I’ve used Dvorak for 10 years, and it’s not all that
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Re: I’ve used Dvorak for 10 years, and it’s not all that
#2Disagree with a lot here. I could touch type before switching to Dvorak, but it’s still been very much worthwhile.
Just trying out a single sentence in QWERTY now the difference is stark to me. My fingers move so much. With Dvorak I find there is much much less finger movement.
It’s not painless, but I’d recommend it to anyone who types for 8+ hrs a day. It’s not a small optimizations imo.
Re: I’ve used Dvorak for 10 years, and it’s not all that
#3Disagree with a lot here. I could touch type before switching to Dvorak, but it’s still been very much worthwhile. Just trying out a single sentence in QWERTY now the difference is stark to me. My fingers move so much. With Dvorak I find there is much much less finger movement. It’s not painless, but I’d recommend it to anyone who types for 8+ hrs a day. It’s not a small optimizations imo.
Also should say that the benefit is 100% ergonomic for me. I can’t type any faster now than before. I’m at exactly the same speed I’d say.
Re: I’ve used Dvorak for 10 years, and it’s not all that
#4> Dvorak isn’t perfect, mainly because most computer interfaces have been designed around a QWERTY interface since their inception. For example, while on a QWERTY keyboard the adjacent shortcuts for Cut, Copy, and Paste can all be pressed with a single hand, Dvorak turns most of them into a two-handed affair.
In macOS, you can use the “Dvorak-QWERTY” layout to solve this.
Re: I’ve used Dvorak for 10 years, and it’s not all that
#5Disagree with a lot here. I could touch type before switching to Dvorak, but it’s still been very much worthwhile. Just trying out a single sentence in QWERTY now the difference is stark to me. My fingers move so much. With Dvorak I find there is much much less finger movement. It’s not painless, but I’d recommend it to anyone who types for 8+ hrs a day. It’s not a small optimizations imo.
I switched about 10 years ago and can still touch type qwerty as well (and need to do so fairly often). I haven't seriously considered going back, but I don't know that there is even any ergonomic advantages much less speed ones.
I think the most relevant thing is that it might actually be worse for programming, both from the symbols and from qwerty-optimized hotkeys.
I use vim with most of the regular bindings which is designed as a combination of mnemonics (which are still fine) and qwerty layout (which obviously just end up in a random spot, though j and k happen to still be together but not in the home row).
Re: I’ve used Dvorak for 10 years, and it’s not all that
#6I've used Dvorak for ~10.5 years (currently on my MacBook, Model M, and Android) and I definitely don't regret it at all. Couldn't tell you my WPM offhand from either now or 10 years ago, but I type pretty quickly and have no issues touch typing.
I might not necessarily recommend it to anyone else unless you're bored or have a good reason to invest in typing more quickly, but I don't recall the adjustment being very painful aside from a week or two of slow typing at the end of the summer break before my sophomore year of high school.
The only real downside is that writing code on someone else's machine is a PITA. On the other hand, it's a good deterrent to others asking to borrow my laptop (no one ever does more than once).
Re: I’ve used Dvorak for 10 years, and it’s not all that
#7I've been a colemak user for a number of years, which has similar pros and cons.
I would say that it is not worth it for most people to change. You could get a lot of the benefit of colemak, with none of the pain, by converting your caps lock key into a second backspace.
The benefits are that it is slightly more comfortable, and you'll have less people trying to use your computer. Also, prior to learning colemak, I had not been typing fully correctly, and learning it forced me to realize that I had been using the wrong fingers for certain keys.
The downsides are the pain of switching, and the likelihood that you'll actually forget how to touch type on QWERTY.
And unless you buy expensive new keyboards with native colemak support, then things like BIOS screens, virtual machines, and so on will likely switch back to QWERTY on you, without much warning.
But on the other hand, buying a quality keyboard is actually a solid investment, considering how much time people spend at the computer. Personally, I recommend a heavy mechanical tenkeyless board. Heavy so that it won't move around. Tenkeyless to save desk space and so you don't need to reach your arm far just to use the mouse. And mechanical because it is much nicer to type on.
Re: I’ve used Dvorak for 10 years, and it’s not all that
#8There are lots of keyboard layouts:
https://github.com/melling/ErgonomicNotes/blob/master/keyboa...
Isn’t the idea that your fingers travel less so it’s healthier for your hands?
If you end up with RSI, you might find you’re using your nose for input:
Re: I’ve used Dvorak for 10 years, and it’s not all that
#9I never really understood the obsession about WPM that some programmers have.
You're a programmer, not a court reporter. You don't need +200 WPM. You need to think before/during/after writing each one of the characters you type. And more often than not, you actually spend +5min of 20 lines of code, so your +200 WPM ability doesn't matter at all.
Re: I’ve used Dvorak for 10 years, and it’s not all that
#10I find it surprising that a person who does not know touch typing would be interested of Dvorak in the first place; I mean for hunt'n'peck the layout does not really matter that much so they could have not understood the relative benefit of Dvorak all that well, and on the other hand learning touch typing (in any layout) would be the obvious first step. But I guess there is all sorts of people.
If you are interested in something not QWERTY, Dvorak is not the only game in town, and indeed many more modern alternatives (such as Colemak-DH) are supposed to be better by almost any metric. Of course that also means you are going deeper in to the niche, and there will be even less support out of the box for those.
If you are European programmer and want a quick easy ergonomics win, consider modifying your layout to put punctuation etc to more US aligned positions, or wherever they would be convenient. I do recommend following the US layout though. The punctuation crazyness in European layouts is one of my pet peeves.