Holy jpal... I mean holy crap. I just rearranged my keys and am typing with Dvorak for the first time. It has literally taken me 5 minutes to type this.
Holy jpal... I mean holy crap. I just rearranged my keys and am typing with Dvorak for the first time. It has literally taken me 5 minutes to type this.
*phew*
how's dvorak going murbot? i've stuck it out for about two weeks and my typing is far far far better now. i am approaching 40 wpm after being at around 7 wpm when i started. the learning curve is much shorther than i expected, but the first five or six days are brutal. i committed the layout to memory in about two days, and then typed "the quick red fox jumped over the lazy brown dog" about one bajillion times.
the biggest problem for me is when i have to use qwerty...i slow to probably 25 wpm where i typed 80wpm before i started. however, using qwerty is laughable because it becomes quite obvious how it sends your fingers propelling all around the keyboard. i mean, why on earth is " ; " in the home row? or K? it is wacky. i'm hoping after another couple of months i'll be able to get around 100wpm with dvorak.
i'm sure this has been covered, but why is it called dvorak? is that the name of the guy who came up with it?
Hehe, I had forgotten completely about dvorak for the last year or so. Ever since my PB's HD died I stopped using it. Now my wrists hurt again all the time though, so I think I will pick it back up. I had to laugh when I saw this thread still alive.
Just in time for a whooooole lot of typing in the next couple weeks too.
I was going to switch to DV, but my dad insisted that it would permanently screw up my ability to type QWERTY.
Your dad's half-right. In the short term, it's really not a good idea to type Qwerty while learning Dvorak. And once you've learnt Dvorak, you will keep trying to use Dvorak on a Qwerty keyboard. So learning Dvorak's half the challange - after that, if you have to still use Qwerty, you have to adapt to switching between two keyboard layouts.
I now use Dvorak at home, and Qwerty at work (sadly). I'l slowly getting used to Qwerty again, although I'll never reach my old speed on it (i'm at that on Dvorak though, and I don't need to type that fast on the tills at work.)
A) It is more ergonomic to use two-key combos from the touch typing position (using the control/option/command key on the opposite side of the keyboard from the alphabetic key).
Well, if I'm in say Photoshop and want to use one hand for undoing and saving and the other hand for using the mouse, I'd think it would be more ergonomic to have them in the same position.
Holy resurrected thread Batman! I didn't even remember posting in this thread before, but it seems I did.
Good point from Placebo: if you use mouse and try to use Dvorak shortcuts with the left hand, you are more likely than not screwed by their location that *was* perfectly planned for the left hand originally. Problem is greatly compounded if you don't change keycaps and have to fish on the "wrong" side of the keyboard - you have very little feel which key you are touching then.
I would never be able to stand a half-way setup that changed to QWERTY for the duration of pressing the command key, either. Of the two sucky choices I'd definitely go for the full-Dvorak version.
Passwords only go slow for a while, then you learn them again. That's not a real obstacle anyone should quit over. If in doubt if you can remember how to spell some password, just change it to one you can spell before changing layout.
The best things that have happened to my fingers have been (in chronological order):
- Microsoft ergo keyboard
- the Vim editor
(this is when I tried Dvorak - not part of the list, but for reference)
- learning the US QWERTY (I knew parts of it before from, believe it or not, using Quake console commands... but this is when I learned the whole thing. The locations of brackets and other coding symbols are insanely great for coding compared to most other layouts. Many of you guys probably don't know how good you have things by default.)
- the Powerbook keyboard: it was the best keyboard I had used. Later iBook keyboard, no difference whatsoever.
- my new love. It's just amazing how much difference it makes having a Control key in the right place, no numpad where I want to keep the mouse, and Esc so close for Vim use. Now I just wish I could configure chords so I could translate f+j into an Esc keypress to take that last strain off the pinky. I doubt other keyboard manufacturers are going to be able to trump this in quite a while. Most likely in five years' time HH will put out a subtle evolution of the current design and I'll buy it immediately.
I haven't had any urge to try Dvorak again after my first adventure with it. It just isn't feasible when you need to constantly switch between different language layouts - in my case finnish, US QWERTY, three Japanese layouts - and will still occasionally use another computer. My opinion is, only go Dvorak if you only write english.
Well, if I'm in say Photoshop and want to use one hand for undoing and saving and the other hand for using the mouse, I'd think it would be more ergonomic to have them in the same position.
Well there's two things wrong with this:
1) Ergonomic doesn't mean moving your hands as little as possible, in fact one of the reasons mice are so bad for you is because you are moving something with very little weight/resistance through such a small range of movement and only using very small muscle groups to do so. Occasionally moving between the keyboard and pointer is probably better for you than just leaving it in one position and quite possibly faster than taking your eyes off the screen to look for a key combo.
2) Hitting double key actions like Command U with one hand is certainly awkward and unergonomic , but that's not really a QWERTY vs. Dvorak issue it's just one handed claw versus two-handed touch typing. With Dvorak Command-U would be the equivalent of Command-F which is slightly easier to hit (similarly Command-S becomes the easier Command-. The only problem is if you've gone fully Dvorak (and not relabeled or re-arranged your keys) then you may have to maintain a mental translation since you can't touch type these double key combos with one hand, and so you have to hunt and peck with distracting key legends. So I wouldn't hitting say hitting combos one handed on Dvorak was any less ergonomic, just more confusing and harder to learn.
Editing in Vim while switching to Dvorak is vile. You have to enter a command (one of several letters) to even begin typing. You use letter keys to move the cursor around. You use letter keys to do things you do with backspace in any other editor. Stuff like that seeps way deeper in your spinal column than any password. The editor keeps jumping between modes when you put in faulty input, so you can't punch two letters and expect two backspaces to deal with it. Punching in two wrong letter keys can destroy your document. Nothing that undo won't fix, but still...
Comments
Originally posted by murbot
Holy jpal... I mean holy crap. I just rearranged my keys and am typing with Dvorak for the first time. It has literally taken me 5 minutes to type this.
*phew*
sure your not just drunk?
Originally posted by Whisper
I know the feeling. The "5 minutes to type anything" syndrome goes away in a few days.
i sure hope so! (on day 3, day 1 1/2 of touch-typing)
Originally posted by progmac
i sure hope so! (on day 3, day 1 1/2 of touch-typing)
i'm getting faster every second, so i dont doubt it. i just hope i can build up to my qwerty speed RSN.
Originally posted by murbot
Holy jpal... I mean holy crap. I just rearranged my keys and am typing with Dvorak for the first time. It has literally taken me 5 minutes to type this.
*phew*
how's dvorak going murbot? i've stuck it out for about two weeks and my typing is far far far better now. i am approaching 40 wpm after being at around 7 wpm when i started. the learning curve is much shorther than i expected, but the first five or six days are brutal. i committed the layout to memory in about two days, and then typed "the quick red fox jumped over the lazy brown dog" about one bajillion times.
the biggest problem for me is when i have to use qwerty...i slow to probably 25 wpm where i typed 80wpm before i started. however, using qwerty is laughable because it becomes quite obvious how it sends your fingers propelling all around the keyboard. i mean, why on earth is " ; " in the home row? or K? it is wacky. i'm hoping after another couple of months i'll be able to get around 100wpm with dvorak.
i'm sure this has been covered, but why is it called dvorak? is that the name of the guy who came up with it?
I've been using dvorak for 18 months now... and I can type pretty well on both layouts....
any new converts?
Originally posted by Placebo
I was going to switch to DV, but my dad insisted that it would permanently screw up my ability to type QWERTY.
Your dad's wrong.
Originally posted by Whisper
Your dad's wrong.
This is the one who kicks me off my comp when he sees me playing UT2004...
Just in time for a whooooole lot of typing in the next couple weeks too.
-Ender
Originally posted by Placebo
I was going to switch to DV, but my dad insisted that it would permanently screw up my ability to type QWERTY.
Your dad's half-right. In the short term, it's really not a good idea to type Qwerty while learning Dvorak. And once you've learnt Dvorak, you will keep trying to use Dvorak on a Qwerty keyboard. So learning Dvorak's half the challange - after that, if you have to still use Qwerty, you have to adapt to switching between two keyboard layouts.
I now use Dvorak at home, and Qwerty at work (sadly). I'l slowly getting used to Qwerty again, although I'll never reach my old speed on it (i'm at that on Dvorak though, and I don't need to type that fast on the tills at work.)
Originally posted by stupider...likeafox
I use the full Dvorak mode because:
A) It is more ergonomic to use two-key combos from the touch typing position (using the control/option/command key on the opposite side of the keyboard from the alphabetic key).
Well, if I'm in say Photoshop and want to use one hand for undoing and saving and the other hand for using the mouse, I'd think it would be more ergonomic to have them in the same position.
Good point from Placebo: if you use mouse and try to use Dvorak shortcuts with the left hand, you are more likely than not screwed by their location that *was* perfectly planned for the left hand originally. Problem is greatly compounded if you don't change keycaps and have to fish on the "wrong" side of the keyboard - you have very little feel which key you are touching then.
I would never be able to stand a half-way setup that changed to QWERTY for the duration of pressing the command key, either. Of the two sucky choices I'd definitely go for the full-Dvorak version.
Passwords only go slow for a while, then you learn them again. That's not a real obstacle anyone should quit over. If in doubt if you can remember how to spell some password, just change it to one you can spell before changing layout.
The best things that have happened to my fingers have been (in chronological order):
- Microsoft ergo keyboard
- the Vim editor
(this is when I tried Dvorak - not part of the list, but for reference)
- learning the US QWERTY (I knew parts of it before from, believe it or not, using Quake console commands... but this is when I learned the whole thing. The locations of brackets and other coding symbols are insanely great for coding compared to most other layouts. Many of you guys probably don't know how good you have things by default.)
- the Powerbook keyboard: it was the best keyboard I had used. Later iBook keyboard, no difference whatsoever.
- my new love. It's just amazing how much difference it makes having a Control key in the right place, no numpad where I want to keep the mouse, and Esc so close for Vim use. Now I just wish I could configure chords so I could translate f+j into an Esc keypress to take that last strain off the pinky. I doubt other keyboard manufacturers are going to be able to trump this in quite a while. Most likely in five years' time HH will put out a subtle evolution of the current design and I'll buy it immediately.
I haven't had any urge to try Dvorak again after my first adventure with it. It just isn't feasible when you need to constantly switch between different language layouts - in my case finnish, US QWERTY, three Japanese layouts - and will still occasionally use another computer. My opinion is, only go Dvorak if you only write english.
Originally posted by Placebo
Well, if I'm in say Photoshop and want to use one hand for undoing and saving and the other hand for using the mouse, I'd think it would be more ergonomic to have them in the same position.
Well there's two things wrong with this:
1) Ergonomic doesn't mean moving your hands as little as possible, in fact one of the reasons mice are so bad for you is because you are moving something with very little weight/resistance through such a small range of movement and only using very small muscle groups to do so. Occasionally moving between the keyboard and pointer is probably better for you than just leaving it in one position and quite possibly faster than taking your eyes off the screen to look for a key combo.
2) Hitting double key actions like Command U with one hand is certainly awkward and unergonomic , but that's not really a QWERTY vs. Dvorak issue it's just one handed claw versus two-handed touch typing. With Dvorak Command-U would be the equivalent of Command-F which is slightly easier to hit (similarly Command-S becomes the easier Command-
Editing in Vim while switching to Dvorak is vile. You have to enter a command (one of several letters) to even begin typing. You use letter keys to move the cursor around. You use letter keys to do things you do with backspace in any other editor. Stuff like that seeps way deeper in your spinal column than any password. The editor keeps jumping between modes when you put in faulty input, so you can't punch two letters and expect two backspaces to deal with it. Punching in two wrong letter keys can destroy your document. Nothing that undo won't fix, but still...