Tonewise update: keyboard controls

Posted on Friday, Apr 5, 2024

Just a quick update on Tonewise, the musical web app I announced a few days ago.

The main tone wheel component now supports keyboard controls, so you can use the app without needing a mouse or touchscreen.

The browser's standard Tab and Shift+Tab keyboard shortcuts will move focus to segments of the wheel that are active in the current scale, and you can trigger the focused note with the space bar or enter key.

A screenshot of the tone wheel with the D note highlighted to indicate that it has keyboard focus

When the wheel has keyboard focus, you can also use the arrow keys to move focus to the next or previous note without the focus "escaping" to a nearby button, as it would with Tab. When you want to leave the wheel, you can use Tab or Shift-Tab to move to the next focusable element.

As an unexpected bonus, it's now possible to trigger two notes at the same time on a laptop without multi-touch. By triggering one note with the keyboard and another with the mouse, you can now play a little two-note chord. You can see what I mean in the short video below: