7 ms·

Everyone is trying to "get rid of the keyboard", but it's the most reliable way I've ever seen to get large amounts of text in to a machine. Having well made k

Everyone is trying to "get rid of the keyboard", but it's the most reliable way I've ever seen to get large amounts of text in to a machine. Having well made key-switches and a good placement is probably the best thing next to just reading what I mean from my mind.

EthanHeilman 13y ago
People speak at ~100-180 WPM (words per minute), with American Sign Language ~200 WPM[1]. Professional typists type at 50 to 80 WPM [2]. Here is a video of someone signing at 120 WPM, he looks like he is moving in slow motion. [3] Everyone is trying to get rid of the keyboard because: 1. they take up a lot of space, 2. typically require a desk/not mobile friendly, 3. only supports fast entry of a limited number of characters, 4. are far slower than the theoretical best (for instance people can talk much faster than they can type), 5. many of the non-alpha keys require the user to look away from the monitor. > Having well made key-switches and a good placement is probably the best thing next to just reading what I mean from my mind. In theory there are input devices that allow far more characters, at higher speed, with fewer errors. Keyboards have stuck around both because they are a great technology and because of path dependency. They aren't going to stick around forever. [1]: http://www.dbcusa.org/index.php/About-Us/ http://www.dbcusa.org/index.php/About-Us/ [2]: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Words_per_minute http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Words_per_minute [3]: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cj7OpQEu5-w http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cj7OpQEu5-w
- colanderman 13y ago
  People speak at ~100-180 WPM (words per minute), with American Sign Language ~200 WPM[1]. Professional typists type at 50 to 80 WPM [2] I'd wager that I can enter computer code at a higher information rate via keyboard than speaking. "Open-brace" takes a lot longer to say than to type.
  - y4mi 13y ago
    of course, but nothing is forcing you to say "open-brace" for this character. there was a video of someone here not that long ago that customized a speech recognition software to use some easily pronounced sounds for this. while it would still take longer to say, for example koi or roi for ( or ), it reduces it significantly, thus making it into a viable option for programming input
    - deleted 13y ago
      [deleted]
- JoshTriplett 13y ago
  > People speak at ~100-180 WPM (words per minute), with American Sign Language ~200 WPM[1]. Professional typists type at 50 to 80 WPM [2]. That gap closes very quickly if you have to say anything other than words (versus typing it). Saying numbers or symbols is far slower than typing them, as is spelling out something a computer doesn't know how to spell. I'd bet that, unless you had an optimized "dialect" for coding or a language designed to be efficiently spoken, a keyboard will beat a human speaking code every time. Even being very generous with the computer's ability to interpret open/close parentheses and brackets intuitively, having different terms for initial capitals versus all-caps, and assuming automatic indentation and newlines: "include s t d i o dot h, blank line, int main paren int argc comma char pointer argv bracket bracket paren brace printf paren doublequote capital Hello world exclamation mark backslash n doublequote paren semicolon return zero semicolon brace"
  - wisty 13y ago
    Input isn't always the bottle-neck. I think far slower than I type. Actually, a keyboard with editing commands (for cut, past, word select ... the basic VIM / emacs commands) and special keys along with a mouse and voice input could be optimal. Programming is a special case, but I think programmers can cope. The languages might have to change. IIRC, C still uses the ";" instead of newlines, because that was optimal for punch cards, but more modern languages often don't. Most people just want to churn out emails and tweets, though. The big issue is, people use much more complex grammar than when they write. It's fine if you're listening (since the human brain is really good at parsing spoken words), but reading what the average person will produce on a speech recognition system will be brutal. Example: It's amazing how people speak - they use split phrases, and they have long run-on sentences; often with embedded subclauses; which go on and on and are really quite complex but then they trail off when they forget what they were talking about. Oh yeah, I think it was how speech recognition is might have unexpected consequences or something.
  - masklinn 13y ago
    > That gap closes very quickly if you have to say anything other than words (versus typing it). Saying numbers or symbols is far slower than typing them Might be fixable in a language with a limited variety of symbols such as a concatenative language, or a somewhat reimagined smalltalk-ish language. Then the few common symbols get assigned to e.g. click consonants.
- paul_f 13y ago
  If I were always perfect on the first draft I'd agree with you. But keyboards are far better suited for editing than voice is.
- colanderman 13y ago
  Actually, don't forget about stenographers. Court stenographers must type at least 225 WPM. It seems it's not keyboards in general are slow, just the particular kind we have today.
XorNot 13y ago
Lately I've been thinking about whether you could simulate enough of the physicality of a keyboard by electrically twitching the muscles in your fingers to provide some back resistance.

EthanHeilman 13y ago

People speak at ~100-180 WPM (words per minute), with American Sign Language ~200 WPM[1]. Professional typists type at 50 to 80 WPM [2]. Here is a video of someone signing at 120 WPM, he looks like he is moving in slow motion. [3] Everyone is trying to get rid of the keyboard because: 1. they take up a lot of space, 2. typically require a desk/not mobile friendly, 3. only supports fast entry of a limited number of characters, 4. are far slower than the theoretical best (for instance people can talk much faster than they can type), 5. many of the non-alpha keys require the user to look away from the monitor. > Having well made key-switches and a good placement is probably the best thing next to just reading what I mean from my mind. In theory there are input devices that allow far more characters, at higher speed, with fewer errors. Keyboards have stuck around both because they are a great technology and because of path dependency. They aren't going to stick around forever. [1]: http://www.dbcusa.org/index.php/About-Us/ http://www.dbcusa.org/index.php/About-Us/ [2]: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Words_per_minute http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Words_per_minute [3]: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cj7OpQEu5-w http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cj7OpQEu5-w

colanderman 13y ago
People speak at ~100-180 WPM (words per minute), with American Sign Language ~200 WPM[1]. Professional typists type at 50 to 80 WPM [2] I'd wager that I can enter computer code at a higher information rate via keyboard than speaking. "Open-brace" takes a lot longer to say than to type.
- y4mi 13y ago
  of course, but nothing is forcing you to say "open-brace" for this character. there was a video of someone here not that long ago that customized a speech recognition software to use some easily pronounced sounds for this. while it would still take longer to say, for example koi or roi for ( or ), it reduces it significantly, thus making it into a viable option for programming input
  - deleted 13y ago
    [deleted]
JoshTriplett 13y ago
> People speak at ~100-180 WPM (words per minute), with American Sign Language ~200 WPM[1]. Professional typists type at 50 to 80 WPM [2]. That gap closes very quickly if you have to say anything other than words (versus typing it). Saying numbers or symbols is far slower than typing them, as is spelling out something a computer doesn't know how to spell. I'd bet that, unless you had an optimized "dialect" for coding or a language designed to be efficiently spoken, a keyboard will beat a human speaking code every time. Even being very generous with the computer's ability to interpret open/close parentheses and brackets intuitively, having different terms for initial capitals versus all-caps, and assuming automatic indentation and newlines: "include s t d i o dot h, blank line, int main paren int argc comma char pointer argv bracket bracket paren brace printf paren doublequote capital Hello world exclamation mark backslash n doublequote paren semicolon return zero semicolon brace"
- wisty 13y ago
  Input isn't always the bottle-neck. I think far slower than I type. Actually, a keyboard with editing commands (for cut, past, word select ... the basic VIM / emacs commands) and special keys along with a mouse and voice input could be optimal. Programming is a special case, but I think programmers can cope. The languages might have to change. IIRC, C still uses the ";" instead of newlines, because that was optimal for punch cards, but more modern languages often don't. Most people just want to churn out emails and tweets, though. The big issue is, people use much more complex grammar than when they write. It's fine if you're listening (since the human brain is really good at parsing spoken words), but reading what the average person will produce on a speech recognition system will be brutal. Example: It's amazing how people speak - they use split phrases, and they have long run-on sentences; often with embedded subclauses; which go on and on and are really quite complex but then they trail off when they forget what they were talking about. Oh yeah, I think it was how speech recognition is might have unexpected consequences or something.
- masklinn 13y ago
  > That gap closes very quickly if you have to say anything other than words (versus typing it). Saying numbers or symbols is far slower than typing them Might be fixable in a language with a limited variety of symbols such as a concatenative language, or a somewhat reimagined smalltalk-ish language. Then the few common symbols get assigned to e.g. click consonants.
paul_f 13y ago
If I were always perfect on the first draft I'd agree with you. But keyboards are far better suited for editing than voice is.
colanderman 13y ago
Actually, don't forget about stenographers. Court stenographers must type at least 225 WPM. It seems it's not keyboards in general are slow, just the particular kind we have today.

XorNot 13y ago

Lately I've been thinking about whether you could simulate enough of the physicality of a keyboard by electrically twitching the muscles in your fingers to provide some back resistance.