5 ms·

This specific one is just bad though. I mean "\" is really difficult to type on almost all non-us keyboards. It's not even really easy on US keyboards (the pink

This specific one is just bad though. I mean "\" is really difficult to type on almost all non-us keyboards. It's not even really easy on US keyboards (the pinky has to go a long way). See how often it's in there. Even standard C syntax is a pain on some non-us keyboards. I.e. on a German keyboard, the [, [, {, }, are rather difficult to type. That's why I (being German) switched to an English layout around two years ago. Now I have trouble typing umlaut and thus writing good German, but at least my coding speed improved by probably 50% and my Hand hurts far less.

jlgreco 14y ago
Yes, without doubt this specific one is bad.
eru 14y ago
You might want to try the Neo layout. It's a modern layout that includes international characters, like German Umlauts. (I'm also German and switched to American Dvorak earlier. I only heard about Neo later, and am too lazy to switch now.)
- dkersten 14y ago
  I guess if LCtrl and their LMod3 were swapped (ie so that capslock is used as Ctrl for shortcut keys), I could see this being an interesting layout. It has all the common keys either on the home row or easily reached from the home row. I can't ever see myself switching from Colemak though, I like how the fingers roll across adjacent keys too much. (Plus since I don't type much German, I don't need quick access to üöäß, though an English-centric variant of Neo would be.. interesting, maybe using those keys for the most common programming symbols?)
threedaymonk 14y ago
There are various keyboard layouts that are superficially English but which allow various diacritics via dead keys, such that, for example, you can type AltGr+" followed by u to get ü. (I just did exactly that.) I know of us altgr-intl on Linux (that is, xkb), but there are similar layouts on OS X and Windows.
GregBuchholz 14y ago
Now I'm interested to know which languages exist that don't rely heavily on backslashes. I guess I can't think of a language that doesn't use blackslashes for string escapes. Some other uses off the top of my head: * C -- line-continuations (important for macros). * Perl -- regex back-references. * Haskell -- anonymous functions. * Python -- line continuation. * Tcl -- line continuation. * Icon -- non-null test (unary), generator limitation (binary). * Prolog -- \+ for not provable. * J -- the prefix adverb and the grade-down verb (\:). * TeX -- Yes.
- rfurmani 14y ago
  Technically, for Perl you can use $ for regex backreferences. I don't remember which one is preferred, but I remember it frowning upon one of them.
  - btilly 14y ago
    What you use depends on where you use it. Inside of a match, \1 refers to what was matched by the first parens. After the match $1 refers to what was matched. In a substitution, \1 is special cased to mean $1, but that is frowned on. Thus: /\b(\w+)\W+\1\b/ means "match repeated word". And: /\b(\w+)\W+$1\b/ means "match word preceeded by the word matched on your last match. Moving on: s/Hello (\w+)/Goodbye $!/ means "Replace Hello followed by a word with Goodbye followed by the same word." And finally: s/Hello (\w+)/Goodbye \1/ is special cased to mean the same thing, but is frowned upon.
- rdtsc 14y ago
  > Now I'm interested to know which languages exist that don't rely heavily on backslashes. I posit that line continuations don't count, at least not in the "rely heavily" category. Then I am not sure how popular J and Icon are. So let' keep those away. Is the backlash really used that often in Prolog? I wouldn't say "heavily". So that leaves us with: * Perl * Haskell * Tex I think that's a more realistic "rely heavily" category.
  - GregBuchholz 14y ago
luchs 14y ago
I solved that problem by binding capslock to Alt Gr and using a custom US layout with Alt Gr plus e-[;' bound to €ßüöä. This basically allows me to quickly switch to the German layout when necessary without losing much speed.

jlgreco 14y ago

Yes, without doubt this specific one is bad.

eru 14y ago

You might want to try the Neo layout. It's a modern layout that includes international characters, like German Umlauts. (I'm also German and switched to American Dvorak earlier. I only heard about Neo later, and am too lazy to switch now.)

dkersten 14y ago
I guess if LCtrl and their LMod3 were swapped (ie so that capslock is used as Ctrl for shortcut keys), I could see this being an interesting layout. It has all the common keys either on the home row or easily reached from the home row. I can't ever see myself switching from Colemak though, I like how the fingers roll across adjacent keys too much. (Plus since I don't type much German, I don't need quick access to üöäß, though an English-centric variant of Neo would be.. interesting, maybe using those keys for the most common programming symbols?)

threedaymonk 14y ago

There are various keyboard layouts that are superficially English but which allow various diacritics via dead keys, such that, for example, you can type AltGr+" followed by u to get ü. (I just did exactly that.) I know of us altgr-intl on Linux (that is, xkb), but there are similar layouts on OS X and Windows.

GregBuchholz 14y ago

Now I'm interested to know which languages exist that don't rely heavily on backslashes. I guess I can't think of a language that doesn't use blackslashes for string escapes. Some other uses off the top of my head: * C -- line-continuations (important for macros). * Perl -- regex back-references. * Haskell -- anonymous functions. * Python -- line continuation. * Tcl -- line continuation. * Icon -- non-null test (unary), generator limitation (binary). * Prolog -- \+ for not provable. * J -- the prefix adverb and the grade-down verb (\:). * TeX -- Yes.

rfurmani 14y ago
Technically, for Perl you can use $ for regex backreferences. I don't remember which one is preferred, but I remember it frowning upon one of them.
- btilly 14y ago
  What you use depends on where you use it. Inside of a match, \1 refers to what was matched by the first parens. After the match $1 refers to what was matched. In a substitution, \1 is special cased to mean $1, but that is frowned on. Thus: /\b(\w+)\W+\1\b/ means "match repeated word". And: /\b(\w+)\W+$1\b/ means "match word preceeded by the word matched on your last match. Moving on: s/Hello (\w+)/Goodbye $!/ means "Replace Hello followed by a word with Goodbye followed by the same word." And finally: s/Hello (\w+)/Goodbye \1/ is special cased to mean the same thing, but is frowned upon.
rdtsc 14y ago
> Now I'm interested to know which languages exist that don't rely heavily on backslashes. I posit that line continuations don't count, at least not in the "rely heavily" category. Then I am not sure how popular J and Icon are. So let' keep those away. Is the backlash really used that often in Prolog? I wouldn't say "heavily". So that leaves us with: * Perl * Haskell * Tex I think that's a more realistic "rely heavily" category.
- GregBuchholz 14y ago

luchs 14y ago

I solved that problem by binding capslock to Alt Gr and using a custom US layout with Alt Gr plus e-[;' bound to €ßüöä. This basically allows me to quickly switch to the German layout when necessary without losing much speed.