9 ms·

I feel like computers are such an important part of our lives now that it's surprising so many people settle for the entrenched option of 'standard QWERTY compu

by ganonm 8y ago

I feel like computers are such an important part of our lives now that it's surprising so many people settle for the entrenched option of 'standard QWERTY computer keyboard'. I realised a while ago that since I spend so much of my life interacting with a computer, I should really invest significant effort into improving, even marginally, the ergonomics and bandwidth of the IO channel between my brain and the computer I am interacting with. This realisation and the ensuing quest for a better option led me to adopt the Ergodox EZ keyboard. This has been the most significant improvement to my day-to-day interactions with computers since learning Vim. It did take several months to adjust and a significant amount of effort went into designing the optimal layout to suit my needs, but the results have been incredible. - I never need to look at the keyboard - My WPM rate is sufficient that I can type almost as fast as I can think - The palms of my hands never move (zero wrist flexion) My keyboard layout can be found here https://github.com/Ganon-M/ergodox-vim-ubuntu https://github.com/Ganon-M/ergodox-vim-ubuntu If any of you out there are heavy Vim users and want to take your ergonomic experience to the next level, I suggest taking a look at the above layout.

nightcracker 8y ago
> My WPM rate is sufficient that I can type almost as fast as I can think Can you quantify this? E.g. through https://typing-speed-test.aoeu.eu/?lang=en https://typing-speed-test.aoeu.eu/?lang=en I don't know how fast you think.
- wlesieutre 8y ago
  On my second try I hit 108 WPM, in the top 1% among a sample of people who go online and take typing speed tests (probably not representative of the normal population). But it's way too easy without punctuation. Real world speeds are definitely slower. FWIW I find that my quicker-than-average typing is still definitely not always fast enough to keep up with what I want to write down.
  - nightcracker 8y ago
    I type at around 120 wpm on that test, and have tried to switch to an ergodox before. And it was an utter failure. I simply couldn't endure going back to typing at 40 wpm at best, with many errors. Too high of a learning curve.
- ganonm 8y ago
  Yeah, perhaps that was too strong a statement to make without qualification. Using the linked speed test I'm consistently getting between 75-85 WPM. While typing code I have recorded speeds of up to 60WPM, this is actually pretty damn fast for writing code which generally contains a lot of special characters and obscure words.
  - cjbprime 8y ago
    Yeah, I think you're probably about an order of magnitude off. People speak at five times your WPM, and it feels like I can think of words to say at least twice as fast as I can say them.
    - deleted 8y ago
      [deleted]
    - simias 8y ago
      Thinking about something and putting it into correct English (or the language of your choice) is a different thing though, you don't usually type a stream of consciousness. You have to figure out the grammar, spelling of uncommon words, you can change your mind and rephrase something etc... Even spoken language is easier, it's often less formal and you can carry additional information through intonation and body gesture and when you're talking directly to somebody you have direct feedback to make sure that you've been correctly understood. My "cruising" typing speed is about 80WPM and I don't think I ever feel like I'm typing too slow, for instance while writing this comment I never felt like my mind was getting ahead of my fingers. Maybe I'm a bit slow in the head, who knows...
naibafo 8y ago
Have you since then used a normal standard keyboard, for example with a notebook? How did that go?
- ganonm 8y ago
  Yes, I actually discuss this in the README for my Ergodox layout. I purposefully kept an approximately QWERTY layout in the Ergodox so a standard keyboard wouldn't become totally alien to me. I also use a standard keyboard at home, although I only average a few hours a week on this. I haven't had any issues yet.
Sir_Cmpwn 8y ago
I use a QWERTY and I can type faster than I can think. I can routinely type at 130 WPM and at bursts up to 140 WPM. But I didn't type this comment that fast, not even close. I think much more slowly than I type. Point being, I can already type far faster than I need to on QWERTY, so why bother switching to something else, where I will almost certainly be slower for a period of months at best?
- simias 8y ago
  Personally I think speed is generally overrated for the reasons you mention, if you type at around 100WPM you probably won't be significantly limited by your fingers for any practical task. For me it's more about comfort, I switched to a better keyboard and the Dvorak layout because I started to have wrist pain. I don't know if dvorak is all that superior to qwerty but it gave me an opportunity to completely re-learn how to type since very few keys line up, and this time I tried to learn proper hand and finger placement etc...
- pmoriarty 8y ago
  It really depends on what you're using your typing skills for. If you're trying to record verbatim what someone is saying, you could easily have to type much, much faster than that. Stenographers are often required to type at least a hundred WPM faster than you type, and some people speak even faster than that. The demands are even higher when more than one person is talking at the same time and you're trying to record them both. There are some tricks one could use to speed up plain old QWERTY, however. In particular, you could use macros. That's essentially what stenographers use on their special steno keyboards. A single chord will translate in to a full sentence. Likewise, you could trigger a macro on a QWERTY keyboard with a single chord and that can boost your WPM significantly, if you use a lot of them.
  - fhood 8y ago
    People do not speak at 230 wpm. Ever. It does not happen. Edit: I stand by this. Auctioneers do provide a good counter example but much of what they say is just repeated phrases.
simias 8y ago
I have exactly the same mindset, if you spend 10 hours a day typing on a keyboard then investing a few weeks and/or a few hundred bucks to marginally improve your speed and comfort is a very good investment indeed. In particular I'm always amazed that, in my experience, the vast majority of the professional software programmers I encounter never bothered to learn how to touchtype proficiently. I personally use the dvorak layout but I can understand staying on QWERTY for convenience but not knowing how to touchtype is very hard for me to rationalize. Regarding the Ergodox I have a question, do you really find that "matrix" key layout (or "ortholinear" as they call it on their website) is really an improvement? It never made a lot of sense to me and when I tried a similar keyboard a few years back (admittedly for a short amount of time) I really didn't like it. The website says: > When you extend your finger, it doesn't go sideways, does it? So why are the keys on your keyboard not directly on top of each other? But... They do go sideways when I have a keyboard in front of me, my hands are not perfectly straight and parallel on the keyboard lest my wrist or shoulders end up in a weird position. Now of course in this case with a split keyboard you can move and orient them any way you like but I always wondered if there was actual science behind that choice or if it's just "non-linear layout == old mechanical typewriter leftover == bad".
- retzkek 8y ago
  > But... They do go sideways when I have a keyboard in front of me, my hands are not perfectly straight and parallel on the keyboard lest my wrist or shoulders end up in a weird position. I've been using an Atreus [1] at work for several months now, it's a 40% angled ortho keyboard. I find my wrists and arms are at a natural angle, similar to how the would be on a standard keyboard, with the advantage of the linear finger movements of an ortho. The chording definitely requires some extra brainpower at times, especially since I still use a standard laptop keyboard on the go. I guess it's good mental exercise. I'm debating trying a 60% Atreus or one of the split keyboards next. (It's also a fun and pretty easy project to build your own keyboard, and a point of pride harkening back to when craftsmen would build their own tools.) [1] https://atreus.technomancy.us/ https://atreus.technomancy.us/
  - simias 8y ago
naikrovek 8y ago
You'll only make up those months spent adjusting if you now spend decades using nothing else, and any time spent on a conventional keyboard will be slower than it would have been if you had not switched. I simply do not understand the "increased performance" claims people in these situations make. There is no way. All keyboards have fundamentally arbitrary layouts, some are just slightly more or less arbitrary than others.
- ganonm 8y ago
  The typing speed increase wasn't my main concern, it is just a side-effect that I felt would be easily measurable and that some people might care about. I also wanted to get an estimate for how long it would take me to become accustomed to the new keyboard, so measuring typing speed in a rigorous, empirical way seemed the best option. The main reason I did this was ergonomics.
- fsiefken 8y ago
  Hi, that's not true for me, 10y ago after months of thinking of the layout I'd stick with for decades I tweaked the Dvorak keyboard layout (switching the U and I) and went cold turkey. Qwerty is still in my muscle memory, I occasionally have to use it on other computers and I am slower with it. I am much more comfortable typing in Dvorak, the typing is significantly more relaxed. I never did it for speed reasons as I figured speech to text might catch up in the future.
  - brokenmachine 8y ago
    Why would you switch the U and I? Just to make it even more difficult? I use dvorak, and I've found it a hassle many times just switching the layout of the various PCs I'm using into dvorak. Worth it, but a hassle. At least the dvorak layout is semi-standard though. Custom dvorak is a bridge too far...
- Jarb 8y ago
  This. I work as a sysadmin and the number of keyboards I have to interact with makes using anything other than QWERTY more of hassle than benefit. On a typical day I will interact with my phone keyboard (blackberry priv, hardware keyboard), my primary work desktop, my secondary desktop (used by colleagues sporadically), my gaming PC (used just for gaming), and my personal laptop. Now add the times I have to jump onto someone else's station or a family member's system and the constant context switching is just not worth it. I tried dvorak some years ago, but found it more trouble than it was worth it, since everyone else doesn't use it.
DenisM 8y ago
When I studied piano I was taught to flex the wrist, otherwise the tension of being in the same position leads to injury (RSI?). FYI.
- protomyth 8y ago
  It always amazes me how much wisdom is common knowledge in other pursuits or even cultures that does not show up when trying to search for solutions to problems in other endeavors. I think its one of those under researched fields of AI to try to link areas of knowledge where someone searching for RSI would see sources from piano training showing the need to flex the wrists.
  - DenisM 8y ago
    You can also ask an ergonomic specialist, they do refer to piano posture at least.
    - protomyth 8y ago
      Yeah, experts tend to explore related fields (I guess that's why they are experts), but I do wonder when actual, relevant one-off searching will actually work.
- ganonm 8y ago
  Interestingly, I also studied piano for many years (from age of 5 until 18 I guess). I agree, wrist flexion is important, and I definitely do flex my wrists (sometimes in a seemingly exaggerated manner) when playing piano, however, for typing, I can comfortably type anything I want, including special characters, without flexing my wrists. Not sure if this is a sign of a well designed layout or RSI waiting to happen
  - DenisM 8y ago
    Perhaps weighted keys make the difference?..
deleted 8y ago
[deleted]
eddieh 8y ago
> I realised a while ago that since I spend so much of my life interacting with a computer, I should really invest significant effort into improving, even marginally In the world of guitars one can spend thousands of dollars having the perfect custom guitar built. I've often wondered why software developers don't invest as much in bespoke custom keyboards for exactly the same reason you have come to realize. I definitely think there's a market for it.
- 0xffff2 8y ago
  What's the potential benefit? What variables would you tweak on a custom bespoke keyboard?
  - eddieh 8y ago
    Well I'm an Emacs user and would love to have Apple's butterfly mechanism style keyboard with the existing modifier keys for macOS (Command, Option & Control) plus the modifier keys from the Symbolics keyboards (Meta, Super & Hyper). That way I can separate out the key chords for window, application, and system commands from the key chords for Emacs text editing commands. I'd pay at least $1000 to have it custom built. I think some of the variables include key layout, key switch type, keycap shape & material, key dimensions, the material of the keyboard itself, type of connector, LED colors & placement, extras like auxiliary displays, knobs, switches, sliders, and touchpads. I could continue...
jVinc 8y ago
Curious, what is your WPM at currently?
FigBug 8y ago
Having one hand I felt this way, I spent a lot of money on a Maltron one handed keyboard, but I could never get it integrated into my work flow. And then laptops became popular, and I just can't be bothered to carry a laptop and a keyboard around with me. So unless I use one computer all the time, I can't get away from qwerty, so I've just stuck with it.
- brokenmachine 8y ago
  Maybe you already know this, but there are one-handed dvorak layouts. It's fairly easy to switch your laptop's layout via software, the OS will just remap the keys. So you don't have to carry another physical keyboard.
sverhagen 8y ago
"My WPM rate is sufficient that I can type almost as fast as I can think" I _so_ wish I could think as fast as I can type.

by ganonm 8y ago

nightcracker 8y ago

> My WPM rate is sufficient that I can type almost as fast as I can think Can you quantify this? E.g. through https://typing-speed-test.aoeu.eu/?lang=en https://typing-speed-test.aoeu.eu/?lang=en I don't know how fast you think.

wlesieutre 8y ago
On my second try I hit 108 WPM, in the top 1% among a sample of people who go online and take typing speed tests (probably not representative of the normal population). But it's way too easy without punctuation. Real world speeds are definitely slower. FWIW I find that my quicker-than-average typing is still definitely not always fast enough to keep up with what I want to write down.
- nightcracker 8y ago
  I type at around 120 wpm on that test, and have tried to switch to an ergodox before. And it was an utter failure. I simply couldn't endure going back to typing at 40 wpm at best, with many errors. Too high of a learning curve.
ganonm 8y ago
Yeah, perhaps that was too strong a statement to make without qualification. Using the linked speed test I'm consistently getting between 75-85 WPM. While typing code I have recorded speeds of up to 60WPM, this is actually pretty damn fast for writing code which generally contains a lot of special characters and obscure words.
- cjbprime 8y ago
  Yeah, I think you're probably about an order of magnitude off. People speak at five times your WPM, and it feels like I can think of words to say at least twice as fast as I can say them.
  - deleted 8y ago
    [deleted]
  - simias 8y ago
    Thinking about something and putting it into correct English (or the language of your choice) is a different thing though, you don't usually type a stream of consciousness. You have to figure out the grammar, spelling of uncommon words, you can change your mind and rephrase something etc... Even spoken language is easier, it's often less formal and you can carry additional information through intonation and body gesture and when you're talking directly to somebody you have direct feedback to make sure that you've been correctly understood. My "cruising" typing speed is about 80WPM and I don't think I ever feel like I'm typing too slow, for instance while writing this comment I never felt like my mind was getting ahead of my fingers. Maybe I'm a bit slow in the head, who knows...

naibafo 8y ago

Have you since then used a normal standard keyboard, for example with a notebook? How did that go?

ganonm 8y ago
Yes, I actually discuss this in the README for my Ergodox layout. I purposefully kept an approximately QWERTY layout in the Ergodox so a standard keyboard wouldn't become totally alien to me. I also use a standard keyboard at home, although I only average a few hours a week on this. I haven't had any issues yet.

Sir_Cmpwn 8y ago

I use a QWERTY and I can type faster than I can think. I can routinely type at 130 WPM and at bursts up to 140 WPM. But I didn't type this comment that fast, not even close. I think much more slowly than I type. Point being, I can already type far faster than I need to on QWERTY, so why bother switching to something else, where I will almost certainly be slower for a period of months at best?

simias 8y ago
Personally I think speed is generally overrated for the reasons you mention, if you type at around 100WPM you probably won't be significantly limited by your fingers for any practical task. For me it's more about comfort, I switched to a better keyboard and the Dvorak layout because I started to have wrist pain. I don't know if dvorak is all that superior to qwerty but it gave me an opportunity to completely re-learn how to type since very few keys line up, and this time I tried to learn proper hand and finger placement etc...
pmoriarty 8y ago
It really depends on what you're using your typing skills for. If you're trying to record verbatim what someone is saying, you could easily have to type much, much faster than that. Stenographers are often required to type at least a hundred WPM faster than you type, and some people speak even faster than that. The demands are even higher when more than one person is talking at the same time and you're trying to record them both. There are some tricks one could use to speed up plain old QWERTY, however. In particular, you could use macros. That's essentially what stenographers use on their special steno keyboards. A single chord will translate in to a full sentence. Likewise, you could trigger a macro on a QWERTY keyboard with a single chord and that can boost your WPM significantly, if you use a lot of them.
- fhood 8y ago
  People do not speak at 230 wpm. Ever. It does not happen. Edit: I stand by this. Auctioneers do provide a good counter example but much of what they say is just repeated phrases.

simias 8y ago

I have exactly the same mindset, if you spend 10 hours a day typing on a keyboard then investing a few weeks and/or a few hundred bucks to marginally improve your speed and comfort is a very good investment indeed. In particular I'm always amazed that, in my experience, the vast majority of the professional software programmers I encounter never bothered to learn how to touchtype proficiently. I personally use the dvorak layout but I can understand staying on QWERTY for convenience but not knowing how to touchtype is very hard for me to rationalize. Regarding the Ergodox I have a question, do you really find that "matrix" key layout (or "ortholinear" as they call it on their website) is really an improvement? It never made a lot of sense to me and when I tried a similar keyboard a few years back (admittedly for a short amount of time) I really didn't like it. The website says: > When you extend your finger, it doesn't go sideways, does it? So why are the keys on your keyboard not directly on top of each other? But... They do go sideways when I have a keyboard in front of me, my hands are not perfectly straight and parallel on the keyboard lest my wrist or shoulders end up in a weird position. Now of course in this case with a split keyboard you can move and orient them any way you like but I always wondered if there was actual science behind that choice or if it's just "non-linear layout == old mechanical typewriter leftover == bad".

retzkek 8y ago
> But... They do go sideways when I have a keyboard in front of me, my hands are not perfectly straight and parallel on the keyboard lest my wrist or shoulders end up in a weird position. I've been using an Atreus [1] at work for several months now, it's a 40% angled ortho keyboard. I find my wrists and arms are at a natural angle, similar to how the would be on a standard keyboard, with the advantage of the linear finger movements of an ortho. The chording definitely requires some extra brainpower at times, especially since I still use a standard laptop keyboard on the go. I guess it's good mental exercise. I'm debating trying a 60% Atreus or one of the split keyboards next. (It's also a fun and pretty easy project to build your own keyboard, and a point of pride harkening back to when craftsmen would build their own tools.) [1] https://atreus.technomancy.us/ https://atreus.technomancy.us/
- simias 8y ago

naikrovek 8y ago

You'll only make up those months spent adjusting if you now spend decades using nothing else, and any time spent on a conventional keyboard will be slower than it would have been if you had not switched. I simply do not understand the "increased performance" claims people in these situations make. There is no way. All keyboards have fundamentally arbitrary layouts, some are just slightly more or less arbitrary than others.

ganonm 8y ago
The typing speed increase wasn't my main concern, it is just a side-effect that I felt would be easily measurable and that some people might care about. I also wanted to get an estimate for how long it would take me to become accustomed to the new keyboard, so measuring typing speed in a rigorous, empirical way seemed the best option. The main reason I did this was ergonomics.
fsiefken 8y ago
Hi, that's not true for me, 10y ago after months of thinking of the layout I'd stick with for decades I tweaked the Dvorak keyboard layout (switching the U and I) and went cold turkey. Qwerty is still in my muscle memory, I occasionally have to use it on other computers and I am slower with it. I am much more comfortable typing in Dvorak, the typing is significantly more relaxed. I never did it for speed reasons as I figured speech to text might catch up in the future.
- brokenmachine 8y ago
  Why would you switch the U and I? Just to make it even more difficult? I use dvorak, and I've found it a hassle many times just switching the layout of the various PCs I'm using into dvorak. Worth it, but a hassle. At least the dvorak layout is semi-standard though. Custom dvorak is a bridge too far...
Jarb 8y ago
This. I work as a sysadmin and the number of keyboards I have to interact with makes using anything other than QWERTY more of hassle than benefit. On a typical day I will interact with my phone keyboard (blackberry priv, hardware keyboard), my primary work desktop, my secondary desktop (used by colleagues sporadically), my gaming PC (used just for gaming), and my personal laptop. Now add the times I have to jump onto someone else's station or a family member's system and the constant context switching is just not worth it. I tried dvorak some years ago, but found it more trouble than it was worth it, since everyone else doesn't use it.

DenisM 8y ago

When I studied piano I was taught to flex the wrist, otherwise the tension of being in the same position leads to injury (RSI?). FYI.

protomyth 8y ago
It always amazes me how much wisdom is common knowledge in other pursuits or even cultures that does not show up when trying to search for solutions to problems in other endeavors. I think its one of those under researched fields of AI to try to link areas of knowledge where someone searching for RSI would see sources from piano training showing the need to flex the wrists.
- DenisM 8y ago
  You can also ask an ergonomic specialist, they do refer to piano posture at least.
  - protomyth 8y ago
    Yeah, experts tend to explore related fields (I guess that's why they are experts), but I do wonder when actual, relevant one-off searching will actually work.
ganonm 8y ago
Interestingly, I also studied piano for many years (from age of 5 until 18 I guess). I agree, wrist flexion is important, and I definitely do flex my wrists (sometimes in a seemingly exaggerated manner) when playing piano, however, for typing, I can comfortably type anything I want, including special characters, without flexing my wrists. Not sure if this is a sign of a well designed layout or RSI waiting to happen
- DenisM 8y ago
  Perhaps weighted keys make the difference?..

deleted 8y ago

[deleted]

eddieh 8y ago

> I realised a while ago that since I spend so much of my life interacting with a computer, I should really invest significant effort into improving, even marginally In the world of guitars one can spend thousands of dollars having the perfect custom guitar built. I've often wondered why software developers don't invest as much in bespoke custom keyboards for exactly the same reason you have come to realize. I definitely think there's a market for it.

0xffff2 8y ago
What's the potential benefit? What variables would you tweak on a custom bespoke keyboard?
- eddieh 8y ago
  Well I'm an Emacs user and would love to have Apple's butterfly mechanism style keyboard with the existing modifier keys for macOS (Command, Option & Control) plus the modifier keys from the Symbolics keyboards (Meta, Super & Hyper). That way I can separate out the key chords for window, application, and system commands from the key chords for Emacs text editing commands. I'd pay at least $1000 to have it custom built. I think some of the variables include key layout, key switch type, keycap shape & material, key dimensions, the material of the keyboard itself, type of connector, LED colors & placement, extras like auxiliary displays, knobs, switches, sliders, and touchpads. I could continue...

jVinc 8y ago

Curious, what is your WPM at currently?

FigBug 8y ago

Having one hand I felt this way, I spent a lot of money on a Maltron one handed keyboard, but I could never get it integrated into my work flow. And then laptops became popular, and I just can't be bothered to carry a laptop and a keyboard around with me. So unless I use one computer all the time, I can't get away from qwerty, so I've just stuck with it.

brokenmachine 8y ago
Maybe you already know this, but there are one-handed dvorak layouts. It's fairly easy to switch your laptop's layout via software, the OS will just remap the keys. So you don't have to carry another physical keyboard.

sverhagen 8y ago

"My WPM rate is sufficient that I can type almost as fast as I can think" I _so_ wish I could think as fast as I can type.