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Just learn dvorak or colemak - they're not hard to learn, have tons of benefits, and are readily available on all operating systems
by StephenSmith 2y ago
Just learn dvorak or colemak - they're not hard to learn, have tons of benefits, and are readily available on all operating systems
- stavros 2y agoWhat are the benefits, beyond retraining all my shortcut muscle memory?
- Dalewyn 2y agoNoone else can use your computer.
- stavros 2y agoThey already can't, I have a custom unlabeled qwerty keyboard.
- netsharc 2y agoI only know QWERTY, given an unlabeled QWERTY keyboard I'd be able to type. If you have a different layout, that's a huge group of people you'd add to your "They"...
- stavros 2y agoI'd invite you to give it a shot: https://www.stavros.io/posts/george-i-made-a-keyboard/first-with-switches.jpg https://www.stavros.io/posts/george-i-made-a-keyboard/first-...
- Perenti 2y agoLiving with neuropathy of the right brachial plexus, I find that dvorak hurts me less as there's a lot less movement.
- stavros 2y agoI see, thanks!
- hn_throwaway_99 2y agoIs there any evidence at all that they have tons of benefits? I thought there was research that said they were mostly myths. Decades ago I learned dvorak and used it exclusively for about a year. I honestly felt no benefits. If anything it made things more of a pain in the ass because many common commands (e.g. Ctrl-C Ctrl-V) are where they are because of their locations on a qwerty keyboard. You can re-map shortcuts but I still find myself using devices that aren't my own often enough that I find it annoying. I remember one funny instance where I had to remote desktop into a shared server, and I remapped to dvorak and forgot to change it back, and then when someone else remoted in they thought their keyboard was possessed.
- Carrok 2y agoIf you are looking at only speed as a benefit, it’s debatable. For ergonomics, absolutely. Look at the hands of someone typing QWERTY, they’re almost bent in half longways for certain key combinations. DVORAK on the other hand allows your hands to stay flat and relaxed. I will never return to QWERTY.
- throw10920 2y agoAs someone who has occasional wrist pain and is fluent in both QWERTY and Dvorak, the latter is significantly less painful to type with when my pain is present. I believe that that indicates that it is less strenuous.
- Aerroon 2y agoCould it be that you get less wrist pain because Dvorak switches things up rather than it being better overall? With mouse use I find that a different grip can alleviate pain not because it's easier on the wrist, but because it's just different from the way I normally use it.
- throw10920 2y agoIt's possible, but given my experience seems unlikely - I spend the majority of my time using Dvorak, and very little time using QWERTY, so there's not much switching going on. Also, most typing effort models (e.g. carpalx[1]) put Dvorak as significantly lower effort than QWERTY. I think it'd be more likely to be the switching effect if you were going between two similar-effort layouts (e.g. Dvorak and Colemak). [1] https://mk.bcgsc.ca/carpalx/?popular_alternatives https://mk.bcgsc.ca/carpalx/?popular_alternatives
- mkl 2y agoOr Workman, which has advantages over both: https://workmanlayout.org/ https://workmanlayout.org/ I like Workman. With that and a keyboard that has many thumb buttons (Moonlander and Ergodox clone) my wrists are much happier. I wouldn't recommend Dvorak - it was designed a very long time ago without computers in mind or the in-depth efficiency calculations we can do today.