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Keyboard lets people type so fast it’s banned from typing competitions

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Re: Keyboard lets people type so fast it’s banned from typing competitions

#301

Post by __MatrixMan__ »

tombert wrote: post #167
__MatrixMan__ wrote: post #150

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Seems like it would be better to have the device be dictionary agnostic and leave it to your editor do know whether you're writing a comment, or code, or a string containing sql...

I wonder if it would make sense to latch into the syntax highlighter for something like Vim. Most syntax highlighters have a reasonable understanding of what context you are currently in, so conceivably the device could, for example, see that I'm inside a comment and revert to vanilla English, and then see that I'm back in code and change to F#.

I think it would. It seems like you'd want some amount of symmetry between contexts, otherwise learning separate ones would be too difficult.

Like the gesture for python's "create a for loop" would align with the english word "repeat" and in functional languages it might map to some manipulation that sets up recursion with a shortened list.

Actually coming up with a list of such a list of abstractions for app developers to map actions onto sounds like a dissertation for some psychologist somewhere.

Re: Keyboard lets people type so fast it’s banned from typing competitions

#302

Post by themodelplumber »

half-kh-hacker wrote: post #169
omegalulw wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yup, having to type unseen text makes a lot of difference. Here's what I personally use to test my keyboard setups: monkeytype.com. My best is ~95 WPM and 100% accuracy.

I like typing :) Here's 163 wpm on a macbook keyboard: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-ulK2VJdQpw Here's 175 wpm on a custom mechanical keyboard: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kO-A8rVJDOM

That's amazing. Do you do any wrist stretches or recovery tasks afterward? Is there a routine you do for prep?

Re: Keyboard lets people type so fast it’s banned from typing competitions

#303

Post by MyNameIsFred »

bern4444 wrote: post #289
haihaibye wrote: post #287

For programming, I wonder if there isn't a lot of low hanging fruit just by key remapping. For instance, a large proportion of keystrokes must be for opening and closing brackets, which requires two fingers for shift + the key. I bet I press brackets more than "d", "f", "j", "k" - the best positioned keys in QUERTY

I have a keyboard[0] that supports a concept of layers which means if I press a key (or hold it down) the layout changes. With this, I have it set such that the keys i o, and k l, are for curly braces and parentheses. My left hand holds down the trigger to swap layers and so that my right hand doesn't have to move much if at all to hit these keys. [0] https://ergodox-ez.com

Yes! I dove into this (and later, Moondlander) because I have mobility issues and had to reduce travel, but the resulting 90WPM and (unprovably) faster coding have been awesome side-effects.

Re: Keyboard lets people type so fast it’s banned from typing competitions

#304

Post by 908B64B197 »

usrbinbash wrote: post #89

>You may soon see that coworker with the weird monolith style trackball mouse rocking this strange peripheral and claiming he’s upped his efficiency in ways you can’t possibly imagine. Since coding is 20% sitting in meetings, 50% reading code, 10% drawing on whiteboards or sticky notes, 15% drinking coffee, 4.5% fighting impostor syndrome and 0.5% actual typing, I think I am quite safe with my good 'ol QWERTY.

> and 0.5% actual typing

I wonder how often Donald Knuth types.

And he is arguably among the 5 best coders in the world.

Re: Keyboard lets people type so fast it’s banned from typing competitions

#305

Post by MandieD »

ghostly_s wrote: post #240
DrBoring wrote: post #38

I wonder how effective this CharaChorder is at preventing RSI (repetitive stress injury). It still seems to have the same flaw as QWERTY in that it requires you to use your small finger muscles, which are more prone to RSI than say your biceps. ps: Ugg, vice.com. I don't care for them.

twitching your fingertips left and right seems like a terribly unnatural repetitive motion to me, I would be concerned.

As a flute player who has experienced my right pinky locking up after passages involving moving between the footjoint keys, you're right to be concerned.

Re: Keyboard lets people type so fast it’s banned from typing competitions

#306

Post by fsckboy »

xboxnolifes wrote: post #258
fsckboy wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> has a steep learning curve just to make the pedantic point, learning curves show skill improvement plotted against time spent/experience, and therefore a steep learning curve means you learn quickly. A shallow learning curve is the difficult one. /pedantry https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Learning_curve

A steep learning curve can also mean you make very little progress for a long time until suddenly being proficient.

you can plot things any way you wish, but the people who invented and named learning curves plotted them so that "a lot of learning" was steep.

Re: Keyboard lets people type so fast it’s banned from typing competitions

#307

Post by fsckboy »

Sebb767 wrote: post #128
fsckboy wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> has a steep learning curve just to make the pedantic point, learning curves show skill improvement plotted against time spent/experience, and therefore a steep learning curve means you learn quickly. A shallow learning curve is the difficult one. /pedantry https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Learning_curve

From your link: > An activity that it is easy to learn the basics of, but difficulty to gain proficiency in, may be described as having "a steep learning curve". That matches QWERTY exactly.

the way I explained it gets you to the right answer more quickly and frequently, plot proficiency vs experience (generally measured by time)

yes, a curve can change its slope from "learn the basics of" vs "gain more proficiency" and any place where it's not steep indicates difficulty.

that some things might have easy basics and other things might not have easy basics isn't really material, but where it matters, picking up the basics would be steep if it is easy.

Re: Keyboard lets people type so fast it’s banned from typing competitions

#308

Post by Izkata »

derefr wrote: post #11
prirun wrote: post #2

"he did win another typing competition using the CharaChorder to hit 267 WPM with 76% accuracy." 76% accuracy doesn't sound so great to me, no matter how fast I can type on it.

If software used for typing competitions is anything like a typing test in a typing tutor program (which give similar WPM + accuracy measures at the end), then it would track the number of incorrect inputs you make, but also wouldn't let you proceed (i.e. would ignore all further input) while any incorrect input remains in the buffer. With such software, you're expected to correct each word you type before moving on…

> but also wouldn't let you proceed (i.e. would ignore all further input) while any incorrect input remains in the buffer.

I hated these ones so much in school because I'd be like 3 letters past the typo and reflexively hit backspace 4 times to get rid of the typo, which just registered as more mistakes because it had blocked those 3 additional letters and so would only accept 1 backspace.

(I'd already learned how to type from having to quickly enter chat messages in StarCraft multiplayer)

Re: Keyboard lets people type so fast it’s banned from typing competitions

#309

Post by fsckboy »

aspenmayer wrote: post #61
fsckboy wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> has a steep learning curve just to make the pedantic point, learning curves show skill improvement plotted against time spent/experience, and therefore a steep learning curve means you learn quickly. A shallow learning curve is the difficult one. /pedantry https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Learning_curve

Your own link explains that the phrase is a misnomer. You’re not pedantic; you’re just mistaken about others being wrong.

you have it backwards. the quote that you are referring to, that "a steep learning curve" is a misnomer, means it's a misnomer if by that you mean it's difficult.

It's not wrong to say "steep learning curve" if you mean it's easy

Re: Keyboard lets people type so fast it’s banned from typing competitions

#310

Post by dwg »

makeitdouble wrote: post #291
dwg wrote: post #283

This gets me curious about a Japanese version. Due to the larger number of basic characters (46) Japanese smart phone input already uses flick-joystick like motions, with pretty amazing speed (for a smart phone). The 46 basic characters are input using 10 keys with 5 directions each: in (press), left, up, right, down. Does CharaChorder support a press as well, or just left/up/right/down?

Japanese input’s core part is less the direct input and more the conversion to the target character (which relies on the IME, so we’re not far from the “chorded” mechanism of this keyboard) For instance there is a “kana” mode that let’s you direct input each kana with one keystroke only, which is way faster than romaji input, but is ignored by 99% of the population because the ROI on learning it is extremely low as y…

Is Kana input really that much faster than Romaji? I've almost never seen it used (presumably because you have to learn romaji input to type in English anyway, so why learn a second input method), so can't speak to its speed.

However, is it possible that ten-key style input could actually be faster than Kana input? After all, direct Kana input in Japanese is kind of equivalent to Roman input in English in the sense of one key = one character, but this keyboard claims to be faster than direct input due to not needing to move your fingers around. Couldn't the same thing be true for Japanese? In fact, for Kana input the problem of finger travel is even worse due to more keys = longer travel.

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