for a curved knife like a boning knife
you rotate the knife as you hone, to keep the contact points parallel to the store
back in my Stone Age i had a piece of leather that i glued to a block of wood
and used a green ' sock ' on it to deposit rubbing compound
on the leather the stick had a binder + rubbing compound mixed in
razor sharp was the result the rubbing compounds were color coded so to speak.
fun at the time for years now EdgePro takes over for me w excellent results