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I went a long time before learning to touch type properly. I had a fast-ish quasi touch / hunt and peck style I suspect similar to what you describe. I ended u

I went a long time before learning to touch type properly. I had a fast-ish quasi touch / hunt and peck style I suspect similar to what you describe. I ended up learning to touch type by 1) switching my keyboard to dvorak in software 2) printing a paper dvorak map that I taped just below my monitor (aside: a big surplus HP CRT with BNC connectors in those days) 3) Forcing myself to use only the correct finger to hit each key, then returning to rest in the home row. This was back in college. I was a journalism major at the time, and so my inability to touch type had become a liability. It took me about a week of slow suffering before I was off to the races. If RSI is a problem for you, you might consider training yourself to type on a dvorak layout. There are lots of claims about dvorak (some true and some hyperbole), but one thing that is absolutely true is that the amount of finger travel is much lower. Back when I learned dvorak, I actually measured finger stretch distances from the home row on my keyboard, and compared a corpus of my emails to figure how much travel would have been required in qwerty vs dvorak. Dvorak was substantially less. There are theoretically better layouts than dvorak, but I think dvorak strikes a great balance between ergonomics and being available and easy to switch to on every operating system.

souterrain 8y ago
I’ve considered Dvorak, but I’m very reluctant to make the investment in lost productivity while learning. I’m not certain my slow suffering would be limited to about a week.
- peatmoss 8y ago
  My wife switched (she was already a touch typist) and it was only a few days of diminished productivity for her. I think I might have been the bad case :-)
magduf 8y ago
>There are theoretically better layouts than dvorak, but I think dvorak strikes a great balance between ergonomics and being available and easy to switch to on every operating system. I disagree, and I'm a Dvorak typist. In any modern OS, Colemak at the least should be commonly available. Workman is a very good layout too, and should be pretty commonly available. Dvorak's main advantage is that it's been around a long time, but it's not really the best layout IMO. One day I want to learn Workman as it seems to correct the flaws I see with Dvorak, and it should also (just like Colemak) be easier to learn for Qwerty typists than Dvorak.
- peatmoss 8y ago
  It's a hard balance. Dvorak is vastly better than Qwerty and is ubiquitous. I have seen Colemak pretty commonly, and Workman once in a while. I don't doubt Workman might be marginally better than Dvorak, but I don't know if it's enough better for me to be the change that I want to see in the world.
  - magduf 8y ago
    Workman vs. Colemak probably isn't a huge gain. However, either of those have a huge advantage over Dvorak for someone who doesn't already know Dvorak and knows Qwerty, because they're just not that different from Qwerty the way Dvorak is. They also preserve the left-hand location of C, V, and X since those are so commonly used for cut-and-paste operations. Again, this is coming from someone who's proficient in Dvorak, but not Colemak or Workman, but right now I would not recommend Dvorak to someone interested in trying an alternate layout; I'd point them to these newer alternatives instead.

souterrain 8y ago

I’ve considered Dvorak, but I’m very reluctant to make the investment in lost productivity while learning. I’m not certain my slow suffering would be limited to about a week.

peatmoss 8y ago
My wife switched (she was already a touch typist) and it was only a few days of diminished productivity for her. I think I might have been the bad case :-)

magduf 8y ago

>There are theoretically better layouts than dvorak, but I think dvorak strikes a great balance between ergonomics and being available and easy to switch to on every operating system. I disagree, and I'm a Dvorak typist. In any modern OS, Colemak at the least should be commonly available. Workman is a very good layout too, and should be pretty commonly available. Dvorak's main advantage is that it's been around a long time, but it's not really the best layout IMO. One day I want to learn Workman as it seems to correct the flaws I see with Dvorak, and it should also (just like Colemak) be easier to learn for Qwerty typists than Dvorak.

peatmoss 8y ago
It's a hard balance. Dvorak is vastly better than Qwerty and is ubiquitous. I have seen Colemak pretty commonly, and Workman once in a while. I don't doubt Workman might be marginally better than Dvorak, but I don't know if it's enough better for me to be the change that I want to see in the world.
- magduf 8y ago
  Workman vs. Colemak probably isn't a huge gain. However, either of those have a huge advantage over Dvorak for someone who doesn't already know Dvorak and knows Qwerty, because they're just not that different from Qwerty the way Dvorak is. They also preserve the left-hand location of C, V, and X since those are so commonly used for cut-and-paste operations. Again, this is coming from someone who's proficient in Dvorak, but not Colemak or Workman, but right now I would not recommend Dvorak to someone interested in trying an alternate layout; I'd point them to these newer alternatives instead.