One Button Keyboard

This was a quick project I put together this weekend.

I’m not entirely sure why I made it, and I have no idea what it is for!

However, it was very satisfying to design and print a neat little case to precisely fit the button and the controller.

The keyboard appears to Windows as a standard PC keyboard, the only difference being that there is only one key. I programmed it to type “:facepalm:” so that I can quickly type that emoji in Slack. I could have gone for anything but that seemed to sum up just what a pointless project this is.

With hindsight, perhaps this would have been better suited to being a Midi Controller. At least, you could use it to play a single drum! That might give a bit of a hint of another project that I’ve currently got in the works.

The keyboard is an Arduino Pro Micro in a custom 3D printed case. I also made a snap-fit base for the case, which isn’t shown in any of the pictures. The button is a Sanwa Arcade Button clone. It is lower profile than a normal Sanwa button, so I also made a slightly taller case that can fit a genuine Sanwa button.

Thingiverse design files are here