4 ms·

This is an interesting design, independently if it may or may not be successful. In my opinion the keyboard should be reinvented. The qwerty and similar designs

by nzonbi 12y ago

This is an interesting design, independently if it may or may not be successful. In my opinion the keyboard should be reinvented. The qwerty and similar designs works, but not for everybody. I for example, took a course on using qwerty correctly, with all fingers, and without having to look at it, and failed. I can type fairly fast, but must look at the keys most of the time, and mostly use both index fingers only. The arrangement feels not intuitive for me, more like a mess. I can't never remember where a key is located exactly. All I can memorize are approximate locations. I am sure that at least for me, there could be better keyboard implementations. I have been thinking, and have some ideas. Both for on-screen touch, and physical keyboards. I may try implementing them soon. There is currently a cool trend on the PC market, in which companies are trying innovative form factors. The hybrid laptop-tablets are becoming popular. There are great devices on the market. MS surface 3, lenovo yoga and miix, asus convertibles, acer R7 and switch, are good examples. But the way I see it, these devices are saddened by the ugly and not cool qwerty keyboards. I wonder why those companies that have the resources, and are eager to differentiate on the market, haven't tried any alternative to the old qwerty. The world needs more creativity. For example, what does stop Microsoft, from offering a choice of alternative keyboard implementations as surface covers? In my opinion this is a big missed opportunity, and I hope these companies realize it someday. In the meantime, I may soon come up with a homemade alternative keyboard for my personal use. For those that the qwerty keyboard works, they should continue using it. But for those that don't, which I suspect are the majority, could use alternatives. There is an interesting opportunity in the market for those that realize it.

skywhopper 12y ago
I'm guessing it's harder to learn to touch type these days for folks who spend huge amounts of time using keyboards. While you're taking the course, you're partially hobbled by only knowing a few letters by memory, and you spend 90% of your day needing to actually type, so practicing your new touch-typing has got to be very hard to do. I learned to type with two fingers on computers in the 80s and could type pretty fast, but in high school (90s) I took a semester-long typing class, and while it was harder at first, touch-typing soon enough became so much faster it was well worth the effort to overcome my old habits. You're right that the QWERTY is screwy. It was designed to be. But while I agree alternative keyboards are something that should be researched, I also think learning to touch-type qwerty will be such a benefit to anyone who types much at all that it'll be worth the pain to do so, even though yes, it's probably way harder today than it was in the early 90s.
jfoutz 12y ago
If you ever care to touch type, look into a Das Keyboard with no markings. Or even better, get a cheapo keyboard and spray paint it. You get the letters committed to muscle memory remarkably quickly when all you have to go on is key position. The numbers are a little rougher, and the symbols toughest of all. You'll probably spend a few days with a text editor open so you can click over to find { or whatever. You'll probably let more fingers touch the keyboard, just so you can anchor your hands in space, over 2 up 1 for O or whatever. I'm not a fast typist, but when i moved from typing and looking, to just muscle memory, i got a nice speed boost.

by nzonbi 12y ago

skywhopper 12y ago

I'm guessing it's harder to learn to touch type these days for folks who spend huge amounts of time using keyboards. While you're taking the course, you're partially hobbled by only knowing a few letters by memory, and you spend 90% of your day needing to actually type, so practicing your new touch-typing has got to be very hard to do. I learned to type with two fingers on computers in the 80s and could type pretty fast, but in high school (90s) I took a semester-long typing class, and while it was harder at first, touch-typing soon enough became so much faster it was well worth the effort to overcome my old habits. You're right that the QWERTY is screwy. It was designed to be. But while I agree alternative keyboards are something that should be researched, I also think learning to touch-type qwerty will be such a benefit to anyone who types much at all that it'll be worth the pain to do so, even though yes, it's probably way harder today than it was in the early 90s.

jfoutz 12y ago

If you ever care to touch type, look into a Das Keyboard with no markings. Or even better, get a cheapo keyboard and spray paint it. You get the letters committed to muscle memory remarkably quickly when all you have to go on is key position. The numbers are a little rougher, and the symbols toughest of all. You'll probably spend a few days with a text editor open so you can click over to find { or whatever. You'll probably let more fingers touch the keyboard, just so you can anchor your hands in space, over 2 up 1 for O or whatever. I'm not a fast typist, but when i moved from typing and looking, to just muscle memory, i got a nice speed boost.