KMK is a feature-rich and beginner-friendly firmware for computer keyboards written and configured in CircuitPython. KMK is currently in public beta, however should handle almost all workflows without major issues.
You can always find the latest releases on our CDN, in compiled and
optimized and raw, hackable text
file forms. These follow the
master branch here on GitHub.
If you need support with KMK or just want to say hi, find us in #kmkfw:klar.sh on Matrix. This channel is bridged to Discord here for convenience.
If you ask for help on chat or open a bug report, if possible please give us your commit SHA, found by running
from kmk.consts import KMK_RELEASE; print(KMK_RELEASE)in the REPL on your controller.
KC.LWIN(KC.L) to lock the screen on a Windows PCComing (hopefully) soon: Bluetooth support! Stay tuned.
Start by grabbing a supported microcontroller. Broadly speaking, KMK supports any device CircuitPython does, but KMK requires a decent bit of RAM, and in general requires a working USB HID stack, which leads us to recommend the following controllers:
* The ItsyBitsy M4 Express is the only controller we currently support in non-handwired configurations, using our ItsyBitsy to Pro Micro converter PCB designed by @siddacious and @kdb424. It is our most-recommended MCU until the ItsyBitsy is updated with an nRF52840 chip
Some other controllers, such as the Feather M0 Express, are usable in reduced functionality modes and may require custom hackery. For example, @kdb424 uses a ItsyBitsy M0 Express as a barebones matrix scanner in a split keyboard configuration here. Use such controllers at your own risk.
Ensure CircuitPython 4.0.0 or newer is installed on your controller. We
recommend the latest stable version from
circuitpython.org. Flashing
instructions vary by device: all Adafruit boards can be flashed using their
instructions,
other boards generally have their instructions in the CircuitPython
repository under the
ports/atmel-samd/boards/<your board here> and ports/nrf/boards/<your board here> directories. If all else fails, consult your device's official
documentation.
Download the latest KMK release and
extract the zip to the USB drive exposed by CircuitPython, typically labeled
CIRCUITPY. Again, we'll defer to Adafruit's
documentation
on adding libraries to a CircuitPython installation. You should end up with a
folder called kmk and a file called boot.py, both living at the top of
this USB drive.
Define your keyboard in a file called main.py on this CIRCUITPY drive and
get tinkering! Examples of both handwired and ProMicro->ItsyBitsy converted
boards exist under the user_keymaps/ tree, and feel free to submit a pull
request of your own definitions! At this point, you'll want to look through
docs/ in the source tree to explore the functionality at your disposal.
Linux, BSD, and MacOS users can also make use of the
Makefileprovided in this source tree to flash KMK and a keymap usingrsync. This is advanced functionality outside the scope of this README, but it's documented in thedocs/tree.
KMK is primarily written and maintained by @klardotsh and @kdb424, but contributions are welcome from all, whether it's in the form of code, documentation, hardware designs, feature ideas, or anything else that comes to mind. KMK's contributors and other helpers are listed alphabetically by username below (we'll try to keep this up to date!):
While Adafruit employees and affiliates are included in the above list and their help has been crucial to KMK's success, KMK is not an official Adafruit project, and the Core team is not compensated by Adafruit for its development.
KMK uses Black with a Python 3.6 target and,
(controversially?) single quotes.
Further code styling is enforced with isort and flake8 with several plugins.
make fix-isort fix-formatting before a commit is a good idea, and CI will fail
if inbound code does not adhere to these formatting rules. Some exceptions are
found in setup.cfg loosening the rules in isolated cases, notably
user_keymaps (which is also not subject to Black formatting for reasons
documented in pyproject.toml).
All software in this repository is licensed under the GNU Public License, verison 3. All documentation and hardware designs are licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Contributions to this repository must use these licenses unless otherwise agreed to by the Core team.