flamingjupiter
commented
1 year ago Also, this isn't the best place to notify it but I don't know where I should do it or if I should just open a new issue, but there's an issue on the macro-release-cancel example of the documentation:
"E.g. in the example below, when holding the key, first 1 is typed, then replaced by ! after 500ms, and finally that is replaced by @ after another 500ms. However, if the key is released, the last character typed will remain and the rest of the macro does not run."
(defalias
;; macro-release-cancel to output different characters with visual feedback
;; after holding for different amounts of time.
1!@ (macro-release-cancel 1 500 bspc S-1 500 bspc S-2)
)The number 1 needs to be aliased (and therefore declared above/before the action alias) cause if not it will be treated as a delay instead of a character to be typed.
jtroo
gerhard-h
What I want is
the ability to use tap-hold and tap-dance actions to immediately send the key/action of the taps, instead of having a small delay on the tap-hold action and sending on timeout expiring/pressing another key/reaching tap limit on the tap-dance action.
mix taps and holds (hold at the end of the sequence): instead of having an action with 2 options, 1 tap or hold (tap-hold action) or an action with arbitrary number of taps (tap-dance action), allow for combinations of taps and the hold at the end. So, 1 tap could give letter a, 1 tap + hold (the "hold" on tap-hold, I'm counting the hold as a tap as well, but how you define them doesn't matter, it won't change the functionality) could give letter b, 2 taps = letter c, 2 taps + hold = letter d, et cetera.
If you use macros on the taps and holds of actions with the two possibilities/features above you could have blazing fast, no delay variable characters, just like you have on the macro-release-cancel action, but instead of continuously holding the key and waiting for the delays you configured on the macro, you'd control that with number of taps + hold.
Example of an use case: 1 tap = "S-9"; 2 taps = "bspc S-["; 1 tap + hold (one single tap that you don't release i.e. you keep it pressed, it becomes a hold) = "bspc ["; 2 taps + hold (tap once, hold on the second tap) = "(macro-release-cancel bspc S-' 200 bspc ')".
If you tap it once, you send (. Tap twice, erases the ( and sends {. Hold your first tap/long press, erases the { and sends [. Tap once and hold your second tap/long press, erases the [ and sends ", then, if you keep pressed until the delay on the macro-release-cancel action is over, it erases the " and sends '. With only two keys you could type very fast the () [] {} "" '' keys (in this specific example there'd even be space for other two characters on a possible macro-release-cancel of the second key).
Tap-hold possess a small delay on tap that messes with fast typing. Tap-dance activates only upon timeout expiring, pressing another key or reaching the tap limit. Even though it activates upon pressing another key so it won't interfere with fast typing, the option to choose between the current tap-dance implementation and the one I'm proposing would be nice, also it'd be faster when you're not continuously fast typing something (you'd have (fast) visual feedback, just like macro-release-cancel, but by tapping instead of holding until you get the desired character). Allowing immediate sending of the key would solve both problems.
As things are right now, it's not possible to mix tap-hold and normal keys on alphanumeric keys when fast typing because of that delay. Making all character keys + space + backspace a tap-hold action where the tap sends it's own original key and the hold does whatever is a possible solution, because now all typing keys have that delay, but that is really difficult to get used to. That delay makes what you see on the screen not match what you're doing with your fingers, leading to a lot of repetitions because you think you haven't pressed the key, at least on my experience.
That's what I want and "really need". But tap-hold, tap-dance and macro-release-cancel could be further improved. Example of other features/further improvement:
Send on key press/down, send on key release/up, send on both: what I'm asking for is the ability to immediately send keys upon key press on tap-hold and tap-dance actions. But that could be further improved and allow for a combination of sending on key press, key release, or both (besides what we currently have i.e. sending with a small delay on tap-hold and sending upon timeout expiring/pressing another key/tap limit on tap-dance). E.g.:
1 tap down = a ; 1 tap up = 1 ; 1 tap + 1 hold = alpha ; 2 taps down = b ; 2 taps up = 2 2 taps + 1 hold = beta .
Output if you tap once: "a1"; output if you tap once and hold: "aalpha" ; output if you tap twice and hold: "a1b2beta". These are all possible outcomes. Then one would choose (by any means, like specifying a variant action) the combination they'd prefer for their use case and set up the taps and holds accordingly i.e. instead of configuring like on my example it'd probably be more useful to put a macro with backspaces (and delays, if possible) to erase what you previously typed on the taps before your last one. There could be options for sending keys on the release of the hold and the release of the macro-release-cancel, though those would probably have very few use cases. Allow for arbitrarily having a hold on a "tap-dance sequence" would also be an improvement but I guess that would be pretty difficult to implement.
I was gonna say that the hold could be further improved by giving it functionality like the macro-release-cancel, but you can do that already, you just need to put a macro-release-cancel on the hold. Still, making the macro action be able to do more than keys, delays, chords would be a great improvement.