3 ms·
It's not just that people don't want to waste an investment into learning something; that investment can actually enable you way more than a more easily accessi
by dxdm 2y ago
It's not just that people don't want to waste an investment into learning something; that investment can actually enable you way more than a more easily accessible interaction method, and you stick to it because it's _better_.
Once you've learned to use the keyboard property, it's simply faster for many applications. Having buttons at your fingertips beats pointing a cursor and clicking at a succession of targets. For example, I can jump through contexts in a tyling window manager and manipulate windows and their contents much faster with a keyboard, than wading through a stack of windows and clicking things with a mouse.
It all depends on what you're interacting with, and how often. I mostly have to deal with text, and do not need to manipulate arbitrary 2d or 3d image data.
But suggesting that I am simply too set in my ways to ditch the keyboard in favor of poking things with a pointy thing or talking into a box is just too reductive.
- pmontra 2y agoI add to your point and to parent's one. I do use touchscreens when I've got one on a laptop or on a tablet with keyboard and desktop apps. The reason is precisely what you wrote: pushing buttons in front of us at close reach is faster than reaching for a mouse, aiming and clicking. When the screen is at 50 cm or less from our belly it's not hard to raise a hand and use it. That also builds on a lifelong investment on pushing buttons, physical and on screen with mice. Using the Tab key to navigate a UI, or shortcuts or hjkl is something that only a few people (comparatively) did so it's can not become mainstream. The last time I truly learned something new was swyping on my phone keyboard, some 15 years ago. It's extremely niche. I'm the only person doing it among everybody I know. I invested some time but the reward is great, especially when holding the phone with one hand or when there are many vibrations and the screen moves a little. A swiping finger never loses contact. And it's faster for me than two fingers tapping. On the other side, that's another way to cement the qwerty layout because I swype on it and I would have to adjust to a different layout, so why bother? Finally, voice. I realized that I used to dictate text to my keyboard on the early 10s, then I stopped. It worked well even back then without all the new technology. I don't remember why I stopped but if I did it means that I didn't lose anything. I wouldn't start again now because I think that there are very few keyboards with only local speech to text.