4 ms·

That was similar to my experience with Dvorak, back in the early 90's. Having learned touch typing on qwerty on an IBM typewriter from high school, and learnin

That was similar to my experience with Dvorak, back in the early 90's. Having learned touch typing on qwerty on an IBM typewriter from high school, and learning/typing for several years, I thought I was pretty good typist, but in college, I had the nagging feeling I wanted to try something else, since my wrist didn't feel too good after a long typing session, and I wanted to get even faster. It felt so weird learning to type in Dvorak layout, but I got used to it and after a month, I was typing ok, and within 2 months, I was probably typing the fastest I've ever been. It felt much easier to type physically and felt more effortless to type. The downside was that every time I went to type on someone else's computer, I just couldn't type on qwerty anymore. Some people just seem to have knack on being able to switch between layouts, but I just couldn't. Being an "expert" on computer as a software engineer, imagine people's surprise when I could barely locate a key... "So where is that B key again?" Also I couldn't use VIM no matter how I tried to remap the keys in vim. Eventually, I abandoned Dvorak for practical reason, and when I did, it took few weeks to get back to re-learning qwerty.

jurassicfoxy 3y ago
I had a co-worker that could switch between qwerty and Dvorak instantly, it was amazing. And type very quickly in both.
- pluijzer 3y ago
  I can switch between Dvorak and Qwerty quicky if it is a physically different keyboard. I type with Dvorak on my Kenisis keyboard and Qwerty on my laptop without any effort in switching between the two. But as soon as I try it vice versa I feel like I am typing for the first time.
  - tough 3y ago
    Some sort of context-aware muscle memory
  - meatmanek 3y ago
    I subconsciously switch to qwerty when using someone else's computer, and it really throws me off if they use Dvorak. I still have an account on my parents' old computer, and it takes me a moment to remind myself to use Dvorak while using it.
  - verisimilidude 3y ago
    Same exact thing here. If it's split and tented, I type Dvorak. If it's flat, I type Qwerty. Full speed, no thought.
  - zaxmyth 3y ago
    Exactly the same for me. And the great thing with keyboards like Kinesis is that the key map is in the board itself so moving between computers is as easy as moving the keyboard. I’ve been doing this now for over 23 years.
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]
TylerE 3y ago
I stopped caring about typing when I realized I could already type twice as fast as I can think.
- Taikonerd 3y ago
  In my mind, a more ergonomic keyboard layout isn't about typing faster -- it's about putting less stress on your fingers.
- celeritascelery 3y ago
  What is your WPM? I am about 80 and still feel like my brain is running ahead of my fingers.
  - TylerE 3y ago
    100ish is I really push it. I tend to edit in my head before typing, so raw wpm mostly isn't all that useful to me past a fairly low bar.
allknowingfrog 3y ago
I switched to Dvorak a couple of years before I learned VIM. I made the decision not to remap anything in VIM, because it seemed like every key already had a job, and I was afraid of upsetting the balance. I'm still a Dvorak/VIM user 10 years later. My directional navigation keys are in strange places, but it's just muscle memory at this point. If I had learned VIM first, I'm not sure how the switch to Dvorak would have gone. My fear of breaking an unfamiliar editor may have accidentally steered me into success.
- WorldMaker 3y ago
  I learned vim first then switched to Colemak and made the mistake of first trying a very heavily remapped vim layout. Eventually it was reminded to Vim's layout other than its directional keys is very heavily mnemonic and eventually I was convinced to use fewer to no remaps and the classic vim mnemonics. I probably could have used that advice sooner to avoid the years of a very custom map and the confusion that still sometimes accidentally triggers.
- taeric 3y ago
  VIM is a fun one, in this regard. True, the arrow keys are no longer on the home row. For the most part, you can just use the arrow keys, of course. Keeping your hand exactly at home position is largely over sold on that regard, and physically grounding your hand between the arrows and home is easy to flip between. The nice thing, though, is most of the other key choices are mnemonic. "C" for change, etc. Such that you really can keep moving fairly well by sticking with the conversation you are having with VIM.
  - rgoulter 3y ago
    > Keeping your hand exactly at home position is largely over sold on that regard... It's a marginal benefit, but it's still a benefit. The more significant factor than "qwerty vs colemak" is that the thumbs aren't able to achieve much with the hands rested on home row. They can hit spacebar; and to be useful for anything else, the hands have to move. Whereas, with keyboards like the Moonlander, the thumbs can reach 2-3 keys each. Albeit, regarding vim's 'hjkl', vim makes it very easy to quickly move around a single line, so h/l shouldn't be very common. For rapid vertical movement, 'easy motion'-style stuff is neat.
meatmanek 3y ago
Yep, very similar experience here. I learned Dvorak around age 12, a year or so after I learned to touch-type QWERTY. I completely lost the ability to touch-type QWERTY after switching to Dvorak until I took a CS class in high school that was on ancient computers running Win98, where I had no ability to change the layout. I have gradually built back my ability to touch-type on QWERTY now, acceptably quickly (probably 50WPM?) but my error rate is atrocious. I find it a little embarrassing to be a computing professional and not be able to type competently when I sit down at someone else's computer.
thingification 3y ago
> Some people just seem to have knack on being able to switch between layouts, but I just couldn't. Did you put in serious deliberate practice time and still find that? If yes, what sort of time? I suspect those people just did that sort of practice (even if maybe not really attending much to the fact they were doing so - I don't think that's a contradiction!)
godshatter 3y ago
> I just couldn't type on qwerty anymore I went through that, and got there eventually. It was probably harder to become bikeyboardal than it was to switch in the first place. But now I type in qwerty at work and dvorak at home. I originally switched to dvorak because I was getting pain in the sides of my hands for some reason, but that went away with dvorak and didn't come back. So I figure it's best for me to keep both layouts in my muscle memory.

jurassicfoxy 3y ago

I had a co-worker that could switch between qwerty and Dvorak instantly, it was amazing. And type very quickly in both.

pluijzer 3y ago
I can switch between Dvorak and Qwerty quicky if it is a physically different keyboard. I type with Dvorak on my Kenisis keyboard and Qwerty on my laptop without any effort in switching between the two. But as soon as I try it vice versa I feel like I am typing for the first time.
- tough 3y ago
  Some sort of context-aware muscle memory
- meatmanek 3y ago
  I subconsciously switch to qwerty when using someone else's computer, and it really throws me off if they use Dvorak. I still have an account on my parents' old computer, and it takes me a moment to remind myself to use Dvorak while using it.
- verisimilidude 3y ago
  Same exact thing here. If it's split and tented, I type Dvorak. If it's flat, I type Qwerty. Full speed, no thought.
- zaxmyth 3y ago
  Exactly the same for me. And the great thing with keyboards like Kinesis is that the key map is in the board itself so moving between computers is as easy as moving the keyboard. I’ve been doing this now for over 23 years.
deleted 3y ago
[deleted]

TylerE 3y ago

I stopped caring about typing when I realized I could already type twice as fast as I can think.

Taikonerd 3y ago
In my mind, a more ergonomic keyboard layout isn't about typing faster -- it's about putting less stress on your fingers.
celeritascelery 3y ago
What is your WPM? I am about 80 and still feel like my brain is running ahead of my fingers.
- TylerE 3y ago
  100ish is I really push it. I tend to edit in my head before typing, so raw wpm mostly isn't all that useful to me past a fairly low bar.

allknowingfrog 3y ago

I switched to Dvorak a couple of years before I learned VIM. I made the decision not to remap anything in VIM, because it seemed like every key already had a job, and I was afraid of upsetting the balance. I'm still a Dvorak/VIM user 10 years later. My directional navigation keys are in strange places, but it's just muscle memory at this point. If I had learned VIM first, I'm not sure how the switch to Dvorak would have gone. My fear of breaking an unfamiliar editor may have accidentally steered me into success.

WorldMaker 3y ago
I learned vim first then switched to Colemak and made the mistake of first trying a very heavily remapped vim layout. Eventually it was reminded to Vim's layout other than its directional keys is very heavily mnemonic and eventually I was convinced to use fewer to no remaps and the classic vim mnemonics. I probably could have used that advice sooner to avoid the years of a very custom map and the confusion that still sometimes accidentally triggers.
taeric 3y ago
VIM is a fun one, in this regard. True, the arrow keys are no longer on the home row. For the most part, you can just use the arrow keys, of course. Keeping your hand exactly at home position is largely over sold on that regard, and physically grounding your hand between the arrows and home is easy to flip between. The nice thing, though, is most of the other key choices are mnemonic. "C" for change, etc. Such that you really can keep moving fairly well by sticking with the conversation you are having with VIM.
- rgoulter 3y ago
  > Keeping your hand exactly at home position is largely over sold on that regard... It's a marginal benefit, but it's still a benefit. The more significant factor than "qwerty vs colemak" is that the thumbs aren't able to achieve much with the hands rested on home row. They can hit spacebar; and to be useful for anything else, the hands have to move. Whereas, with keyboards like the Moonlander, the thumbs can reach 2-3 keys each. Albeit, regarding vim's 'hjkl', vim makes it very easy to quickly move around a single line, so h/l shouldn't be very common. For rapid vertical movement, 'easy motion'-style stuff is neat.

meatmanek 3y ago

Yep, very similar experience here. I learned Dvorak around age 12, a year or so after I learned to touch-type QWERTY. I completely lost the ability to touch-type QWERTY after switching to Dvorak until I took a CS class in high school that was on ancient computers running Win98, where I had no ability to change the layout. I have gradually built back my ability to touch-type on QWERTY now, acceptably quickly (probably 50WPM?) but my error rate is atrocious. I find it a little embarrassing to be a computing professional and not be able to type competently when I sit down at someone else's computer.

thingification 3y ago

> Some people just seem to have knack on being able to switch between layouts, but I just couldn't. Did you put in serious deliberate practice time and still find that? If yes, what sort of time? I suspect those people just did that sort of practice (even if maybe not really attending much to the fact they were doing so - I don't think that's a contradiction!)

godshatter 3y ago

> I just couldn't type on qwerty anymore I went through that, and got there eventually. It was probably harder to become bikeyboardal than it was to switch in the first place. But now I type in qwerty at work and dvorak at home. I originally switched to dvorak because I was getting pain in the sides of my hands for some reason, but that went away with dvorak and didn't come back. So I figure it's best for me to keep both layouts in my muscle memory.