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Monday, 18. December 2023

[This article has been bi-posted to Gemini and the Web]

The TEK Cleave: A unique typing experience

In this article I compare the new TEK Cleave to the classic TEK (Truly Ergonomic Keyboard). If you are unfamiliar with the former and want to know more, you can read my 2015 review:

TEK - The Truly Ergonomic Keyboard

This post was originally meant to be called "Two weeks with the TEK Cleave keyboard" and to be published at the end of January 2021. I wasn't happy with the article, though and so I delayed it. Eventually I scrapped what I had written and started over after more than half a year of using my new keyboard on a daily basis. However... I didn't publish it then, either.

TEK Cleave box (top side) (PNG)

Not much has changed in my conclusions since then but one important thing happened: The TEK Cleave has been discontinued. When I received that information I almost couldn't believe it. While I do have mixed feelings about the actual product, I was and still am sad to see it go. Even more so to know that an important piece of tech had obviously failed according to the market's law.

A couple of days later I read another mail from Truly Ergonomic Inc. which asked for feedback from their customers and encouraged us to actively _dream_ about the perfect keyboard. Truth be told, I owe them no less than being able to continue working in my profession. So the least thing I could do is doing them this favor, right? And since I had prepared a review twice, it made sense to re-write this again and finally publish it as an article. Except... I simply had no time to do so for various reasons. But now I eventually got there.

Cleave vs. Classic TEK

In contrast to what I normally do, I'll start with my rating up-front and then cover things in detail. I rate the Cleave keyboard for 4.5 out of 5 stars. Which clearly means that I think it's a great keyboard and I would generally recommend it to people interested in ergonomic keyboards. It misses out the perfect score, though. And more importantly: In my review of the classic TEK I gave that a 5/5 rating. So that definitely calls for an explanation.

I've been an extremely happy TEK user for many years and as hinted above, their product made typing a pleasure for me after it had been the opposite for some time (in fact I bought my first TEK out of pure desparation because of severe pain in my wrists partly due to the strain of typing a lot). When the Cleave model was announced, I was immediately curious about how they intended to further improve something that I perceived as really close to being perfect. After reading the info on the company's website, I didn't need to think too long before placing a pre-order for two keyboards.

TEK Cleave box (bottom side) (PNG)

Progress does necessarily require change. And while a lot of people seem to prefer sticking to what they already know, I like to challenge my habits to see if I can further improve or optimize things. So please don't assume that I'm hostile towards what the Cleave model does differently just for the sake of hating different approaches. This is not the case. I usually can adapt to new ways if given a bit of time. Incredibly useful features being completely dropped is another story, though. And this is where my major complaint comes from. Fortunately the good changes _almost_ make up for this. But almost is not completely.

Use cases

A keyboard is a tool for people using a computer. This is the most general thing I can say about it. Being only a little bit more specific we already have to take into account _how_ people use their computers. And this is were things are done _wildly different_. As a consequence, people use keyboards differently and different use cases boil down to different requirements. Creating a product that has any chance to succeed means balancing things: A keyboard packed with features that few people use is bound to carry a price tag that will make it not attractive to all but those few people. To name the other extreme: If it can't do much it could be affordable by many - but would have to compete against legions of other boring, generic hardware.

Box opened (PNG)

Now I'm pretty much a snowflake if there is any and I'm aware of it. My use case is very far off from mainstream and so I'm not going to blame any company for not making a product that exactly fits my needs. You can see where this is going. I try to take "average Joe" into account but of course cannot entirely remain silent about the problems that the Cleave confronted me with. And well, there we are: While the classic TEK basically allowed for complete customization, the new one unfortunately doesn't. There are a few other issues as well, but they are pretty minor while this one really is the considerable step backwards for me. But lets talk about the good changes first, shall we?

Improvements

I loved the classic TEK for taking so many ergonomic aspects into consideration. The alternating higher or lower placement of the keys due to the human fingers not having the same length has been one of my favorite details. It's a small thing but I think it's genius. Now the Cleave model expands on that by introducing a split layout which is meant to provide even better ergonomics. I'm not in research, so I won't say whether it is true or not, but I can testify that it further increases comfort in typing. On the box they promised "the most comfortable keyboard on the planet". While I can't say that I love marketing speech I will admit that the company does have the right to be proud of their product and superlatives may even be justified.

The Cleave keyboard freshly unboxed (PNG)

The split design allowed for placing additional keys in the center which is a pretty big advantage compared to the classic TEK. I have no use for the 'copy', 'cut', 'paste' and 'undo' keys, but there's no harm in having them. And I can definitely see that other people may love them. Moving backspace and delete to the center so you can type them with your pointer finger instead of stressing poor pinky is an excellent choice. And placing _four_ keys (by default it's two space keys plus return and an additional shift) at the bottom to be pressed with the thumbs is just incredibly useful! Of course I make different use of them (more on that in a bit) but that of course requires having them in the first place. Also the lower 'ctrl' and 'alt' keys (next to the cursor or positional keys) are slightly bigger which is a very good design choice. Since they are _vertically_ longer it gives those keys a unique shape which is easy to detect blindly.

Another obvious improvement is that all the keys have optional backlight. The Cleave supports multiple brightness levels and comes with various profiles. So people who need the backlight will almost certainly be happy with the feature.

Then there's the optical infrared mechanical key switches. The box praises them for "Extraordinary feeling and great tactility", being "More reliable than any other key-switch" and having a "Superior lifespan guaranteed for 100 million keystrokes". The first is definitely true; I've used my share of different kinds of keys and being a typing enthusiast I do care for such things. As far as I'm concerned, the Cleave's key switches are nothing short of excellent. They allow for a great feeling while typing and indeed are perfectly reliable. I haven't used my keyboard long enough to say anything about the lifespan, though. The classic TEK models worked pretty well for me for several years, too, before both started occasionally missing strokes.

Other items that come with the keyboard: A double-sided manual sheet, a key picker and replacement keys (PNG)

There's also new features like being able to record macros - which I can't say anything about as I've not even tried to use it. There are people who need or want such things, though, so it makes sense to mention it.

(Small) flaws

Even more than the rest of the post this part is highly subjective. So keep in mind that these are things that bother _me_ and chances are that you are not even affected by what I think of as small flaws.

When I opened the box, the first thing that I noticed was the absence of the dust cover that the classic TEK came with. I actually liked that quite a bit and think that it's a bit of a pity that it is missing for the Cleave model. But that's a minor nitpick.

It didn't take too long (half a year or so?) before one key's cover started wearing off. Take a look at the 'F' and ';' keys two pictures below and you see what it looks like now if the backlight is turned on. While this is a little unexpected for a not exactly cheap keyboard, I'm not going to complain loudly. It's a purely optic thing that does not affect typing, so I don't care much. I don't look at the keys anyway and both are in the home row where my fingers cover them most of the time, anyway.

New Cleave with backlight on (PNG)

After a couple of days my oldest daughter asked me what the thing was with the new keyboard she had heard me mention to multiple people. When I wanted to show it to her it was evening, so I decided to turn on the backlight. It didn't work! Instead of the light turning on, I got two keys blinking blue a couple of times (probably indicating an error). That was an unpleasant surprise. Again it's not a feature that I use, so meh. It got me thinking that I should probably update the firmware, though. Which is my next point.

I found out that there's only a tool for _Windows_ available which really is a bummer. The classic TEK originally had support for Windows and macOS, neither of which I have access to. This made me install Windows 2000 on an old laptop (this is the last Windows version that I legitimately own, bought before I started reading EULAs and finding out that it's completely impossible for me to really use Windows ever again). Luckily not too much later Truly Ergonomic Inc. released a firmware flasher for Linux which I used multiple times until I was satisfied with my customized layout.

It's not cool that they decided to not continue this for the Cleave. While I understand that most of their users probably use Windows or macOS, those are proprietary platforms which I cannot use for various reasons. It looks like the company is aware of letting down Open Source people, so they asked Linux users who have no Windows at all to please go to a friend or relative. Well, I moved to a distant city to work. I don't know too many people here. And the people I know as well as my co-workers at work of course don't use Windows anymore! Therefore: No firmware update for me, unfortunately. That doesn't feel entirely right given that there's the tux logo printed on the box, indicating that the product is compatible with Linux.

Two key captions slightly worn off after almost three years usage (PNG)

Speaking of which: Technically the keyboard is. I just cannot update the firmware. Well, it works, doesn't it? Ahm, yeah - mostly. I don't work with Linux computers regularly anymore, so I don't know when it happened (things work fine on my OS). But with never versions of the Linux kernel the keyboard is getting turned off during boot. It works in the GRUB or Syslinux bootloaders but during the hardware probe of the kernel (I guess) it stops working. So to be able to log into the system I need to unplug the keyboard and then plug it into the USB socket again. Then it'll work. Another minor annoyance, but still. Could probably be fixed with newer firmware - but yeah.

Let's take a look at the actual keyboard next. It is different from the previous model concerning its layout - and while I can see why they made the changes they made, I don't approve of all of them. The most annoying one is that they chose to break key symmetry (my classic TEK was entirely symmetric): Above left shift there's an additional 'ctrl' key and above that one is tab. Both are long keys like the shift key. On the right side in their place there's four small keys: '[', '[', ''' as well as '\'. What is probably not a big deal for you was an actual shock for me: As hinted above, I need the additional modifier keys for my special layout - and of course I need they _for both hands_!

And finally there's the elephant in the room: No more custom firmware with the ability to re-program all the keys to achieve the perfect layout! I can imagine that not too many people did this, but I have become very much dependent on that feature. It missing from the Cleave means that despite its great improvements it's a step backwards for me. Again: This is me and you probably can do fine without it.

My workflow

Ok, to get an idea of what I do and why I'm having trouble, let me explain a little about how I'm using my computers. First: My operating system of choice. Most customers of Truly Ergonomic Inc. probably use Windows or macOS. Some certainly use Linux and I think it's great that they officially support it. My workstations and laptops run FreeBSD, though.

The GELI disk encryption passphrase prompt (PNG)

Most of their customers are probably used to QWERTY keyboards - I'm German, ours are QWERTZ. And worse: The vast majority probably stick with whatever their country's standard keymap is and a few will use well-known alternatives like Dvorak. I've learned touch-typing with my country's standard layout and then re-learned it twice. In the end I use an exotic one called _NEO Bone_ which uses 6 layers for advanced usage but requires additional modifier keys for that (e. g. to reach special characters, the whole Greek alphabet and such).

Again, most people will probably have used the classic TEK as-is or be fine with macros and such as the Cleave provides. I however have made extensive use of the custom firmware feature to re-map multiple keys...

FreeBSD's boot menu (PNG)

I require full disk encryption for my work-related machines and since it's so easy to do, I've gotten used to have it on my private laptops and even workstations as well. You can see the GELI prompt in the screenshot - this is extremely early in the boot process and there's no means to re-map keys, yet. However I'm required to type in a passphrase of about 30 characters once in the morning and - if I'm having bad luck - several times a night when I'm on call and need to boot the system to VPN into our data center to fix services on some server.

It's annoying me every single time (so pretty darn often since I switched from the TEK classic to the Cleave) that I cannot touch-type these long strings of gibberish but have to look at the keyboard because I have to use QWERTY. It's a real pain to do and has added to my reaction time at night (especially when I mistype at like 3 am and have to try again...).

System booted up and running in text mode (PNG)

Next is the boot menu. So this is still before the kernel is even read from disk and loaded into memory. Again no chance to re-map any keys at this point. When messing with kernel modules, using boot environments or fixing broken systems I need to work with the boot loader. Not being able to type properly there is a major nuisance. Of course recommendations like the ones on the homepage ("use 3rd party software such as AutoHotkey (for Windows) or Karabiner (for Mac) to fully customize your layout") is not exactly possible.

Finally when the system is up in text mode (yes, I prefer to start graphical mode manually on some systems), there _is_ a way to change layouts but it's a lot of work. I went through it once years ago for my old keymap and don't really want to do it again. *sigh*

Graphical mode: X11, 'awesome' window manager, some tiled instances of the 'sakura' terminal emulator running the 'tmux' terminal multiplexer and doing various tasks (PNG)

When X11 is up and running, I can use a .Xmodmap file that I have prepared so that _finally_ I can type as I like and am used to. I need to log in using QWERTZ, though, as I share some machines with my wife who attaches a normal keyboard. And when I pull the Cleave's plug from a running machine and temporarily attach it to another one, the custom layout is gone and needs to be set again (after logging in using QWERTZ again because most likely the screen lock has since kicked in).

Now I wouldn't complain if it had always been like that. But no: The classic TEK allowed me to flash a customized firmware on it which brought my self-designed layout with it. So whatever machine at whichever state of the system, I would just attach my TEK and be ready to start typing away! This was pure bliss - especially in retrospect. 😦

KeePassXC password safe in floating mode (PNG)

How I use the Cleave

Even though .Xmodmap lets me work *mostly* as I want to, there's more issues. I'm using a small tiling window manager called 'awesome'. It is brutally efficient, especially since you can control it all via the keyboard without ever having to reach for the stupid mouse. My configuration has 9 tags (think _workspaces_ even though it's not exactly the same). On tag 1 I usually have various local terminals open. Tag 2 is for browsers. On 3 I open my password safe and maybe music player or video player. Tag 4 is for messengers. On 5 I usually keep one or more instances of a file manager open. 6 is for IDEs including those for documentation like TeXstudio. Tag 7 is for misc other stuff (it's empty on the screenshots so there's no square there). Tag 8 holds email client and calendar application. And finally 9 is for remote SSH sessions and such.

It's all carefully organized and tailored to my needs. Key combinations to switch between tags, send windows somewhere else, close an application, change the tiling modes, make a window floating, change the size and such all are accessed with the 'super' key ("windows key") + something. On my old TEK I had re-mapped things to be able to use the 'Fn' key as that is in a central position and can be reached with both hands alike. With the Cleave this key is NOT usable (it's reserved to control the keyboard itself). This is extremely annoying and the other occasion where I hate that the symmetry is broken. When reaching for 'super' (next to 'Fn' on the right) with the left hand, I sometimes accidentally press other keys as well, especially if I'm in a hurry anyway. The distance to reach there is just a little to big to be comfortable.

Remember me complaining about the three long keys on the far left which have no equivalent on the right side? Shift is the first modifier key which lets me access the second layer of the layout. I need a second one, though, to access layer 3 (which is used very frequently as it holds all the common special characters) and a third one (but I use layer 4 rarely). The old TEK had 'ctrl' buttons right about shift on _both_ sides which was perfect. When I found the right 'ctrl' missing, it was a moment of shock for me. Having to reach down for the lower right 'ctrl' was out of the question, that's way too far off the home row for a modifier key. Those have to be reachable by the pinky _without_ having to take the other fingers off their default position. So what now?

Neo Bone overview of all 6 layers (on a classic keyboard, though): 'Umschalt' is German for 'Shift', 'Strg' is 'Ctrl' of course (PNG)

I admit that for a moment I thought I couldn't use the Cleave at all and would have to stick with my old TEKs (even though their missing key presses were starting to happen often enough to drive me crazy). The solution that I found sounded odd at first but I must say that I've come to like it: I'm using the 'Back-Tab' and 'Backspace' keys as the additional modifier. Of course I needed to re-wire my brain so that the pointer fingers press it when I need layer 3, but that was done reliably after only a couple of days. And I must say that it works pretty well. Not sure if I would want to go back to the previous way even if I could.

For the other central keys I re-mapped 'left space' to 'enter', 'central shift' to 'backspace', 'enter' to 'tab' (frequently needed for shell auto-completion) and 'right space' remains what it is.

The keyboard of my dreams

If Truly Ergonomic Inc. would bring the classic TEK back, that would be my choice of keyboard. I'd probably miss the split design and especially the additional thumb keys but I can't say how much. Most definitely not as much as I miss the firmware feature of completely customizable layouts. On the other side if that one missing feature were to come to the Cleave, I'd definitely go with it over the classic TEK (the center keys outweigh the disadvantage of being asymmetric - of course if I could also have both...).

But let's start dreaming! If I got a Cleave + customizable firmware + a _trackpoint_ (that little pointing device that e. g. thinkpad laptops have) in the middle for those occasions when you need a mouse after all, that would be my dream keyboard: No need to ever take the hands off the keyboard just to reach for the mouse. With such a unified input device, I'd gladly throw my mouse out of the window! Even if the model with the track point was 50 to 100 dollars more expensive, at least I wouldn't think twice.

Red trackpoint on an IBM keyboard (photo by Nils Schneider) (JPG)

I would also suggest opening up a future product a bit. It's absolutely ok if there is no expertise available in a company that would be needed to support more niche operating systems. But why not put the source code for the firmware update tool under an Open-Source license and upload it e. g. to GitHub? Even if it's Windows-only, the community is very likely to take care of porting it to Linux sooner or later.

An even greater achievement would be to declare the hardware _hacker friendly_ and let people experiment with alternative firmware. Of course flashing hardware with invalid firmware is known to sometimes "brick" devices. However some companies which wanted to go that route found a good solution to that thread by offering an additional active flashing module which is capable of restoring e. g. the factory default one even of devices which hold broken firmware. Of course hardware needs to be designed with such a feature in mind. Chances are that once people start playing with these keyboards they will come up with all kinds of weird / wonderful (depending on the individual perspective) features. Offering for example a forum where people can share their layouts, their firmware with additional capabilities and such can also help to build a healthy user community. Eventually the most popular new features could later be added into the official firmware with the original inventor getting an honorable mention on the homepage. Things like that which motivate people to not just buy and use a product but to participate.

Conclusion

The Cleave is a great piece of hardware which is worth its money. I would have liked to write a pure love letter again but unfortunately its older sibling has spoiled me so much that not even all the innovation of the Cleave managed to make me forget the greatest missing feature. It's still the best keyboard I know off currently and I'm not happy that it was discontinued. If you type a lot and care for your health - seriously consider getting one while they are still available. You will even get a nice discount.

If you are interested in my .Xmodmap file or a PDF with a table in which I mapped all the scan codes to the various keys, let me know. I can share those.

What's next?

When I first started to write that article in 2021, this part said that might write about Poudriere next. While it never happened I found myself needing to use that tool again just recently. So maybe it's time to get back to that, too? Afterwards I definitely plan to cover more CBSD.

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