mrflip / custommackeycaps

Custom Mac keycap templates for Cherry MX mechanical PC keyboard, in Adobe Illustrator format.

Custom Mac Keycaps

This is a set of keycap templates with Apple keyboard layout. They are designed for Cherry MX mechanical PC keyboards and based on Apple Keyboard with Numeric Keypad. With this keycap set and key mapping softwares, your mechanical PC keyboard not only function like a real Mac keyboard, but also look like one! (Actually it looks even cooler, ;-))

Vendors who build custom mechanical keyboards can use these templates to print custom keycaps, which can be installed on almost any Cherry MX mechanical keyboard. My personal favorite vendor is WASD Keyboards.

This work is licensed under Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License. Basically you can do whatever to it as long as not commercial use.

A Little Bit History

Back in November 2011, I was looking for a mechanical keyboard for my mac. However, it was so hard to find a perfect keyboard with mac layout back then. Finally I decided to create my own based on the work of a GeekHack user.

After I published the final result on my blog: Custom Mac Mechanical Keyboard — Let’s have some fun! and GeekHack, I received many positive feedbacks and requests for the template files. I initially hosted them on my blog. However, since my server crashes sometime, I decided to move them here from now on.

How To

1. Download the .ai files from this repository.
2. The two .ai files are pretty much the same except one has a "Pig King" logo on the space bar.
3. Feel free to modify it to fit your needs.
4. Go to your favorite vendor and create a keycap set based on the .ai file you chose. Use WASD Keyboard as an example, just go to this page and upload your .ai file.
5. Once you install the new keycaps on your keyboard, you need to map the keys to the labeled functions. I use Karabiner for that. The software used to be called KeyRemap4MacBook.
6. My configuration file for the key mapping is private.xml.

Other Alternatives

Nowadays, there are more and more native Mac mechanical keyboards. For example:

• Matias Tactile Pro 3: use ALPS switches, a little heavier than most Cherry switches.
• DAS Model S Professional for Mac: if you like Blue switch, this is probably best shot for now.
• Happy Hacking Professional 2: this is actually not a Cherry MX keyboard; instead, it has "Topre electrostatic capacitive switches". It supports Mac very well natively. I am currently using one and love it!

Pictures

• Layout file

• Layout file with Pig King

• Keycap Pictures