exxos blog - random goings on

[alexh]

no idea if they [MegaST keycaps] are compatible with ST keys for a simple swap

Unfortunately not without an adapter. They have a different switch design. These are Cherry (MX?) which is different to all other Atari key switches. Amiga guy Kipper2k has made some 3D printed adapters but I dunno how well they work.

[exxos]

Bizzare. Must be short on business. Not used them since 2005!

IIRC they charged per panel size. Not really cost-effective these days. Looking back they charged $150-$200 for a stencil which is madness these days.. Unless your buying in the UK then its normal

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[exxos]

I have been trying to get around to adding Atari keyboard keys to my store. It poses some slight challenges. Firstly I don't really want to create 100 key images. Aside from the time involved, I don't think loading another ton of images in the store is a good thing. It is getting rather long as it is.

The only option is to create a single image and then use it as a "css sprite sheet". This way I only need one picture of the keyboard. This also poses some slight problems because my web store will have to be adapted to process the sprite sheet as opposed to separate images. I do have an idea to change the code in the store so that if it receives coordinates in the image it will treat it as a sprite image and not a regular single image. I think that could potentially be the quickest and easiest way.

Problem then becomes I still end up "making" images anyway but I did ask the A.I. for help with that. So after a couple of "misunderstandings" I now have a test page where I can draw any size box around the keys and it will tell me the XYWH coordinates so I can use that information to extract keys from the image on the fly.

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The only slight problem with this is that Atari decided to make my life incredibly difficult by manufacturing angled keys as well

And now I am thinking it might just be easy to take images of every separate key than start altering scripts as undoubtedly would end up with some weird bugs somehow

I did wonder about just taking a picture of the keypad for example and just using that as a single image and putting in the description which key it is. They becomes a little bit of a problem with all the keys because if I list things like the top row of keys from 1-0 for example, I only have 320px width in my webstore images. So I might only be able to group something like five keys in one single image anyway.

I have fleetingly thought about other options like having a "show key" button for the images so users can just click on them to download and show the image if needs be. Though that would end up altering scripts anyway. I also considered one time to just auto hide the key section until it is clicked on, but then I would end up altering scripts again anyway I did wonder about just having one single image for the A-Z keys, but then if every image showed a "A KEY" letter, it would undoubtedly confuse the clowns in the world thinking that there is a mistake in the store because all the keys show the letter "A"

EDIT:

Taking images of the keys and then having to crop them and resize and whatnot 100 times over seem somewhat to soul destroying to me so I am thinking maybe a better solution would be to just list some generic keys in the store (one single image) and used the info link button in the store to open up a larger image where I can just highlight each key on a larger image. This would still involve 100 large images.. But maybe I can write a script which would highlight coordinates of the key on one single image in a small script. So I guess it depends how long that script takes to construct as opposed to just going with multiple images.

[exxos]

It's that time of the year when my chair snaps in half again but thankfully it went very wobbly so I got off it under my own power without landing in a heap on the floor. Good job, as I wouldn't be going to event as it hurts my back and arms otherwise.

So when I get home Monday night I'll 3D print a block where the piston goes in and I'll drill holes in the chair base to fix the block to. Not sure how long it will last. But I'll likely get a metal one made soon after.

[HigashiJun]

It's that time of the year when my chair snaps in half again but thankfully it went very wobbly so I got off it under my own power without landing in a heap on the floor. Good job, as I wouldn't be going to event as it hurts my back and arms otherwise.

So when I get home Monday night I'll 3D print a block where the piston goes in and I'll drill holes in the chair base to fix the block to. Not sure how long it will last. But I'll likely get a metal one made soon after.

You are the "chair man" of this forum after all..

[stephen_usher]

What on earth do you do on that chair which causes it fatigue failure?!

[exxos]

You are the "chair man" of this forum after all..

[exxos]

What on earth do you do on that chair which causes it fatigue failure?!

Sit on it I'm not even a big guy, just the usual bit of middle-aged spread

[stephen_usher]

You must fidget a lot!

[rubber_jonnie]

I've honestly never had a chair fail on me, other than the gas strut fail, I bet you're really having races on it and hitting corners hard, otherwise I don't know how you're breaking it