Remember the Keyboard Layout Editor .json file we saved earlier? Turns out that we can use it to generate a plate file! Let's make a simple stand-off based plate for our macropad. To get started, navigate to the ai03 Plate Generator site. Paste your KLE file into the text box.
Rotary encoders are a reliable, switch-debounce-safe method of detecting (believe it or not) rotary motion. Rotary encoders (aka quadrature encoders) have a number of uses outside of making your keyboard look cool--they have historically been used as part of a closed-loop motor control system as the speed/direction input device.
Embedded engineers bridge the gap between hardware and software. That means we need tools beyond our editor, compiler, and debugger. Oscilloscopes, multimeters, logic analyzers, hardware debuggers, and on and on. Here are my recommendations for the tools you can use to make embedded development easier! Note: All Amazon links in
Time to design something you can really hold in your hand! If you've been following along, you should have a cool macropad layout planned and footprints for everything you need. Click "Tools > Update PCB from Schematic." KiCAD should open up the PCB editor. Keep everything checked for now. If you
It's time to get into the best part of keyboard design--coming up with a cool idea and bringing it to life. By the end of this post, we should be ready to start our PCB layout for a pro micro based keyboard. To get started, lets play around with https: