4 ms·

QWERTY is maybe more efficient (for english), but it is not as efficient as it could be. Unfortunately more efficient keyboard layouts are hard to establish.

by cryptos 11y ago

nwah1 11y ago
It isn't so hard to establish. Colemak and its variants are clearly among the most efficient out there, and there are plenty of metrics one can use to judge, such as finger travel distance, alternating distribution of right and left hand use, and concentration of the most commonly used characters on the home row. The problem is mainly that it isn't default, which can make it annoying unless you don't mind buying native colemak keyboards. Changing your caps lock key to a backspace provides most of the finger travel benefits of colemak with much less annoyance.
- nazgob 11y ago
  While its not default you can get it very easily on Linux and its ready on OSX, just need to pick it. No idea about Windows. For pair programming I use keyboard with hardware Colemak, my pp partner can use whatever that way ;)
  - nwah1 11y ago
    Yes, but now what happens when you need to use someone else's computer? It just makes life a little bit more annoying. De facto standards tend to be very important, so much so that the optimality of that standard is less important than the existence of a standard. I happen to use colemak, but I recognize it was not a rational decision.
    - nazgob 11y ago
      Perhaps I was not clean enough. When I use sb else computer for a longer time I bring my hardware Colemack keyboard with me. If its just a minute or two, I use my now lame touch typing qwerty skills, I'm much slower then Colemack but still faster then most of 'normal' people.
Johnny_Brahms 11y ago
You can be bi-keyboardial. On my home computer I use a modified version of swedish dvorak (svdvorak). I thought that since svdvorak isn't available anywhere I might as well go full obscure. I type almost as fast with qwerty, but vastly prefer not having to move my fingers that much. On a separate note: you don't have to be that smart to modify dvorak to something better. Just switching u and i and d and h brings a lot.

QWERTY is maybe more efficient (for english), but it is not as efficient as it could be. Unfortunately more efficient keyboard layouts are hard to establish.

by cryptos 11y ago

QWERTY is maybe more efficient (for english), but it is not as efficient as it could be. Unfortunately more efficient keyboard layouts are hard to establish.

nwah1 11y ago

It isn't so hard to establish. Colemak and its variants are clearly among the most efficient out there, and there are plenty of metrics one can use to judge, such as finger travel distance, alternating distribution of right and left hand use, and concentration of the most commonly used characters on the home row. The problem is mainly that it isn't default, which can make it annoying unless you don't mind buying native colemak keyboards. Changing your caps lock key to a backspace provides most of the finger travel benefits of colemak with much less annoyance.

nazgob 11y ago
While its not default you can get it very easily on Linux and its ready on OSX, just need to pick it. No idea about Windows. For pair programming I use keyboard with hardware Colemak, my pp partner can use whatever that way ;)
- nwah1 11y ago
  Yes, but now what happens when you need to use someone else's computer? It just makes life a little bit more annoying. De facto standards tend to be very important, so much so that the optimality of that standard is less important than the existence of a standard. I happen to use colemak, but I recognize it was not a rational decision.
  - nazgob 11y ago
    Perhaps I was not clean enough. When I use sb else computer for a longer time I bring my hardware Colemack keyboard with me. If its just a minute or two, I use my now lame touch typing qwerty skills, I'm much slower then Colemack but still faster then most of 'normal' people.

Johnny_Brahms 11y ago

You can be bi-keyboardial. On my home computer I use a modified version of swedish dvorak (svdvorak). I thought that since svdvorak isn't available anywhere I might as well go full obscure. I type almost as fast with qwerty, but vastly prefer not having to move my fingers that much. On a separate note: you don't have to be that smart to modify dvorak to something better. Just switching u and i and d and h brings a lot.