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How bad is QWERTY, really? A review of the literature, such as it is

erichgrunewald.com

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Re: How bad is QWERTY, really? A review of the literature, such as it is

#31

Post by jw14 »

heavenlyblue wrote: post #14

I had been programming since I was 11 years old (now 30 years old professional programmer). I’ve spent innumearable hours at computer keyboard. I can type QWERTY and Russian layout blindly both and I constantly use both. Never had any issues with my wrists or finger pain. What am I doing wrong? Just to be clear I am not trying to say that people who use DVORAK are wrong. It’s just that you tend to forget there’s a hu…

I think there are stress/psychological factors. I developed RSI while being in a very bad living & working situation.

I've switched to COLEMAK and I still have pain. Does that mean COLEMAK doesn't work? Maybe. Or, since my pain level has stayed manageable it could mean I'd be worse off without it. I've been doing other things too. It's hard to reason on a sample of 1.

Re: How bad is QWERTY, really? A review of the literature, such as it is

#32

Post by userbinator »

Personal anecdote, but I know a few people who got RSI/CTS and had a chance to watch them type --- and what they all had in common was how "stiff" their typing posture was, and the strength at which they hit the keys. They weren't fast either, probably in the 50-70wpm range. One of them, before he got RSI, even commented on how bad my posture was and how it'd "make it easier to injure myself".

I find that relaxing, as counterintuitive as it may sound at first, actually helps with typing speed and comfort. To me it makes sense that if you tense up all your muscles and punch the keys really hard, you're much more likely to injure yourself, slow down, and tire more quickly. I think the vast majority of keyboards also have too high of an actuation force, which also adds to the strain of typing. If you look at videos of fast typists (150wpm+), they don't look like they're exerting much effort at all; many of them aren't using the "standard" key-to-finger mapping, and a lot of them "smear" their hands all over the keyboard. Here's one example (not me):

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y4NUqoXI8Xw

Re: How bad is QWERTY, really? A review of the literature, such as it is

#34

Post by vemv »

chillacy wrote: post #12

> One week or so ago I switched from Colemak to typing on QWYRFM due to the reduced load it places on the pinkies. I typed Dvorak for 10 years before I started getting RSI again in my right ulna. It turns out that the 'S' key being hit by the pinky in Dvorak caused me a lot of pain. I ended up switching to BEAKL, a pretty obscure layout which is specifically made to alleviate stress on the pinky. It moves the relativ…

> but the pinky and ring finger are such weak fingers that it's often better to move the index or middle fingers up or down a row than hit a key on the home row with the pinky.

Spot on, I would go as far as saying that using the pinky at all is poor technique because it indicates one reaches keys by stretching the fingers, rather than hovering the hand over the keyboard, allowing each finger to remain in its natural position, and using only the fingers that are naturally strong and precise.

Re: How bad is QWERTY, really? A review of the literature, such as it is

#35

Post by vemv »

nomel wrote: post #7
terracottage wrote: post #2

The problem of RSI isn't QWERTY, the problem is putting all your fingers on the home row. Type with your hands at an angle, and your wrists inline with your arms and palms. Problem solved.

This position is how I've always typed, but I still had RSI problems. I switched to Dvorak with great, personal, success. If you watch a video of someone typing on Dvorak vs Qwerty [1], it's clear that the experience is very very different with any of these reduced motion layouts. 1. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=udc9CH8ICVQ

That video shows poor technique, it's the arms/hands that should hover over the keyboard, in one motion.

Stretching the fingers for reaching a given key is bad, Dvorak masks this by minimizing travel, which is simply a workaround / optimization for the wrong thing that long-term will result in the same problems (simply delayed a few years).

I could use an intentionally bad keyboard layout and it wouldn't matter. Arms are designed to be moved.

Re: How bad is QWERTY, really? A review of the literature, such as it is

#36

Post by xhevahir »

scoofy wrote: post #9

I switched to Dvorak in my 20's. I don't think i got faster, but my right-hand wrist which would irritate me and was one reason for the switch, definitely was more comfortable after, and hasn't given me any problems since. That said, switching was a huge pain in the ass.... like horrible for the first two months, and i promised myself i'd keep typing in both. However, i eventually lost the ability to type in qwerty,…

I switched after developing hand injuries at work (in a job that didn't involve computer use). Since then, whenever I've had to use QWERTY for whatever purpose I've started getting pain in my tendons after a few hours which goes away almost as soon as I'm able to switch back to Dvorak. Like you, though, I found that picking up Dvorak was a total pain in the ass. A while ago I saw a YouTube video in which a guy was telling his viewers that learning it was easy and that the effort was a small price to pay. When I commented that I had had a period of months when I couldn't type anything spontaneously, he suggested that maybe this was due to my age. I was all of thirty at the time I learned it.

Re: How bad is QWERTY, really? A review of the literature, such as it is

#37

Post by rsfern »

chillacy wrote: post #12

> One week or so ago I switched from Colemak to typing on QWYRFM due to the reduced load it places on the pinkies. I typed Dvorak for 10 years before I started getting RSI again in my right ulna. It turns out that the 'S' key being hit by the pinky in Dvorak caused me a lot of pain. I ended up switching to BEAKL, a pretty obscure layout which is specifically made to alleviate stress on the pinky. It moves the relativ…

That’s interesting. I guess I never really thought about it, but on dvorak `ls` is a double tap with the right pinky, and it’s often immediately followed by [enter] with the same pinky… I type that key sequence a lot

Re: How bad is QWERTY, really? A review of the literature, such as it is

#38

Post by _fat_santa »

userbinator wrote: post #32

Personal anecdote, but I know a few people who got RSI/CTS and had a chance to watch them type --- and what they all had in common was how "stiff" their typing posture was, and the strength at which they hit the keys. They weren't fast either, probably in the 50-70wpm range. One of them, before he got RSI, even commented on how bad my posture was and how it'd "make it easier to injure myself". I find that relaxing, a…

Back when I was still an intern, I noticed that i was getting wrist pain and was instantly worries about getting carpel tunnel later so I went out and got a Microsoft Ergonomic keyboard.

I've since stuck with them and one of the things that I love about them is how they force you to use more of your fingers because it restricts what keys each hand has access to. I found that the way I typed changed, the 't', 'g', 'r' and 'f' keys I could no longer reach over with my left hand and vice versa for the other hand. This meant I had to switch my how I typed which inevitably switched which fingers I used to hit some fingers and forced me to use more of my hand for the typing (the "smear" as you call it)

Re: How bad is QWERTY, really? A review of the literature, such as it is

#39

Post by evanmoran »

I had an RSI issue where it was uncomfortable to reach for the H key and I was convinced existing layouts didn’t take this into account. I also thought that learning new keys was overrated so I attempted to generate keyboard changes with the least number of key changes from qwerty and with significantly less side-to-side motion. The results were very promising and then after trying them out for a bit it turned out Minimak-8 felt better to type on. Big shoutout to Minimak even if it didn’t help my H key :)

http://www.minimak.org/

Re: How bad is QWERTY, really? A review of the literature, such as it is

#40

Post by isodude »

xhevahir wrote: post #36
scoofy wrote: post #9

I switched to Dvorak in my 20's. I don't think i got faster, but my right-hand wrist which would irritate me and was one reason for the switch, definitely was more comfortable after, and hasn't given me any problems since. That said, switching was a huge pain in the ass.... like horrible for the first two months, and i promised myself i'd keep typing in both. However, i eventually lost the ability to type in qwerty,…

I switched after developing hand injuries at work (in a job that didn't involve computer use). Since then, whenever I've had to use QWERTY for whatever purpose I've started getting pain in my tendons after a few hours which goes away almost as soon as I'm able to switch back to Dvorak. Like you, though, I found that picking up Dvorak was a total pain in the ass. A while ago I saw a YouTube video in which a guy was te…

Took me about three weeks when I switched cold turkey at age 14 to start typing ok. My biggest pain was that the letter I search for was always under the other hand which was resting on the keyboard :)

I'm letting my daughter learn it when she's 8 instead.. they just.. learn it. It is truly fascinating from the perspective of a typist.

So maybe the youtuber is onto something. I think that you should have a clear strategy when learning though, that will probably speed up the process alot.

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