3 ms·

To go against the other comments here, I couldn't get used to it (building new muscle memory - let alone switching). Years ago I bought an ErgoDox. One of the m

by orlp 5y ago

To go against the other comments here, I couldn't get used to it (building new muscle memory - let alone switching). Years ago I bought an ErgoDox. One of the main things I underestimated is that it has an ortholinear layout: the keys are straight above each other instead of being staggered like on a traditional keyboard. I went from typing 110WPM to 30WPM. After a week of practice I was at 50WPM. Two weeks in and I was at 60WPM. Most importantly, typing was now an activity that required thought, instead of simply flowing. At this point I was sufficiently frustrated and felt slowed down enough I stopped and went back to a traditional keyboard. I'm sure that with enough time I would reach my original speed and effort. But I have spent more than a decade building this muscle memory, and I didn't feel it was worth it to spend another decade building muscle memory on non-commodity hardware. Nowadays I'm on 130WPM, so any barrier to switch is even higher. I do understand that my experience is very atypical since I am (supposedly) in the top 0.1% percentile of typing speeds.

hirako2000 5y ago
It isn't just about speed. Ergonomic instruments increase comfort, which increases stamina and lower risks of injuries. Better ergonomy may increase per minute throughput, or decrease it. Rather measure throughput per day or even per week or longer; also factor in the potential consequence of injury leading to using the instrument at a fraction of the average user's speed for a good few months at least.
- orlp 5y ago
  Most important for me wasn't speed, it was flow. But speed is easy to put a number on. I would be a lot more cautious about injury if I was doing a lot more sustained writing. But mostly I am doing technical writing and programming, which usually involves a lot of thinking followed by a small sprint of actually typing. If this small sprint doesn't break my flow or train of thought, it's perfect.
michaelsalim 5y ago
For me it's actually almost the reverse. I used to average 80WPM, not fast but pretty decent. Recently changed to use Moonlander[1], split keyboard + ortholinear. The first week was a chore. Even avoided the computer when I can. But during that time, I forced myself to finally learn how to touch type. Now I get 90+WPM consistently. More if I warm up and actually go for speed. Learning to type very differently than I used to probably helped to make the transition faster (no bad habits). So now I have the advantage of typing faster, without looking at the keyboard at all and better ergonomics (it helped with my shoulder pain). The biggest downside is now I can't type on a normal keyboard anymore. The problem is I never tried touch typing on staggered keyboard so it's like learning an entirely new keyboard layout. Not a big issue during the past year due to work from home though. [1] https://www.zsa.io/moonlander/ https://www.zsa.io/moonlander/
samatman 5y ago
Ortholinear is just one of those things, I was tripped up for a few hours at most. I took it slowly in evolving my QMK map for an ErgoDox, but for whatever reason my fingers just don't find ortho layout confusing. Other people really trip up on it, almost as badly as switching actual layouts to e.g. Colemak. If someone out there hits that point and wants to get past it, the requirement is to train out errors, using a typing trainer which penalizes mistakes by, for example, requiring a word to be typed correctly before the next word is allowed. Breaking the errors is a prerequisite for any jump in typing speed, whether that's a plateau or a new platform. It's annoying but it's the only thing which works.

by orlp 5y ago

hirako2000 5y ago

It isn't just about speed. Ergonomic instruments increase comfort, which increases stamina and lower risks of injuries. Better ergonomy may increase per minute throughput, or decrease it. Rather measure throughput per day or even per week or longer; also factor in the potential consequence of injury leading to using the instrument at a fraction of the average user's speed for a good few months at least.

orlp 5y ago
Most important for me wasn't speed, it was flow. But speed is easy to put a number on. I would be a lot more cautious about injury if I was doing a lot more sustained writing. But mostly I am doing technical writing and programming, which usually involves a lot of thinking followed by a small sprint of actually typing. If this small sprint doesn't break my flow or train of thought, it's perfect.

michaelsalim 5y ago

For me it's actually almost the reverse. I used to average 80WPM, not fast but pretty decent. Recently changed to use Moonlander[1], split keyboard + ortholinear. The first week was a chore. Even avoided the computer when I can. But during that time, I forced myself to finally learn how to touch type. Now I get 90+WPM consistently. More if I warm up and actually go for speed. Learning to type very differently than I used to probably helped to make the transition faster (no bad habits). So now I have the advantage of typing faster, without looking at the keyboard at all and better ergonomics (it helped with my shoulder pain). The biggest downside is now I can't type on a normal keyboard anymore. The problem is I never tried touch typing on staggered keyboard so it's like learning an entirely new keyboard layout. Not a big issue during the past year due to work from home though. [1] https://www.zsa.io/moonlander/ https://www.zsa.io/moonlander/

samatman 5y ago

Ortholinear is just one of those things, I was tripped up for a few hours at most. I took it slowly in evolving my QMK map for an ErgoDox, but for whatever reason my fingers just don't find ortho layout confusing. Other people really trip up on it, almost as badly as switching actual layouts to e.g. Colemak. If someone out there hits that point and wants to get past it, the requirement is to train out errors, using a typing trainer which penalizes mistakes by, for example, requiring a word to be typed correctly before the next word is allowed. Breaking the errors is a prerequisite for any jump in typing speed, whether that's a plateau or a new platform. It's annoying but it's the only thing which works.