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geekhack Community => Ergonomics => Topic started by: mashby on Fri, 27 February 2015, 16:47:15

Title: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: mashby on Fri, 27 February 2015, 16:47:15
I recently listened to Matt Mullenweg (of WordPress fame) on Tim Ferriss' podcast -- Matt Mullenweg on Polyphasic Sleep, Tequila, and Building Billion-Dollar Companies (http://fourhourworkweek.com/2015/02/09/matt-mullenweg/). In their conversation, Matt mentioned that he had switched to the Dvorak keyboard layout awhile back and that he was a fan of it to this day. In the show notes, they linked to http://www.dvzine.org to provide an over view and gave it a read.

Certainly I've heard of the layout before, but never really gave it much thought. I suppose I didn't like the idea of having to relearn how to type, but after reading the zine and listening to Matt wax poetic about it, I'm considering it.

Other than the fact that many key cap sets don't support it and the fact that I'm probably adding yet more potential complexity to my life -- anyone think this is a bad idea?
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: ideus on Fri, 27 February 2015, 17:00:25


If you experiment with Dvorak, you might enlighten us on the switching, considering your long experience with keyboards.

Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: nubbinator on Fri, 27 February 2015, 17:48:43
I've never seen any studies supporting dvorak as being better.  I'd try Colemak or one of the other alternate layouts before dvorak.
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: jacobolus on Fri, 27 February 2015, 22:59:46
There were a bunch of studies showing Dvorak better, but there’s some debate about how credible they are.

In any event, note that every alternative layout is designed based on some set of personal opinions/models about what constitutes a good layout. None of them as far as I can tell are backed by good empirical evidence about the hand motions involved in typing letter combinations. As such, the best guide when choosing layouts is your own personal preference. Just try typing on a few different layouts for a few weeks each, and settle with the one you like best.

Note that Dvorak layout was specifically designed for manual typewriters, in the 30s. Its goal is to reduce the use of the bottom row of the typewriter to the extent possible, because typing letters on the bottom row is a notable slowdown. I don’t think its design criteria make quite as much sense on computer keyboards, and especially not on e.g. flat laptop keyboards. On the other hand, I don’t think later layout designers did too much better a job figuring out great criteria either... or maybe a better way to say that: I think Dvorak is about as good as any of the others. I have friends who prefer Dvorak to Colemak, and other friends who prefer Colemak to Dvorak, and there are folks on this board who use Arensito, ADNW, Workman, Norman, Carpalx, Malt (on a Maltron), etc.

If you do a search of geekhack (either through the forum search box or through google), you’ll find plenty of discussion about alternative keyboard layouts.

Of course, there’s only so much you can do with such a broken keyboard arrangement as the one designed by IBM. If you split the keyboard in half, arrange the keys in columns instead of rows, and move backspace, enter, tab, escape, shift, and all the modifier keys to better spots, you can do dramatically better.
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: brimborion on Fri, 27 February 2015, 23:04:24
Do you use more than one computer?
Can you switch on all of them, including laptops and work keyboards?
Is it important for you to be able to keep up your typing rate because of work or other uses while you learn Dvorak?
Do you game? Can you remap everything?
Wouldn't it be better to learn Colemak?

If you answered anything to any of the above, give it the old college try anyway and see what obstacles you hit :).
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: ideus on Fri, 27 February 2015, 23:34:35
Do you use more than one computer?
Can you switch on all of them, including laptops and work keyboards?
Is it important for you to be able to keep up your typing rate because of work or other uses while you learn Dvorak?
Do you game? Can you remap everything?
Wouldn't it be better to learn Colemak?

If you answered anything to any of the above, give it the old college try anyway and see what obstacles you hit :) .


Our favorite keyboard cannot be usede in all circumstances.
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: SonOfSonOfSpock on Sat, 28 February 2015, 00:55:51
Dvorak wouldn't be my first choice if I was switching. I'd suggest looking at some positives/negatives to various keyboard layouts before trying one out. Taking a look at QWERTY vs other layouts it is pretty easy to see that nobody would create QWERTY nowadays and there are more efficient and ergonomic layouts. What are the reasons you're thinking of switching?
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: Korth on Sat, 28 February 2015, 02:25:18
Tried it myself a few years ago.

It's much harder to learn to type when you already know how to type.  My wpm and accuracy sucked for months - on both dvorak and qwerty - while constantly hesitating to think and rethink once-automatic motor skills.

End result, I can now sustain a disappointing 45wpm on dvorak, and still test out about 75-80wpm on qwerty (same before and after my dvorak experiment).  Yeah, I could type a mucho faster 90wpm+ in my shady youth, but these days I don't work on a keyboard, I mostly just play on one.  I suppose I could've pushed myself to succeed at high-speed dvorak (and qwerty be damned!) if I had stuck through it for months or years.  But one day it occurred to me that qwerty dominates the world and is here to stay for a long while, dvorak is just for the mutant typing elitists - and just can't buy those cool gaming keyboards in dvorak, y'know.  :p

That being said, I do believe dvorak is the better layout.  A scientifically designed effort to make the most frequently-used letters and letter sequences more easy to reach faster, and with minimal effort.  As opposed to qwerty, which was essentially the exact opposite - a deliberate misarrangement of keys designed to slow typing down on ancient typewriters so that their mechanical levers wouldn't jam and tangle up as often.
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: mashby on Sat, 28 February 2015, 14:02:18
Thanks for all the great feedback guys!

@nubbinator -- why would you pick Colemak over Dvorak?

@jacobolus -- I did a search, but I didn't see much. Perhaps my search-foo is a bit lacking, but most of the search results were about people asking for GB's to include a Dvorak kit.  :roll eyes:

@brimborion -- great questions. I think I can switch on all the computers that I use and I don't game, but why do you prefer Colemak to Dvorak?

@ideus -- The only deal break is the HHKB if I choose a different layout, but I think I'd just go with blanks if I found the legends to be an issue.

@SonOfSonOfSpock -- The main reason that I'm considering it is the idea that Dvorak is more efficient over QWERTY. I don't have RSI issues, or anything, but I like the idea of efficiency. One of the reasons I like the HHKB and 60% layouts. Why wouldn't you choose Dvorak?

@Korth -- That was my assumption too, that it's going to be harder to UNLEARN than anything. Interesting that you go back and forth. I hadn't thought about that, but I'm sure I would. I suppose it's just a more extreme example of switching between the Poker X and the HHKB. Each fn layer is different and I have to think about it a little until I get adjusted when I split.
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: hoggy on Sat, 28 February 2015, 14:28:43
I switched to Dvorak when I was contemplating giving up programming as a career. It wasn't the only thing that helped, and I think switching to colemak or the Maltron layout would have helped at least as much.

It wasn't an easy transition for me, and I've pretty much lost my ability to type qwerty, but it was one of the best decisions of my life.

The best reason for switching is comfort, if you simply want to type faster, then take a look at text expansion software first.



Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: Oobly on Sat, 28 February 2015, 14:34:09
If you prefer inward rolls vs hand and finger alternation, choose Colemak. If you prefer alternation and don't mind that ZXCV are in a different place for shortcuts, choose Dvorak. If you want the ultimate in efficient layouts, use an optimised AdNW layout, customised to a corpus of the type of writing you do.

They're all only a marginal increase in efficiency over QWERTY, though (less than 20% in most cases), and it may not be worthwhile depending on how much of the day you spend typing and how much effort it takes to become proficient in each layout.

I only bothered learning an alternate character layout when I switched to an alternate physical layout, and the only one that took into account the different weighting values of the new physical layout was the AdNW software. So I use a variant of that, customised for my physical layout.

One reason not to learn Colemak on a standard layout board, though, is if you require your QWERTY skills and speed to remain around the same during the learning period. This is very difficult with Colemak since it has so many similarities with QWERTY that you'll inevitably be slow in both during while learning. Dvorak is different enough to interfere less with the QWERTY typing muscle memory, but it still can if it's on the same physical layout board.

This is the main reason I didn't learn Dvorak and only switched when I had my ergo board complete. My QWERTY speed actually increased slightly during the learning phase since I started using better (mechanical) QWERTY keyboards and paid more attention to the layout and the way I type.

So now I type well on QWERTY and decently on my ergo with AdNW. Eventually, I'm sure my ergo typing will equal or surpass the speed of my QWERTY typing. It's already less effort and more comfortable (and often a lot more fun).

The physical layout is more of a hindrance to typing efficiency than the character layout. The familiarity of QWERTY on a "normal" staggered board is hard to get around. So I didn't.

P.S. - if you use a Linux / Unix terminal often, Dvorak can be a pain.. "L" and "S" are both on the right hand pinkie...
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: davkol on Sat, 28 February 2015, 15:35:19
DSK (incorrectly Dvorak) is great, if you're stuck with legacy hardware and everybody's software. All modern operating systems support DSK out of the box (shout-out to the awesome DSK-QWERTY in OS X), it's an ANSI standard, plenty of keyboards support it. Configuring any computer to DSK is no more difficult than switching it to a national layout (various QWERTZ, AZERTY, etc. variants), and hundreds of millions of people are doing it all the time. Although it's easier to maintain typing skills in more significantly different layouts (BTW do NOT *unlearn* QWERTY), there's no point in keeping both US QWERTY and DSK, because they're both more or less everywhere.

Colemak is wonderful, if and only if you type on some supported systems equipped with scissor-switch keyboards and appreciate the convenience of switching via Tarmak (http://forum.colemak.com/viewtopic.php?id=1858). In that case, Minimak (http://www.minimak.org/) is an option worth exploring too.

Other than that, there's a bunch of truly niche layouts, but the problem is... learning a new layout takes several weeks. Several painful weeks. And then several months to get a sense of rhythm or possible actual issues (because issues that arise during the learning process are rarely real problems in actuality). That's quite a price to pay for "trying it out".
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: brimborion on Sat, 28 February 2015, 15:37:15
@brimborion -- great questions. I think I can switch on all the computers that I use and I don't game, but why do you prefer Colemak to Dvorak?

I don't, I was just ignorantly tossing out questions; my point was more that you should just try it and see what happens.
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: nubbinator on Sat, 28 February 2015, 16:58:16

@nubbinator -- why would you pick Colemak over Dvorak?

Almost all the dvorak studies I've seen are highly biased with major flaws.  The few decent ones show no advantage in speed or ergonomics.  Choral also creates some incredibly awkward shortcuts (ctrl+c for example) that decreases efficiency.  Colemak and some other more modern niche layouts are less awkward.  From what I've seen, they also tend to have better evidence (but still a dearth of proper scientific study) to back them.

Additionally, most people tend to be slower with dvorak, though some do get faster.  I'd rather not type slower with a layout that has no scientifically backed ergonomic superiority.  Some of the other layouts like Colemak report minor ergonomic improvements and typically a return to the same speed.

It's really something you have to research and see if it's right for you.
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: davkol on Sat, 28 February 2015, 17:11:06
Almost all the dvorak studies I've seen are highly biased with major flaws.
A honest question: What studies have you actually read?

Choral also creates some incredibly awkward shortcuts (ctrl+c for example) that decreases efficiency.  Colemak and some other more modern niche layouts are less awkward.
I believe mashby uses OS X. That system has built-in support for DSK with QWERTY shortcuts (https://support.apple.com/kb/PH6528?locale=en_US).

Additionally, most people tend to be slower with dvorak, though some do get faster.  I'd rather not type slower with a layout that has no scientifically backed ergonomic superiority.  Some of the other layouts like Colemak report minor ergonomic improvements and typically a return to the same speed.
...and the evidence is where? Isn't the reason for a lower speed exactly the same as the reason for low typing speeds in general? Because AFAIK most people revert to hunt'n'peck typing even after passing a touch typing course.
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: nubbinator on Sat, 28 February 2015, 17:20:25
I'm on my phone, so I can't link, but most were done by Dvorak and his proponents.  The Wikipedia article discusses some.  There haven't been any rigorous studies that I've seen. 

Read around anywhere people switch.  A minority get back to Qwerty speeds even after years of switching.  Most report more comfort from Colemak and other more modern alternate layouts.  Again, since there are no proper studies, thus becomes a more tricky thing, but dvorak would be my last choice for a new layout.
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: davkol on Sat, 28 February 2015, 17:37:30
The Wikipedia article links the Strong's study (a joke by itself) and the writing of Liebowitz&Margolis (cough, cough). That's all. Some other sources are poorly picked as well (e.g. The Curse of QWERTY).
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: nubbinator on Sat, 28 February 2015, 18:16:12
There really aren't many studies.  When I was still in grad school and had access to all the big databases, I tried to find more studies and there were like one or two more, all of which sucked.  All the "studies" you see out there being touted as good measures are amateur studies that use spurious measures that really don't give any kind of scientific credence to the claims.  For example, some of the most touted "studies" are ones with heat maps where a user tracked their usage with different layouts.  They laughably concluded that since their fingers spent a majority of the time on the home row with one of the layouts, that it was the best layout for ergonomics and efficiency. 
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: snipars on Sat, 28 February 2015, 19:20:17
i use dvorak, i've used it for like 2 or 3 years 
it's nice to type with but it's not worth spending ages learning
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: ideus on Sat, 28 February 2015, 19:22:41
i use dvorak, i've used it for like 2 or 3 years 
it's nice to type with but it's not worth spending ages learning


Wise advising.
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: dusan on Sat, 28 February 2015, 21:49:17
I switched to Dvorak when I was contemplating giving up programming as a career. It wasn't the only thing that helped, and I think switching to colemak or the Maltron layout would have helped at least as much.

It wasn't an easy transition for me, and I've pretty much lost my ability to type qwerty, but it was one of the best decisions of my life.

The best reason for switching is comfort, if you simply want to type faster, then take a look at text expansion software first.

+1.

One point more: I use Dvorak everywhere (although only 99% of the time), most keyboards I use are with QWERTY keycaps, so I don't think the lack of Dvorak keycap layout is any problem.
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: Vibex on Sat, 28 February 2015, 21:55:38
I'm not a huge fan of dvorak. I tried it briefly, but it felt uncomfortable. I would recommend trying Colemak instead. I found it pretty nice to use. Or you could try out JAZ (my layout). Or you could just go the extra mile and make your own layout. ;) I would be happy to help you with that if you would like. ;D
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: steve.v on Sat, 28 February 2015, 22:34:33
1. Qwerty 125 wpm
2. Dvorak 60 wpm
3. Workman 45 wpm
4. Colemak 100 wpm

I prefer finger rolls over alternations. Dvorak used too much of my right pinky. Colemak uses my right hand a little too much. I like capslock as my backspace on Colemak. No layout is worth changing unless your wrists hurts from typing; as mine did with qwerty and now there's no more pain. Expect a moment of not being able to type at all; kinetic finger memory collision.
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: SonOfSonOfSpock on Sun, 01 March 2015, 01:00:02

@SonOfSonOfSpock -- The main reason that I'm considering it is the idea that Dvorak is more efficient over QWERTY. I don't have RSI issues, or anything, but I like the idea of efficiency. One of the reasons I like the HHKB and 60% layouts. Why wouldn't you choose Dvorak?


Some of the newer layouts make it easier for a qwerty typist to switch easier. Also the right pinky in dvorak gets a lot of use.
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: davkol on Sun, 01 March 2015, 04:51:43
There really aren't many studies.  When I was still in grad school and had access to all the big databases, I tried to find more studies and there were like one or two more, all of which sucked.  All the "studies" you see out there being touted as good measures are amateur studies that use spurious measures that really don't give any kind of scientific credence to the claims.
There are actually plenty of academic research papers on the topic to my big surprise. Most of them really focus on one or two layout properties though... that's where many of the claims about "no advantage to DSK" stem from. It's kinda pointless to conclude anything (esp. typing speed estimates) from a "study" that consists of several typists repeatedly pressing isolated *bigrams* on camera.
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: MajorMajor on Sun, 01 March 2015, 11:16:19
I chose DVORAK over Colemak due to Colemak not being built into major OS. I don't want to be in a position of looking like a goofus hunting and pecking when I need to use someone's PC.
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: steve.v on Sun, 01 March 2015, 11:21:06

I chose DVORAK over Colemak due to Colemak not being built into major OS. I don't want to be in a position of looking like a goofus hunting and pecking when I need to use someone's PC.

Only Mac doesn't come loaded with Colemak; can be installed easily.
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: Vibex on Sun, 01 March 2015, 12:39:56

I chose DVORAK over Colemak due to Colemak not being built into major OS. I don't want to be in a position of looking like a goofus hunting and pecking when I need to use someone's PC.

Only Mac doesn't come loaded with Colemak; can be installed easily.
Quite a few linux distros don't have colemak by default.
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: jacobolus on Sun, 01 March 2015, 14:01:48
Only Mac doesn't come loaded with Colemak; can be installed easily.
I see Colemak as an option on my Mac (OS X 10.9), and I’m sure I never explicitly added it.
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: jacobolus on Sun, 01 March 2015, 14:25:54
@jacobolus -- I did a search, but I didn't see much. Perhaps my search-foo is a bit lacking, but most of the search results were about people asking for GB's to include a Dvorak kit.  :roll eyes:
Well, I’m not going to read carefully through, but here are 60 threads that came up in my searching, I think at least 10–20 of them should be pretty relevant:

4379 (https://geekhack.org/index.php?topic=4379) 5036 (https://geekhack.org/index.php?topic=5036) 6435 (https://geekhack.org/index.php?topic=6435) 6622 (https://geekhack.org/index.php?topic=6622) 6998 (https://geekhack.org/index.php?topic=6998) 7494 (https://geekhack.org/index.php?topic=7494) 8110 (https://geekhack.org/index.php?topic=8110) 8146 (https://geekhack.org/index.php?topic=8146) 10794 (https://geekhack.org/index.php?topic=10794) 14308 (https://geekhack.org/index.php?topic=14308)
15306 (https://geekhack.org/index.php?topic=15306) 16434 (https://geekhack.org/index.php?topic=16434) 16559 (https://geekhack.org/index.php?topic=16559) 16828 (https://geekhack.org/index.php?topic=16828) 18590 (https://geekhack.org/index.php?topic=18590) 19458 (https://geekhack.org/index.php?topic=19458) 22183 (https://geekhack.org/index.php?topic=22183) 23005 (https://geekhack.org/index.php?topic=23005) 24167 (https://geekhack.org/index.php?topic=24167) 25172 (https://geekhack.org/index.php?topic=25172)
26197 (https://geekhack.org/index.php?topic=26197) 26440 (https://geekhack.org/index.php?topic=26440) 32621 (https://geekhack.org/index.php?topic=32621) 33460 (https://geekhack.org/index.php?topic=33460) 35196 (https://geekhack.org/index.php?topic=35196) 37824 (https://geekhack.org/index.php?topic=37824) 40611 (https://geekhack.org/index.php?topic=40611) 40649 (https://geekhack.org/index.php?topic=40649) 40823 (https://geekhack.org/index.php?topic=40823) 43491 (https://geekhack.org/index.php?topic=43491)
43994 (https://geekhack.org/index.php?topic=43994) 46374 (https://geekhack.org/index.php?topic=46374) 47278 (https://geekhack.org/index.php?topic=47278) 47775 (https://geekhack.org/index.php?topic=47775) 48292 (https://geekhack.org/index.php?topic=48292) 48689 (https://geekhack.org/index.php?topic=48689) 48834 (https://geekhack.org/index.php?topic=48834) 48879 (https://geekhack.org/index.php?topic=48879) 49138 (https://geekhack.org/index.php?topic=49138) 50734 (https://geekhack.org/index.php?topic=50734)
51563 (https://geekhack.org/index.php?topic=51563) 51741 (https://geekhack.org/index.php?topic=51741) 52387 (https://geekhack.org/index.php?topic=52387) 53131 (https://geekhack.org/index.php?topic=53131) 54544 (https://geekhack.org/index.php?topic=54544) 55407 (https://geekhack.org/index.php?topic=55407) 56312 (https://geekhack.org/index.php?topic=56312) 57491 (https://geekhack.org/index.php?topic=57491) 57559 (https://geekhack.org/index.php?topic=57559) 59828 (https://geekhack.org/index.php?topic=59828)
61586 (https://geekhack.org/index.php?topic=61586) 61780 (https://geekhack.org/index.php?topic=61780) 62065 (https://geekhack.org/index.php?topic=62065) 63162 (https://geekhack.org/index.php?topic=63162) 64293 (https://geekhack.org/index.php?topic=64293) 64558 (https://geekhack.org/index.php?topic=64558) 66390 (https://geekhack.org/index.php?topic=66390) 66546 (https://geekhack.org/index.php?topic=66546) 66802 (https://geekhack.org/index.php?topic=66802) 67604 (https://geekhack.org/index.php?topic=67604)
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: jacobolus on Sun, 01 March 2015, 14:35:22
[...] Colemak and some other more modern niche layouts are less awkward.  From what I've seen, they also tend to have better evidence (but still a dearth of proper scientific study) to back them.
Which “better evidence” are you referring to?
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: keyhopper on Sun, 01 March 2015, 15:06:36
I have never reordered the keycaps on my keyboards. It hasn't been an issue.

For starting to learn Dvorak I cannot recommend 'gtypist' enough. It has lessons specifically tuned for Dvorak. Like whole texts that you can type without moving from the home row, and which do give your brain AHA! moments.

It is a free program available on most linux distributions, and it is also available for windows:

           http://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/gtypist/w32_binaries/

It also seems to be available for Macs:

           https://packages.macports.org/gtypist/


When I switched to dvorak 10 years ago, I tried several typing tutors and found gtypist to be the best, though its UI isn't as good looking as the others.

For the dvorak lessons, select "Series D - Dvorak touch typing" in the main menu. To skip lessons, there is a trick: hit ESC during a lesson, then 'N' to go to the next one.

At the time, I printed the layout and kept it sticked on my monitor while I was learning.

Once you are comfortable touch typing, you can do speed lessons in gtypist or typeracer.com. The process took a few weeks to get me to my previous Qwerty speed. Now I type between 80wpm and 120wpm, but the most important thing is that the pain in my hands has been gone ever since.

Also, if you look at videos of people typing with dvorak, you'll notice that their hands barely move and don't contort as much while typing fast.

I don't think that dvorak will provide enough benefits for everybody to justify switching, but I do think that it is a more natural and relaxed layout, and that maybe cannot be quantified in a study...

I can still type in Qwerty but I choose to avoid it if possible. Funny note: in my cell phone I still type in Qwerty layout with my two thumbs, quite fast and don't use autocorrect.

Cheers!
.KeyHopper.
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: mstechfreak on Mon, 02 March 2015, 01:25:11
Guys, whichever keyboard layout you use, I can suggest you http://www.typingstudy.com to help yourself to learn the layout (it has colemak and dvorak layouts too). It really helped me a lot! Maybe anyone else has tried?
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: Oobly on Mon, 02 March 2015, 02:00:13
I chose DVORAK over Colemak due to Colemak not being built into major OS. I don't want to be in a position of looking like a goofus hunting and pecking when I need to use someone's PC.

This is a good reason to try to keep your QWERTY skills up while learning your new layout (and thus to choose a layout as unfamiliar / different from QWERTY as possible). In many cases if you have to work on someone else's PC they may not even allow you to switch the layout, let alone install a new one. I avoid these hassles simply by continuing to be proficient in QWERTY despite it's flaws.

There really aren't many studies.  When I was still in grad school and had access to all the big databases, I tried to find more studies and there were like one or two more, all of which sucked.  All the "studies" you see out there being touted as good measures are amateur studies that use spurious measures that really don't give any kind of scientific credence to the claims.
There are actually plenty of academic research papers on the topic to my big surprise. Most of them really focus on one or two layout properties though... that's where many of the claims about "no advantage to DSK" stem from. It's kinda pointless to conclude anything (esp. typing speed estimates) from a "study" that consists of several typists repeatedly pressing isolated *bigrams* on camera.

I have found the same as davkol, most research papers will focus on a single aspect or only a few aspects of layout efficiency and use.

I have found it better to use dynamic (software) analysers for analysing different layouts and the best I've found so far is the AdNW one as it allows you to adjust the weighting of various criteria to suit your physical layout and personal use and use your own corpus of text. For "quick and dirty" comparison you can use this online analyser (http://patorjk.com/keyboard-layout-analyzer/#/main), but it may not have the same weighting of criteria that you're looking at for comparing layouts for yourself (upper vs lower row weighting, etc). I have found it to be a good way to quickly analyse a layout in comparison to others, though. It allows you to put your own "corpus" into the text field for analysis, although you can't put a large volume of text in unless you want to wait a LONG time with an unresponsive browser ;)  It was very useful when designing my custom layout for my ergo board. Once I had a good rough draft I did the final analyses (with much larger texts) and fine tuning with AdNW.

One thing the online analyser does not take into account is the fact that it's easier for the index fingers to press lower row keys and it's easier for middle and ring fingers to press upper row keys. In fact in my case it's easier to press upper row keys with middle and ring than home row keys due to the way I hold my hands when typing.
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: Oobly on Mon, 02 March 2015, 02:29:44
Alright, so far I've been talking generalities and "most efficient", etc. But for some practical advice, if you're going to use a standard physical layout board and you simply want a little more typing comfort / efficiency and you're willing to put the time in (and you want it to be a "standard" alternative layout), I'd suggest rather learning Dvorak than Colemak for a number of reasons:

1. It's different enough from QWERTY that you're not going to interfere as much with your existing QWERTY muscle memory and skills.
2. Alternation is more conducive to more comfortable typing than rolls (this an opinion, but a well-grounded one). It's also faster, but there are some caveats here (see my comments below).
3. Colemak overloads the index fingers.
4. It's available on every OS with very little effort needed to "install" it. Colemak is getting better, but still not as widely available.

In terms of keycaps, most GB's that include support for an alternative layout will include both Dvorak and Colemak caps, so it's not really a factor, IMHO.

I suspect some will challenge number 2, so here is a little supporting information: Fingers on the same hand have shared tendons and muscles, which makes pressing successive keys with the same hand require more effort and concentration (flex, release, flex) and thus less speed than if you were to be alternating all the presses. You could argue that the "roll" can be produced by a rotation of the wrist (pronation / supination motion) without much finger movement required, however you still need to position the individual fingers to "set up" the roll which requires more concentration and as much finger movement as pressing alternating keys.

The only advantage to "rolls" that I can think of are that it matches the way your mind works in breaking words into key groups to be pressed which then translate into finger movement "sets", but these sets tend to start off as single keys when learning and progress to larger and larger groups as you become more proficient and used to typing specific words, so the Colemak rolls will only match certain stages of typing proficiency. It's still more fatiguing overall.
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: davkol on Mon, 02 March 2015, 03:44:24
Rolls are essentially only a consequence of Colemak's reduced same-finger ratio with focus on home-row typing though.
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: steve.v on Mon, 02 March 2015, 03:56:26

Alright, so far I've been talking generalities and "most efficient", etc. But for some practical advice, if you're going to use a standard physical layout board and you simply want a little more typing comfort / efficiency and you're willing to put the time in (and you want it to be a "standard" alternative layout), I'd suggest rather learning Dvorak than Colemak for a number of reasons:

1. It's different enough from QWERTY that you're not going to interfere as much with your existing QWERTY muscle memory and skills.
2. Alternation is more conducive to more comfortable typing than rolls (this an opinion, but a well-grounded one). It's also faster, but there are some caveats here (see my comments below).
3. Colemak overloads the index fingers.
4. It's available on every OS with very little effort needed to "install" it. Colemak is getting better, but still not as widely available.

In terms of keycaps, most GB's that include support for an alternative layout will include both Dvorak and Colemak caps, so it's not really a factor, IMHO.

I suspect some will challenge number 2, so here is a little supporting information: Fingers on the same hand have shared tendons and muscles, which makes pressing successive keys with the same hand require more effort and concentration (flex, release, flex) and thus less speed than if you were to be alternating all the presses. You could argue that the "roll" can be produced by a rotation of the wrist (pronation / supination motion) without much finger movement required, however you still need to position the individual fingers to "set up" the roll which requires more concentration and as much finger movement as pressing alternating keys.

The only advantage to "rolls" that I can think of are that it matches the way your mind works in breaking words into key groups to be pressed which then translate into finger movement "sets", but these sets tend to start off as single keys when learning and progress to larger and larger groups as you become more proficient and used to typing specific words, so the Colemak rolls will only match certain stages of typing proficiency. It's still more fatiguing overall.

I type Colemak.

Your post left too many things out in favor of Dvorak. The left index finger, right ring & pinkies are overloaded for Dvorak. I, R, L, very common letters, requires the fingers to stretch often.

Your number three is misleading and false. If anything, it's qwerty that works the index fingers due to top middle row usage. Between Dv/Col, its Dv that suffers due to the letter i.

Strictly for English. One of Colemak's greatest strength is the distance accumulated through typing; it's far less than many layouts. 

However it comes down to personal preference; as each hand/fingers can be different. Finger rolls & a very balanced finger load versus finger alternation and a unique layout.

Dvorak was my first layout beyond qwerty; the positions of the three letters were annoying and pushed me to switch.

I can type for hours without fatigue. Nothing's perfect of course and the only thing I find annoying about Colemak is typing the word 'you'.

Want to be faster and efficient? Learn Plover. 

 
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: PieterGen on Mon, 02 March 2015, 04:26:11
P.S. - if you use a Linux / Unix terminal often, Dvorak can be a pain.. "L" and "S" are both on the right hand pinkie...

If you use Linux/Unix you know what an alias is. Let's use some inward rolls.
alias nth='ls'
alias snth='ls-a'
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: Oobly on Mon, 02 March 2015, 05:09:26
More
Alright, so far I've been talking generalities and "most efficient", etc. But for some practical advice, if you're going to use a standard physical layout board and you simply want a little more typing comfort / efficiency and you're willing to put the time in (and you want it to be a "standard" alternative layout), I'd suggest rather learning Dvorak than Colemak for a number of reasons:

1. It's different enough from QWERTY that you're not going to interfere as much with your existing QWERTY muscle memory and skills.
2. Alternation is more conducive to more comfortable typing than rolls (this an opinion, but a well-grounded one). It's also faster, but there are some caveats here (see my comments below).
3. Colemak overloads the index fingers.
4. It's available on every OS with very little effort needed to "install" it. Colemak is getting better, but still not as widely available.

In terms of keycaps, most GB's that include support for an alternative layout will include both Dvorak and Colemak caps, so it's not really a factor, IMHO.

I suspect some will challenge number 2, so here is a little supporting information: Fingers on the same hand have shared tendons and muscles, which makes pressing successive keys with the same hand require more effort and concentration (flex, release, flex) and thus less speed than if you were to be alternating all the presses. You could argue that the "roll" can be produced by a rotation of the wrist (pronation / supination motion) without much finger movement required, however you still need to position the individual fingers to "set up" the roll which requires more concentration and as much finger movement as pressing alternating keys.

The only advantage to "rolls" that I can think of are that it matches the way your mind works in breaking words into key groups to be pressed which then translate into finger movement "sets", but these sets tend to start off as single keys when learning and progress to larger and larger groups as you become more proficient and used to typing specific words, so the Colemak rolls will only match certain stages of typing proficiency. It's still more fatiguing overall.

I type Colemak.

Your post left too many things out in favor of Dvorak. The left index finger, right ring & pinkies are overloaded for Dvorak. I, R, L, very common letters, requires the fingers to stretch often.

Your number three is misleading and false. If anything, it's qwerty that works the index fingers due to top middle row usage. Between Dv/Col, its Dv that suffers due to the letter i.

Strictly for English. One of Colemak's greatest strength is the distance accumulated through typing; it's far less than many layouts. 

However it comes down to personal preference; as each hand/fingers can be different. Finger rolls & a very balanced finger load versus finger alternation and a unique layout.

Dvorak was my first layout beyond qwerty; the positions of the three letters were annoying and pushed me to switch.

I can type for hours without fatigue. Nothing's perfect of course and the only thing I find annoying about Colemak is typing the word 'you'.

Want to be faster and efficient? Learn Plover.

http://patorjk.com/keyboard-layout-analyzer/#/main

Post your favourite text into that and then take a look at the finger usage graphs. Dvorak has MUCH more balanced finger usage than Colemak and doesn't overload the index fingers, despite the inclusion of "i".

I agree that the letter placement of Dvorak leaves something to be desired, which is why I went for a completely custom layout for my own board. Dvorak can be "improved" by switching the positions of U and I, but L and R are difficult to reposition without damaging the layout more than you fix it. Still, it's better than Colemak for the use case I specified and for the reasons I listed.

Regarding Plover, it's great for dictation, but like all dictation techniques (which are designed for rapidly jotting down speech concepts), it requires parsing afterwards to turn it into readable text and it's not very useful for tasks like programming.

If you want the best general purpose typing efficiency, a well designed ergo board (with thumb keys) and properly analysed and tested character layout is about the best you can do. Maltron did a good job of this, but with newer, more configurable software you can design a better layout simply because you can do analysis using larger texts and more variables / constraints much faster.

@PieterGen: Nice! That's a good way to make things better for yourself when using Dvorak layout :)
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: PieterGen on Mon, 02 March 2015, 06:10:27
Quite a few linux distros don't have colemak by default.

Layouts are in the xkeyboard config. The people at Freedesktop.org decide which keyboard layouts are in the standard X11 files. Of course users are free to change this, to add layouts, modify them and so on. So you will find qwerty, azery, qwertz, dvorak, colemak and *lots* of other layouts, on your standard Linux, Unix or BSD system. The less known ADNW layout has been in it since May 2014. Colemak has been in xkeyboard for a long time.

So why don't you see all these layouts in the menus of your latest Ubuntu or Fedora? This is because individual desktop environments (Gnome, Mate, KDE, Cinnamon, OpenBox and so on) and/or distributions (Ubuntu, Mint, openSuse, Fedora etc.) decide which layout-options they put in their menus. So a specific layout may not be in the menu, but it will be in your xkeyboard files. If the layout you want is called exoticlayout5 you just open a terminal and type set xkbmap exoticlayout5
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: PieterGen on Mon, 02 March 2015, 06:29:44
Quote
Strictly for English. One of Colemak's greatest strength is the distance accumulated through typing; it's far less than many layouts. 
True. At the same time, it scores worse on other variables. Keyboard optimization is a matter of compromises.....

Quote
Dvorak can be "improved" by switching the positions of U and I, but L and R are difficult to reposition without damaging the layout more than you fix it.
Optimizing by hand is extremely hard. You should use a computer to calculate that !

Oobly uses an ADNW layout. I do too. ADNW is made based on Dvorak's approach, so if you "buy" Dvorak's theory, ADNW is interesting. Stock ADNW is optimized for an 50% English/50% German mix. Oobly made a version for his specific use (care to post it, and tell something about the backgrounds?). I made a version for my specific use, which is mixed Dutch and English prose.  For fun I also calculated a version for 100% English. Like Dvorak, which was also optimized for English. I called this new version Dvormax. If you like the Dvorak idea, but are not completely happy with it, for instance with the I, U, L, S   you may give Dvormax a try !


If you do, please post your findings.

Here are four layouts:
Code: [Select]
[b]Dvorak[/b] (optimized for English) 
  ,.py fgcrl'
  aoeiu dhtns;
  ?qjkx bmwvz

DvorMax (optimized for English)
  kyu." zlmdpv
  rieao hnstcw
  x*?,/ jqfgb

Stock ADNW ("hieao")  (optimized for German/English)
  ku"./ vgcljf
  hieao dtrnsx
  y?,qb pwmzß

Dutch ADNW ("rieao") (optimized for Dutch/English). This is the layout I use
  y.u," wclhqz
  rieao gdtnsk
  /x?;j vpmbf
Title: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: rebus on Mon, 02 March 2015, 12:13:24
I tried Colemak for a few months then I tried Dvorak and immediately felt much more comfortable. I think most of the studies claiming the superiority of a layout over others are based on stats, and a very few of them (maybe none) can measure a real improvement in comfort for the fingers. I mean, they all say there is less motion this way or that other way, but how the motion has been? So they all mean nothing to me. Anyway I read that some prefer Colemak over Dvorak after trying both (like me, but I have opposite feelings) so in the end it's all up to you.
Just a few more considerations: why would you have to wait to suffer for RSI to change layout? I did, and I regret that.
And lastly, qwerty and Colemak seem cool because they give you the chance to type frequent shortcuts like ctrl-v with just the left hand. But that's not a good habit at all. Since I began suffering for wrist pain, I learned to always type the modifier with the opposite hand. And I feel very nice with shortcuts in Dvorak now. Just my 2 cents
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: Vibex on Mon, 02 March 2015, 13:05:10
Quite a few linux distros don't have colemak by default.

Layouts are in the xkeyboard config. The people at Freedesktop.org decide which keyboard layouts are in the standard X11 files. Of course users are free to change this, to add layouts, modify them and so on. So you will find qwerty, azery, qwertz, dvorak, colemak and *lots* of other layouts, on your standard Linux, Unix or BSD system. The less known ADNW layout has been in it since May 2014. Colemak has been in xkeyboard for a long time.

So why don't you see all these layouts in the menus of your latest Ubuntu or Fedora? This is because individual desktop environments (Gnome, Mate, KDE, Cinnamon, OpenBox and so on) and/or distributions (Ubuntu, Mint, openSuse, Fedora etc.) decide which layout-options they put in their menus. So a specific layout may not be in the menu, but it will be in your xkeyboard files. If the layout you want is called exoticlayout5 you just open a terminal and type set xkbmap exoticlayout5
That might be true for Ubuntu and such, it has been a long time since I used it. However the most recent distro I tried that didn't have Colemak was Funtoo.
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: PieterGen on Mon, 02 March 2015, 15:35:13
@vibex - I've been eying funtoo & gentoo for a while now....I've hopped lots (30 + ? ) of distros, some long term loves were crunchbang, mint and the last couple of years arch (+ openbox/goomwwm//herbstluft). Do you like funtoo, is compiling everything worth the hassle? Can you find everything in the repos? is the masked stuff usable? I like my system to be reasonable up to date.

(Not that arch is without faults. The AUR build files vary in quality, sometimes you haveto repair them, packages get abandonned, etc etc ).

Thanks.

Sorry for the linux off topic talk, back to Dvorak !!  ;D 
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: mashby on Mon, 02 March 2015, 16:46:54
Well, I’m not going to read carefully through, but here are 60 threads that came up in my searching, I think at least 10–20 of them should be pretty relevant:

I saw some of those, but nothing definitive enough not to warrant starting a new thread. However, your search was much more exhaustive than what I found.  :thumb:



Lots of great discussion here. Thank you! You guys have brought up a lot of things that I either hadn't considered or didn't even know existed, not to mention helping address all of my questions. Again, thank you so much for contributing to the conversation.

Since I don't have RSI issues and it's not pain that's motivating me to consider different layouts, it's pretty clear that different layouts are more about personal preferences. I'm also not looking to increase my typing speed necessarily, but faster is always good if something like that were to happen, it's just not a motivating factor for considering a different layout.

It sounds like I just need to dive in and give it a shot for a week or so and go from there. Since I tend to rotate keyboards anyway, there's no reason that I could set one to be DSK and the other QWERTY and switch as I need to. In fact, after getting acquainted with DSK, I think venturing into Colemak for a test drive is warranted as well. Looking at Mac OS Yosemite, it would appear I have plenty of options.

(http://l.mashby.com/1ayGP+)

So I'll have to set aside some time to give it a crack and I'll let you know how it goes. That being said, please feel free to keep the conversation going. There's a lot of good stuff being discussed!
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: jacobolus on Mon, 02 March 2015, 16:53:59
I saw some of those, but nothing definitive enough not to warrant starting a new thread. However, your search was much more exhaustive than what I found.  :thumb:
I didn’t mean you shouldn’t start a new thread. Only that you might learn something useful by reading old threads. :-)
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: Vibex on Mon, 02 March 2015, 19:09:24
@vibex - I've been eying funtoo & gentoo for a while now....I've hopped lots (30 + ? ) of distros, some long term loves were crunchbang, mint and the last couple of years arch (+ openbox/goomwwm//herbstluft). Do you like funtoo, is compiling everything worth the hassle? Can you find everything in the repos? is the masked stuff usable? I like my system to be reasonable up to date.

(Not that arch is without faults. The AUR build files vary in quality, sometimes you haveto repair them, packages get abandonned, etc etc ).

Thanks.

Sorry for the linux off topic talk, back to Dvorak !!  ;D
Everything important is in the repo, plus a ton of other stuff. I wouldn't say everything though. I remember not being able to find things like bar.
I didn't mind the compiling, except for things like firefox. That took for ever. Masked packages were really on a case by case basis.
I'm on antergos now (basically arch, but I can't install arch at my college). I'm still not sure which I prefer. I'm also planning on looking at Crux, I just like playing around with things.
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: SonOfSonOfSpock on Tue, 03 March 2015, 00:01:04
@Oobly: Your point about Dvorak being different from QWERTY and not interfering with those muscle memory skills is a good one. I always thought alternatives being similar to QWERTY was a good one to ease switching, but I didn't consider they could interfere with QWERTY skills if they were still needed. I guess they could also interfere with QWERTY skills while you are in the middle of switching which would be kinda bad if you need to type for you job.
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: william on Tue, 03 March 2015, 04:07:53
I think people who defend QWERTY are like climate change deniers; they don't want anyone telling them anything that makes them question their beliefs.

QWERTY Pros: It is everywhere. You know how to use it.
QWERTY Cons: Everything else. It is balls and a bunch of nonsense. It is the religion of keyboard layouts.

Dvorak Pros: Hand alteration. Less finger travel than QWERTY. Different enough to limit confusion of muscle memory when alternating between layouts, if you need to. Supported virtually everywhere.
Dvorak Cons: Look at 'F'. Like what the **** is it doing there? Dvorak is a good step in the right direction, but the design is old as ****. While it did get a lot right, there is a lot of room for optimization.

Colemak Pros: It is easy to learn. It is more thought out in some ways than Dvorak. The shortcut keys are the same as QWERTY. It is supported most places where it would matter for anyone.
Colemak Cons: Too many concessions made to QWERTY, like leaving 'A' on the pinky. The things that make it easy to learn might also make it difficult for you to switch between it and QWERTY without hurting your typing speeds.

Custom layout on a custom keyboard Pros: Your keyboard can eventually be whatever you want to be. Even a sex bot. But that is gross, and I mostly advise against it. But what do I know? Change my mind. Maybe a sexbot keyboard is a brilliant idea. But is it sanitary? Do I care if it is?
Custom layout on a custom keyboard Cons: They can be A LOT OF WORK, and the job may never be done. But maybe that is what you want, because messing with **** is fun.

Other things to keep in mind:You won't be peck-typing on any layout that isn't QWERTY, so keycaps are mostly for fun and keeping your hands oriented.

 There is such a thing as programmable keyboards. A lot of the things that bother you about some of these layouts, such as where shortcuts are located, could be relocated to another layer somewhere that is maybe even more convenient than where they were before. Or you could move your punctuation around. Want the shift state of '.' to be '?'? Mine is. Want your passwords or user names saved to a key? ****ing do it, ****. J/K, I don't think you are a ****. But you can make your keyboard do, or not do, whatever feels right to you, ****. Oh, and you can also have different layouts on locking layers (a locking layer being like capslock instead of a shift layer being like shift), if that is your thing.
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: Korth on Tue, 03 March 2015, 21:29:02
Show Image
(http://l.mashby.com/1ayGP+)
Just sayin' - as a Canadian - that Canadian-English and US-English keyboard layouts are not equal.  Various Frenchy characters/accents annoyingly appear from time to time when you inadvertently press certain key sequences.  And the software will still tend to emphasize American counterparts in spelling and grammar. 

I do wonder when the Irish got their own keyboard.  Hmm.
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: janlonden on Thu, 05 March 2015, 09:38:39
I think people who defend QWERTY are like climate change deniers; they don't want anyone telling them anything that makes them question their beliefs.

So true :D

I highly recommend thetypingcat.com. I used it for practice when I switched to colemak.
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: MajorMajor on Thu, 05 March 2015, 10:11:54

Dvorak Cons: Look at 'F'. Like what the **** is it doing there? Dvorak is a good step in the right direction, but the design is old as ****. While it did get a lot right, there is a lot of room for optimization.


This is all too true for me. I've been on DVORAK for ~4 weeks now, up to ~35 WPM, and the F key really is a pain in the ass. I would have liked to have it swapped with the K or B, or even Q or J.
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: dusan on Fri, 06 March 2015, 15:00:14
The F is not bad. The staggered layout is.

I' ve been using an ortho-linear Dvorak keyboard for years. The F, as well as P, work just fine.
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: rebus on Sat, 07 March 2015, 06:41:36
Totally agree. I also use Dvorak with a Kinesis Advantage and a Typematrix with great comfort and no trouble at all when hitting the F key
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: keyhopper on Sat, 07 March 2015, 11:03:52
I have no problem with the F key in Dvorak.
But I do catch myself using the ring finger instead of the pinky for the L key.

Cheers!
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: MajorMajor on Tue, 10 March 2015, 08:53:49
On a staggered layout, the X and F require the most finger movement for me. Everything else is a breeze, maybe I should try a non-staggered layout sometime.

Up to 40 WPM now, slow and steady...
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: skullydazed on Tue, 17 March 2015, 00:43:00
I've been typing Dvorak for 15 years now, I first started learning because of RSI issues. I've never found a speed improvement. My typing speed with qwerty was ~45wpm, and after a couple months of Dvorak I plateaued at ~45wpm. Now I'm up to around 60wpm, but I think that's mostly a factor of how fast I can transfer instructions from my brain to my fingers, not how fast I am able to type. To this day I can type both Dvorak and qwerty at about the same speed (although with fewer errors on Dvorak.)

Comfort is another story. A couple hours of qwerty and my wrists are feeling it. I can type all day long with Dvorak.
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: mashby on Thu, 19 March 2015, 08:03:52
I came across this comic today and had to share: http://www.pvponline.com/comic/2015/03/19/keystroke
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: nomaded on Thu, 19 March 2015, 21:48:02
I came across this comic today and had to share: http://www.pvponline.com/comic/2015/03/19/keystroke

Heh. My wife showed me that last night. We both had a good chuckle -- both of us have been typing Dvorak (DSK) for over 10 years.
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: rsac on Wed, 29 April 2015, 18:06:37
Regarding Plover, it's great for dictation, but like all dictation techniques (which are designed for rapidly jotting down speech concepts), it requires parsing afterwards to turn it into readable text and it's not very useful for tasks like programming.
I'm not sure what you mean by parsing afterwards. Computers do that job in real time. That is actually the whole point of Plover and similar software. And if you make a mistake, just go back and correct it like you would in a normal keyboard. Here a demo of text editing with Vim and Plover.


Mirabai speaks of 6 months of real training to get to 120 wpm and then one year or more (up to infinite) to get to 220WPM. It seems much harder to learn than a new keyboard layout. On the other hand, it is a completely different skill from normal typing, and thus really won't clash with your QWERTY typing skills. Mirabai retains her 100+ wpm on qwerty.

I would only advise steno if text input speed is really a bottleneck for what you do (or plan to do) AND you only need to type in a single language (that works much better if you are a native english speaker...). On the other hand, Mirabai advises it even for programming: http://plover.stenoknight.com/2010/04/writing-and-coding-with-steno.html

If you want the best general purpose typing efficiency, a well designed ergo board (with thumb keys) and properly analysed and tested character layout is about the best you can do.
Well, there is also Proword shorthand method, to type less w/o a huge up front learning curve.
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: Korth on Sat, 02 May 2015, 22:06:08
Some of the newer layouts make it easier for a qwerty typist to switch easier. Also the right pinky in dvorak gets a lot of use.
Gotta give that right pinky more of a workout, lol.  I could find no right-hand-only analogue for typing the horrible word "stewardesses".

Not that I actually end up typing "stewardesses" all that often.  I don't fly a lot, and I can't think of any other good way to really interact with stewardesses, much as I'd like to hope and dream.
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: ideus on Mon, 04 May 2015, 10:48:55
I've been typing Dvorak for 15 years now, I first started learning because of RSI issues. I've never found a speed improvement. My typing speed with qwerty was ~45wpm, and after a couple months of Dvorak I plateaued at ~45wpm. Now I'm up to around 60wpm, but I think that's mostly a factor of how fast I can transfer instructions from my brain to my fingers, not how fast I am able to type. To this day I can type both Dvorak and qwerty at about the same speed (although with fewer errors on Dvorak.)

Comfort is another story. A couple hours of qwerty and my wrists are feeling it. I can type all day long with Dvorak.


It would be interesting if you share what movements do you think was reduced, with Dvorak, that alleviated your wrists pain.
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: skullydazed on Mon, 04 May 2015, 11:44:12
I just tried typing a few sentences with qwerty to figure out what I don't like, and it seems like two things mostly. The first impression I had is that my hands moved around a lot more with qwerty. I was always going up and down or back and forth. The second was hand alternation. There's just a lot more hand alternation with Dvorak, or at least more comfortable transitions when you do have to type with the same hand.

Take a look at "Just" for example, even though "ju" are both typed with the index finger, with qwerty you are going from the home row up, which means moving your hands up a bit to hit the U. With Dvorak you use the index finger of your left hand, but since the J is down you just move your finger down to hit it and not your whole hand.
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: Tony on Fri, 29 May 2015, 01:57:40
(http://www.learncolemak.com/picks/Colemak_vs_qwerty.jpg)

Colemak is a better alternative than Dvorak.

Colemak keep 10 same keys (QWAHZXCVBM )with Qwerty, while Dvorak has only 2 same keys (AH). That means you can learn Colemak faster.

ZXCV the same means your habit of copy paste cut remains unchanged.

GG "Colemak or Dvorak" for more opinions.
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: davkol on Fri, 29 May 2015, 07:41:07
Colemak is a better alternative than Dvorak.
No, it isn't, unless additional criteria are specified.

Colemak keep 10 same keys (QWAHZXCVBM )with Qwerty, while Dvorak has only 2 same keys (AH). That means you can learn Colemak faster.
That is pure speculation.

Or, it might be faster to learn Colemak, but at the cost of losing proficiency on QWERTY, due to altered muscle memory. Colemak is not a standard by any means, unlike Dvorak Simplified Keyboard.

ZXCV the same means your habit of copy paste cut remains unchanged.
You are ignoring Dvorak-QWERTY layouts (https://code.google.com/p/dvorak-qwerty/). One even comes out of the box with OS X that OP uses. Unlike Colemak, Dvorak-QWERTY doesn't move S in shortcuts.
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: steve.v on Sat, 30 May 2015, 11:53:31
Colemak typer. Used Dvorak before; right pinky started hating it. Switched and been happier ever since. It's all personal preference when qwerty is taken out.
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: MajorMajor on Wed, 03 June 2015, 19:12:34
I don't understand this talk about right pinky issues... I think if you used your right pinky properly in QWERTY, you'll be fine. Regardless of which keyboard layout you use, being able to use all 10 fingers adeptly is going to increase your productivity.
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: Oobly on Thu, 04 June 2015, 01:59:24
I don't understand this talk about right pinky issues... I think if you used your right pinky properly in QWERTY, you'll be fine. Regardless of which keyboard layout you use, being able to use all 10 fingers adeptly is going to increase your productivity.

Dvorak... overloads the right pinkie for certain combinations, such as "ls -ls".
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: keyhopper on Thu, 04 June 2015, 06:54:56
[..]
Dvorak... overloads the right pinkie for certain combinations, such as "ls -ls".

You are right, that is why I always use this alias:

         alias l='ls -l'

and just type 'l'. I always put this in:

         /home/<my_user>/.bashrc

in every machine I own or have to log on to.
If it's a shared login, I just run it in the shell:    alias l='ls -l'
and that lasts for until I log out.

Cannot live without 'l'  :D  :D

Also:
        alias la='ls -lA'

        alias gr='grep -i'
        alias rgr='grep -ril'

Cheers!
.KeyHopper.
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: dndlmx on Thu, 04 June 2015, 12:00:06
Colemak FTW. It might seem goofy at first, but Dvorak seems even goofier to me.
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: vindaon on Thu, 04 June 2015, 12:27:21
I really like Colemak too, especially the rolls. I think the main thing is too get away from qwerty. Maybe you could argue which is better between Colemak and Dvorak, but to me the difference isn't that great. It becomes preference at that point imo.
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: keyhopper on Thu, 04 June 2015, 12:46:25
I really like Colemak too, especially the rolls. I think the main thing is too get away from qwerty. Maybe you could argue which is better between Colemak and Dvorak, but to me the difference isn't that great. It becomes preference at that point imo.

> I think the main thing is too get away from qwerty.

Couldn't agree more.  :thumb:

Touch typing without looking is tons of times easier when getting away from Qwerty. And I mean not even peeking, not even for passwords.
True touch typing.

Just the fact of being able to truly touch type will improve posture, at least a little bit.

After trying Dvorak or Colemak, and only then, people can appreciate what a veritable unmitigated disaster Qwerty is.

Cheers!!
.KeyHopper.
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: Koren on Tue, 09 June 2015, 12:55:59
Quote
That being said, I do believe dvorak is the better layout.  A scientifically designed effort to make the most frequently-used letters and letter sequences more easy to reach faster, and with minimal effort. As opposed to qwerty, which was essentially the exact opposite - a deliberate misarrangement of keys designed to slow typing down on ancient typewriters so that their mechanical levers wouldn't jam and tangle up as often.
Please stop with this...

Qwerty is also designed on logical basis, although a bit less strictly than Dvorak. But on different basis: large use upper row (because thoses keys are easier on a typewriter...), rolls (like 'rew') and avoid digrams that could jam the mechanism.

The "misarrangement to slow people down" is purely an urban legend (although a commonly repeated one, probably based on a misunderstanding... they indeed moved the keys from ABCDE... ordering to avoid the jams, but not by randomizing them)


Dvorak advocate the use of alternate hands and avoid rolls, which is a choice...

There's nothing really scientific in those layouts, you just choose a metric, and try to optimize the keyboard for that metric, but it's difficult to say which metric is the best.


Quote
In any event, note that every alternative layout is designed based on some set of personal opinions/models about what constitutes a good layout. None of them as far as I can tell are backed by good empirical evidence about the hand motions involved in typing letter combinations.
This.

I don't like Dvorak because I prefer rolls to strict alternance of hands. I play music a bit, and I've always found rolls easier to perform at high speed than and alternance.

I also have to use azerty keyboards sometimes, so I value the fact that x/c/v/s/z don't move. I've optimized my layout using my own metrics, using my own corpus of text/source code, and I'm pretty happy with it... It's a matter of taste.

(Although unfortunately, it's difficult to source labeled keys for alternate layouts on non-ISO keyboards... Yes, I'm a touch typer, but I still prefer labeled keys just for aesthetic reasons)
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: davkol on Tue, 09 June 2015, 14:28:49
There's nothing really scientific in those layouts, you just choose a metric, and try to optimize the keyboard for that metric, but it's difficult to say which metric is the best.
Sooo, what about experimental time/motion studies? Corpus analysis? Error analysis? Learning methodology? (Is psychology a science?)
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: Koren on Tue, 09 June 2015, 17:16:18
Sooo, what about experimental time/motion studies? Corpus analysis? Error analysis? Learning methodology? (Is psychology a science?)
I don't think those studies say that a layout is definitively "better" than another... At least honest ones.

For example, You can do studies of what kind of motion each layout will use more, but you still need to prove that a given motion is better or worse. You can measure speed, and error-rate. But those are closely linked to training, and thus it's difficult to conclude anything. What do you conclude about person X typing faster and with less error with layout A than person Y on layout B ?

If I'm not mistaken, most typing speed records have been performed on Qwerty layouts, I wouldn't conclude that's the best layout using those metrics... Some of the best typist also think that the "one key = one finger" is a mistake (and I agree *), and I don't think I've ever encountered a layout study that consider this kind of thing.

(* on a similar matter, my accordion teacher has a strict rule: NEVER hit the same key with the same finger twice in a row. Indeed, you press better a key twice in succession if you change your finger. And he trained a couple person who won national championships, so I'll trust him on this anyway. Chromatics accordions and keyboard have enough in common to think that they share some ergonomics tricks)


Those studies ARE interesting, but I don't think they constitute a formal and scientific proof of the superiority of a given layout. There's an interesting thing about Ussain Bolt. His running has been studied: he's doing everything wrong (he's even physiologically unable to be a really fast runner). I find him quite efficient, myself, on the running track.


Take one of the Dvorak principle: alternation as much as possible. I've yet to see a convincing study that proove that it's indeed better than rolls (I don't even think it's possible to prove this, or the opposite). After finding the software Amphetype, I decided to program my own software to check my slowest and fastest digrams/trigrams, and found that indeed I type several rolls (especially on adjacent keys with the strongest fingers, such as 'er' and 'ui') faster than alternating digrams.


There's also something I've seen by using my own corpus and tweeked metrics to design my "ideal" layout: I've used 80% of what I typed in the past ~10 years (which is a huge corpus) and... my top 5 letters aren't even the same as the "top 5 letters" of the languages I speak (Mine is E-T-N-I-R, while, according for example to Wikipedia, N is 6th in both english and french, and R is 7th in french and 9th in english).

Even assuming that you COULD define the best layouts based on letters and digrams statistics, since each person types different things, each person will get a different layout. With exactly the same rules as Dvorak (or programmer-Dvorak, or Bépo, french equivalent), you'll get far different layouts.


There's bad layouts (imagine all vowels on the pinkies) and good layouts. Dvorak and variants, Colemak, Bépo, NEO, Workman, Maltron, Asset, Capewell and many others I don't remember all probably have their advantages and issues. You can pick the one that fits you the best, or adapt it to your needs (some have stronger fingers, other not so much, etc.) I don't think there's a definitive metric to order them, even on a given corpus.
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: davkol on Tue, 09 June 2015, 18:21:31
Ugh. I don't even know where to start.

There's nothing really scientific in those layouts, you just choose a metric, and try to optimize the keyboard for that metric, but it's difficult to say which metric is the best.
Scientific method (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scientific_method)

I recommend at least reading the original Dvorak's or Malt's work. The methodology or might be questionable here and there, but I don't see, how "there's nothing really scientific".
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: Koren on Wed, 10 June 2015, 05:42:05
I recommend at least reading the original Dvorak's or Malt's work. The methodology or might be questionable here and there, but I don't see, how "there's nothing really scientific".
I think you misunderstand me, most probably because I've worded badly my thoughts (and I really shouldn't have said there's nothing really scientific in the layouts, my bad, and apologies for this)

It's indeed a scientific approach of the layout problem. They tend to develop the best layout for given metrics.

The issue would be to prove that the chosen metrics are better than others. You can't use theory to prove it, it has to be by practical experiments. But each study recognize that you can't make a perfect experiment, because you would need the identical persons that train and use (for a long time) different layouts to do the same thing.


I wouldn't dare to say that mathematics are not scientific. But you can't prove that they're right, since they're based on axioms (Euclid's for example, Peano's works, etc.). You can prove the self-coherence, or that they are true when admitting the axioms.


If you want, I don't have problems with saying that Dvorak keyboard reduces the fingers vertical motion compared to X layout on a given corpus of text. Can be scientifically checked.

I think it's far harder to prove that "vertical motion is worse than lateral motion", "forefinger should be used twice more than little finger", "alternation are better than roll", etc. The only metrics should be pain/comfort and typing speed, but the measure of this is virtually impossible (long time-measurements, different training, different individuals, etc.)

If a layout is really bad, the difference can be seen more easily, but when we compare good layouts, the benefits are probably so small that any measurements falls into the incertaincy of the measurements.


I hope I can convey a bit what I mean, it's not easy on a forum :/
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: davkol on Wed, 10 June 2015, 05:54:07
Quote
The issue would be to prove that the chosen metrics are better than others.
The metrics are based on experiments, such as the time/motion studies. They're discussed in the original patents/papers/book.
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: Koren on Wed, 10 June 2015, 12:20:47
Quote
The issue would be to prove that the chosen metrics are better than others.
The metrics are based on experiments, such as the time/motion studies. They're discussed in the original patents/papers/book.
I know, I've read a lot of them (research papers, mostly), even used them to design my own layout, and I still don't think those measurements prove you'll feel less pain or type faster after years of training, especially when the differences for good keyboard are usually tiny (and may change if you change a bit the corpus).
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: Oobly on Wed, 10 June 2015, 12:34:34
Another way to judge layouts is from people's experiences of them. For instance many don't like the right pinkie usage on Dvorak, etc.

It really is a personal choice about which metrics you value most highly, but it's hard to conciously know which really are the most effective for your particular case. They may not be the ones you think they are in the end. If you could become proficient with all the popular alternate layouts you could figure out which has been optimised the best for your use cases, but this is not practical.

IMO, the best way to go about this is to use a software like the AdNW one and feed it the metrics you THINK are most important to you, a corpus which represents the majority of what you tend to type, a physical layout you THINK will suit you best and let it optimise a custom layout for you. Try that out, and fix it if there's something definitely wrong. This way you can also work out if the metrics you fed it really are the ones that matter to you. If not you can start the optimisation again with adjusted metrics. The computer can analyse and optimise faster than doing it manually, but manual testing is vital to the process.

This is the route I have taken. I started with a physical layout, applied a modified Bu-Teck layout which I generated with English corpus and have since been figuring out which parts of the layout could be better in my case. So far I have modified the positions of 4 main layout characters and a few symbols on the Fn layers. Now I am very happy with my layout, although I'm sure there COULD be a very slightly better one out there, but the time and effort it would take to find it would not balance the benefit over my already VERY good (for me) layout.

Quote
The issue would be to prove that the chosen metrics are better than others.
The metrics are based on experiments, such as the time/motion studies. They're discussed in the original patents/papers/book.
I know, I've read a lot of them (research papers, mostly), even used them to design my own layout, and I still don't think those measurements prove you'll feel less pain or type faster after years of training, especially when the differences for good keyboard are usually tiny (and may change if you change a bit the corpus).

The physical layout and typing technique are more important than the character layout for reducing the chance of long term injury, although both Colemak and Dvorak can help reduce the finger movement and related stresses.
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: MajorMajor on Fri, 12 June 2015, 08:08:10
The only reason why I went with DVORAK over Colemak is that Colemak isn't standard on some OS's yet. At my current job I can install it on my work laptop if I really wanted to, but I know if I change jobs, they might keep their machines more locked down and I 'd be screwed.

Also, if I had to use a keyboard for an interview or certification test, etc. it's unlikely they'd let me install anything new things on their system. After using DVORAK for 6 months or so, I don't have any regrets. I'm fine playing it safe even though learning Colemak would have been easier, I just hit 80 WPM yesterday so I seem to be doing fine.
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: Oobly on Sun, 14 June 2015, 08:12:07
The only reason why I went with DVORAK over Colemak is that Colemak isn't standard on some OS's yet. At my current job I can install it on my work laptop if I really wanted to, but I know if I change jobs, they might keep their machines more locked down and I 'd be screwed.

Also, if I had to use a keyboard for an interview or certification test, etc. it's unlikely they'd let me install anything new things on their system. After using DVORAK for 6 months or so, I don't have any regrets. I'm fine playing it safe even though learning Colemak would have been easier, I just hit 80 WPM yesterday so I seem to be doing fine.

You could also just buy a reprogrammable board and program the layout into it. Will work on any PC you plug it into. IMHO, software / OS support for a layout is not a good reason to choose one over another. I still prefer Dvorak over Colemak, though, for various reasons.
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: davkol on Sun, 14 June 2015, 12:00:55
Same security measures apply.
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: MajorMajor on Thu, 09 July 2015, 08:25:49
The only reason why I went with DVORAK over Colemak is that Colemak isn't standard on some OS's yet. At my current job I can install it on my work laptop if I really wanted to, but I know if I change jobs, they might keep their machines more locked down and I 'd be screwed.

Also, if I had to use a keyboard for an interview or certification test, etc. it's unlikely they'd let me install anything new things on their system. After using DVORAK for 6 months or so, I don't have any regrets. I'm fine playing it safe even though learning Colemak would have been easier, I just hit 80 WPM yesterday so I seem to be doing fine.

You could also just buy a reprogrammable board and program the layout into it. Will work on any PC you plug it into. IMHO, software / OS support for a layout is not a good reason to choose one over another. I still prefer Dvorak over Colemak, though, for various reasons.

That still doesn't address my second example though, unless you want to carry your programmable keyboard with you to every interview or any place you might need to use a keyboard. For example, I went home to visit my parents last weekend and didn't need to bring a keyboard or install anything on their system for the brief time I used their PC (<10 minutes). I see that if I was really dedicated to Colemak I could find ways to use it, but I don't see any sizable advantage over DVORAK that makes up for ease of use.
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: Oobly on Fri, 10 July 2015, 01:49:25
The only reason why I went with DVORAK over Colemak is that Colemak isn't standard on some OS's yet. At my current job I can install it on my work laptop if I really wanted to, but I know if I change jobs, they might keep their machines more locked down and I 'd be screwed.

Also, if I had to use a keyboard for an interview or certification test, etc. it's unlikely they'd let me install anything new things on their system. After using DVORAK for 6 months or so, I don't have any regrets. I'm fine playing it safe even though learning Colemak would have been easier, I just hit 80 WPM yesterday so I seem to be doing fine.

You could also just buy a reprogrammable board and program the layout into it. Will work on any PC you plug it into. IMHO, software / OS support for a layout is not a good reason to choose one over another. I still prefer Dvorak over Colemak, though, for various reasons.

That still doesn't address my second example though, unless you want to carry your programmable keyboard with you to every interview or any place you might need to use a keyboard. For example, I went home to visit my parents last weekend and didn't need to bring a keyboard or install anything on their system for the brief time I used their PC (<10 minutes). I see that if I was really dedicated to Colemak I could find ways to use it, but I don't see any sizable advantage over DVORAK that makes up for ease of use.

The way I did things (use a very different layout from QWERTY on a fully ergonomic physical layout) works for this scenario, too. You keep your QWERTY skillset at a decent level, so you can use other people's machines without any significant slowdown.
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: Korth on Thu, 16 July 2015, 22:37:53
I wouldn't dare to say that mathematics are not scientific. But you can't prove that they're right, since they're based on axioms (Euclid's for example, Peano's works, etc.). You can prove the self-coherence, or that they are true when admitting the axioms.
Not wanting (too much) to troll off-topic, but it's so hard to resist this one ... there is a little something called Godel's Incompleteness Theorem which sort of applies to your above statement ...

I do agree, however, with all your statements about Dvorak, lol.
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: nick2253 on Tue, 21 July 2015, 10:58:49
To add an anecdote to the discussion:

I switched to Dvorak Simplified Keyboard about 8 years ago, and I think it was honestly one of the best decisions I've ever made.  It was my freshman year of college, and I forced myself to do all my final papers in DSK.  That was a really painful experience, as I was a 90+WPM QWERTY typist, and I was suddenly typing at ~20WPM.  However, I got through it, and I was really happy with it.  In a month, I was up to 100WPM with DSK.  The biggest improvement with DSK is that I felt like my hands are much more controlled.  In QWERTY, I feel like I'm flying all over the keyboard.  I honestly find typing to be a much more enjoyable experience.  I used to get terrible cramps in my hands after marathon typing sessions with QWERTY, and with DSK, I no longer have that problem.

Over the years, I've lapsed my QWERTY proficiency, even though I work in IT and have to use QWERTY fairly regularly.  I can 10-finger hunt-and-peck at around 30-40 WPM with QWERTY, and I find that that's sufficient for my work.  If I really cared, I could probably get back to 90+WPM with QWERTY, but I honestly don't care.

As some people have said, I didn't find my speeds improve dramatically with DSK.  I speculate that any speed increase I developed with DSK was probably more a factor of my renewed dedication to typing proficiency rather than an inherent benefit in DSK.  However, like I said, I find DSK to be seriously more comfortable to type on than QWERTY.

The one problem that I had to adjust to was the modifier keys.  That really threw me for a loop at first.  However, I find I now have two modes of doing stuff:  when I'm mousing, I use the right-click menu, and when I'm tying with both hands on the keyboard, I use the modifier keys.  That works for me, though I know some people don't like it.

When I was deciding to switch, I chose DSK because it was available on all OSes, while Colemak was not.  If I were to switch today, I could see myself choosing Colemak.  However, I have no interest in switching away from DKS to something that's a best a sidegrade.  And I'm not particularly interest in switching to a personalized layout, since it wouldn't be available wherever I go.

The biggest downside with DSK was when I took my GREs.  The written portion of the GRE was on a computer, and I didn't think about it until after I started, but the computer was configured with QWERTY (obviously), so I had to hunt and peck my way through that paper.  In the end, I still did well enough for what I needed, but that was the only time I've been "Oh ****, maybe I shouldn't have switched."

EDIT:  One thing I thought I'd add is that I use QWERTY for almost all my passwords.  This is primarily so that my password muscle memory works when I'm on a QWERTY keyboard, which is actually what I would be using when typing in most of my passwords (on my computers, I use a password manager).  In Windows, you can hit Ctrl+Shift (or any combination you choose) to switch between different keyboard layouts.
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: nothing4me on Tue, 21 July 2015, 22:13:59
I think the best thing you can do is sticking to QWERTY (so you can still use other keyboards), but just remapping your two most used keys (there is an online keyboard tool that measures that). For me, it was shift and ctrl. I was always using my pinky. But, now that I've moved them, it feels a lot more comfy to type!  :)
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: Oobly on Mon, 27 July 2015, 06:05:43
...it's not very useful for tasks like programming.
...Mirabai advises it even for programming: http://plover.stenoknight.com/2010/04/writing-and-coding-with-steno.html

...

Quote from that very article: "I still haven't managed to find a good solution to programming using the steno keyboard"

It's simply not viable for coding in a symbol-rich language which uses very few real words and unique function and variable names. I stick with my statement that for general use, and particularly coding, a well designed ergo board with thumb clusters and a well-designed layout is the best. It also has the benefit of not requiring any specific software on the system to parse, so you can plug it into anything and simply type, and the learning curve is MUCH shorter than Plover. For dictation and prose, where you can install whatever you like on the PC then sure, I can see it being handy, but it just doesn't suit my situation.
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: knightjp on Tue, 08 March 2016, 23:55:20
1. Qwerty 125 wpm
2. Dvorak 60 wpm
3. Workman 45 wpm
4. Colemak 100 wpm

I prefer finger rolls over alternations. Dvorak used too much of my right pinky. Colemak uses my right hand a little too much. I like capslock as my backspace on Colemak. No layout is worth changing unless your wrists hurts from typing; as mine did with qwerty and now there's no more pain. Expect a moment of not being able to type at all; kinetic finger memory collision.
what layout do you use now?
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: knightjp on Tue, 08 March 2016, 23:57:21

I chose DVORAK over Colemak due to Colemak not being built into major OS. I don't want to be in a position of looking like a goofus hunting and pecking when I need to use someone's PC.

Only Mac doesn't come loaded with Colemak; can be installed easily.

 Correction... Mac OS X does have Colemak. Only Windows does not have Colemak at all. Most Linux versions have Colemak too.
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: steve.v on Fri, 11 March 2016, 15:51:01

1. Qwerty 125 wpm
2. Dvorak 60 wpm
3. Workman 45 wpm
4. Colemak 100 wpm

I prefer finger rolls over alternations. Dvorak used too much of my right pinky. Colemak uses my right hand a little too much. I like capslock as my backspace on Colemak. No layout is worth changing unless your wrists hurts from typing; as mine did with qwerty and now there's no more pain. Expect a moment of not being able to type at all; kinetic finger memory collision.
what layout do you use now?

I use Colemak
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: algernon on Tue, 15 March 2016, 13:00:48
I am in the process of switching from QWERTY to Dvorak. My QWERTY speed is around 100 WPM, Dvorak is around 50 now. My right hand is giving me trouble, and wants to type QWERTY all the time, but it's getting better, I'm just incredibly slow at the switch (~4 months now, but I haven't been typing a lot at day job in that time).

I game on Dvorak (most games I play, use a controller, or a mouse mostly, or I can remap keys; I can't reacall a single one where Dvorak was an issue), and whenever I need to use another computer, I bring my own keyboard, or fumble around with QWERTY, if I have to use a computer without my keyboard being with me. Mind you, the amount of time I didn't know in advance that I will need to use another computer, and wasn't able to bring my own keyboard is exactly zero, in the past six years.

I choose Dvorak over Colemak, because Dvorak is more different, and I wanted a very clear, hard switch, and none of the benefits of Colemak I often hear about (easier learning curve, among other things) appealed to me. Having typed on Dvorak for the past 4 months, I already feel the difference. My speed may be half of what it used to be, but my hands feel more comfortable. This is very subjective, mind you, I have no hard evidence why Dvorak may be better, or why QWERTY sucks. But Dvorak works for me, and I had no problems with games, nor with using other people's keyboard (I can still type QWERTY, even if not at 100 WPM anymore, 60-70 is still perfectly fine, would I need to use such a layout). The only difficulty is learning it, but that's because my right hand is a dumbass.
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: -musubi on Sat, 19 March 2016, 00:49:26
Can't even imagine switching from QWERTY, but it does kind of suck that we've inherited this old school layout that was created only from a functional point of a type writer
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: skullydazed on Sat, 19 March 2016, 14:12:05
Can't even imagine switching from QWERTY, but it does kind of suck that we've inherited this old school layout that was created only from a functional point of a type writer

That's the reason I really want to teach my daughter Dvorak from the start, but I'm also worried about how much that would hamper her at school, early career, etc. I think she'd be so much happier to have never learned qwerty, but the world is not yet amenable to that. :(
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: henz on Sat, 19 March 2016, 14:19:42
I joined the Dvorak club last week. Went all in, at about 16/17 wpm
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: ideus on Sat, 19 March 2016, 14:27:19
Can't even imagine switching from QWERTY, but it does kind of suck that we've inherited this old school layout that was created only from a functional point of a type writer

That's the reason I really want to teach my daughter Dvorak from the start, but I'm also worried about how much that would hamper her at school, early career, etc. I think she'd be so much happier to have never learned qwerty, but the world is not yet amenable to that. :(

You are gonna make her an outcast for any computing related experience, do you see her carrying her own board along with her lap top? do you see her unable to use any regular keyboard?
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: -musubi on Sat, 19 March 2016, 14:29:26
Can't even imagine switching from QWERTY, but it does kind of suck that we've inherited this old school layout that was created only from a functional point of a type writer

That's the reason I really want to teach my daughter Dvorak from the start, but I'm also worried about how much that would hamper her at school, early career, etc. I think she'd be so much happier to have never learned qwerty, but the world is not yet amenable to that. :(
You are gonna make her an outcast for any computing related experience, do you see her carrying her own board along with her lap top? do you see her unable to use any regular keyboard?

Yeah that's the problem, QWERTY is so deeply embedded that it can't just be taken out overnight. Kind of relates to a lot of things in the world, maintaining legacy compatibility but at the same time phasing it out eventually.
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: ideus on Sat, 19 March 2016, 14:32:20
Can't even imagine switching from QWERTY, but it does kind of suck that we've inherited this old school layout that was created only from a functional point of a type writer

That's the reason I really want to teach my daughter Dvorak from the start, but I'm also worried about how much that would hamper her at school, early career, etc. I think she'd be so much happier to have never learned qwerty, but the world is not yet amenable to that. :(
You are gonna make her an outcast for any computing related experience, do you see her carrying her own board along with her lap top? do you see her unable to use any regular keyboard?

Yeah that's the problem, QWERTY is so deeply embedded that it can't just be taken out overnight. Kind of relates to a lot of things in the world, maintaining legacy compatibility but at the same time phasing it out eventually.


Unless some mighty force push the world into a different reality, I do not see any easy way to replace qwerty as the main keyboard standard for general computing.
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: klennkellon on Sat, 19 March 2016, 14:50:56
pretty much, Qwerty is not ideal but it's just good enough.
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: davkol on Sun, 20 March 2016, 05:34:46
Can't even imagine switching from QWERTY, but it does kind of suck that we've inherited this old school layout that was created only from a functional point of a type writer

That's the reason I really want to teach my daughter Dvorak from the start, but I'm also worried about how much that would hamper her at school, early career, etc. I think she'd be so much happier to have never learned qwerty, but the world is not yet amenable to that. :(

You are gonna make her an outcast for any computing related experience, do you see her carrying her own board along with her lap top? do you see her unable to use any regular keyboard?
LOL at outcast. DSK has been standardized by ANSI. It's about as hard to switch to it for typing, as in case of any other national standard. Do you actually think any kid, that uses a non-English layout in the US, or US QWERTY outside the US, is an outcast?
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: joen on Sun, 20 March 2016, 07:10:32
I switched to Programmers Dvorak a couple of months ago and right now I am at about 50 wpm and I don't regret the switch.

I started thinking about switching after I realized that my hand placement was really weird when typing on Qwerty. I started trying to keep my hands where they should be and thought that writing all of '{}[]' was really awkwardly placed, all at my right pinky. And I use those frequently while working with programming. So I started to look around at DSK and Colemak and spent a couple of hours with each. But I realized that they both still had the '[]{}' at my right pinky and thats when I found Programmers Dvorak and I decided that thats what I want to have. But the number row was quite hard to get comfortable with (still not completely comfortable, but getting there).

What I did for my switch was to first use the Dvorak Qwerty layout in OS X, that made switching a little easier because I could use copy/paste and other such shortcuts as usual.
When I felt quite comfortable with that I switched to the normal Dvorak layout to get used to the new copy/paste etc.
And finally when I felt comfortable with that I switched to Programmers Dvorak.

My Qwerty skills has almost completely been erased and now I have to stare at the keyboard to type anything (except my computer password) , and that is a bit annoying.
I still feel a little bit fatigued after spending a day typing but its better than before, now I'm pondering if I should get a more ergonomic keyboard, like the ErgoDox EZ or something similar.
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: ideus on Sun, 20 March 2016, 09:30:09
Can't even imagine switching from QWERTY, but it does kind of suck that we've inherited this old school layout that was created only from a functional point of a type writer

That's the reason I really want to teach my daughter Dvorak from the start, but I'm also worried about how much that would hamper her at school, early career, etc. I think she'd be so much happier to have never learned qwerty, but the world is not yet amenable to that. :(

You are gonna make her an outcast for any computing related experience, do you see her carrying her own board along with her lap top? do you see her unable to use any regular keyboard?
LOL at outcast. DSK has been standardized by ANSI. It's about as hard to switch to it for typing, as in case of any other national standard. Do you actually think any kid, that uses a non-English layout in the US, or US QWERTY outside the US, is an outcast?

I use US International to write in English and Spanish and my laptop and my keyboards have the same layout, and it works very well for me, but when I have to write in someone else computer, for example, to help my students to write some R code it is very hard even finding a character like the tilde, it is incredible how diverse the ISO Spanish layouts are, and that is mainly related with the symbols only, if you add further complexity changing the alphas distribution it would be even harder for the person to be comfortable with the available layouts.
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: skullydazed on Sun, 20 March 2016, 10:07:23
Can't even imagine switching from QWERTY, but it does kind of suck that we've inherited this old school layout that was created only from a functional point of a type writer

That's the reason I really want to teach my daughter Dvorak from the start, but I'm also worried about how much that would hamper her at school, early career, etc. I think she'd be so much happier to have never learned qwerty, but the world is not yet amenable to that. :(

You are gonna make her an outcast for any computing related experience, do you see her carrying her own board along with her lap top? do you see her unable to use any regular keyboard?
LOL at outcast. DSK has been standardized by ANSI. It's about as hard to switch to it for typing, as in case of any other national standard. Do you actually think any kid, that uses a non-English layout in the US, or US QWERTY outside the US, is an outcast?

It may be easy to enable Dvorak, but that also assumes you CAN enable it. If they have the system locked down or if it's a shared computer you may get in trouble for changing it, no matter how easy it is. So yeah, if she only learned Dvorak there are times she'd be an outcast.
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: xtrafrood on Mon, 21 March 2016, 02:08:38
After a few days of using a layout printout I could slowly touch type in Dvorak. I'm not a remarkable typist, my QWERTY average is between 60-70 wpm.

A month of Dvorak training, (10-20 minutes per day) and my wpm went from ~10 wpm to 16 wpm.

Idk, I'm starting to wonder if the change to Dvorak is worth the effort.
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: b0f0 on Mon, 21 March 2016, 02:25:48
Learning a new layout and typing 100 WMP is not something that can not happen in short amount of time. I am wainting for person that will report more then 100WPM in Colemak or Dvorak on this forum. Would like to ask also how long it took learning for such speeds. I am also asking myself is it worth changing layouts if you type in qwerty more than 100WPM (I touch type really slow, so this is not my resoult). Also there are the keycap sets that are made for qwerty, sometimes also for other layouts.
I will try to make a change and try to practice every day to touch type with all 10 fingers. Will see what happens and report.
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: davkol on Mon, 21 March 2016, 03:34:59
http://www.ryanheise.com/colemak/
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: b0f0 on Mon, 21 March 2016, 05:30:30
http://www.ryanheise.com/colemak/
Great ! This makes me happy.
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: xtrafrood on Mon, 21 March 2016, 13:05:11
http://www.ryanheise.com/colemak/
He typed in an alternate layout for the entire day?! Good god that's dedication!
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: livingspeedbump on Mon, 21 March 2016, 13:26:53
I used Dvorak (and to an extent Colemak) back in college, and while Colemak was easier to learn, Dvorak had more advantages for my typing style and needs. I used it exclusively the last 2 years of college and really, really loved it.

The problem came when i took an IT job that required me to bounce around to different machines, or remote login, etc, and then i got all confused and looked rather incompetent. Sadly at the time I didn't really look into keyboards that could actually output Dvorak, as I was simply changed the input settings on my computer when I was learning it and on my main work computer. The frustration of swapping back and forth on the fly, daily, if not hourly pushed me back to Qwerty unfortunately. I still try to type Dvorak and Colemak here and there so I don't totally use it, but have become rather complacent.

So, I absolutely recommend it, but having a keyboard that can output dvorak will be your best friend, especially if you heavily use more than one computer.
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: LuX on Mon, 21 March 2016, 14:42:56
I used Dvorak (and to an extent Colemak) back in college, and while Colemak was easier to learn, Dvorak had more advantages for my typing style and needs. I used it exclusively the last 2 years of college and really, really loved it.

The problem came when i took an IT job that required me to bounce around to different machines, or remote login, etc, and then i got all confused and looked rather incompetent. Sadly at the time I didn't really look into keyboards that could actually output Dvorak, as I was simply changed the input settings on my computer when I was learning it and on my main work computer.

You could use the Portable Keyboard Layout. Just stick a flash drive in the computer and the keyboard turns to Colemak/Dvorak/what ever without installing anything. If you need to switch back just click the icon on the toolbar or make a hotkey for switching.

http://pkl.sourceforge.net/
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: livingspeedbump on Mon, 21 March 2016, 14:50:31
I used Dvorak (and to an extent Colemak) back in college, and while Colemak was easier to learn, Dvorak had more advantages for my typing style and needs. I used it exclusively the last 2 years of college and really, really loved it.

The problem came when i took an IT job that required me to bounce around to different machines, or remote login, etc, and then i got all confused and looked rather incompetent. Sadly at the time I didn't really look into keyboards that could actually output Dvorak, as I was simply changed the input settings on my computer when I was learning it and on my main work computer.

You could use the Portable Keyboard Layout. Just stick a flash drive in the computer and the keyboard turns to Colemak/Dvorak/what ever without installing anything. If you need to switch back just click the icon on the toolbar or make a hotkey for switching.

http://pkl.sourceforge.net/

Using remote logins to other desktops/servers wouldnt work for that, but that is a handy thing to know :thumb:
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: DvorakDachshund on Tue, 22 March 2016, 14:09:11
I am wainting for person that will report more then 100WPM in Colemak or Dvorak on this forum.

I peak at 103 WPM on DVORAK when I'm warmed up and not tired (currently working 11 hour days so I'm averaging about 83 ATM).
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: PieterGen on Tue, 22 March 2016, 16:04:08
Quote
It may be easy to enable Dvorak, but that also assumes you CAN enable it. If they have the system locked down or if it's a shared computer you may get in trouble ....

I work in a very locked down environment, but even here we can change our layouts. 

Quote
That's the reason I really want to teach my daughter Dvorak from the start, but I'm also worried about how much that would hamper her at school, early career, etc. I think she'd be so much happier to have never learned qwerty, but the world is not yet amenable to that. :(
   
Well, Dvorak sure did not hamper Matt Mullenweg (WordPress) or Steve Wozniak (Apple)  :)
Title: Re: Considering Switching To Dvorak -- Thoughts?
Post by: eternalmetal on Tue, 22 March 2016, 19:02:28
Unless some mighty force push the world into a different reality, I do not see any easy way to replace qwerty as the main keyboard standard for general computing.

This.  The general public isnt going to care about any ergonomic advantages or slight benefits, so QWERTY will remain the standard until some new technology threatens to entirely replace the keyboard.

Can't even imagine switching from QWERTY, but it does kind of suck that we've inherited this old school layout that was created only from a functional point of a type writer

That's the reason I really want to teach my daughter Dvorak from the start, but I'm also worried about how much that would hamper her at school, early career, etc. I think she'd be so much happier to have never learned qwerty, but the world is not yet amenable to that. :(

You are gonna make her an outcast for any computing related experience, do you see her carrying her own board along with her lap top? do you see her unable to use any regular keyboard?
LOL at outcast. DSK has been standardized by ANSI. It's about as hard to switch to it for typing, as in case of any other national standard. Do you actually think any kid, that uses a non-English layout in the US, or US QWERTY outside the US, is an outcast?

Using a non-English layout in the US is the definition of an outcast.  It's simple, the QWERTY keyboard is a huge standard and it isnt going anywhere, for better or worse.  Learning another layout is fine, but expect to have to fiddle with computer settings and deal with annoyingly wrong legends if you want to use them.  It's fine if you want to deal with this, as I expect a large portion of the techies on this site might be fine with it as well, but most people would find it to be cumbersome, not to mention extremely nerdy.