# Multiple layers?

**URL:** <https://community.keyboard.io/t/multiple-layers/401>\
**Category:** Programming\
**Created:** [October 10, 2017, 6:29am UTC](https://community.keyboard.io/t/multiple-layers/401 "2017-10-10T06:29:10Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 1\
**Showing post:** 24

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**Author:** ![Jennigma](https://yyz1.discourse-cdn.com/flex031/user_avatar/community.keyboard.io/jennigma/32/353_2.png) [@Jennigma](https://community.keyboard.io/u/Jennigma)\
**Post date:** [October 29, 2017, 4:41pm UTC](https://community.keyboard.io/t/multiple-layers/401/24 "2017-10-29T16:41:27Z")

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I agree that the wording doesn’t convey unambiguously.

My metaphor for the keymaps is like a kids picture book with transparent overlay pages, but of course that fails because with a keymap stack you can apply each layer independently without the ones below it, while in a picture book if you are looking at layer 3 then layers 1 and 2 are also active.

A metaphor of a stack of layers with toggle switches would more closely reflect the design than my picture book, so I see the merit of “Toggle.”

However, the metaphor is a bit weak it the sense that it doesn’t evoke a physical analog, and so isn’t viscerally compelling for folks. No one is likely to have an “aha” moment about toggle switches and layers. It’s more correct but less evocative.

I will noodle. What comes immediately to mind is Russian dolls, with the inner doll being zero and the ability to surround zero with an arbitrary set of larger dolls in a fixed order, but adding the third dimension muddles things.

I can imagine transparencies on a pivot that can be rotated in and out independently, but can’t think of a real world object that works that way. Has to be something.

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