4 ms·

i deeply hate being without a numpad. I understand it's duplicated space, but typing numbers on a numpad is just a million times faster than going above the alp

i deeply hate being without a numpad. I understand it's duplicated space, but typing numbers on a numpad is just a million times faster than going above the alphabet keys.

Aperocky 5y ago
is it? I don't think it's any slower than typing other characters.
- baron_harkonnen 5y ago
  I haven't had a full keyboard with a numpad in years, but if you ever worked in any data entry job in your career and learned to properly touch type on the numpad it is wildly faster than touch typing with the regular keyboard and needing to use two hands to reach all of the numbers. I suspect the utility of a numpad is increased while the off center problems are decreased for touchtypers which is why there is such a divide.
  - wott 5y ago
    > I suspect the utility of a numpad is increased while the off center problems are decreased for touchtypers which is why there is such a divide. Ah? I would have thought the opposite. I cannot touch-type at all (and you could promise me a million dollars reward, I still wouldn't manage), nevertheless there is one part of the keyboard I can use without looking, and it is the numpad. Possibly because it is a limited area with a limited number of keys, and the numbers are placed in a "logical" order (compared to letters on the main part of a keyboard). I am bad at entering numbers on the top row, a I am forced to do on most laptops (and unfortunately, I personally find the pseudo-numpad, which requires using the Fn key or similar, utterly unusable; I never could get used to it).
- somethingwitty1 5y ago
  I did data entry for a job. In my experience, the numpad was considerably faster and accurate. It has been a long time, but I recall it cutting down entry time by ~5-6x (yes, I finished my daily quota in about an hour or two, instead of all day). The advantage was being able to use multiple fingers comfortably, without looking (there is a nice nub on most numpads) and leaving a hand free for letters/tabs. But like anything, I'm sure there are people that would have a different experience.
  - Aperocky 5y ago
    Interesting, though data entry feels like something that should have been automated (even if source is paper).
    - somethingwitty1 5y ago
      You'd be amazed how much cheaper it is to have a human do it than pay for automation. But also, law/contract required the data to be accurate (so there were 3 people, at minimum, entering the exact same data and records would be flagged if any of the 3 did not match). OCR, at the time (and even now), is highly unreliable with human handwriting. Not that I disagree with your statement, automation would have been nice. And though I like to think we want humans doing higher-level things, a lot of the people there were happy to get decent pay and not have to think for their day job.
protomyth 5y ago
I guess I spend much more time doing regular typing and being off-center really makes it painful (old HP laptop). I did buy a wireless numeric keypad at one time that had some extra keys and arrows that made data entry really fast.
scintill76 5y ago
How many digits long does it have to be to pay for the time to move your hand to the numpad and back?
- dragontamer 5y ago
  About 4 digits IMO. The "5" key on most numpads has a bump so I can reach it without even looking at a keyboard I'm familiar with. Any 4-digit security pin I use is entered from numpads. I always buy a laptop with a numpad. Its my preferred method of typing numbers. There are also a whole slew of video game applications, as well as Blender movement (camera angles, camera movement, etc. etc.) that's highly intuitively mapped to the numpad. ------ I should note that when I was practicing for the video-game community "Blazblue", all movements were discussed in terms of numpad. 236 is quarter-circle forward. 69874123 is "360-degree circle, counterclockwise, starting with right". Needless to say, typing a combo such as 5b 5c 2d 28d 28 b c b 8 b c 236c 2d was much easier with a numpad. Anyone who wants to "decode" the button pushes only needs to look at their numpad to see how their left-hand should move, with "b, c, d" being the keywords for the right-hand buttons in Blazblue. Street Fighter players use lp, mp, hp (light punch, medium punch, heavy punch) instead. So those bits get game specific, but the numpad approach to discussion is basically considered superior.
  - flemhans 5y ago
    The bump may be ok for new keyboards you didn't try before but quickly become irrelevant after a few days. You know where the keys are then.
    - dragontamer 5y ago
      I disagree. The bump on the j-key on the keyboard, and the 5-key on the numpad is very much clear to high-speed typing. On keyboards without bumps, I find myself off-aligned. Instead of typing "jumping jellyfish", I type "hynoubg hekktfusg", and have to realign my hands. Could I do it without the bump? Probably. But having the bump there (both the j-bump and the 5 bump) is very useful at preventing this mistake.
  - 5y ago
raffraffraff 5y ago
If you work in a bank, entering deposits and withdrawals all day. Or a shop that doesn't have a barcode reader. Or if you're an accountant. I suppose you could also argue for a special programmer's pad too. I mean, I play the odd FPS and I'm still happy with WASD so I'm definitely not gonna understand.
- xxs 5y ago
  ...or if you are use it for navigation, along with enter. I never use the numlock but I do use the numpad.
aendruk 5y ago
A virtual numpad via a modifier key can be the best of both worlds; no extra space is used and your hands stay in the center. Example with image: https://andrew.kvalhe.im/2021-03-19 https://andrew.kvalhe.im/2021-03-19 With this method you can customize the location and surrounding mathematical operators.
- nyanpasu64 5y ago
  In my limited beginner experience (rarely use numpads, mostly in Blender, or virtual numpads), it's awkward to turn virtual numpads on and off, I keep forgetting which state the keyboard is in, and it's hard to read the grayed-out key labels to figure out which normal key maps to the numpad key I want.
- admax88qqq 5y ago
  Sort of. But it's not ortholinear like most numpads and lacks the addition keys like a big Enter key, and the various math operations. It's an impoverished numpad that requires different muscle memory that you probably don't use often enough to master. Personally I never use the virtual numpad on my devices, I use the full numpad if available or I usr the top row of number keys.
andrepd 5y ago
You can get a cheap external numpad.
xxs 5y ago
actually i use the numpad for arrows (and virtually dont need a mouse in a decent IDE, once I reprogram the shortcuts). I don't recall having a numpad lacking keyboard and a laptop in the last 15y+.

i deeply hate being without a numpad. I understand it's duplicated space, but typing numbers on a numpad is just a million times faster than going above the alphabet keys.

Aperocky 5y ago

is it? I don't think it's any slower than typing other characters.

baron_harkonnen 5y ago
I haven't had a full keyboard with a numpad in years, but if you ever worked in any data entry job in your career and learned to properly touch type on the numpad it is wildly faster than touch typing with the regular keyboard and needing to use two hands to reach all of the numbers. I suspect the utility of a numpad is increased while the off center problems are decreased for touchtypers which is why there is such a divide.
- wott 5y ago
  > I suspect the utility of a numpad is increased while the off center problems are decreased for touchtypers which is why there is such a divide. Ah? I would have thought the opposite. I cannot touch-type at all (and you could promise me a million dollars reward, I still wouldn't manage), nevertheless there is one part of the keyboard I can use without looking, and it is the numpad. Possibly because it is a limited area with a limited number of keys, and the numbers are placed in a "logical" order (compared to letters on the main part of a keyboard). I am bad at entering numbers on the top row, a I am forced to do on most laptops (and unfortunately, I personally find the pseudo-numpad, which requires using the Fn key or similar, utterly unusable; I never could get used to it).
somethingwitty1 5y ago
I did data entry for a job. In my experience, the numpad was considerably faster and accurate. It has been a long time, but I recall it cutting down entry time by ~5-6x (yes, I finished my daily quota in about an hour or two, instead of all day). The advantage was being able to use multiple fingers comfortably, without looking (there is a nice nub on most numpads) and leaving a hand free for letters/tabs. But like anything, I'm sure there are people that would have a different experience.
- Aperocky 5y ago
  Interesting, though data entry feels like something that should have been automated (even if source is paper).
  - somethingwitty1 5y ago
    You'd be amazed how much cheaper it is to have a human do it than pay for automation. But also, law/contract required the data to be accurate (so there were 3 people, at minimum, entering the exact same data and records would be flagged if any of the 3 did not match). OCR, at the time (and even now), is highly unreliable with human handwriting. Not that I disagree with your statement, automation would have been nice. And though I like to think we want humans doing higher-level things, a lot of the people there were happy to get decent pay and not have to think for their day job.

protomyth 5y ago

I guess I spend much more time doing regular typing and being off-center really makes it painful (old HP laptop). I did buy a wireless numeric keypad at one time that had some extra keys and arrows that made data entry really fast.

scintill76 5y ago

How many digits long does it have to be to pay for the time to move your hand to the numpad and back?

dragontamer 5y ago
About 4 digits IMO. The "5" key on most numpads has a bump so I can reach it without even looking at a keyboard I'm familiar with. Any 4-digit security pin I use is entered from numpads. I always buy a laptop with a numpad. Its my preferred method of typing numbers. There are also a whole slew of video game applications, as well as Blender movement (camera angles, camera movement, etc. etc.) that's highly intuitively mapped to the numpad. ------ I should note that when I was practicing for the video-game community "Blazblue", all movements were discussed in terms of numpad. 236 is quarter-circle forward. 69874123 is "360-degree circle, counterclockwise, starting with right". Needless to say, typing a combo such as 5b 5c 2d 28d 28 b c b 8 b c 236c 2d was much easier with a numpad. Anyone who wants to "decode" the button pushes only needs to look at their numpad to see how their left-hand should move, with "b, c, d" being the keywords for the right-hand buttons in Blazblue. Street Fighter players use lp, mp, hp (light punch, medium punch, heavy punch) instead. So those bits get game specific, but the numpad approach to discussion is basically considered superior.
- flemhans 5y ago
  The bump may be ok for new keyboards you didn't try before but quickly become irrelevant after a few days. You know where the keys are then.
  - dragontamer 5y ago
    I disagree. The bump on the j-key on the keyboard, and the 5-key on the numpad is very much clear to high-speed typing. On keyboards without bumps, I find myself off-aligned. Instead of typing "jumping jellyfish", I type "hynoubg hekktfusg", and have to realign my hands. Could I do it without the bump? Probably. But having the bump there (both the j-bump and the 5 bump) is very useful at preventing this mistake.
- 5y ago

raffraffraff 5y ago

If you work in a bank, entering deposits and withdrawals all day. Or a shop that doesn't have a barcode reader. Or if you're an accountant. I suppose you could also argue for a special programmer's pad too. I mean, I play the odd FPS and I'm still happy with WASD so I'm definitely not gonna understand.

xxs 5y ago
...or if you are use it for navigation, along with enter. I never use the numlock but I do use the numpad.

aendruk 5y ago

A virtual numpad via a modifier key can be the best of both worlds; no extra space is used and your hands stay in the center. Example with image: https://andrew.kvalhe.im/2021-03-19 https://andrew.kvalhe.im/2021-03-19 With this method you can customize the location and surrounding mathematical operators.

nyanpasu64 5y ago
In my limited beginner experience (rarely use numpads, mostly in Blender, or virtual numpads), it's awkward to turn virtual numpads on and off, I keep forgetting which state the keyboard is in, and it's hard to read the grayed-out key labels to figure out which normal key maps to the numpad key I want.
admax88qqq 5y ago
Sort of. But it's not ortholinear like most numpads and lacks the addition keys like a big Enter key, and the various math operations. It's an impoverished numpad that requires different muscle memory that you probably don't use often enough to master. Personally I never use the virtual numpad on my devices, I use the full numpad if available or I usr the top row of number keys.

andrepd 5y ago

You can get a cheap external numpad.

xxs 5y ago

actually i use the numpad for arrows (and virtually dont need a mouse in a decent IDE, once I reprogram the shortcuts). I don't recall having a numpad lacking keyboard and a laptop in the last 15y+.