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The Workman Keyboard Layout Philosophy (2010)

workmanlayout.org

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Re: The Workman Keyboard Layout Philosophy (2010)

#71

Post by Mikhail_Edoshin »

brennebeck wrote: post #68
deno wrote: post #61

Sit up straight (fix your posture) and stop gluing your wrists to the desk or wrist “support” and the layout doesn’t matter unless you’re going for typing records. There is no magical layout that can eliminate the tension you’re artificially creating by stretching your fingers into unnatural positions instead of just moving the entire hand. What healthy typing looks like (on a horrible keyboard no less): https://www.…

Huh. I had no idea I typed pretty healthily. Thank you. But... references? (It does make sense, though)

There's quite a body of knowledge on body mechanics that doesn't seem to get much reflection in scientific publications. The only possible exception is the Alexander technique, and even this one is very much obscure. Not because it's secret or something like that, it's that these things don't seem to be searched for.

BTW, healthy writing (according to Palmer) is very similar: you rest your elbow and little finger on the desk and write by floating your whole hand above in a very relaxed way.

Re: The Workman Keyboard Layout Philosophy (2010)

#72

Post by vemv »

Mikhail_Edoshin wrote: post #71
brennebeck wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Huh. I had no idea I typed pretty healthily. Thank you. But... references? (It does make sense, though)

There's quite a body of knowledge on body mechanics that doesn't seem to get much reflection in scientific publications. The only possible exception is the Alexander technique, and even this one is very much obscure. Not because it's secret or something like that, it's that these things don't seem to be searched for. BTW, healthy writing (according to Palmer) is very similar: you rest your elbow and little finger on…

I wouln't rest my elbow (or forearms) on anything, it's an unnatural pressure.

Instead I place the keyboard at the border of the desk, so I can't possibly lean my arms on the desk.

Granted, you have to use more force to keep your whole arms lifted for hours, but it's good that you can know when do you need a rest.

Re: The Workman Keyboard Layout Philosophy (2010)

#73

Post by lbj »

fooblat wrote: post #18
lbj wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You hover? Doesnt that just move the strain to your upper arms?

The key to this for me is having the keyboard as close to my lap as possible. The effort to hover seems to go up with the height of the keyboard relative to my thighs.

Right, that makes sense, thanks.

Re: The Workman Keyboard Layout Philosophy (2010)

#74

Post by citation_please »

jstanley wrote: post #26
reacweb wrote: post #16

He uses the wrong test. Testing on "The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes" is meaningless for developpers: tests should be performed using real usages like "source code of linux kernel" or "mailing list of linux kernel" to have a better balance between code and text.

Even better, it should be performed using a recorded vim session, rather than a full file. The keystrokes you use while editing are not the same as those that end up in the finished file.

But this brings up that some Vim hotkeys are more positional than mnemonic (J-down, K-up), while others are more mnemonic than positional (I-insert, X-exterminate(?)).

Food for thought.

Re: The Workman Keyboard Layout Philosophy (2010)

#75

Post by melling »

deno wrote: post #70
brennebeck wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Huh. I had no idea I typed pretty healthily. Thank you. But... references? (It does make sense, though)

Practically all ergonomic studies start from the position of compromised wrist placement and measure what angle does least damage. That’s how you end up with split “ergonomic” keyboards. This is the height you need for your monitor to not encourage slouching: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S467Ck8uIsc . You also need to touch type which not everyone can. As a result most office workers have terrible postures. I bet…

I’ve got dozens of stories about people with RSI here:

https://github.com/melling/ErgonomicNotes/blob/master/README...

There doesn’t seem to be one cause or one solution.

Re: The Workman Keyboard Layout Philosophy (2010)

#76

Post by deno »

melling wrote: post #75
deno wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Practically all ergonomic studies start from the position of compromised wrist placement and measure what angle does least damage. That’s how you end up with split “ergonomic” keyboards. This is the height you need for your monitor to not encourage slouching: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S467Ck8uIsc . You also need to touch type which not everyone can. As a result most office workers have terrible postures. I bet…

I’ve got dozens of stories about people with RSI here: https://github.com/melling/ErgonomicNotes/blob/master/README... There doesn’t seem to be one cause or one solution.

You can put everything in that list into 3 categories:

1. Fixing the problem: posture & monitor/keyboard height

2. Masking the problem: anything with the word ergonomic

3. Avoiding the problem: typing less/taking frequent (flow-interrupting) breaks

Of course most people with pain want quick solutions, so no. 2 is going to be over-represented. Fixing your posture actually takes work to stretch/compress different muscle groups over a period of time, otherwise you’re back to slouching after 10 minutes.

Re: The Workman Keyboard Layout Philosophy (2010)

#77

Post by cityroasted »

eggie wrote: post #20

The author doesn't even learn dvorak before deciding that it doesn't work for them. They mention don't like how it behaves on the consonant-heavy, qwerty-optimized commands used in unix. (I have to say this is a fair evaluation, but in practice the layout somehow doesn't encourage RSI despite the apparent awkwardness of typing unix commands on it.) In result they don't seem to understand that the dvorak layout is opt…

In the author's defense, I came to the same conclusion using Dvorak when I was a teenager learning unix and programming. I switched back to QWERTY for a while, but around 8 years ago I learned about Colemak and switched and have been very happy with it since.

One thing I like about Colemak is that it is close enough to QWERTY that I can still type on QWERTY by looking at the keys and not look like a complete fool. Dvorak is so different that it completely rewires the brain and it's very difficult to switch between it and QWERTY. That's been my experience at least.

Re: The Workman Keyboard Layout Philosophy (2010)

#78

Post by tjoff »

citation_please wrote: post #74
jstanley wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Even better, it should be performed using a recorded vim session, rather than a full file. The keystrokes you use while editing are not the same as those that end up in the finished file.

But this brings up that some Vim hotkeys are more positional than mnemonic (J-down, K-up), while others are more mnemonic than positional (I-insert, X-exterminate(?)). Food for thought.

This is why I believe that qwerty is the best layout. All applications have designed all shortcuts to be sensible on it. Any other layout is just going to be a disaster and negate any benefits and more during actual use.

You can of course use whatever layout you like and then while ctrl/alt/meta is pressed it switches to qwerty, doesn't save vim users though (or other applications where shortcuts don't need to be prefixed).

I'm not convinced switching from qwerty is that beneficial, I believe (but have not yet tried it) an orthogonal keyboard will do more than any layout will. But I admit that I don't have experience to back that up.

Re: The Workman Keyboard Layout Philosophy (2010)

#79

Post by myhf »

citation_please wrote: post #74
jstanley wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Even better, it should be performed using a recorded vim session, rather than a full file. The keystrokes you use while editing are not the same as those that end up in the finished file.

But this brings up that some Vim hotkeys are more positional than mnemonic (J-down, K-up), while others are more mnemonic than positional (I-insert, X-exterminate(?)). Food for thought.

This is why I believe that Dvorak is the best layout. J/K and H/L retain their relative positions.

Re: The Workman Keyboard Layout Philosophy (2010)

#80

Post by melling »

deno wrote: post #76
melling wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’ve got dozens of stories about people with RSI here: https://github.com/melling/ErgonomicNotes/blob/master/README... There doesn’t seem to be one cause or one solution.

You can put everything in that list into 3 categories: 1. Fixing the problem: posture & monitor/keyboard height 2. Masking the problem: anything with the word ergonomic 3. Avoiding the problem: typing less/taking frequent (flow-interrupting) breaks Of course most people with pain want quick solutions, so no. 2 is going to be over-represented. Fixing your posture actually takes work to stretch/compress different muscl…

There are some plenty of programmers who have dealt with problems for years:

http://ergoemacs.org/emacs/emacs_hand_pain_celebrity.html

I wouldn’t trivialize anything.

Happens to designers too.

This was on the front of HN a few years ago:

http://www.looknohands.me

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