Upon closer inspection, the issue with my keyboard wasn't firmware, hardware, or software, it was just that I had plugged it into an HDMI port.

@foone how... do you DO that?!

@indigoviolet in the dark

@foone when the light is running low

@foone HDMI keyboard when

(I mean theres an I2c channel so why not)

@cinebox @foone yeah very doable ;D

@foone @cinebox keyboard over HDMI CEC

@root @cinebox there's also HDMI cables that carry ethernet. maybe I could do my keyboard-over-UDP over that?

I think the firmware is also broken, because it turns out I can right click from my keyboard, but only once.

to be able to right click again, I have to disconnect and reconnect it.

maybe I should buy a 30 pack of raspi picos and program them each as a keyboard that types one hardcoded letter, and nothing else.

then to type out "hello world" I just have to plug in the USB cables one by one in the right order

@foone what about one keyboard that you unplug and re-plug over and over until the desired phrase is typed?

@kasdeya ooh, just make it count the insertion attempts!

@foone exactly! I don’t know if a keyboard’s microcontroller has non-volatile storage that you could use to track which insertion number it’s on, but it’d be a fun concept

edit: oh wow a raspi pico has a lot of stuff actually. these things are crazy featureful for how cheap and small they are

@foone @root @cinebox X11 FTW

@foone @cinebox @jbqueru what does X11 have to do with any of this

@root @foone @cinebox It's a great way to carry keyboard, mouse, and display information, all over Ethernet.

@jbqueru @root @foone not sure an entire computer running an X server really counts as a "keyboard"

@foone @cinebox @jbqueru fair enough I guess

@root @foone @cinebox I can sense the disappointment in not having to re-invent that wheel.

But then again we could simply plug the keyboard into the right port.

@cinebox @jbqueru @root and why not?

keyboards have always been little computers, they might as well keep getting bigger and bigger and bigger

@foone Add one more to be the shift key

@negative12dollarbill good idea

@Unlikelylass that takes some doing! how?

@foone

it me in picture, I no like

@Truck @foone Miss the era where you pretty much couldn't plug things in the wrong port.

@lanodan @foone

well, you know, American

So that is definately not a thing that happened there

"This is a 9 pin joystick obviously it goes in the vga port" "no it does" "computer why you not accept joystick" "computer why you break my joystick" "oh I may need caffiene for brain to operate"

@Truck @foone Also RCA connectors in the wrong port but I think that was pretty rare on computers where so far I've more seen RGB-DIN → SCART, S-Video, 13W3*, VGA, DVI/HDMI/DisplayPort/…

*Which seems annoyingly vendor-dependent in terms of signal, deserves the 13 in the name I guess

@lanodan @foone @Truck my favorite was the laptop where the power cable could also be plugged in to the PS/2 port.

(Nothing exploded)

@ShadSterling @foone @Truck Scary.

*points at USB-C charging port on laptop* Hey we can do that safely now!

@ShadSterling @lanodan @Truck yikes

they should have made it work, though. that'd be stupid and slick in equal amounts.

@lanodan @Truck @ShadSterling usb-c is neat because now we're down to 2 connectors.

as soon as we can merge HDMI with usb-c, we'll be home free and only ever need one cable forever

@foone someone did a similar thing with floppy disks

insert the disks corresponding to the letters you want in order

@CauseOfBSOD that was me