Tuesday, January 14, 2020

Keyboard Cleaner

Jan Lehnardt’s Keyboard Cleaner is a tiny free app for macOS that does one thing only: it locks the keyboard for easy cleaning. Open the app to lock; quit (⌘-Q) to get going again. I’m intent on keeping my MacBook Air’s keyboard from developing a greasy shine, so I wipe the keys on occasion with a spritz of distilled water on a microfiber cloth. (Don’t laugh.) Keyboard Cleaner makes this slightly obsessive task easier to manage.

The strangest synchronicity I’ve ever encountered online: yesterday I posted a photograph of a decades-old box of typewriter correction film. The random letters typed on the film visible in the photograph: ploks. I thought that would make a nicely cryptic blog description line. I typed it in. When I went to the page for Keyboard Cleaner this morning, I was startled by the URL. Look closely:

jan.prima.de/~jan/plok/archives/48-Keyboard-Cleaner.html

Jan’s explanation, on the same page: “plok — It reads like a blog, but it sounds harder!”

comments: 6

Geo-B said...

plok plok fizz fizz, oh what a relief it is!

Michael Leddy said...

Yes, I remember it well. It’s amazing to me that once upon a time people could get Alka-Seltzer at a soda fountain.

shallnot said...

At first I thought that’s a good program to use as you don’t need to turn off your machine. But then I realized: my solar keyboard has an on/off switch…

Steven

Michael Leddy said...

And I just learned that there is such a thing — I had no idea.

shallnot said...

Mine is by Logitech and is Mac specific. It has the same sort of “Chiclet”-style keys as Mac keyboards but those keys have a resistance and travel to them unlike the Apple keyboards. It’s wireless although I believe there are Bluetooth ones available that allow pairing with up to three iPads, iPhones, and Macs (laptop and desktop).

Michael Leddy said...

Oh, those Apple keyboards. I find that I mind my MBA’s keyboard less than I expected to. But the keyboard that goes with the iMac, which I’ve used only in libraries, I find impossible. Best keyboard I’ve used: the one on my Apple //c.