4 ms·
I can confirm that having physically different keyboards makes it much easier to switch back and forth. Many years ago, I worked for a company that had a mess o
by mauvehaus 8y ago
I can confirm that having physically different keyboards makes it much easier to switch back and forth. Many years ago, I worked for a company that had a mess of old Sun hardware in the lab with the old Sun-layout[0] keyboards. After about a week of using them, I was pretty comfortable using them, and had no trouble switching back and forth the the customary layout keyboard at my desk.
One day, I discovered the one Sun machine that had a Sun-manufactured keyboard in the customary layout. I was incapable of functioning because I expected it to be in the Sun layout. I had to switch it for a Sun-layout keyboard so I could get some work done.
As an aside, I decided I prefer the Sun layout, and so I've remapped the 6 or so keys via software on basically every computer I've used since. The only issue is the `~ key, which ends up on [ESC], since I haven't yet found a keyboard that has the [backspace] key split in two.
In practice, this isn't much of an annoyance to me. My wife, however goes nuts any time she needs to use the computer for "just a second" and doesn't log me out. I've since gotten better at switching, and if I have to type something when she's logged in, I usually flip the switch pretty quickly.
[0] https://deskthority.net/wiki/Sun_Type_5#Layout https://deskthority.net/wiki/Sun_Type_5#Layout
- acheron 8y agoSun keyboards are nice for pair programming, since when your partner does something good you can press the 'props' key.
- JdeBP 8y agoFor a keyboard with separate single-width E13 and E14 (like the old 84-key PC/AT keyboard and the Sun Type 5) instead of a single double-width key spanning both, you want the JIS 109-key Windows keyboard or the Korean 106-key Windows keyboard. * http://www2d.biglobe.ne.jp/~msyk/keyboard/layout/usbkeycode.html http://www2d.biglobe.ne.jp/~msyk/keyboard/layout/usbkeycode.... * https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Korean_106-key_keyboard.jpg https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Korean_106-key_keybo... * http://www.ps-aoki.com/~ace/ebay/pc/keyboard/5W_1.jpg http://www.ps-aoki.com/~ace/ebay/pc/keyboard/5W_1.jpg The 104-key Windows keyboard moves the old PC/AT E13 key to D13, and the 105/107-key Windows keyboards move it further to C12. The 106-key Windows keyboard has it back at E13. The JIS keyboard actually has that key at C12, though. Its E13 key is another key with a different PS/2 scancode and USB HID usage. This is important to know when remapping the keys. (I have the JIS E13 mapped to the FEP/IM toggle, a.k.a. Zenkaku/Henkaku/Kanji, in my U.K. International and U.S. International maps, with the E00 "Grave" key retaining its usual mappings.)