Unlocking the full potential of the Aula L99 touchscreen — custom widgets, dynamic displays, and a Stream Deck-like experience, built by the community.
The Aula L99 is a mechanical keyboard featuring a built-in 3.98" IPS touchscreen (320×480). Out of the box, it supports GIF/image uploads, a calculator, a numpad, media controls, and LED management — all through the official AULA driver.
But the screen is capable of so much more.
This project aims to reverse engineer the USB communication protocol between the AULA driver and the L99, and build an open-source software layer on top of it — enabling fully custom, dynamic widgets on the keyboard's touchscreen.
Think: Spotify now playing, Discord status, system stats, weather, custom macros — all displayed and interactive, directly on your keyboard.
The L99's touchscreen has the surface area and resolution to act as a mini Stream Deck built into your keyboard. No extra device, no extra desk space. Just your keyboard, doing more.
What we want to build:
- 🎵 Media widget — current track, artist, album art from Spotify / Apple Music
- 💬 Discord widget — voice channel status, mute/deafen toggle, notifications
- 📊 System stats — CPU, GPU, RAM usage in real time
- 🌤️ Weather widget — local forecast at a glance
- ⚡ Custom macro buttons — tap to trigger shortcuts, launch apps, run scripts
- 🚀 App launcher — tap to bring any window to the foreground or launch it, on screen 1 or 2
- 🎨 Fully customizable layouts — multiple pages, drag, resize, theme your widgets
This project started from a very concrete frustration.
Picture a dual-monitor setup: a 32" main display and a 13" secondary screen. At any given time, there are 6–8 apps open — Discord, Spotify, a browser, League of Legends, Blitz.gg, a video tutorial, a work project. Switching between them means Alt+Tab, losing focus, breaking flow.
The obvious solution is a tablet as a secondary touch panel — a Galaxy Tab, an iPad. In practice: lag, unresponsive touch when used as a second screen, and yet another device taking up desk space.
The L99 already sits on the desk. It already has a touchscreen. Why not use it?
Here's what the ideal setup looks like in practice:
- 🎮 While playing League of Legends — tap Blitz.gg to pull up champion stats on screen 2, tap Discord to bring up a friend's screen share, tap Spotify to skip a track — all without Alt+Tab, all without ever leaving the game
- 💼 While working — a custom layout with quick-launch buttons for the exact tools needed for that project, switching profiles between "gaming mode" and "work mode" with a single tap
- 🎵 Always — current track visible at a glance, one tap to skip, no need to switch windows
This is the problem a $300 Stream Deck solves — as a separate device, on an already crowded desk. The L99's built-in touchscreen could solve it more elegantly, at no extra cost, with no extra space.
That's what this project is building toward.
The keyboard-with-screen market has exploded in 2024–2025, but existing products fall into distinct categories — each with limitations:
| Keyboard | Screen | PC control | Open ecosystem |
|---|---|---|---|
| Ajazz AKP815 | 4.95" grid of 15 fixed LCD buttons | Per-button images via HID | ❌ Partial |
| Ajazz AKP846 | 10.1" extended display (USB monitor) | Full OS-level display | ❌ DisplayLink |
| Ajazz AK650 / AK35I V3 | 0.85"–1.14" TFT info display | GIF upload only, offline after | ❌ Closed |
| AULA L99 | 3.98" free canvas, fully tactile | Pixel-level, real-time via COM | 🔶 This project |
The L99 is the only keyboard where the screen accepts a full custom JPEG over a serial port in real time, with no fixed grid, no locked layout — and nobody has documented how to do this without the official driver. Until now.
Our Wireshark captures are the first public documentation of the L99 screen protocol. No GitHub repo, no forum thread, no prior art exists for VID EEEF / PID 268A on a COM port for this device. We are starting from zero — and we have already made significant progress.
AULA's own team confirmed that custom widget development is technically achievable — it's just not something they've exposed through their official software.
| Component | VID | PID | Interface type |
|---|---|---|---|
| Keyboard (keys, RGB, macros) | 0C45 (SONiX) |
800A |
USB HID |
| Screen | EEEF |
268A |
USB Serial (COM port) |
The L99 exposes two separate USB devices when connected. The keyboard and screen communicate independently. This is a key architectural finding: the screen is not controlled through the keyboard's HID interface — it has its own dedicated serial channel.
Two Wireshark captures have been analyzed (captures/capture_red_picture.pcapng and captures/capture_complex_picture.pcapng). Key findings:
Image transfer format (confirmed):
[64-byte header]
Bytes 00–04 : 12 34 56 78 02 ← Magic signature + command type (0x02 = send image)
Bytes 05–07 : 00 00 00 ← Padding
Bytes 08–11 : [height, LE 32bit] ← e.g. E0 01 00 00 = 480px
Bytes 12–15 : [width, LE 32bit] ← e.g. E0 01 00 00 = 480px
Bytes 16–55 : 00 × 40 ← Padding
Bytes 56–59 : 02 00 00 00 ← Unknown (possibly quality/type)
Bytes 60–63 : [JPEG size, LE] ← Exact byte count of the following JPEG
[JPEG data]
ff d8 ff e0 ... ← Standard JPEG, no modification
Refresh trigger (confirmed): After the image transfer, a HID SET_REPORT command is sent to the keyboard device (0C45:800A) to trigger the display refresh. The screen does not update until this command is received.
Magic bytes origin: The signature 12 34 56 78 does not match any known ecosystem (not Turing Smart Screen ef 69, not Ajazz/Mirabox HID). This is an AULA/SONiX proprietary protocol with no prior public documentation.
| Feature | Status |
|---|---|
| Image push to screen | ✅ Documented |
| Touch input events (tap X/Y coordinates) | ⏳ Not captured yet |
| Screen brightness control | ⏳ Not captured yet |
| Screen on/off command | ⏳ Not captured yet |
| Navigation between pages (official driver UI) | ⏳ Not captured yet |
Keyboard RGB commands (0C45:800A side) |
⏳ Not captured yet |
| Refresh trigger command (exact bytes) | 🔶 Partially identified |
- ✅ Identify VID/PID of all exposed USB devices
- ✅ Capture image push traffic (2 captures analyzed)
- ✅ Decode image transfer format and magic bytes
- ⏳ Capture touch input events (next priority)
- ⏳ Capture brightness, on/off, and other screen controls
- ⏳ Capture keyboard-side HID commands (RGB, macros)
- Send a custom JPEG to the screen using
pyserial, without the official driver - Read touch coordinates from the COM port
- Trigger the HID refresh command via
hidapi
- Build a lightweight app that renders widgets as JPEGs and pushes them to the screen in a loop
- Map touch zones to actions (tap → launch app, skip track, mute Discord, etc.)
- Integrate with public APIs: Spotify Web API, Discord RPC, OpenWeatherMap, etc.
- Design a simple config system for widget layout and profiles
You don't need to be a developer to contribute. Here's what we need right now, in priority order:
📸 If you have an L99 and can run Wireshark (highest priority): We need captures of specific interactions:
- Tapping different areas of the screen (we need touch event packets)
- Changing screen brightness in the official driver
- Navigating between pages in the official driver menu
- Any other interaction with the screen in the official software
See docs/capture-guide.md for step-by-step instructions on how to capture with Wireshark + USBPcap.
🐍 If you know Python + USB/HID:
Help write the initial pyserial bridge to push images to the screen. The image format is documented — we just need the code.
🔬 If you have an AULA F75 MAX:
The F75 MAX uses the same keyboard VID/PID (0C45:800A). Do your Wireshark captures show a similar 12 34 56 78 magic bytes sequence for the screen? Sharing your captures could confirm whether the screen protocol is shared across AULA models.
🎨 If you're good at UI/UX: Design the widget layout interface, icon sets, themes.
📝 If you just have ideas: Open an issue and describe the widget you'd want. Community input shapes what gets built first.
The following Wireshark captures are available in the captures/ directory:
| File | What it contains | Status |
|---|---|---|
capture_red_picture.pcapng |
Sending a solid red 320×480 JPEG to the screen | ✅ Analyzed |
capture_complex_picture.pcapng |
Sending a complex image 320×480 to the screen | ✅ Analyzed |
More captures will be added as the protocol is mapped.
| Project | Description |
|---|---|
| F75_Initializer | Screen initialization for AULA F75 MAX — same keyboard VID/PID as L99 (0C45:800A) |
| aula-rgb-controller | Complete RGB controller for AULA F87 TK — 191 commits, full protocol docs in C |
| Aula-F87-Controller | Protocol documented, Python CLI + WebHID app for AULA F87 |
| OpenRGB issue #5166 | Complete wireless protocol reverse engineered for AULA F99 |
| aegis-2067usb | Open-source custom software for AULA F2067 — protocol fully documented |
| win-68-he-tool | Local copy of official AULA web driver in readable JavaScript |
| Rangoli | Open-source RK keyboard software via USB reverse engineering |
| turing-smart-screen-python | Python library for USB serial screen devices — similar architecture, different protocol |
| OpenRazer | Community Razer driver for Linux — proof that this model works at scale |
| Elgato Stream Deck | The gold standard for what keyboard-adjacent widgets can look like |
| Spec | Value |
|---|---|
| Screen | 3.98" IPS touchscreen |
| Resolution | 320 × 480 px |
| Connection | USB-C (wired) |
| Keyboard USB device | VID 0C45 / PID 800A (SONiX chip) |
| Screen USB device | VID EEEF / PID 268A (COM serial port) |
| Screen protocol | Serial, magic bytes 12 34 56 78, JPEG payload |
| OS support | Windows only (official driver) |
| Driver download | soaidriver.com |
This project was started by a user who wanted a keyboard that could do more — not a developer. If you're in the same boat, you're in the right place.
- 💬 Discussion: GitHub Issues — share ideas, ask questions, post captures
- 🧵 Reddit thread: [link to be added]
MIT — free to use, modify, and distribute.
The Aula L99 has the hardware. Let's build the software.
