Try it here

Your keyboard is the instrument. Press keys on the digits, QWERTY, ASDF and ZXCV rows, or click the keys below. If nothing happens, click the page once first.

The sound here comes from a small synthesizer built into this page. The program itself makes no sound: it sends MIDI notes to the synthesizer you choose. Keys are identified by position, not by the letter printed on them, so the layouts are the same on AZERTY, QWERTZ or Dvorak.

What it does

• Two instruments, three layoutsA piano, and a chromatic button accordion in the B system or the C system. The layouts are fixed, on the 45 small keys of the four main rows.
• One instrument per keyboardPlay the piano on your laptop and the accordion on a USB keyboard, at the same time. Every keyboard is told apart from the others.
• Exclusive modeWhile a keyboard is an instrument its keys only play. They no longer type in any other program.
• Position, not lettersKeys are identified by where they are, so the layouts are the same on QWERTY, AZERTY, QWERTZ, Dvorak and so on.
• Plays in the backgroundKeep a DAW or plugdata in front and play. A Bluetooth keyboard that sleeps and wakes up starts playing again without a click.
• MIDI outA virtual port called Keynortia on Linux and macOS, or any MIDI port that already exists. On Windows that means loopMIDI or the Microsoft GS Wavetable Synth.
• On-screen keyboardIt lights up the keys you press, with the name of every note (Do Re Mi or C D E). Octave shift, velocity and MIDI channel are there too.
• One small native programWritten in Rust, with a terminal-inspired look in the Etruscan style. It never connects to the internet.

The program

Piano

Button accordion · B system

The keyboards in the screenshots are made up.

Install

Download the file for your system from the Releases page. SHA256SUMS has the checksum of each file.

One thing to do once on Linux

Linux keeps the input devices for members of the input group. Add yourself to it, then log out and back in (or reboot). If you forget, Keynortia tells you, with this very command, when you start it.

Hearing it

Keynortia sends MIDI. A synthesizer makes the sound. Pick the Output in the program, then press Test note: you should hear a middle C.

• Linux: Keynortia opens a virtual port called Keynortia. Pick your synthesizer's port in the Output list, or connect the virtual port to it with your DAW, qpwgraph or aconnect. FluidSynth with a General MIDI soundfont is a quick one to try.
• Windows: leave the Output on Microsoft GS Wavetable Synth for a first test. To reach another program, install the free loopMIDI, create a port, and enable the same port in that program.
• macOS: start Keynortia first, then enable Keynortia among the MIDI inputs of the program that makes the sound.

Status

Keynortia is at version 0.1. Linux is the main platform and the one that has been tried on real keyboards. Windows and macOS are new: they are built and tested automatically on every change, but they have seen little use on real machines, above all the exclusive mode. If something does not work, please open an issue and say which system, which keyboard and what the window says.

Quick start

1. Start Keynortia. The window has three parts: the MIDI settings at the top, the list of your keyboards, and the on-screen keyboard at the bottom.
2. Make sure something is listening. Press Test note. You should hear a middle C.
3. Tick “Use as instrument” on the keyboard you want to play. An external keyboard is the comfortable choice: the keys of the keyboard you switch on stop typing.
4. Pick the instrument: Piano, or Button accordion in the B or the C system.
5. Play on the digits, QWERTY, ASDF and ZXCV rows. The on-screen keyboard shows the note of every key. To stop, untick “Use as instrument” with the mouse. Closing the window frees the keyboards too.

If your only keyboard is the one you are playing, keep the mouse at hand. With Exclusive on, the keys of that keyboard cannot type anything else. Untick “Use as instrument”, or close the window, and it types again.

What it looks at

A program that reads keys should say what it does with them.

• No networking codeKeynortia never connects to the internet and sends nothing anywhere.
• Keys become notes, nothing elseIt keeps no log and writes nothing to disk, apart from the keyd configuration if you ask it to free a keyboard on Linux.
• Only the keyboards you switch onIt acts on those keyboards only, and only on their 45 small keys. Everything else you type passes through untouched. The details for each system are in the manual.
• Open source, built in the openThe releases are built by GitHub Actions from the tagged source, and SHA256SUMS lets you check the files you downloaded.

About the name

1. Livy, Ab Urbe Condita 7.3.7, English translation by Canon Roberts (1912): Perseids.
2. William Smith (ed.), A Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology, entry Nortia: Perseids.
3. Nortia on Wikipedia, which lists the ancient sources and the modern studies.
4. Etruscan alphabet on Wikipedia. Keynortia is a modern name, so its Etruscan letters are a transliteration, not a spelling an Etruscan would have used.