OP here. You definitely need to be very familiar with your keyboard for this to be a fun experience. Even switching to a slightly different key layout would throw me off. As long as you're a proficient touch-typist, it's really not a problem.

To see your keyboard, I can imagine a few hacks but all of them are a bit awkward:

- Have a "keyboard cam" that only shows you the keyboard (and your hands when they're over it) displayed at some natural spot in the VR.

- Have a keyboard with capacitive sensing keys, reproduced in the VR with keys highlighted as a function of the proximity or contact with your fingers.

- Something like this [1]. Typing in thin air or on a table probably wouldn't work very well, but if the leap motion senses the keyboard as well as your hands, and the whole thing is reproduced in the VR, that might work.

[1]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TRhoQ6o4mI8#t=142

On the DK2, you can look down at the bottom edges/corners and see out the, I'm guessing, airholes.

if it's < 10 minutes you could remove your headset temporarily, or you could leave some space between your face and the oculus rift to glance down. You can also mount a fisheye webcam on your head and transparently overlay it on the world when needed.