Ask HN: How did you learn to touch type?

#1

Post by dartf » Thu, Jun 25, 2020, 1:47 PM UTC

I'm a self-taught typist and my previous attempts to learn touch typing weren't very successful. So I'm curious how you learned to/improved your touch typing?

Re: Ask HN: How did you learn to touch type?

#2

Post by lewe » Thu, Jun 25, 2020, 1:52 PM UTC

I have used this free tool to improve my touch typing https://www.tipp10.com/en/

Remember to look at the screen, not at the keyboard ;) Also, focus on precision - not typing speed.

Re: Ask HN: How did you learn to touch type?

#3

Post by mtmail » Thu, Jun 25, 2020, 1:55 PM UTC

Learned in school on a typewriter. This game https://zty.pe/ is fun (also addictive) to type faster. I enjoyed that more than other online tool where you type long sentences.

Re: Ask HN: How did you learn to touch type?

#4

Post by mindcrime » Thu, Jun 25, 2020, 2:08 PM UTC

Learned in high-school (typing class in 9th grade) on an old IBM electric typewriter. Didn't do much typing for the next couple of years, so my first year of college I took a "keyboarding" class to refresh my skills.

In hindsight, probably two of the best decisions I've ever made.

Re: Ask HN: How did you learn to touch type?

#5

Post by karmakaze » Thu, Jun 25, 2020, 11:27 PM UTC

mtmail wrote: post #3

Learned in school on a typewriter. This game https://zty.pe/ is fun (also addictive) to type faster. I enjoyed that more than other online tool where you type long sentences.

Hey thanks, I can use this right now, I'm relearning. I didn't used to touch-type. I recently started to learn an alternative keyboard layout.

First tried Dvorak, my starting wpm was too frustratingly low. Looked at Colemak but Tarmak had too many steps.

Made Qwickly and am up to 50-60 wpm after about 3 weeks. I also noticed that since I'm trying to improve my typing speed that I touch-type when using the new layout.

https://github.com/qwickly-org/Qwickly

Re: Ask HN: How did you learn to touch type?

#6

Post by smashd » Sun, Jun 28, 2020, 5:31 PM UTC

Like others here, I did a lot of learning via a game and via a typing class in high school. But one thing that helped me a lot was doing some imaginary practice away from a keyboard as well. For example, if I was a passenger in a car I would read road signs and imagine typing out the letters. Sometimes I would physically move my fingers, and sometimes I would just tense the finger involved while I imagined reaching to the appropriate key. I practiced this way anywhere I was hearing or reading words and had the spare mental cycles to do it.

I used this technique again when I switched from qwerty to colemak. You'll still need some dedicated "coursework" like a game or program, but this approach lets you fit in some extra practice over the course of a day.