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An AI designed keyboard layout (2021)

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Re: An AI designed keyboard layout (2021)

#61

Post by andai »

I used the QGMLWY layout by Carpalx[0] for a year or so. The site is really interesting, worth a read. Afaik they made a list of the most common trigrams (three letter combinations) then used a genetic algorithm to optimize the layout for most of the same factors listed in OP's GitHub Readme (minimizing same finger sequences, certain kinds of movement).

In the end I switched back to qwerty for 3 reasons:

1. keyboard shortcuts ending up in weird places and behaving inconsistently between programs (at least on Windows, some of them seemed to respond to the physical key rather than the letter).

1b. so for games i'd be used to WASD but WASD ended up in different places so I'd either have to remap the keys in every game, or switch to QWERTY while using them. Same with browsers, the Ctrl+N and Ctrl+T ended up in weird places I somehow never got used to.

2. different preferences in terms of how my hands work and how comfortable each key is to access. (e.g. i'd rather move up a row than reach to the middle of the keyboard. Minor but it adds up with use.)

3. frequently switching devices. I think there was no QGMLWY support for MacOS (but I also recall rearranging my keyboard keys -- perhaps I had switched to Colemak at that point because it was built in.)

[0] http://mkweb.bcgsc.ca/carpalx/

Also somewhat related, regarding programming comfort specifically, something I thought was cool is swapping the numbers and symbols in Vim, so you can access symbols without Shift. I don't use Vim but I kind of wish there was a system-wide toggle for that kind of thing. (Maybe with AutoHotKey, and then porting it to HammerSpoon or whatever the cross-platform one was called :)

Re: An AI designed keyboard layout (2021)

#62

Post by eimrine »

minimilian wrote: post #23
eimrine wrote: post #9

Dvorak touchtyper since 2010 is here ^_^ I appreciate any attempts to make August Dvorak's work even better. For example, that claster of wovels is not AI's work but Dvorak's. BTW there is one strange claim from my POW: > QWERTY - 0% (baseline) > Dvorak - +77% > Colemak - +84% > Workman - +101% > Halmak - +134% If author considers Colemak and Workman more efficient than Dvorak, I should not even to give this layout a…

> 7531902468 I've been using this (almost) and had forgotten it was from the programmer's Dvorak, but surely it must be: 7531980246 Surely programmers start counting from 0 and use 0 more often than 8.

> Surely programmers start counting from 0 and use 0 more often than 8.

So interesting that me and you are using the same argumentation for different positions of all even digits. Maybe it is just a matter of habit, for example my layout for my mother language is heavy modified for some reasons I do not want to put on debate.

Re: An AI designed keyboard layout (2021)

#63

Post by AlphaGeekZulu »

adamhp wrote: post #41
AlphaGeekZulu wrote: post #37

Alternative keyboard layouts are fascinating, but always raise a couple of questions for me and I wonder if anyone here can come up with actual experiences regarding the following topics: - I have been using standard german QWERTZ for about 42 years now, in average certainly not less than 3 hours every day. I was originally educated in proper 10 finger blind typing in a dedicated typing school as part of my typesette…

I think you bring up really great points, and it's probably the main reason there isn't more heterogeneity. There is a nice middle ground though, in customizable keyboards with macro buttons. I have the ErgoDox which is a split keyboard with these columns of three keys on each side of the split, and a cluster of thumb buttons. Really is nifty (once you get used to it) for programming. Even simple things like having o…

> I have the ErgoDox

This keyboard sure looks extremely nice! The price tag, though!

On the other hand, the keyboard is my main tools of trade, and the perfect solution is certainly worth a price between 250 to 400 bucks.

I would want to try the hardware before doing the investment. That could actually be a business: renting out keyboards for evaluation.

Re: An AI designed keyboard layout (2021)

#64

Post by ddalex »

gillesjacobs wrote: post #56
medstrom wrote: post #53

Y'all need to know the background of past efforts [1], people keep making the same observations over and over again as if they're new. In the area of computer-generated layouts, there's been lots of rich discussion on the AdNW [2] and MTGAP [3] projects. For "improving Dvorak", that was solved back in 2004 with Capewell-Dvorak [4]. To the author: what is supposed to be AI here? I don't see a mention of a ML method or…

I agree that I would love a discussion by OP acknowledging previous efforts and comparing approaches. Having multiple minds working at the same problem is great, but not engaging with prior art diminishes the value of their own work IMO.

Am I the only one that finds that the typing speed doesn't matter... it takes me way longer to figure out what I want to write then actually writing it...

Re: An AI designed keyboard layout (2021)

#65

Post by dpwm »

Interesting to compare it to my preferred keyboard layout, BÉPO [0][1].

In Halmak, the vowels are clustered around the right hand rather than the left. Like BÉPO, the punctuation is reachable with index fingers. There is some difference with the home row consonants, but otherwise this looks like an interesting layout.

Although BÉPO is a French layout, I’ve found it works well for English – despite giving space to accented characters that are not often used in English.

[0] https://bepo.fr/wiki/Accueil (in French) [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/B%C3%89PO

Re: An AI designed keyboard layout (2021)

#66

Post by minimilian »

eimrine wrote: post #62
minimilian wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 7531902468 I've been using this (almost) and had forgotten it was from the programmer's Dvorak, but surely it must be: 7531980246 Surely programmers start counting from 0 and use 0 more often than 8.

> Surely programmers start counting from 0 and use 0 more often than 8. So interesting that me and you are using the same argumentation for different positions of all even digits. Maybe it is just a matter of habit, for example my layout for my mother language is heavy modified for some reasons I do not want to put on debate.

Not sure what you mean, but don't you agree that, if we take 0 to come before 1 and not after 9, there's an asymmetry between the left and the right hand?

Re: An AI designed keyboard layout (2021)

#67

Post by sylware »

dpwm wrote: post #65

Interesting to compare it to my preferred keyboard layout, BÉPO [0][1]. In Halmak, the vowels are clustered around the right hand rather than the left. Like BÉPO, the punctuation is reachable with index fingers. There is some difference with the home row consonants, but otherwise this looks like an interesting layout. Although BÉPO is a French layout, I’ve found it works well for English – despite giving space to acc…

No post body was provided.

Re: An AI designed keyboard layout (2021)

#69

Post by AlphaGeekZulu »

vonunov wrote: post #49
AlphaGeekZulu wrote: post #37

Alternative keyboard layouts are fascinating, but always raise a couple of questions for me and I wonder if anyone here can come up with actual experiences regarding the following topics: - I have been using standard german QWERTZ for about 42 years now, in average certainly not less than 3 hours every day. I was originally educated in proper 10 finger blind typing in a dedicated typing school as part of my typesette…

Look up Sean Wrona -- one example of typing skill that can't be improved by changing keyboard layouts. People looking into Dvorak are often warned that it isn't a magic bullet to make them faster, only possibly more comfortable.

> Look up Sean Wrona

Yeah, insane!

> People looking into Dvorak are often warned that it isn't a magic bullet to make them faster, only possibly more comfortable.

That is an important point!

First, being fast in a competition is not only a question of fast finger movement, but also endurance and ability to focus. I would classify myself as a "burst" typer - pretty fast (about 460 characters per minute), but only for a short time. Because my typical typing operation is throwing out emails, short reports, jotting down notes and typing junks of code. I am lacking endurance when it comes to continouos typing. Sean Wrona certainly has everything it takes!

And then, of course, comfort is a coequal factor. Comfort means health! Because, when I look at Sean Wrona's shoulders I see a serious malposition. It might not originate from typing, but if it does than the comfort factor has been neglected.

So you are right! Improvement in comfort/health might justify an alternative keyboard layout, even if some speed is lost.

Re: An AI designed keyboard layout (2021)

#70

Post by mkl »

medstrom wrote: post #53

Y'all need to know the background of past efforts [1], people keep making the same observations over and over again as if they're new. In the area of computer-generated layouts, there's been lots of rich discussion on the AdNW [2] and MTGAP [3] projects. For "improving Dvorak", that was solved back in 2004 with Capewell-Dvorak [4]. To the author: what is supposed to be AI here? I don't see a mention of a ML method or…

They probably mean ML. They're mutating keyboard layouts with a simple genetic algorithm. "Just" an evolutionary algorithm, but still arguably ML.
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