I never understand the thumb cluster, even the spacebar stretches your muscles around the thumb so much, it's painful to watch.
I never understand the pinky cluster, even the [control/shift/enter/backspace/etc.] stretches your muscles around the [pinky/wrist] and forces your hands to disorient from the homerow, it's painful to watch.
The thumb cluster is awesome. I understand if you have small hands though, but even then floating a little should help.
Don't know about that...I think using pinky for the control is very ergonomic.
I only use CTRL for CTRL + C/V/X/F/T/W, which are all close reach for the left hand.
With one exception being CTRL + L, which needs both hands.
I'd be surprised if you find the ordinary position of the spacebar uncomfortable, whereas ergodox gives it an angle that forces your thumb to extend.
In ordinary spacebar, your thumb is in crunched position, which is natural.
Of course I was exaggerating just to prove a point, unless you use control commands on a minute basis it's no issue either way, still, using your pinky will disorient your hand, which is unavoidable each time you have to extend it. The thumbs can be used almost entirely without affecting the rest of the hand, unless of course you reach for the buttons on the far side, but there I only have keys I rarely use. I've currently set up the main thumb buttons with double functions. In other words while you hold down space it functions as shift on both sides, and the second button is enter with control and altgr on the respective sides while you hold it down. And before you ask, I've typed 87 WPM on keyhero with that setup, only rarely have any problems. That minimizes overall finger and hand travel in editors and such by a lot.
Have you by any chance tried an ErgoDox for a significant time period? I worried first that it would be too big and uncomfortable for my hands (around medium size) and put off buying one for a long time, but it's not really. In fact after using it for some weeks and then trying out a regular keyboard my thumbs feel trapped and forced to be close to my hand. The ErgoDox position is, give or take, where my thumb would be completely relaxed. Keeping the thumbs close to the palm causes it to tense, something I only learned after being used to the dox. It takes a couple days to adjust to the thumb cluster before you can really say much about it. At first it just feels too weird. Besides, on the 78 'dox the main thumb keys can be hit with the knuckle part/side of your thumb, and its general position close to where it would be on a regular keyboard. If you ever buy one and dislike it, they hold their value pretty well and you can even turn a profit by selling one pre-built.
