Question about keyboard for cnc build

I've got one of these denford desktop / desk-top tutor keyboards too.

robertspark wrote: I've got one of these denford desktop / desk-top tutor keyboards too.

14 x 8 matrix, so I guess that it might be straight-wired to the 25-pin D-sub.

But if it is, it can't be a parport pinout.

I would think that burying a 7i73 inside would be one answer, but an arduino or similar would be cheaper.

8 x 14 matrix (112 buttons available)

as can be seen there is a 22 pin I/O interface (8x14 matrix??) from the keyboard to the microcontroller.

I will see if I can get the ASCII codes for each of the buttons in the matrix.

I have thought about an arduino micro ATmega32u4 as it has a built in keyboard emulator capability..... but that may interfear with keyboard shortcuts?? in LinuxCNC

Pokeys 57U and Teensy are also similar keyboard emulator options.

I'll see if I can get the ASCII codes as I'd like to have a neat solution available as a cnc keyboard for shortcut buttons.

{early days for me + linuccnc, still learning about hal at the moment}

robertspark wrote: I have thought about an arduino micro ATmega32u4 as it has a built in keyboard emulator capability..... but that may interfear with keyboard shortcuts?? in LinuxCNC

One reason to like the 7i73 in this application is that the button presses stay in the realtime layer until you deliberately link them to user-space.

There are ways to achieve the same thing with a uC but I think that you would lose that with keyboard emulation..