Report: Apple planning dynamic keyboards for laptops


The Wall Street Journal:

Apple Inc. has teamed up with an Australian startup to turn the standard QWERTY keyboard into a blank slate.

The new keyboards will be a standard feature on MacBook laptops, and will be able to display any alphabet, along with an unlimited number of special commands and emojis, people familiar with the plans said.

The report claims this may be in store for 2018, so it's a ways off. The idea seems basically the keys will have programmable displays. The same keyboard could show multiple languages and be configured for special keys.

This could be cool feature, but practical too. For example, like you can get those little sticker sets specific for application shortcuts, here the keyboard could be configured to display these shortcuts when needed. The other big thing could be common commands, such as controlling iTunes, and special characters like emojis.