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Ask HN: Examples of well done keyboard-driven interfaces?

There was a recent tweetstorm that went around the internet about how computers in the 80s were perceptually faster than modern computers[1]. I'm not interested in arguing for or against this claim, but the author made the claim that keyboard driven interfaces are more user friendly than mouse driven ones. I'm inclined to believe this for many application types, particularly data entry and retrieval, which is probably the majority of business software out there, but I'm not familiar with any good, relatively modern[2] applications done in this style. So does anyone on HN have examples they can share? Ideally something I could try out and use. [1]: https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/927593460642615296 [2]: Not modern in the sense of "modern javascript" or "modern c++", but just meaning still maintained or made within the past few years.

pwg 9y ago
Modern? Both vi and emacs are "still maintained" and are both keyboard driven interfaces that huge numbers of individuals consider good. You can try out both on most Linux distributions. Other examples from Linux/Unix systems are the Joe editor, which ships with configuration files to emulate several other keyboard driven editors. Also the "less" file viewer, as well as the "mutt" email client and the "tin" usenet news reader. All are also "still maintained". For less modern, WordStar and Visicalc and Lotus123 all had fully keyboard driven interfaces. Lotus123 added menus and such in later incarnations but retained the keyboard driven interface. And in all of these cases they keyboard interface was not "the keyboard simply drives the GUIs menus and windows" but true keyboard driven without menus. How you could try any of them out today would likely involve a VM (i.e, VirtualBox), loading an old copy of Dos, and finding an old copy of one of them to install in the VM.
- virtualmic 9y ago
  Spacemacs has a pretty great keyboard driven interface too and somehow it clicked with me more than both vim and emacs.
coreyp_1 9y ago
It's not strictly keyboard-only, but several music notation programs (eg., Finale) have a keyboard (QWERTY) interface for quickly entering music. They have a MIDI keyboard interface, too, but that's obviously not what you are asking. :) I would say that the advantage of a keyboard (non-mouse) interface is that you don't have to "aim" in order to move to the next component, you just press "enter", "tab", or an arrow key. Having said that, many spreadsheet programs could be considered to support a keyboard interface, as well as your favorite calculator app. EDIT: Adding that many command line tools fit this. Of course there are text editors like Vim, but also tools like htop.
jotux 9y ago
AutoCAD has always had a command line that shows commands even as you're using the UI. It's neat to pull it up and see the command history, and also makes text commands more discoverable.

pwg 9y ago

Modern? Both vi and emacs are "still maintained" and are both keyboard driven interfaces that huge numbers of individuals consider good. You can try out both on most Linux distributions. Other examples from Linux/Unix systems are the Joe editor, which ships with configuration files to emulate several other keyboard driven editors. Also the "less" file viewer, as well as the "mutt" email client and the "tin" usenet news reader. All are also "still maintained". For less modern, WordStar and Visicalc and Lotus123 all had fully keyboard driven interfaces. Lotus123 added menus and such in later incarnations but retained the keyboard driven interface. And in all of these cases they keyboard interface was not "the keyboard simply drives the GUIs menus and windows" but true keyboard driven without menus. How you could try any of them out today would likely involve a VM (i.e, VirtualBox), loading an old copy of Dos, and finding an old copy of one of them to install in the VM.

virtualmic 9y ago
Spacemacs has a pretty great keyboard driven interface too and somehow it clicked with me more than both vim and emacs.

coreyp_1 9y ago

It's not strictly keyboard-only, but several music notation programs (eg., Finale) have a keyboard (QWERTY) interface for quickly entering music. They have a MIDI keyboard interface, too, but that's obviously not what you are asking. :) I would say that the advantage of a keyboard (non-mouse) interface is that you don't have to "aim" in order to move to the next component, you just press "enter", "tab", or an arrow key. Having said that, many spreadsheet programs could be considered to support a keyboard interface, as well as your favorite calculator app. EDIT: Adding that many command line tools fit this. Of course there are text editors like Vim, but also tools like htop.

jotux 9y ago

AutoCAD has always had a command line that shows commands even as you're using the UI. It's neat to pull it up and see the command history, and also makes text commands more discoverable.