and computer sciences specialization… but school was more than 25 years ago! So far, I have worked as a consultant in information technology architecture, have changed from very large companies to very small ones, and moved from many business areas. A few years ago, I moved to cybersecurity, and I’m now responsible for an architecture and security team in the banking sector.

Outside of my work, I’m engineering and building stuff…I'm the kind of handyman who likes to train his manual capabilities: as carpenter to build wooden furniture, electrician to build (useless) things, but also couturier and cook when needed, or whatever DIY because I love to do real things by myself. It is maybe the needed counterpart of my job, in which I do not create things that you can touch, smell, or view.

What I like is always to invent useless things, such as small toys or decorative items, but what I prefer above all is to build clocks. Not the ones that display the time ;-), but the ones that use the time as an excuse to build a beautiful object. Let’s name one of my preferred ones (not from myself, even if I have spent years to create mine from scratch): the ClockClock 24 by Humans. It is the perfect combination of computer logic, electronic, and mechanical brain puzzle.

I always have many projects in mind, and the most important challenges are not what I am building, but how I am building. Finding a trick to minimize the resources I need, using as few components as possible, or using as few premade components as possible (back to basics, as a cook who prefers to cook from raw ingredients). But (fortunately or not…), I also use all of these projects to justify the purchase of the best tools for a perfect result. Each "large" project adds a new tool in my collection, and my basement is now going to be a full-featured fab lab with 3D printer (very useful for internal parts, or for ad hoc tools, but plastic is not a "noble" material, so most of the time the printed parts are not visible), a large CNC (a dream tool for DIYs !!! even if the learning curve is very high), and so on.

What hardware do you use?

For computer-related activities, my company laptop. Not a great one, and with very little flexibility as I’m not a local administrator of it (and I’m one of the ones who imposes that on my 12,000 colleagues for security reasons—don’t tell, or they will hate me for that!).

At home, I like using my MacBook Air (so quiet…), and a Windows desktop as well, on a large screen. Thanks to the magic of USB-C connectivity, power, display, mouse and keyboard come automatically.

I have had a Prusa MK3S 3D printer for a while (indeed, I upgraded it several times since I ordered it six years ago—that’s one of the cool things about this printer!). I bought it with my large clock in mind, to print gears and other hidden parts. I mainly print PETG, ASA, or PLA for prototyping. But plastic is… plastic… and I prefer handcrafted wooden parts & so for the "visible" things. But this is where I discovered that a 3D printer was a real time-saver to build… tools. When you need to perfectly drill with a specific angle or distance down to the 0.1mm or so, or holding two pieces, or whatever, 3D printer is a game changer: You can build your own tools, adapt cutting parts or guiding hands or router to your needs. I printed more than 20kg of filaments… not really "ecological", but I have avoided ordering so many tools or parts that let’s say it’s balanced. I also use it to print broken parts.

My CNC machine, my new (60kg) baby: I have a FoxAlien CL-6560 that I "customized" a little bit (1500kW spindle, some custom-made laser guides, integrated "vacuum" system, cooling spray, etc...). It’s heavy, solid and… requires that I learn so many new things that I still consider myself as a beginner. Nevertheless, I’m now able to create wooden parts, and also some objects in other solids (such as Corian). Of course I’ve broken a couple of bits, and drilled the CNC itself due to beginner’s error, but I’m on the way. I still have to learn about aluminum milling, as my first attempts were… just a disaster. I do not regret my FoxAlien, even if with some knowledge now I would go for an Ultimate Bee instead! (Linear rails and a little bit less expensive. But I cannot blame anything on the FoxAlien so far!)

Current projects for the CNC:

• Mill the solid surface box for my new "clock" (a very small one this time, around 50x20cm, using very small stepper motors—from a car dashboard ;-)
• Mill the aluminum (better than my first attempt, cf. the picture… far from the expected result: a 8mm-wide index for the clock, with its connection with the motor)

But of course, before milling I have to take time to make progress on the "computer" part of this new clock (with some challenges, such as flashing the 12 RP2040 chips only through an "I2C broadcast" from a small esp32, as I want to be able to remotely flash all components even when finished).

And what software?

For my (nonartistic) needs, I always use openSCAD. Perfect to create whatever shape with code. It’s probably running all the time on my laptop, as I always have a box/a tool/a part to model and print. I always have a caliper as well to measure exactly what I need.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

I have selected the black version with blank keycaps (indeed no keycaps would cover the BÉPO layout, very French and probably very specific). No regrets! Better to learn with a printed version of your layout, and once used to it, no more need to look at your fingers. When looking for a key, the answer is in your brain! And no one tries to use your keyboard at work to send a "croissant tomorrow" to your colleagues when you turn back to your desk (croissant is the price for an unlocked session at work, and indeed I used one of the two red keys for a single-tap session lock).

I applied all my "fancies" to my keyboards—as I do for almost everything, up to the coffee grinder (a HG one, just pure perfection), after having played with several commercial ones, such as the TypeMatrix, and DIY ones, such as a very nice setup on top of a XD75 mainboard.

My perfect keyboard had to:

• Implement whatever layout without any software (remember that I cannot install anything on my professional laptop)
• Be able to do that including for layouts not available on Windows—I decided to implement a BÉPO layout (sort of Dvorak layout but adapted for French, even if I had to relocate the W, as it has an impossible position in BÉPO—a sure sign that we almost never use it in French! But I work half of the time in English). For those who don’t know it, yes, have a look at this nice little comic about QWERTY history. The magic here is that my layout "emulates" an AZERTY keyboard (with alt-codes on Windows, as the standard AZERTY layout on Windows is a real pity… if only someone in the past had had a two-hour think about the dead keys… I’m dreaming of something close to the International Canadian layout…).
• Being able to do that as well on numerous mission-critical production servers that I’m used to connecting to. Those who work on Citrix desktop knows that keyboards layouts are a real nightmare.
• Be ortholinear—or stacked, because if you decide to learn an efficient layout, why not do the big jump to use an efficient key pattern??? Split was not a mandatory criterion, but a nice-to-have.
• Be nice, but this is subjective. And build up to perfection.

At the time of selecting the "ultimate keyboard that will last decades because it has all what you will ever need", the Moonlander Mark II was my top choice among many others. Today, I would say that I would select… a Voyager for its portability. And also for its reduced layout, because once you get used to layers, you no more need to have numerous keys! Nevertheless, Moonlander is still perfect!

Note that I don’t "need" a BÉPO layout, or an ortholinear/stacked layout. I have no issues with muscles, nor with my entry speed (that is still better in AZERTY than BÉPO, even one year after of use, at partial time). Take it as a new challenge, to ask to my brain (and my fingers) to learn something new. And something very hard, as trying to get rid of 30 years of (intensive) use of an AZERTY keyboard. And you know what? Even if I am still learning my custom layout, even if I am still far from my former entry speed, I like to do it, and I like to do it on this perfect keyboard that is the Moonlander. I would do it again.

What would be your dream setup?

I already have my dream setup! Let’s say to have the Voyager to travel more time with my keyboard, as half of the time at work I travel "light" and use the laptop keyboard instead. That is fine for working, but this is not as satisfactory as doing the same with style ;-). But also sometimes to have done that choice before, to do the training with a more flexible brain than the one I have now…

My name is Monica Lane, and I am a family nurse practitioner who works on telemedicine remotely. I assist clients with weight loss, hair loss, skin care, and primary care. I live in Vancouver, Canada, but work in the United States. I like to snowboard, paddleboard, and travel with my husband Levi (like the jeans) and two French bulldogs, Blueberry and Pancake.

I love traveling to new spots, but my favorite spots would be Reykjavik, Iceland for how otherworldly it is; Zamami Island in Japan, as it’s very isolated but beautiful; sexy speakeasy Raines Law Room in Manhattan, NY; Kauai, HI for the natural beauty and endless activities like horseback riding along the ocean, and Marché Mon Pitou in Vancouver, just about the cutest French cozy café ever.

I like anywhere I can paddleboard, get good eats, or sip a cocktail and enjoy the sun. Vancouver also has amazing Thai restaurants, Kin Kao being one of them. In the winter, I am on the slopes snowboarding with my husband locally on Cypress Mountain! You can watch the city from the mountains, and it’s a killer view.

The best part of Vancouver is you can hit the slopes then beach for dinner on the same day. There is the best Asian food and cozy cafés! It’s a foodie paradise.

What hardware do you use?

I’m an Apple girl, so I use a Mac mini with two Apple displays and a MacBook Air as well.

My MacBook is wrapped in an affordable Amazon beauty, a plastic case with a cute silicone keyboard cover that protects the keyboard.

My Hello Kitty hot water dispenser holds three liters of water at four temperatures—208, 195, 175, and 160—so I can have my black, green, and herbal teas at the perfect temperature with a push of a button. She makes sure I am glowing inside out with hydration so I can practice medicine with a clear mind! I am obsessed with Harney & Sons Hot Cinnamon Sunset tea (they have a decaf version for those of us who can’t sleep if we drink caffeine after noon), Republic of Tea’s Double Matcha tea, and Fortnum and Mason’s Earl Grey.

And what software?

My Mac runs macOS Sonoma. I work on multiple Electronic Medical Record systems that our developers built from ground up for the medical platforms that use them.

Working on an EMR can be really fun or horrible depending on who built it: When someone who is a medical provider themselves gives their input into the development, it’s more intuitive and the focus of the medical visit becomes the patient—but if it’s an outsourced job, it feels like trying to put together the frame of a house with bananas. You just don’t have the tools, or the process is so complicated you just want to rip your hair out. I have avoided interviewing for jobs entirely because of the horrible EMR systems in place.

When using my EMRs I always use Text Blaze, which is an amazing text expander program. The head honcho there will personally email you and troubleshoot and help you in any way he can.

I use my dual screens so I can have three different EMRs open and hustle.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

I use the Moonlander with Cherry MX Silent Red (RGB)/ Complete keyboard keyswitches. The quieter the keys the better, as I need to speak to clients while typing.

What would be your dream setup?

My dream setup is the Mac Studio and the nicest Apple displays and a Moonlander with all the keyswitches to play with! Maybe more plants to make it feel like an inner jungle.

One more picture! My stationery/hydration corner with all things girly. Who says women can’t be pretty and smart?

My name is Luis Rosario, and I make websites for the University of Rochester. I mainly work as frontend developer (HTML/CSS/JS), but I am also responsible for design and user-experience decisions.

Outside of work I jump between a variety of hobbies like illustration, diorama scene making, and video games. I recently made a model train layout to go around the base of our Christmas tree. It's been fun to come up with an idea, sketch it out, and then build it.

I like to keep up with soccer and F1, but I'm also starting to pay attention to the World Rally Championship. I bought a racing wheel and seat in 2022 and rediscovered a love for motorsport playing Dirt Rally 2.0, and now EA WRC.

What hardware do you use?

The work setup is Apple-based.

• 14" MacBook Pro 2021
• Mac Mini, 2020
• HP VH240a Monitor
• Logitech MX Master 3S
• ZSA Moonlander
• Apple HomePod
• Cowin E7 Headphones
• Eureka Ergonomics 60" L-shaped Standing Desk
• Novo Task Chair

The play setup is Sony-based.

• PlayStation 5
• Logitech G29 Wheel and Logitech G Driving Force Shifter
• Playseat Challenge Black Actifit and Playseat Gearshift Support
• TurtleBeach Stealth 350VR

And what software?

I use Firefox Developer Edition for work and projects, Firefox for anything else, and Chrome just to use Oryx :)

Other software for work and play includes:

• Sublime Text
• Terminal
• Figma, Sketch
• Affinity Photo 2, Affinity Designer 2
• Todoist
• Spotify

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

It's still a work in progress, but I based my keyboard setup on the Workman layout. I wanted to be able to type fast (speed of thought) and avoid any repetitive injuries to my wrists (one of the reasons I bought the Moonlander!).

Caps Lock is replaced with a second Enter button for left-hand uses. The bottom row is loosely based on a typical Mac keyboard, with the Fn key switched out for an Esc key (which I usually press with bottom part of my pinky). Direction keys are based on Vim navigation layout (middle finger on Down key, ring finger on Up key, etc.).

I asked myself, "What are my most common commands and actions?" and tried to make those common tasks enjoyable, to have "fun moments" while typing. In a web browser I use Command+L command a lot to focus on the URL bar, so I wanted to make sure my right hand felt comfortable hitting those keys. When writing curly braces for a function: right thumb down, then middle and ring fingers down in quick succession.

I'm still exploring my setup and use the Heatmap feature to see where I'm most active (it influenced where I placed the Right Command button—I wanted to make more use of the right thumb pad). Recently I added a "navigation layer," but I'm not sure I'll stick to that since I use the main layer almost exclusively.

What would be your dream setup?

Studio-space style office, nice-sized windows for plenty of sunlight. Standing desk for digital work and a workbench for other projects. A music corner with vinyls and instruments. Plants scattered throughout, plenty of artwork on the walls, a bookshelf or two, and a sofa.

I'm pretty close to it… I just need more space for another bookshelf and a sofa!

Hello! I'm Soledad Penadés, although most people know me as sole, and sometimes I'm also known as supersole.

I studied computer engineering, and I have worked in a number of roles, because if I'm one thing it is curious. I'm interested in many things!

I started building video games and websites, then mostly websites only, but with added front-end coolness with Flash (ActionScript 3 was very flexible and very fun).

Then I built Android apps, but the developer tools and the whole process was a bit frustrating for me: It was slow and kept crashing whenever I wanted to do Cool Stuff (Note: for me, 'cool' means real-time generated, hopefully interactive, graphics and audio).

Roughly around the same time HTML5 had been released–and along with modern CSS and JavaScript—was turning the Web into something that you could make Really Cool Things with, and I thought it was a bit futile to have to port the same thing to multiple platforms, i.e. iOS, Android, Blackberry, you name it... when you could write it once for the Web. Plus it was way easier to get it in people's hands by giving them a link, no need for any "store" of any sorts, etc.

Not only did it feel like a waste of human potential, but I felt that as a single developer or a small studio there's no way you could compete in the mobile development field, let alone in multiple platforms, if you wanted to build interesting apps—it is just not economically feasible. The testing consumes all of your time, and there will always be another strangely configured device from a vendor you've never heard about that misreports their capabilities and crashes, and you get unfair one-star reviews (this is more of an Android problem). Of course it's different if you use Apache Cordova and build apps that are more like shells around a browser, like text-heavy apps. But I wanted to do more than that.

So I set Android aside and started building things with Web technologies again. I made a lot of WebGL, webcam, and Web Audio things that you could interact with... and I was so driven that I even worked at Mozilla, first getting people excited about building cool stuff for the Web and for mobile phones using web technology (i.e. Firefox OS), and then making Firefox's developer tools more reliable and capable.

Then I decided to do something quite different and veered into the intriguing world of 'fintech.' I've worked in companies that facilitate payments for their customers in one way or another for the last few years, and I've also been managing and leading teams, so that's been another thing I've learned about.

At heart, I just really find computers and the things they enable are truly fascinating, even after all these years!

You might find yourself in a bit of a rut if you always do the same thing. But I always aim to find something that gets me all curious and excited again, either by learning something entirely new or by bringing something I learned into an slightly different environment.

For example, when I learn a technique about refactoring in a compiled language, my mind will probably get ahead and think of how to apply this to JavaScript. Or going in the other direction. For example: Have you ever asked yourself, how do dynamic languages work, and how would you build a similar interpreter in a compiled language? etc. I'm always going back and forth between what I know, asking myself questions and what-ifs, and trying to fill in gaps and connect things together.

One of my big interests is music, both listening and making it. I grew up in an area where either you're a musician or your friends are musicians; music is in every ceremony, and there are special songs and tunes for each occasion and festivity all through the year, so music is very important to me. I didn't get any real formal education in music, but I had a small CASIO PT-100 keyboard, which had six notes of polyphony, so I taught myself basic chords with that. A few years later I also taught myself to play Spanish guitar, as I was intrigued by the guitarists in the choir I was singing at—I was very happy that I could cover a couple times when they couldn't turn up! And that same year I discovered that I could also make music in a computer! And it took off from there.

I also love discovering interesting music, and I can spend long "research periods" where I hear about an artist or song then I find they also did something else with another artist that I like, and I go and listen to it and next thing you know it's 3:00 a.m. and I've listened to the whole back catalogue of the artist including extra-official white-label/bootlegs!

I'd say my other main interest is food, both eating out and cooking at home. I often make Valencian/Spanish recipes but with ingredients that are available in the UK. I frequently try to vegetarianise or even veganise things as a challenge.

I keep a blog where I document what we eat and drink (and where) for future reference.

• With things like A/B/C/D tests to reverse engineer recipes, it's imperative to make a note of the outcomes, so I can repeat the experiment;
• Once you develop a successful recipe, of course you want to share it with your friends. Sending them the URL to a post is much better than text messages that they lose when they change phones!
• Also, restaurants in London open and close so quickly, and it is easy to forget where something was and what it was like unless you make a note. So yes, I am that person that takes pictures of her food and then writes about it in an exhaustive level of detail.

Other activities I'm interested in: knitting (somehow freestyle) and sewing (not so freestyle... yet?); drawing and painting (I started doing this more regularly as I found about urban sketching, and I sometimes join the London group); and sports... running, yoga, and weightlifting. Especially since we started working more at home, it's important to build in that deliberate activity to keep your body moving! Use it or lose it!

What hardware do you use?

For work I use whichever laptop the company deems suitable (although I tend to push back against heavy 16" laptops, as it's a chore to carry those when we have to travel). I don't get excited about work laptops because for me it's just 'the office.' As long as it does not get in the way of doing my work, I am fine with it.

For my personal projects, I tend to build software which is as lightweight as I can get away with (the code you don't write is the one you don't have to maintain). So that inevitably leads to not having a ton of hardware requirements.

Right now my personal laptop is a MacBook Pro from 2017, which is more than enough for my other endeavours like music-making, as the software I use is quite optimised. So I am happy with the laptop as is; the only thing that bugs me is that it gets hot in summer and the fan starts whirring the minute you do anything moderately intensive (or with some terribad websites, ahem!).

I've been thinking of replacing it with one of the M2 Apple laptops, as I used an M1 for work and it was surprisingly cool and quiet... But at the same time I wonder if there exists a non-Apple laptop that works nicely with Linux, is lightweight but powerful enough, and whose fan doesn't start the minute you open a terminal. Suggestions are welcome! I'd love to escape the Apple grip (and I'd also love to be able to repair it myself; maybe a Framework?).

Apart from the laptop, of course I have a ZSA keyboard, a Moonlander Mark I in white, with Cherry MX Brown switches. I use the wrist support and the thumb modules, but I am still not sure that I've found the best configuration. I change the height of the legs from time to time to see if it feels better... My hands aren't small for a woman, but they aren't big compared to the general population either, so I keep wondering if I need a smaller keyboard. How would the keys work? Maybe we need smaller keys too!

I place the (wireless) trackpad between the two halves, so it is in a bit more of a laptop position, and thus I can use either hand to do mousy things, so reducing the time and distance away from the keyboard. At one point I tried getting one of those Kensington trackballs that look like HAL 9000, but I found it too big for me, and I really struggled to do things like dragging items around the screen, so I sold it.

I keep the laptop closed and on its side using a vertical laptop stand. It has space for two laptops at once, which is helpful in tidying up the desk, as I can have both my work and personal laptops in there. Also, it helps with ventilation, as there's more laptop surface exposed to the air than if it were horizontal, and I strategically place the laptops with the right side on top so that I can access the headphones port, and if the fan turns on, it blows away from me and towards the wall, which means I don't suffer additional heat on my face when it's already hot.

I have an external Dell monitor from 2015 mounted on an arm so I can get more space on my motorised standing desk (an IKEA Bekant). Bigger monitors have become sort of standard since I bought this one, but it still works for me, and I like that it has a built-in USB hub so I only need to connect one cable to the laptop, rather than having a separate USB hub, or plugging in a ton of cables directly to the laptop for the keyboard, webcam, music keyboards etc.

I have a Razer Kiyo webcam mounted on top of the monitor. I quickly realised at the beginning of the pandemic that bending the neck to look down towards the laptop's built-in webcam gave me a great deal of neck ache. This setup avoids that.

I never use the ring light in the webcam: It's not bright enough to make my face look brighter, and at the same time it's too bright and blinds me. Instead, I just use my Anglepoise Type 75 lamp turned towards the ceiling to diffuse the light, so it doesn't look like I'm in a cave, and also the shadows aren't as harsh as they'd be if the lamp was directly lighting my face. I've had this lamp for so many years and it has survived so many moves! And when I need to do detailed work, such as inking some drawing, I turn it towards the table so I get great light.

For music-making I use a small Korg nanoKEY 2 keyboard controller for melodies and a QuNeo for drum or percussions. They are both wired, so when I'm not using them I disconnect them, put them away, fold and tie the cables with a hair band, and stick them to the back of the monitor with (guess what?) heavy-duty Velcro!

I used to have monitor speakers on the desk as well, but they took up a lot of space and I tended to use a pair of AKG K512 MKII headphones anyway (they don't artificially increase the bass response, so the mixes are more balanced). So I put the speakers away until I find suitable arms for them. You're meant to have them roughly at ear level when monitoring, and they weren't, so it is just as well.

Apart from the fact that cables are distracting, the reason why I'm so determined to keep the desk free of clutter is that in addition to work, I use the same desk for my hobbies, and on the weekends my spouse might use it too. Dangling cables can get in the way when you want to draw or cut patterns for sewing, plus you might accidentally cut a cable... oops. So putting all the cables away helps you avoid those issues!

And that's only "above ground." I attached Velcro to the power strips and stuck them under the desk as well, so they're not sitting on the floor or dangling from the desk. I used hair bands again to artificially shorten the cables a bit. You can't fully fold and tighten the remaining length for all of them because you still need a bit of slack to be able to move the desk. It's tidier than it was, but it still makes me a bit uncomfortable to look under and see all the slightly dangly cables.

It can certainly be optimised, but my solution for now is to just not look at it!

When I'm not standing, I use an Alvar Aalto three-legged stool 60. Like the lamp, it was more expensive than what you can get from a cheaper supplier, but it's sturdy and well-made, and we find ourselves using it all the time for other purposes around the home, so given that it will last a long time, I think it's not "that expensive."

In general I'm not fussed about newness. I like things to last as long as possible, and in particular, I am worried about the hidden environmental and human costs that we've learned to overlook.

I'm very cautious about buying and dispensing with anything unless an upgrade is sorely needed. Even if I have to dispose of something, I will try to find a new home for it or repurpose it before recycling or sadly disposing of it.

So I really like the ethos of ZSA keyboards that can be repaired and made to last!

And what software?

At work lately I have been using a lot of web-based apps such as Notion, plus we were building things with Go for the back-end, and the usual React/ESLint/TypeScript/Styled, etc., mega combo for the front-end. This was also the first time I used VS Code on a day-to-day basis because I was more hands-on and I wanted to optimise resources and use the same as the rest of our small team were using so we could reuse things like launch configurations, etc....

... but for small tasks and in my personal projects I mostly just use MacVim!

I find it fast and reliable, and I've been keeping my configurations under version control for years, so I quickly get my Vim environment to look the way I'm used to when I set up a new computer. As I mentioned, I also normally build simple projects, so I don't tend to need IntelliSense-style autocompletion because I can hold the whole thing in my head (and Vim can do basic autocomplete with Ctrl+N anyway).

Even so, I am not a Vim expert. I just add things to my bag of tricks when I need them. At the beginning I tried to learn as much as I could in a short period of time, and I just got very frustrated and forgot things as quickly as I learned them. So I decided to take the slow lane.

I do a lot of work in the terminal, as it annoys me to take the hands off the keyboard to click things. For me, it's "CLI above GUI" most of the time!

I normally use iTerm2. I started using it back when Terminal.app in what was then macOS X did not have tabs, and I wanted tabs, not separate windows! And now I keep using it. I also use the split panes feature a lot; my typical use case is when working on back-end software: I tend to have a vertical pane showing a tail of the logs or the output messages, while I issue commands related to that server process on the other pane. And then I might have another tab with a similar split layout, but in lieu of the back-end server I run a watch process that checks for front-end app code changes, and regenerates the app on the fly. That way I keep related tasks together in the terminal, which helps with focus. If I have a lot of tabs going on, e.g. running a few long processes in the background, I move the tabs I'm actively working on to the beginning of the list and use different tab colours to highlight them, so I know where to direct my attention.

I tried learning how to use tmux for similar-ish features, but I could only remember the tricks for a week, then I went on holidays and forgot everything, and went back to iTerm2. One day I'll try again, I guess.

I tend to use simple commands like less, tail, grep, etc... quite a lot. People use IDEs for that kind of functionality, but the cool thing of using the commands is they're IDE-agnostic, and you can apply them to entire directories quite fast: You don't need to "create a project" or "open a folder." And using less or tail can be way faster than opening huge files with a text editor. There's a place for everything in the world, but knowing these little nuggets helps a lot when you are connected to remote machines and trying to debug what is happening...

Music-wise, I tend to like music where synthesisers are really evident, and that is also a good description for the music I make! Unfortunately I do not have space for actual dedicated music hardware other than the MIDI keyboards, so all my music is made using samples and virtual synths like those in Reason.

I also use Renoise if I want very finely grained sequencing or want to do sample-heavy songs, as I find its interface easier for detailed, with lots of notes, tracks. That's because Renoise is a modern music tracker.

It's a very different way of writing music compared to the "piano roll" style that you normally find in other software. Here you enter the notes and effects that you want to happen in a sort of grid that resembles a spreadsheet, and then sort out the spreadsheet pages (called "patterns") into a "playlist". Here's a video of one of my songs playing in Renoise, if you want to see what I mean.

Initially trackers were sample-based, so it they offered a very computationally cheap, size-limited and expressive way of making music that made the most of the sound hardware of the Amiga computers of the time. Since they were so optimised, they were frequently used for adding music to videogames and demos (for the demoscene).

You can make really bonkers things such as using only one full-size pattern with the entire song on it, and use very short one-line patterns played at the fastest speed with only instructions to mute/unmute channels interleaved in the pattern list; or making the play head go backwards; or repeat fragments of the song x times (like for a loop) so you use less space in disk. Here's an example of a song that does a bit of that and the backwards technique, running in the DOS based Impulse Tracker—I made this song with a friend. Look for the song going backwards at about 2:00.

The first enjoyable music I made with a computer was with something called Scream Tracker many years ago, and I got totally hooked. It enabled me to make my own songs in a computer that was running at 120MHz (yes, megahertz, and that was very powerful at the time!).

Before Scream Tracker, I had made the computer play music using the beeper with GW-BASIC's PLAY and SOUND statements, but it was not exactly enjoyable to anyone else in the household to hear a melody you could not interrupt once it started playing its square wave drone.

Nowadays trackers like Renoise have support for samples, and also modern capabilities such as built-in DSP effects, support for MIDI, VST plugins, and even a programmable interface so you can build your own utilities using Lua. They've gone a long way...

I also use Audacity to edit samples, although I often just use the built-in sample editor in Renoise, as you can record and also do the editing in it, it's super fast and precise, and it is literally what you need to keep the flow going, as you don't leave the application at any point. You can even draw the sample you want, or draw over an existing sample to adjust the values by hand if you wanted to. If you know what you're doing, you can get away with not sampling anything externally, and just draw the sample you want from scratch, then use the built-in effects to round off your creation.

A final shout out goes, oddly for me, to GarageBand. I used to uninstall it from my phones or laptops as soon as I got them, as I already had my preferred music software and didn't want to learn something else (plus it just looked so lacking).

But one time during a long-haul flight to San Francisco, I realised that I had not deleted GarageBand from my new phone, and as mystifying and confusing and featureless as I felt it to be initially, I experienced a lot of bliss playing random instruments with it during that flight.

So now I keep it on my phone, and I tend to jam with it when I am getting a little bit "frazzled" by a journey. It's like doodling, but with music! I wish I had figured this out earlier.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

A bit like my first attempt at learning Vim, I started very enthusiastically, and I ended up with a config that I didn't know how to use; I kept making lots of typos and sending incomplete messages in the work Slack! I had to unplug the keyboard and replace it with the previous, noncustomised one, until I gathered the energy and time to start anew.

Now I have been working on this layout for about a year and I tried to not be "too clever." Rather I wanted a basic sensible layout that wouldn't trip me, and then refined the config as needed.

My favourite anecdote was when I flashed the first version of my second attempt. I was confident that this was it. This time I was using a reasonable layout and I was READY TO WRITE SOME CODE... and then I realised that I had not mapped the equal sign. I did not have time to start the configurator at that moment, so I had to copy and paste an '=' from other lines until I finished the day and could fix my little oversight, hehe!

I suspect my current layout could be more optimised to use more of the centrally based keys rather than the outer keys, which maybe would help with feeling like the keyboard is too big for my hands, but for now, this suffices.

Although I like using the big keys to press them with the thumb and send ENTERs like I mean them. My favourite thing about mechanical keyboards is having the ability to truly express yourself and represent what you mean, and when I press ENTER, I want to press it like I mean it.

So using a 1u key for ENTER would seem a bit like not being quite sure about what you just wrote. When I have used computers which had one of those small ENTER keys it always felt like you weren't really sure that you were really committing to send that line of text.

In a similar vein, I slightly regret my choice of Brown switches rather than the Blue ones that I had on my first and previous mechanical keyboard. I feel that my typing is not expressing its rage intent sufficiently, as the noise is now more like tump tump tumpity tump rather than CLICK CLICK CLACK CLICK. But I am comforted by the thought that I can always replace the switches with blue ones and I won't need to de-solder and solder anything.

I am still using the same keycaps that came with the keyboard, in part because I haven't had time to research which other keys could I use, and in part because it looks like all the cool keycaps are made in the parts of the globe that will incur in the most expensive customs taxes to ship to the UK.

The one thing I've done is moving some keys around. I love being able to just pull the keys out and put them back wherever I want, and the fact they're in a vertical layout and all the keycaps have the same size and profile is very helpful for this, because I tried moving keys in my previous keyboard (designed for Windows) so the keys were more natural for macOS, and it ended up a bit like a Frankeyboardstein, as they were a bit uneven in heights.

What would be your dream setup?

What the absolute dream would be is having programmable keys like those from the Optimus Popularis prototype that made the rounds a few years ago. That way one would not need to physically switch keycaps ever.

It would also be really useful in contexts such as when switching language layouts: UK/US layouts are very convenient for programming because the brackets and braces are easier to type than in the Spanish layout, but they don't have accents. In macOS, if you want an accent you can keep the vowel key pressed down for long enough until a little pop-up menu shows up, and then you pick up which accented variation you want. But when I want to type longer texts in Spanish I have no patience to wait for the pop-ups, so I tend to switch to the Spanish layout, but then I keep forgetting where the semicolons, the parentheses, the brackets, etc. are.

It could also be very helpful when switching layers ZSA-style, as the keys could change in turn, not just the colour but also the label on top of them.

Sadly, I don't think that Optimus Popularis ever made it into production. So back to possibly more feasible things:

I grew up using a computer whose CAPS LOCK key had a really nice red glow coming through its tiny circular indicator. I wish I could get the same or a similar effect. E.g. I am not going to drill a hole into the key to see the LED glow, but right now I don't think you can "toggle" the state of keys with the current configurator, CAPS LOCK or not. And when I am standing, sometimes I can't see the CAPS LOCK indicator on the top right, as the keyboard's top key row itself covers it. So being able to use individual key LEDs as a toggle indicator would be helpful.

I can see an immediate use other than just for CAPS LOCK: One great feature of music trackers is that if you learn the shortcuts, you can be SUPER productive because they're very keyboard-driven and almost every function is mapped to a shortcut. Imagine making a layer to drive a tracker and also be able to have the keys react to things like "loop mode" on or off.

I also wish there was more flexibility in the "colour sequences" department. Right now, either you activate one of the "colour" modes with built-in effects, or you use a fixed mode where the key lights have a certain hue. It would be useful to be able to use colour changes as visual information, not just as a decorative effect. For example, to notify the user that you're recording, the R key could be pulsating in red. (Maybe this is pushing the keyboard customisation a little bit too far and I instead I should program more of my QuNeo to achieve this!)

And it's not all about usefulness: I think it would be fun to be able to program our own effects! As an ex-demoscener, I feel that if something has colours and can be programmed, it has to be programmed, but after writing all of these wishes, I am getting this strong sense that what I actually need to do is to learn how the keyboard's QMK firmware works and what its limitations are, and maybe then either do it myself or stop asking for something that can't happen, ha!

Either way, here are three more wishes that do not involve me taking up a new hobby:

• I wish the keyboard was heavier or had a heavier feel to it. Since I don't carry it around when I'm travelling, weight is not a problem for me, but I miss the heavier feel of my former keyboard. Sometimes I get carried away typing and I end up sliding the keyboard and I have to stop and bring it back towards me...
• Since I use the two halves of the keyboard quite close together, there's a lot of slack in the cable, which makes it quite bulky and distracting, so I've been thinking of replacing that with something shorter, but it would be nice if the keyboard came with a short one in addition to the long one. Or maybe a coiled one?
• And the absolute dream would be if the keyboard were Bluetooth and there was nothing between the computer and the keyboard! (but if you could also keep the capability for wired for flashing a new config, or when you don't want the latency...).

My name is Salvador de la Puente González, although everybody calls me Salva. I'm a Spanish software engineer working from New York, in quantum computing at IBM. I've been a developer for almost 20 years, and I’ve worked on pretty cool technologies, such as Firefox OS, WebVR, and now quantum! Today, I’m head of engineering and dedicate my life to improving the culture and processes that make us more agile, more adaptable, and more resilient to uncertainty. I spend my free time hanging with friends, programming, and (trying to) produce electronic music.

What hardware do you use?

I use a Mac and I sit in front of a curved UltraWide 38” LG monitor. Since my wrist started to hurt, I’ve liked discovering ergonomic hardware, and nowadays I own a ZSA Moonlander and a Logitech Ergo trackball. I’ve tried pretty crazy things, from vertical mouses to that RollerMouse oddity. I think I’m settling with keyboards (love the customization options of my Moonlander), but I feel I’m still missing something regarding pointer devices.

And what software?

In my day to day, writing emails and attending videoconferences are my main activities, so Outlook and WebEx. When programming, I use Visual Studio Code, a variety of AI assistants, and Rust, Python, or TypeScript as my programming languages.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

I do use a custom layout. I changed the caps of some keys. I use several layers, and a color code to remind me where special keys are. One of my layers is multimedia, and the other is a mirrored QWERTY so I can type one-handed. These days I’m thinking of changing the space key; today emplacement is one of the regular keys in the bottom row, and it does not provide enough support for my left thumb.

What would be your dream setup?

Ideally, I’d love to stop switching between the keyboard and pointer. An alternative is to become more proficient with my mirrored QWERTY and use the left hand for typing, and the right hand for controlling the mouse. However, I was experimenting with a pointer stick attached to my Moonlander with good results. It would be great not to leave the keyboard but also have the versatility of the mouse at reach.

My name is Liz, and I'm a cozy gamer and psychology major from Ukraine currently based in Poland. I've been in gamedev since 2018 and currently work as a community manager for Wargaming. Beyond my professional life, I also wear the hat of a meme page admin.

I find joy in playing PC games with friends and consuming a vast amount of digital media. My interests extend to VR, Nintendo consoles, and various DIY projects like watercolor painting, knitting, sculpting, and sewing, among many others. I take pride in being a cat mom to my seven-kilogram baby boy.

What hardware do you use?

I'm a big fan of clutter-free workspaces, opting for an all-black theme with red accents on my main setup. My home PC is an RX 6800 XT with Ryzen 5 7600X, housed in a neatly packed mini ITX NZXT H1 V2. Building it from scratch was my first venture into PC building, aiming for a compact, minimalist design without compromising power. It was an overwhelming but thrilling adventure!

On my desk, you'll find two enormous mousepads from KRUX, an ErgoDox EZ with thick gold switches, and a Logitech G502 X mouse. For voice calls, I rely on the HyperX QuadCast mounted on an Elgato Wave Mic Arm, and a Logitech C920 cam. My monitor of choice is the UltraWide LG 34WP75C. For audio, I picked Edifier R1700BT speakers with SPC Gear Viro headphones.

My chair of choice is a Diablo X-Player; complete with custom embroidery on a horned pillow, it sets the perfect mood for video conferences.

Additionally, I enjoy gaming on Oculus Quest 2 for VR, Nintendo Switch, and New 3DS XL for a more exotic gaming experience.

And what software?

Operating on Windows 10, my daily toolkit includes Opera GX, Discord, Spotify, my Steam library, League of Legends, Minecraft, Black Desert Online, and whatever my gaming buddies come up with for a gaming session. I also play VR games like Beat Saber and Superhot VR, and occasionally lurk on private servers in VRchat.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

As a self-proclaimed minimalist, I designed my keyboard layers for comfortable switching between four languages. The first layout (Polish Programmers) is for English and Polish, and the second (custom Layout based on Ukrainian) is for Ukrainian and Russian. I've tweaked the Windows Ukrainian Language layout to seamlessly incorporate both UA and RU special characters without the need to switch between additional languages.

I chose thick gold switches with my set, since I work from home and no one will be able to hate me for my Thicc Popcorn clicks. I added a thin layer of foam to slightly mod my keyboard as all cool kids do, but I don’t feel much difference. I may switch to some thockier switches next year. Long live hotswap!

What would be your dream setup?

My dream setup is one that never experiences BSODs or strange noises for no reason. <3

I value having a good view and clean workspace without too much cat fur.

Nevertheless, I find myself quite content with my current station.

My name is Darius Moldovan, and I'm a full-time media composer. I produce music for Hollywood films and AAA video game trailers. I’ve worked on campaigns such as Top Gun: Maverick, Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3, AIR, Loki, various Call of Duty games, and many others. I am currently working in-house exclusively for SPM Music Group.

Outside of work, I like to spend time with my wife and five kids. I also enjoy playing COD with friends and investing more time into my skills: learning instruments, keeping up to date with tech, creating custom workflow solutions, or whatever other rabbit hole I get lost in at the time.

What hardware do you use?

The main components of my studio consist of a fully spec'd out M2 Ultra Mac Studio and a networked NUC 13 Extreme, which helps carry some of the workload and control the customised Wacom Cintiq Pro 27" touchscreen which also controls Cubase on the Mac. My audio interfaces consist of a Lynx Hilo and UAD Apollo x6. The audio is sent to my Drawmer MC3.1 monitor controller, which feeds my Focal Trio 11BEs and Avantone Mixcubes. My main keyboard controller is a Roland RD-2000. I also use a Roli Seaboard Rise, and an Expressive E Touché controller for organic, expressive instrument programming. All of this sits on a custom-made desk I designed, which is skinned in real carbon fibre.

I also have several bass guitars that I love. The ones pictured here are a Dingwall NG-3, an MG Bass Desert custom,a Cort C6 (de-fretted) an Ibanez BTB806SC, and the most recent: the custom Fingybass. It is a travel bass that is a 22" short scale, six-string fretless that I helped design. Especially for use practicing in bed while enjoying some Netflix with my wife.

I only have six-string basses currently.

And what software?

My main work application is Cubase, which I have a strong love/hate relationship with. I also have a vast array of third-party instruments and plugins from companies like FabFilter, Soundtoys, Kilohearts, Universal Audio, Sonible, Audio Imperia, Heavyocity, and many more.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

I'm currently using a ZSA Moonlander with customized keycaps and layouts. I have spent numerous hours perfecting and adjusting the custom layout for Cubase—copying the muscle memory I developed with a previous controller that I spent well over 10,000 hours developing.

Integrating it all on the Moonlander has been awesome because my left hand stays on the keyboard for the vast majority of the time I work. The only time it moves is when I use my customised touch screen or Stream Decks. Being able to switch from a custom app-specific layout to keyboard typing at the touch of a button was a game changer for me. I feel like I've only scratched the surface with the potential of this setup.

What would be your dream setup?

I have pretty much built my dream setup. If I were to go to the next level, a bigger, purpose-built room would be nice with an Atmos 7.1.4 system, which is not necessary for my work, but would fun to have.

My name is Lucas Slominski, and I'm a senior concept artist & illustrator at ZeniMax Online Studios. I started my career in 2010 working on The Lord of the Rings Online for WB Games Boston. After five years there, I decided to move to Baltimore to join ZOS, where from 2016 to 2019, I was responsible for painting the key art illustrations for The Elder Scrolls Online. Since then, I've been working on an exciting new project for ZOS, but since it's still unannounced, I can’t talk about it just yet.

Career stuff aside, by far the greatest project of my life launched in March 2023, when my wife gave birth to our son, William. As I’m a first-time dad, any hobbies I once had have been put on hold since he arrived. When I was younger and less sleep-deprived, though, I enjoyed running, hiking, snowboarding, and figure drawing. During the pandemic, I also picked up vegetable gardening and began researching my family’s genealogy.

I've continued working from home on a full-time basis since then, so a lot of effort has gone into maximizing the appeal of my home office as an effective work environment. When my wife is at work and our part-time nanny isn't here, baby Will can often be found perched right between the two halves of my Moonlander. Evidently, he and my cat Kingsley have an ongoing competition to see which of them can trigger the greatest number of errant keypresses via my thumb cluster. As of this writing, Will is in the lead by a significant margin.

What hardware do you use?

The foundation of my workspace is a 65" x 24" Energize Corner Standing Desk by iMovR. The desktop's corner-facing diagonal front edge is crucial for the ergonomics of my digital painting setup, and allows for a more symmetrical arrangement of my peripheral devices. When I have the desk in standing mode, I keep an Ergodriven Topo Comfort Mat under my feet (highly recommended), and when I feel like sitting down, I do so in a Union & Scale FlexFit Hyken black mesh chair from Staples. The chair is nothing special, but I did give it a low-cost upgrade by replacing the wheels with rollerblade-style rubber casters. I try to stay comfortable in different seasons with the help of two different desk fans, as well as a small space heater beneath the desk to keep my feet warm.

For drawing and painting, I use Wacom’s Grip Pen and Art Pen to draw directly on a Cintiq 22HD pen display, which serves as the centerpiece of my digital work environment. Positioned directly above it is a Dell UltraSharp 32" UHD display (UP3216Q), flanked by two vertically oriented Dell UltraSharp 24" displays (U2415 & U2410). The three Dells are all mounted on VIVO monitor stands that do a great job of freeing up some extra space on my desk surface, while my Cintiq is mounted on a repositionable Ergotron LX Desk Monitor Arm (not pictured). All four displays are driven by an NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3070, which runs on a work-issued HP Z4 workstation featuring a Core i9 processor and 64 GB of RAM. My personal laptop is a Legion Pro 5i Gen 7 with similar specs, but unless I'm traveling, I rarely have occasion to use it.

For remote work meetings, I use a Logitech C922 webcam that I've paired with a Samson Q2U microphone. Outside of meetings, audiobooks are my favorite way to consume media while multitasking, and I typically listen to those using a pair of Shokz OpenRun bone conduction headphones. If I really need to focus on what I'm doing, I'll whip out my Sony WH-1000XM4 headphones, which I tend to use mostly for their noise-canceling capabilities.

I use a Logitech G502 Lightspeed mouse, which features several customizable auxiliary keys that I’ve configured with an eye toward browser tab management. My keyboard of choice is the Moonlander Mk1, which I keep modestly tented using ZSA's Platform.

Finally, this falls a bit outside the normal definition of hardware, but for any future parents who’ll be working from home with a newborn, I strongly recommend the Lalabu Dad Shirt. I used it almost daily for the first few months after Will was born, enabling me to “wear” him while staying productive at work, which also allowed his mom to get some much-needed sleep.

And what software?

I use Workflowy to organize and manage nearly every facet of my life (including the responses you're reading now). It features an infinitely nesting list structure that's deceptively powerful and astonishingly similar to the way my brain is naturally organized.

Photoshop is my main app for art creation, and I use it almost daily. Depending on the task, I'll occasionally use other Adobe apps, too, like Illustrator, InDesign, and After Effects. When I need to work out a particular problem in 3D, I turn to ZBrush & Autodesk Maya. I find Pinterest to be a surprisingly useful tool for gathering visual reference, and PureRef is a godsend for organizing and displaying visual reference images on screen while I work.

Visio is my go-to for building flowcharts and other diagrams, although Miro is more convenient for collaborative mind-mapping. Slack, Teams, Outlook, Confluence, and Jira are all important tools for my work-related communications, while Discord keeps me connected with my extended family. Edge is my browser of choice, YNAB is my preferred budgeting app, and 1Password manages my digital credentials for me.

As a Windows user, I use AutoHotKey to expand the capabilities of my Moonlander far beyond what's possible through firmware alone. As for other utilities, AnyCase allows me to perform in-place capitalization changes on typed text, while Ditto vastly extends the functionality of my clipboard. Having displays with different native DPIs can be annoying, but LittleBigMouse enables my cursor to move between them in a way that reflects their physical position in the real world. Greenshot lets me capture pixel-perfect screenshots, and PowerToys provides me with a whole phalanx of digital quality-of-life improvements (I've found FancyZones, Color Picker, and Quick Accent to be especially useful).

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

Before describing my layout, I should give some background on the circumstances that inspired it.

In order to be effective while working on an illustration, I like to have my entire Cintiq display pulled forward to the front edge of my desk and tilted back like a drafting table. That position doesn't leave much room for a keyboard in front, so prior to learning about the existence of split keyboards, I spent most of my early career using a standard QWERTY keyboard placed on the far left side of my desk. This meant that in order to type with both hands, I had to twist my spine all the way to the left while my neck stayed turned to the right (so I could keep my eyes on the screen while touch-typing). Not exactly an ergonomic system!

I did have my frequently used Photoshop commands mapped to a Logitech G13, which I controlled with my right hand while painting with the Wacom pen in my left hand. The G13 made working in Photoshop more efficient, but it still left a lot to be desired when it came to typing. That all changed in 2019 when I discovered the ErgoDox EZ, and my subsequent upgrade to the Moonlander in 2022 made things even better. I now work with the two halves of my keyboard positioned on either side of the Cintiq, so when I'm typing with the display pulled forward, it almost looks like I'm giving it a hug.

The biggest inconvenience I face these days is my right hand needing to feel its way back to the home row after leaving the keyboard to control the mouse (I'm a lefty, but I've always used a right-handed mouse setup). In an effort to address this, I've set up a Tap-Toggle layer switch on each thumb cluster that swaps the key assignments between the two halves of the board, resulting in a mirrored layout that gives each of my hands independent access to the entire alphabet. This makes it possible for me to type one-handed using only half of the board. It's obviously slower than using two hands, but it can be a real time-saver in cases where I'd otherwise have to repeatedly move my hand back and forth between the mouse and the keyboard.

My custom layout, Disparatus, uses a modified version of Colemak as its base layer. It includes Tap-Toggle switches that provide access to a numpad layer, a "mod" layer for page navigation & text formatting shortcuts, the “swap” layer I mentioned earlier, and a function key layer that I mostly use to trigger custom-scripted AHK hotkeys.

In fact, Oryx only tells part of the story for a bunch of the keys in my layout, since I use AutoHotKey to change their functionality at the software level. As an example, I have different combinations of modifiers set up to alternately send an en dash or an em dash when I press the hyphen-minus key. Super useful if you're a language pedant like me.

The heart of my layout is the NAV layer, which sits at the top of the layer stack and remains accessible no matter which layer I have active. It gives me consistent access to directional arrows, media controls, screenshot/clipboard controls, and crucially, a direct switch to every other layer in the layout. This is one of the ways I reliably switch from "typist mode" to "artist mode," since I also have discrete layers for 3D modeling (Maya) and 2D painting (PS). My main Photoshop layer actually leads to two sub-layers of its own, due to the sheer number of keyboard shortcuts I use while painting.

When I originally ordered my ErgoDox EZ, I started off using Kailh Speed Silver switches, but I found them to be a little too touchy for my liking—especially when using them as tool modifiers while painting. I experimented with Kailh Box Heavy Dark Yellows for a while, which were great for painting but exhausting to type on. Since receiving my Moonlander, I've happily embraced the Kailh Box Blacks that I ordered with the board; they strike a great balance between sturdiness and compliance.

I prefer blank, sculpted keycaps, and I loved the feel of the set that came with my ErgoDox EZ. I wanted to make better use of its per-key RGB lighting to indicate key assignments though, so I ordered an affordable set of translucent black Cherry-profile blanks, which were surprisingly difficult to find. They held up really well, but when I got my Moonlander I decided to commit to ZSA’s set of OEM-profile blanks by Tai-Hao, which are the keycaps I still use today.

What would be your dream setup?

I'd love to upgrade my pen display to the stunning Wacom Cintiq Pro 27. Unfortunately, since its price is equally stunning, it might be a while before I can justify an expense like that. I've also considered moving to an ultrawide monitor, but I think I'd have a hard time sacrificing the utility of my vertically oriented displays. Regardless, I'd eventually like to upgrade all of my secondary displays to curved monitors with UHD resolution or better, even if that doesn't include the ultrawide form factor.

In terms of my keyboard, words cannot express how incredible it would be for me to have a trackball integrated into the right thumb module of my Moonlander (while still retaining some thumb keys). No more fumbling between the mouse and my home row! I've seen some DIY approaches to modding the Moonlander to achieve this, but they always feel pretty hacky, and I don’t want to risk ruining my board.

Finally, I really like the combos functionality integrated into Oryx, although I haven't made much use of it yet. I'd love to do more with chorded key assignments in the future—I even have an unused Splitography steno board sitting in a drawer—but so far I haven't found the time to dig into it. As it turns out, this whole parenting thing takes up an astonishing amount of time and energy. Who knew?

Hi, my name is Ahmet Necati Uzer. I’m a translator/copy editor working for a localization company in Istanbul, Turkey. I’m interested in digital photography, love to consume popular culture (video games, novels, lots of movies/TV shows), and have a very unhealthy interest in wristwatches. I also dabble in powerlifting.

What hardware do you use?

I currently use a five-year-old CUK Hades Canyon NUC Premium VR Mini Desktop Gaming PC. I initially bought it for gaming and photography postproduction, but later delegated it as my at-home workstation during the COVID lockdown. The small dimensions are a real lifesaver, and the hardware still holds up for work-related stuff, despite the belated addition of a BENQ 4K monitor. I also use the Logitech MX Master 3S mouse and the Moonlander MK 1 as my primary input devices. They are both nested under a sliding desk.

An IKEA Elloven stand and its integrated drawer provides me with additional space for knickknacks and notebooks. I use a Logitech web camera paired with Shokz OpenRun Pro headphones (the open design is great if you don’t like wearing over-the-ear designs for longer durations, especially during the summer). A Samsung wireless charger helps me top up my phone and earbuds in a convenient manner. Various pens and markers are also right next to my workstation.

And what software?

The basics: Windows 11, Microsoft Office suite, Adobe Lightroom (I tried for years to make Capture One work, but in the end, I found its workflow and file management too complex for my liking), and CAT software like Trados Studio (bloated as hell but sadly still the industry standard), memoQ (my favorite), and others. Dashlane for password management, Everything for file searching. And lots of extensions for Edge.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

No custom keycaps, but I use a custom Turkish F-layout that is optimized for text editing, Internet research, and CAT workflows. It uses a combination of long-press functions, layers, combos (color coding them on the key caps helps a lot to remember their existence), and single key assignments for the most common commands (copying, pasting, arrow keys etc.).

I’m constantly changing the layout, especially after coming upon other users’ ideas that are featured in your newsletters. I also sometimes plainly forget my latest layers/combos, so having the ORYX configurator bookmarked in my browser is a must. In the end, I try to concentrate on ergonomics and ease of use, anything that will prevent repetitive stress and make inputting stuff easier. The Moonlander’s split design and software features makes this easy in the long run, despite the initial demanding adaptation period.

What would be your dream setup?

Maybe high-fidelity speakers and an additional, vertically aligned monitor on a swivel could be useful. A cat hammock on top of the monitor is also on my to-do list.

P.S.: Your new Voyager keyboard also looks like it would pair ideally with my gaming PC.

Hi, I'm Laura! I'm a lifelong resident of the SF Bay Area (but am also a Canadian citizen), and my most recent job title is "Developer Advocate," but I'm currently funemployed following an acquisition-induced layoff from a company in the WebAssembly space, where I owned our docs. I consider myself a Professional Generalist, and before I pivoted into the tech industry I was a math lecturer (but before I settled on math, I switched majors between theater, English, Italian studies, astrophysics, fashion design, and computer science). I'm fortunate to be able to take this time to explore all of my varied interests and see where I might like to go next when the job market recovers.

I'm neurosparkly, from the AuDHD zone of the neuroverse. I love discovering the connections between things, and lately that's had me on a linguistics kick thanks to the History of English podcast. I spend a lot of time configuring my tools to work and look just right for me, which is probably true of every person who reads interviews like this one. 😁 Fiber arts like knitting and crochet keep my hands busy when they're not on my keyboard.

I blog on my website and stream on Twitch and YouTube. You can also find me on Mastodon and Bluesky!

What hardware do you use?

A 16" MacBook Pro with an M1 Max is my primary machine, and my current daily driver keyboard is a white Voyager (I also have and love her big sister—my first ergo!—the Moonlander). When I'm streaming or have a video meeting I use a Fully desk, and I have a Studio Display on a walnut monitor stand my husband made for me. My chair is a Mirra 2, and I use a Canon EOS RP with an RF24-105 lens and an Elgato Cam Link as a webcam. I have a Wave:3 microphone on a low-profile mic arm, and a Key Light Air with 3D-printed barn doors. I use a Stream Deck MK.2 to control my lighting.

You can see below how the angle of the base of the Voyager relative to the lap desk supporting it is nearly 90 degrees, and that combined the angle of the left edge of the Voyager relative to the lap desk lets my wrist stay completely neutral. My forearm is supported by the arm of my chair, and my hand just floats alongside the keyboard.

When I work from bed I put my laptop on a bed desk and my keyboard on a lap desk that can sit in front of me when I'm sitting cross-legged, or on my lap when I'm reclining.

I have a second Studio Display I sometimes use when not at my desk, with an Ergotron monitor stand that has a wide base and very low center of gravity so it's stable on the bed desk or on my lift-top coffee table.

But usually when I'm not at my desk I'm looking at three AR monitors on my XREAL Air glasses, which I was introduced to by a previous interview in ZSA's Ergo newsletter!

And what software?

I'm gradually transitioning from VS Code to Neovim for writing code and docs, and a few months ago I switched from iTerm2 to Warp for my terminal. GitKraken helps me when Git gets convoluted, and Raycast and an array of apps I have through Setapp optimize my macOS workflow.

I adore the Arc browser, and I use Obsidian for personal knowledge management (Markdown and Vim bindings for all the things!). I use Anki cards to learn new things, 1Password for passwords and passkeys, Vimcal for calendar and scheduling, and Shortwave for email (RIP Google Inbox 😭). For streaming I use Restream, and for videos I've just started using Screen Studio.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

My keyboard usually lives on a lightweight lap desk that I've trimmed down, and I have Velcro dots on the underside of the lap desk and on the keyboard tray of my desk so I can plop the lap desk down on the keyboard tray and it'll stay put. I've also used the Velcro dots to attach a Magic Trackpad between the two halves of the keyboard.

After trying several different tenting solutions, I've landed on using Z-shaped camera mounts, which I've attached to the lap desk with bar magnets. On each camera mount I've attached a MagSafe tripod mount, which is a perfect match for the Voyager's magnetic base! For the Moonlander I use MagSafe stickers on its base for a similar effect (not quite as good, though, since the magnetic surface is limited to the size of the sticker).

The magnetic attraction between the base of the Voyager and the tripod mount is strong. I can position the Voyager high up on the mount when I need extra height for a particular position.

I can achieve any degree of rotation.

When I move into a new position, I let my hand achieve a natural position and then adjust one or more of the above until the keyboard is aligned perfectly to my hand and fingers, not the other way around.

I also frequently work from an armchair that has a cover with a zipper underneath, so I used fabric tape to put magnets under the cover, inside the arms to attach my Voyager directly to the arms of the chair.

It worked and it was very cool! But because the keyboard halves need to be connected, the cable acted as a sort of gate each time I stood up, and it turned out that the lap desk and Z mounts, though not quite as cool, provided the best solution yet again.

I have small hands, so my layouts for both Voyager and Moonlander keep my fingers almost exclusively on the three main rows (home row and the rows above and below home), so I don't need to stretch my fingers.

The pink raised dot stickers I added to the top row and home keys are to help me know which row I'm touching (apparently this is called "indexing"!).

For the Moonlander I tried a few different tactile and linear switches and weights, and settled on 63.5g Healio linear switches from Zeal, which I lubed and filmed. The Moonlander has lots of outfits (keycap sets), and some of my favorites are MechSupply's Vilebloom, Mintlodica's Witch Girl, and Epomaker's Honey-Milk.

What would be your dream setup?

Iterating is fun for me, so I doubt I could have an "endgame" setup. But right now I'm playing with ideas to eliminate the keyboard tray on my desk to optimize the surprisingly complex spatial relationships between my camera, monitor, desk, chair, and background. I'm also dying to try the Vision Pro! Having a dedicated office would be lovely.

My name is Annie, and I work for the Dylan Jude Harrell Community Center as director of operations. This is a local nonprofit serving the county and neighboring counties where I reside.

We are a relatively small staff, so many of us wear different hats at work! Our primary goal is to build community through after-school and family programming, and through our daycare/preschool. We are working towards constructing a permanent facility that will strengthen and expand our programs.

Outside of work, I love to spend time outdoors with my dogs and husband and experiment in the kitchen both in culinary and patisserie. I enjoy arts and hobby-illustrated a children’s book for a self-published author.

What hardware do you use?

I am a plain Jane! I use a standard MacBook Air at work and have a MacBook Pro personally.

And what software?

Once again, a pretty plain user. All the standard macOS applications, but I rely much more heavily professionally on G Suite. I use Adobe Lightroom and Photoshop as well.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

As you’ve gathered, I’m probably not the typical audience for this type of keyboard! I have basically the standard setup and have a minimally custom layout to keep my frequently used keys close to me. I use the lighting to distinguish the ten-key layer (which I adore) and I was most drawn to this keyboard to help my posture and my hand/wrist health!

What would be your dream setup?

Honestly, at this time in my technological understanding, I think the setup I have is exactly what I need. I’m only just beginning to see the options that are out there for customizing but currently I love the setup I have, even if it’s a bit boring for now!

My name is Jen. I've been working in IT Support for about ten years now. I genuinely love the work, and the people there really feel like a second family to me. The pandemic really upended my "social life" at work. I met my best friend there, who was my work partner, and we had a blast working together every day. We worked in Colorado together for a few years and had a gorgeous view of the mountains just right outside. Unfortunately, due to rising costs in real estate brought on by COVID, I had to move out of state and back home to Texas. I bought a house with my significant other, and we've been here for a few years. I'm hoping one day to eventually sell this house and move back to Colorado and buy a house there.

Outside of work, I used to be an avid gamer for years and years. Unfortunately, I developed severe pinched nerve damage in my neck, which caused pretty bad carpal tunnel syndrome in my right hand. I also have ulnar impaction syndrome in my left wrist, which just means my ulnar bone on the outside of my wrist is longer than normal, which causes a lot of pain for me when playing a ton of video games with my left hand. So, after multiple x-rays and MRIs, I finally have a solid answer as to what is going on with me physically. I also had shoulder impingement in both shoulders as a result.

I started working out in January of this year to try and pull my body out of this state and get to a much healthier place. I've lost 40 lbs. so far and I haven't felt this great in years and I'm not done yet. As a result, I'm on medication for my neck nerve pain but my carpal tunnel syndrome in my right wrist is pretty much gone. I was told by multiple doctors that I could no longer use a normal keyboard. So, once I started to research different types of keyboards; a friend of mine had gotten the ZSA Moonlander and after a lot of research, I finally purchased one as well and also got an ergonomic keyboard for work. I absolutely adore this keyboard. It has made such a huge difference in my daily life since I still am on a computer for the majority of the day.

Besides that, I also like doing projects on my house. I'm currently working on a spare bathroom renovation and updating it as well. I really love working with my hands and plan on doing a lot more projects in the weeks and years to come.

I also have a workshop and shed in my back yard that I eventually plan to renovate. I've been itching to start dabbling and try out woodworking and tinkering in there. I've also been researching 3D printers and want to buy one soon, as I already have several ideas that I'd like to bring to fruition. I've been looking at a Bambu Lab X1C or a Prusa MK4. I hear they are both amazing and wonderful machines to work with.

I also recently bought a Lectric XP e-bike earlier this year and have a blast riding it around my neighborhood.

I'm currently taking a class to get a Google Cybersecurity Professional Certificate on Coursera and am hoping this will open up some more doors for me career-wise. I've always been interested in the security side of things, since it's already a part of my daily job in the IT field.

What hardware do you use?

I'm currently using this amazing keyboard, the black ZSA Moonlander with Cherry MX brown keys, along with an Xbox Lunar Shift Special Edition controller and my newest toy, the Azeron Cyborg gaming keypad. It's amazing and not too dissimilar to the Moonlander in terms of customization and adjustability. I'm also using a Logitech G502 mouse.

I actually have two PCs that I use. My main computer is running Windows 11 Pro with an Intel i7-12700K liquid-cooled with an ASUS Rog Strix Z690-A motherboard with 64 gigs of Corsair Vengeance RGB Pro RAM. I bought this motherboard because it had four M.2 slots and all of them are full of NVMe drives. I also have an 8TB hard drive that I use for game storage so loads of space. I really wanted to futureproof it. I'm also running an Nvidia GeForce RTX 3080Ti 12GB video card. This video card is super fast, and everything looks and runs fantastic. I have two BENQ 27" gaming monitors that I currently use. I'm using a be quiet! 1000W 80+ Platinum fully modular ATX PSU. A bit overkill, I know, but I would rather have more than I need than not have enough. All of this is packaged into a full case tower that sits on top of my Uplift desk that I got last year at the same time I built this PC.

My other PC is my old one that I built back in 2015 and is running Windows 10 Pro. I mainly use it to run game servers for friends and family. I also use it as my Plex server that's on the same network as my TV so I can store vast amounts of movies, TV shows, etc. I doubt I will ever go back to a single PC setup again now that I have both running side by side. It's just too darn convenient to have at this point.

I also have to include obligatory cat pictures since he is my constant companion. Spooky is seventeen years old!

And what software?

I'm running Windows 11 and Windows 10 Pro respectively. I usually have Steam, Discord, Telegram, Spotify, Firefox, and some form of Microsoft Office windows open depending on what I'm working on. I switched from Chrome to Firefox earlier in the year and couldn't be happier.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

I don't have any custom keycaps yet, but I have been looking around to see what's available. I do normally stick to a mostly QWERTY setup, but I've changed a few things over time and changed some of the layers as I go along to adjust things to my liking. I really love the ability to customize the keys, and the tilt options are off the charts. Thank you so much for creating such a beautiful piece of hardware! I've gotten very fast at typing on it.

What would be your dream setup?

I'm actually not too far off from my dream setup. I just built my dream PC last year and got my Uplift desk, but I think I would eventually like to add maybe two more monitors—but 4K this time so I can take better advantage of my video card. I've been thinking about maybe streaming on Twitch in the future, but who knows where I'll go from here.

Hi there! I’m Vittoria, a software engineer based in Brazil (well, not that based lately since I’ve being trying to spend some periods traveling and experiencing life in different countries) working for a fully remote company called Valued.

I’ve been working in the last three years mainly with Elixir, and I’m loving it. So I would say my main focus of interest lately has been the development of distributed systems with functional languages, preferably Elixir.

Outside of work—generally speaking—people can find me doing a lot of sports (Olympic weight lifting and calisthenics mostly), reading as a way to reduce my screen time, hanging with my friends, helping my family, and trying to learn something. Right now it is music, an old passion that I never actually put the effort into to master the theoretical base of. I’m using Brazilian «choro popular» and introductory jazz pieces in my learning.

What hardware do you use?

I work on a MacBook, and I have a set of peripherals to help me have an ergonomic setup, which has been very important for me lately. From chair to a standing desk, to the Logitech MX Vertical and sometimes an Apple trackpad as well. Also a wider monitor helps me a lot (mine is a simple wide-screen one from LG) and a RØDE mic for a more improved sound quality. Also the Moonlander as main keyboard, but also I have a regular mechanical keyboard that I use for unrelated-to-work stuff.

And what software?

VS Code and other work-related software (Slack, Notion, iTerm2, 1Password, etc.). I’ve been using Sukha for time management and focus tasks. But besides that, I’m pretty much a notebook person.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

My setup with the Moonlander is the default keycaps and the macOS mastery layout. I’m feeling already comfortable with it, so eventually I might add some custom changes I could do to improve it.

What would be your dream setup?

I love minimalist setups with nonexistent cable cords. So that would be a great start + having a better monitor—I’m curious about those curved wide-screens. And most important: better lighting to avoid eye fatigue. The last one seems very doable, but I never took time to figure it out.

I'm Lindsey Gunsallus! Digital art nerd who loves comics, video games, and anime. For work, I'm a senior 3D artist at Epic Games working on Rocket League, Rocket League Sideswipe, and Fortnite. Some of the cosmetics you have equipped in RL might be the very assets I created; it's always a fun moment for me when I see them used in-game!

Outside of work, I've been writing short stories for fun, and in July of 2023, I launched the start of my webcomic series, ATHEOS, on Webtoon Canvas. When I'm not making art, I spend as much time as I can with friends and family.

What hardware do you use?

My personal PC is a few years old now and is in need of a few upgrades, but she still kicks: GeForce 1080Ti, 64GB RAM, AMD Ryzen 7 1700 eight-core, in a Phanteks Eclipse case. Every plug and port on it is occupied because of all the additional hardware on my desk.

I use my XP-Pen Artist 16 every day to draw, and because of the drawing tablet, I had a hard time with keyboard reach on a small-footprint desk. After a few months of drawing my comic and struggling with a frustrating setup, I found out about ZSA's split keyboards and ordered the Moonlander. Each half sits on either side of my tablet in front of me while I draw, and it minimizes my movement and strain to hit all my hotkeys and type quickly. It has been pretty essential to my workflow comfort ever since.

And what software?

Most often I use Photoshop, Illustrator, Clip Studio Paint, Autodesk Maya, Zbrush, and Substance Painter for drawing my comic and making personal 3D projects! As for gaming, my PC has drowned in Overwatch, Apex Legends, and various RPGs over its dutiful years of service.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

I don't have any off-colored or custom keycaps because I like the clean original look of the Moonlander for my all-dark theme, but I did rearrange one or two keys! The default keycaps with Brown switches work best for me.

What would be your dream setup?

I pretty much have my dream setup! A new 4090 and upgraded processor notwithstanding, I don't have room for any more upgrades, as my four-screened wall of light might suggest. Some folks chase RGB futuristic aesthetics, and I respect that look, but the darker neutral setup works best on my eyes for color-testing my art on multiple screens without colored light interference. Most of the time I'm working on this setup at night since my day job is on a different PC.

I’m Ryan Muller Kennedy, a software engineer originally from Massachusetts. I live in Sånta Rita-Sumai, Guam, USA with my wife, one-year-old son, and our dog. I’ve worked from home since 2015. I graduated from Worcester Polytechnic Institute in 2009 with a degree in mechanical engineering, but it became clear after graduation that I was more talented with software, so I’ve built a career based on that.

I work at Droplet, a company that aims to reduce the friction of paperwork. My primary focus is on the React-based frontend. I’m lucky to work with a great team on a great product!

Guam is a tropical paradise, and there are plenty of amazing opportunities for hiking and scuba diving. Most weekends, I’ll go hiking with my family, and we’ll spend a few hours exploring the mountains, waterfalls, and beaches of the island. It’s a small island (only about 30 miles long), but the terrain is so varied that we are in no risk of becoming bored by our hikes. I also have a pilot’s license and enjoy flying planes.

During the week, I spend a lot of time working out. I do a fair bit of running, cycling, and swimming. We participate every week in a 5K fun run organized by a local hiking shop—my wife and I take turns each week pushing our son in his stroller. I completed a 65-mile bike race this past December, and am planning to compete in a series of local triathlons this year.

I also enjoy developing software for fun. I’m working on an iPhone app that will help me keep track of running pace while training. Recently, I’ve also started 3D printing. It’s satisfying to design and print a part to repair a broken household item, and also I feel that it keeps me in touch to some extent with my mechanical engineering background.

What hardware do you use?

For work, I use a 13-inch 2022 MacBook Pro. I spend a lot of time in coffee shops—I have worked from home since 2015, and it’s nice to get out of the house sometimes. When I travel, I bring my iPad as a second display, and use cheap wired earbuds for music and the occasional phone call. I never go anywhere without my Leuchtturm Dotted notebook and my favorite brand of pen.

When I’m working in my office, I have significantly more gear. My MacBook connects to two external monitors using a Dell D3000 dock driven by DisplayLink. Of course, my ZSA Moonlander is featured front and center—I really feel as though it’s the last keyboard I’ll ever need. Also plugged into the hub is my Kensington Expert Mouse; its large trackball makes it easy to travel across all three of my monitors. A Monstera-themed desk pad helps tie in the “jungle” theme of the rest of the office. I use a Logitech Zone headset for meetings; I really like the way it auto-mutes when you swivel the boom microphone into the “closed” position. I’ve been using the same Logitech webcam atop my monitor for years now.

The desk itself is a Vari Electric Standing Desk 48x30. The larger desks appeal to me, but in my experience larger surfaces create more room for clutter. My desk chair used to be a basic model from Staples, but the arms prevented effective typing and the back broke during one of our moves. Now it’s just a stool.

I have an Edison bulb over the desk, as well as a monitor lamp atop my central monitor. These are controlled by switches attached to the bottom of the monitor using Command strips.

Fitness is important to my productivity, so I count my fitness gear as essential as well. My most important piece of fitness tech is my Garmin Instinct 2 Solar. It’s enough of a smartwatch to give me the info I need—notifications, training status, calendar—but not so high-tech that it gets in the way. (I have also tried the Apple Watch, but it didn’t work well with my lifestyle.) My primary sport is running, which doesn’t tend to use a lot of gear. I’ve recently fallen in love with triathlon racing. My most important pieces of equipment for staying fit are my Concept2 Model D rower, my Giant Propel Advanced road bike, and my off-brand TRX-style strength training straps.

My Ender 3 V2 Neo 3D printer sees a lot of use—I’ve been able to fix a few household items with 3D-printed parts, and enjoy printing things for friends. I’ve also been slowly upgrading it by designing and printing new parts for it.

And what software?

As a frontend developer, I spend most of my day in VS Code and Google Chrome. I use Notion for my personal note-taking, but am still looking for a notes app with better support for offline/local notes. I also spend a lot of time in Figma reviewing mockups and specs produced by our design team.

I use Raycast as a Spotlight replacement, CleanShot for screenshots and annotations, and iTerm2 as my terminal. I’m an obsessive 1Password user and have been for several years. There are also a number of small online utilities I use in my day-to-day work; highlights include transform.tools, AST Explorer, and SVG OMG.

For my personal “fun” programming work, I use mostly the same apps, with the addition of GitHub Codespaces. I have a dotfiles repo that makes it quick and easy to set up a new laptop or Codespace.

A surprising amount of my 3D printing involves designing new parts. I use OpenSCAD for simple parts and FreeCAD for more complex work. I’m interested in learning CadQuery but haven’t had the time to invest in it.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

I used to cycle through keyboards about once per year or so, but that stopped once I received my Moonlander. The high humidity on Guam isn’t kind to electronics, so it’s useful to be able to open the keyboard easily and blow it out with compressed air every so often. I use Kailh Box Red switches because I prefer slightly quieter operation; these switches aren’t too noisy yet still offer a great typing experience.

My Moonlander layout is highly customized. When I first received the keyboard, I was updating the layout multiple times a day. Now, though, it’s very stable—I haven’t made any changes in the last six months. I built a Planck keyboard from a kit several years ago, but never really got comfortable with it due to its size. Even though it used QMK, I didn’t use it enough to justify spending time customizing it. Using a split keyboard like the Moonlander has been a game changer.

I used Programmer Dvorak from 2011-2014, and got used to having parentheses and braces under my fingertips instead of clustered on one side of the keyboard. My left thumb activates the symbols layer, which puts braces and brackets on the home row. With my left pinky, I can activate the Num Lock key, which allows me to use the right side of the keyboard as a numpad; I use this so often that I’m now better at entering numbers using this numpad feature than using the actual number row.

I like the clean look of simple black-on-white keycaps, so I use the “Ice Cap” set from Pimp My Keyboard. I like that they have a large library of icons and legends to pick from, which allowed me to add custom keycaps for screenshot and other functionality.

On the fronts of some of the keys, there are alternate icons that I’ve drawn (somewhat poorly) in Sharpie. The green icons are for the VS Code debugger; if I hold Cmd+Num Lock with my left hand, I can use these keys to pause/resume execution, step into a function, deactivate breakpoints, etc. The black hand-drawn legends are for keys that have a second function when they are held; for instance, the quote key will act as a Command key if I hold it. This is particularly useful for switching apps, since I have Raycast configured to switch apps when I press Cmd+Opt+.

I’ve played around with one-handed typing a little bit, but don’t use it regularly. The “shuffle” button on the left-hand thumb cluster flips the keyboard. I had intended to use this for certain keyboard shortcuts, but in practice it’s pretty slow.

What would be your dream setup?

I’m pretty close to my dream setup. We’re living on the Navy base, but when we move into our “forever home” in Massachusetts, I’d like to set up some home automation to bring the lights up when I enter the office and stand at my desk. I’d probably add a few more plants because I’m a huge fan of the “jungle” vibe, but it’s a balancing act keeping my current plants alive. Other than that, I’m pretty happy with my setup!

I'm Tomas Jonsson, and I'm originally from Sweden, but my wife and I and our two German shepherds moved to the US and New Jersey two years ago. We moved to the US after I did an internal relocation at Spotify, where I've been working for almost eleven years. The last four years have been as a cloud network engineer. Before moving into the cloud network area, my team and I managed all the office networks at Spotify.

When I'm not in front of the computer, I enjoy brewing beer, cooking BBQs, and photography. The common theme here would be creativity. That's how I enjoy my life, by creating things myself that I can later enjoy in one way or another. Either coming up with a solution to an IT problem and enjoying the outcome of that or pouring up a cold home-brewed beer.

My desk also gives some hints about my hockey interest as well. Moving here was a genius move for my hockey interest, especially in the Pittsburgh Penguins. I can actually watch almost all of their games now when I’m in the correct time zone. And of course, I am keeping an eye on my home team back home in Sweden, MoDo Hockey, as well.

I've been a Linux user since ’97, and I still remember my first attempt at trying to install Slackware. My plan was to dual-boot, but I ended up wiping my whole hard drive and ended up with only a Linux system. One of my best moves back then was to just deal with it and spend all my time in Linux.

Photography is also something that I really enjoy, and street photography is something that I've started to do more and more. That was one of the benefits of moving here as well: much bigger cities, and easier to pursue that form of photography as an introvert.

Since our apartment is too small to have servers in, I have two servers, which I run Proxmox on, at Hetzner. I have built myself a Frankenstein's monster setup with different services that I am hosting for myself, like mail, DNS, Mastodon, Kubernetes cluster, etc. I've always enjoyed trying to replicate big-scale services on a small scale just to get a better understanding of how things tie together. I remember being a super excited teenager back in 2000 when I managed to set up my Samba server as an NT logon domain. My parents were less happy when they couldn't log on to their Windows machine because I broke something with the Samba server.

What hardware do you use?

My laptop is a Lenovo P1 Gen 4, which I use together with a Logitech MX Master 2S mouse, a Benq 32” monitor and the Moonlander keyboard. My headphones are Bose NC 700 HP, and on the desk I have a pair of cheap Sanyun speakers that I found on Amazon.

I used to be more of a hardware geek back in the day, but the older I’ve gotten (currently forty-three) the less I’ve cared. As long as what I have can perform what I want it to do. I even was convinced by my wife to replace my laptop after the fans in my old laptop kept making much noise. For video games I use the Xbox, so no need for me to been on the top in terms of hardware specs, since I mostly sit in the terminal.

And what software?

I'm a keyboard-driven person (and this was one of the main reasons for getting a Moonlander), and most of my work happens in the terminal in a tmux session or in a web browser. Neovim is my editor of choice, and I use a combination of Chrome and Firefox for web browsing. I use Chrome for work purposes and Firefox for nonwork purposes. Both browsers have the Vimium extension for navigation. So naturally, my email client of choice is NeoMutt.

Currently my Linux distribution of choice is Fedora with i3wm. I’ve used i3wm for many years, but sometimes I decide to switch distributions for one or other reason. I am still trying to find an organizer that suits me, but there's always something that makes me drop the idea of using one. However, currently, I am trying out Notion, and we'll see how that goes.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

My keyboard layout is pretty much the standard layout, but I've made some minor tweaks to suit me a bit better. I've tried to avoid going too crazy with the layouts just to make life a bit easier on those days when I don't have my keyboard around and need to use the laptop keyboard. So, most of my reconfigurations are made within i3 instead.

For the switches, I went with the Cherry MX Brown ones. And yes, I love this keyboard! I had a few "moments" when I was trying to get used to it since it was my first split and ortholinear keyboard, but it only took a few weeks to get used to it.

What would be your dream setup?

I'm pretty happy with what I have, but I would love to have the space to be able to have a lab at my home again. I used to have plenty of space back home in Sweden, but after moving to the US, my priorities changed a bit, so most of my things are hosted at Hetzner in Germany.

I’m Pat, and I’m a physician who specializes in sleep medicine as well as a computer nerd from way back. I bought my first 64K 8086 PC compatible in 1985 and my first Mac in 1987—a toaster Mac SE. My medical/surgical practices have all run on the Mac platform since then. I’m an otolaryngologist-head/neck surgeon (ENT) by original training, but in 2002, I had what can only be called an epiphany and became a sleep specialist. In fall 2020, at the height of the pandemic, I made the hard decision to close my clinical practice. These days, I am semiretired and help manage five sleep disorder laboratories across three states. This involves a fair amount of windshield time, but fortunately the majority of the work can be managed remotely from anywhere in the world I may find myself.

Outside of work, I travel the world with my wife of thirty-nine years, do woodworking in my garage, and build digital light/color based clocks in my basement electronics shop. We live at home with our four cats when we’re not on the road.

What hardware do you use?

My travel kit includes my M1-based MacBook Pro, my new Voyager keyboard, a Logitech Ergo M575 trackball mouse, and my Firewalla Purple to keep my gear safe on sketchy hotel Wi-Fi networks and to connect securely to my home network. It is all stored on the road in an Alpaka Elements Travel Backpack with all the cables and accessories I might need, including my Bose noise-canceling headphones.

My home setup also includes an LG external monitor and Sonos Roam speaker for my MacBook Pro, as well as an older 2017 Retina 5K iMac with my ErgoDox EZ Glow keyboard and a Samsung external monitor.

My network setup includes four Mac minis to manage my file storage, backup services, media services, and SFTP service. A Firewalla Purple SE protects my home network from outside influence and helps manage my internal VLANs for security. I use a small HDMI monitor to keep tabs on the Mac minis.

And what software?

I use the typical Mac apps (and Microsoft Word when forced to), but since I spend a fair amount of time with the command line, iTerm2 always has its own desktop on all my computers, as does Panic Software's Transmit SFTP client. Edovia's Screens and ScreensConnect software let me keep tabs on my servers over WireGuard VPN when I am away from home. I use Tunnelblick to connect to hospitals that use OpenVPN and SonicWall Mobile Connect for those hospitals that use SonicWall VPN devices. I use YubiKey 5 series keys for 2FA.

What’s your keyboard setup like? Do you use a custom layout or custom keycaps?

I use the default keycaps with Kailh Chocolate Red keyswitches on my Voyager for now, as I am pretty happy with that setup.

I run custom keycaps (Artifact Bloom series Glow from Drop.com) on my EZ, as you can see from my photos, with HaloTrue keyswitches.

What would be your dream setup?

I feel like I have my dream setup now! The only upgrades might be to change out all my Mac minis and my iMac to the latest Apple silicon, but that’s not in the budget for this fiscal year :)