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Principles for Keyboard Layouts (2022)

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Re: Principles for Keyboard Layouts (2022)

#11

Post by bradley13 »

dustincoates wrote: post #9
bradley13 wrote: post #8

I spent a lot of time on this, back in my bored 20's. A super-optimized keyboard layout, which I used for a year. I measured my typing speed on qwerty before the change, and on the optimized keyboard after using it for a year. Yep, you do type faster. In my case, it was 10%. Honestly, it wasn't worth it. There are way too many disadvantages, not least of which is the fact that that only your computer has your weird k…

> not least of which is the fact that that only your computer has your weird keyboard. Fair, but how often are most people typing on someone else's computer? (Outside of developers who do pairing.)

For me, it somehow happens all the time. Helping out co-workers, friends or family. Using a different workstation than usual (we no longer have assigned desks). Sure, you can mentally "switch" layouts, but it's a pain.

Then there's the reverse: My PC at home - wife wants to check something quickly without turning on her PC.

Finally: I regularly use both a PC and a laptop. Depending on how weird you want the layout to get, there may not be a way to use it on the laptop. Schlepping an external keyboard around - nope, not practical.

Re: Principles for Keyboard Layouts (2022)

#12

Post by NikolaNovak »

dustincoates wrote: post #9
bradley13 wrote: post #8

I spent a lot of time on this, back in my bored 20's. A super-optimized keyboard layout, which I used for a year. I measured my typing speed on qwerty before the change, and on the optimized keyboard after using it for a year. Yep, you do type faster. In my case, it was 10%. Honestly, it wasn't worth it. There are way too many disadvantages, not least of which is the fact that that only your computer has your weird k…

> not least of which is the fact that that only your computer has your weird keyboard. Fair, but how often are most people typing on someone else's computer? (Outside of developers who do pairing.)

at home I have a number of laptops. Any of them may become a shared laptop at any point in time with zero notice :) ( I already get enough grief for having the black original Das keyboard on my main desktop.)

At work there's less sharing but back when we were in the office, it happened. I also have two work provided laptops (one from my employer and one from client) which are heavily locked down.

Finally there's all the other keyboard manifestations in my life - on my work iphone and my personal android phone and the tablets and all the tv apps that pop up a keyboard to sign in etc.

Qwerty may be suboptimal but it's freaking everywhere.

Re: Principles for Keyboard Layouts (2022)

#13

Post by 000ooo000 »

I settled on Workman 8 years ago, as the methodology behind it seemed pretty sensible. It's definitely nicer to type on than qwerty, IMO. I do however notice occasionally that some words are skewed to a particular hand. It definitely doesn't plague me, nor is it enough of a bother that I have even looked at other layouts. I wonder if it's even possible to adjust the layout to improve this, or does the same problem just pop up somewhere else, so to speak.

Re: Principles for Keyboard Layouts (2022)

#14

Post by dannyz »

bradley13 wrote: post #8

I spent a lot of time on this, back in my bored 20's. A super-optimized keyboard layout, which I used for a year. I measured my typing speed on qwerty before the change, and on the optimized keyboard after using it for a year. Yep, you do type faster. In my case, it was 10%. Honestly, it wasn't worth it. There are way too many disadvantages, not least of which is the fact that that only your computer has your weird k…

Similarly I switched to Colemak, and I agree, it's not worth it for most people.

I switched because I never typed with proper technique in QWERTY. I would only use ~2 fingers on my right hand. I tried multiple times to retrain myself but there was just too much muscle memory. The only way for me to switch to proper technique was to switch layouts.

Re: Principles for Keyboard Layouts (2022)

#15

Post by inawarminister »

I like to write Clojure, and getting away from home row to write the parentheses was... annoying. I did try (and my fingers still remember!) Colemak a few years back, though.

I found Neo2, which is a German keyboard layout with 5-6 layers of keys (which is ironic since I don't actually... speak German). Tried Neo2 vanilla and Bone/other layout, but nowadays I'm just using QWERTZ + Neo2 layers, which is available for Linux and Windows/Mac with utilities.

Just look at the following layout!! https://dl.neo-layout.org/grafik/bilder-einzeln/flat/neo_qwe...

Now I'm thinking, maybe modifying Colemak with Neo2-style layer 3-6 might be perfect for me, and a few others...?

Re: Principles for Keyboard Layouts (2022)

#16

Post by gumby »

bloopernova wrote: post #7

I would like to see something that records your keystrokes and gives you stats on what you type the most. Then spits out a keyboard arrangement to start from. Not sure how you'd get around it being a huge security risk? Maybe only write totals for keypresses every 30 minutes? Edited to add: Does anyone daily-drive a Keyboardio Model 100? I really liked the concept and participated in the kickstarter, but unfortunatel…

> I would like to see something that records your keystrokes and gives you stats on what you type the most. ... Not sure how you'd get around it being a huge security risk?

A small program that locally collects data and lets you analyze it locally is pretty much a definition of a computer! IMHO this is not the place to worry about a security risk.

Note that the author had video of herself typing and it probably didn't trigger the "security risk" reflex because it's so obviously safe -- safe enough to post in this case. I mean I'm typing right now and when I push the "reply" button the result of my typing will be posted right to the Internet with no access restriction!.

Anyway, with that out of the way: I like your idea. With the raw data stream you can look not just for simple frequency but n-grams as well. The same data stream could be used to design single-handed chord keyboards as well, and even malleable layouts for programs with shitty key assignments (I refuse to call them "shortcuts").

Re: Principles for Keyboard Layouts (2022)

#17

Post by 000ooo000 »

bloopernova wrote: post #7

I would like to see something that records your keystrokes and gives you stats on what you type the most. Then spits out a keyboard arrangement to start from. Not sure how you'd get around it being a huge security risk? Maybe only write totals for keypresses every 30 minutes? Edited to add: Does anyone daily-drive a Keyboardio Model 100? I really liked the concept and participated in the kickstarter, but unfortunatel…

>gives you stats

You might enjoy toying around with this: https://patorjk.com/keyboard-layout-analyzer

Config in the top right lets you load other layouts.

Re: Principles for Keyboard Layouts (2022)

#18

Post by bloopernova »

inawarminister wrote: post #15

I like to write Clojure, and getting away from home row to write the parentheses was... annoying. I did try (and my fingers still remember!) Colemak a few years back, though. I found Neo2, which is a German keyboard layout with 5-6 layers of keys (which is ironic since I don't actually... speak German). Tried Neo2 vanilla and Bone/other layout, but nowadays I'm just using QWERTZ + Neo2 layers, which is available for…

oh wow, I could absolutely see those home row keys being super useful if they are easy to get to.

Re: Principles for Keyboard Layouts (2022)

#19

Post by bbojan »

bloopernova wrote: post #7

I would like to see something that records your keystrokes and gives you stats on what you type the most. Then spits out a keyboard arrangement to start from. Not sure how you'd get around it being a huge security risk? Maybe only write totals for keypresses every 30 minutes? Edited to add: Does anyone daily-drive a Keyboardio Model 100? I really liked the concept and participated in the kickstarter, but unfortunatel…

I've built exactly that, but need to polish it a bit before releasing. Hopefully will have time to do it soon.

Re: Principles for Keyboard Layouts (2022)

#20

Post by bbojan »

000ooo000 wrote: post #13

I settled on Workman 8 years ago, as the methodology behind it seemed pretty sensible. It's definitely nicer to type on than qwerty, IMO. I do however notice occasionally that some words are skewed to a particular hand. It definitely doesn't plague me, nor is it enough of a bother that I have even looked at other layouts. I wonder if it's even possible to adjust the layout to improve this, or does the same problem ju…

I found Workman horrible for same-letter bigrams.

After testing a lot of different layouts I've settled on a slightly modified Colemak-DH.

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