Timing issues with tap mapping [question]

[skatterwe]

Hello,

I'm trying to configure my keyboard and it does what it is supposed to do, but looks like i'm typing faster than the tap is executed.

So what happens is, that in stead of "das ist ein test" i'm seeing: "da sis tein tets". All letters are very close so I most likely type them super fast.

Do I have the chance to solve my setup with expressions instead of the layer approach and make it faster responding? So instead of activating this layer on long press, just have an expression putting this into a register and based on that i will execute my macro. I'm hoping that this would make it obsolete to have a mappig for the same letter on tap.

the things i've tried with expressions just failed badly. So I thought I would ask for help instead.

here is my config:

also the left gui to left control map, seems like it is not always picked up if i use it together with other keys (cmd+a) for example. I see first one or two times an a typed and then everything is selected if i force myself to do it very slowly.

Any suggestions on how I could improve the setup?

[skatterwe]

I had a look at the expression builder and started with something super simple:

0x00070016 input_state_binary
hold_state
123
0
ifte
1 store

and

0x00070016 hold_state
123
0
ifte
1 store

and then have a mapping that uses register 1 to display macro 2. but nothing happens.

[jfedor2]

Not sure if I'm getting everything you're trying to do, but it seems that the issue is that when you type fast, you press the next key before you release the previous key. It's perfectly normal of course, everyone types like that, the problem is that, by necessity, a tap mapping triggers the input only on key release. So let's say you have mappings like this:

Then if you're trying to type A-space, you press A, press space, release A, release space. But what comes out is this series of events: space pressed, A pressed, A released, space released. Which results in space-A instead of what you wanted. HID Remapper can only send the "A pressed" input when you release A, because only then it knows if you're doing a tap or a hold.

You can try a trick like this. This works for me. I'm not sure if you will be able to use it once you add the rest of your configuration.

The trick is based on the fact that even when you have tap and hold mappings for some key, you can still have a vanilla non-tap, non-hold mapping as well. In this case I'm using it to activate layer 3, which has the "unmapped inputs passthrough" flag disabled. This means that whenever A is held, layer 0 is no longer active and on layer 3 pressing space does nothing. This way even when you press space before you release A, it doesn't send the space input yet, it only starts sending space after you release A (which sends A because of the tap mapping). This way the inputs come out in the indended order.

However this depends on the special layer 0 mechanic, where it deactivates whenever other layers are active.

I don't see an obvious generic solution to this right now. Though we should be able to replicate the layer 0 logic on other layers using expressions.

[jfedor2]

Regarding your question about hold_state, HID Remapper only keeps the hold state for inputs that have a mapping with the "hold" flag set and that input set as input. You can add a dummy S -> Nothing mapping with the "hold" flag set and then you should be able to fetch the hold state from an expression. (This is something I should fix.)

[skatterwe]

Hey @jfedor2 thanks a lot for your response.

So maybe as a background, I'm trying to find a configuration to mirror the macOS keyboard behaviour on a windows machine. Especially the accent menu and the cmd/ctrl mapping. I love working with the English layout but I need some special chars from time to time and the way macOS handles this is just brilliant. The CMD mapping was more than straight forward. The accent menu took me a bit. I got it working in the end using various layers (one for each special character key i wanted to support - a,e,o,u,s).

I did some more tests with expressions after I found your expression builder. After realising I needed this basic mapping so that hold_state and tap_state works, I got one working for one key. But the timing thing remained. So I just postponed further investigations and waited if you might answer.

Your suggestion that the timing is not the calculation of the mapping but rather me not releasing the key sounds very reasonable. I'm not sure if I understood on the first read what the solution with layer 3 will be like but I will have a go and let you know. I will also check where I saved the initial layer config and can paste it, might help in showing what I'm trying to do.

One thing I'm still not too sure about. Is it ok to implement something like this with layers? Or should I rather do some expressions/registers? Is there any pro/cons on those approaches for that type of use case?

[skatterwe]

PS and thanks for your project. it is brilliant!

[skatterwe]

I'm not a 100% sure if I understand why this unmapped layer will do a trick. I tried to configure it the way you did. As I need quite some layers for those letters (a,e,o,u,s) and one layer to toggle the behaviour overall, I tried to do the following:

layer 2 => toggle overall macos mapping
layer 1 => default layer that will have the checkbox setting removed "unmapped input passthrough on layer"
layer 3+n for the macro mapping

this is how it lookes:

hid-remapper-config (1).json

unfortunately the behaviour is still the same. but maybe I missed a detail.

could it have something todo with the tap being set to 500ms? I need it to be a bit longer than the initial value.

[skatterwe]

btw i was just able to reproduce by typing slowly. it looks definitely like the issue is the key being released after the other was pressed. just not too sure why your workaround doesn't work.

[skatterwe]

If I switch the main mapping to be on layer 0 like this it seems to work:

i will add the rest of the setting later and check if everything works as expected.