Question for touch typists regarding least-to-most strenuous movements of fingers.

[Paul Browne]

Hi, I’m doing some research for a keyboard layout and I would just like to find out what you consider to be the least-to-most strenuous finger movements, starting from the home row, when you are typing. This is regarding the RIGHT HAND ONLY. Anyway here are the movements that I would like you to rank, if you could be so kind.

Contraction of the;

1.   Index finger  (J to M)
2.   Middle finger (K to ,)
3.   Ring finger (L to .)
4.   little finger (; to \)

Extension of the;

5.   Index finger (J to U)
6.   Middle finger (K to I)
7.   Ring finger (L to O)
8.   little finger (; to P)

other;

9.   Linear movement of the Index finger (J to H)
10.   Down and to the left movement of the index finger (J to N)
11.   Up and to the left movement of the index finger (J to Y)

If you could order your preference from least to most strenuous it would be very much appreciated. Although I’m not a touch typist my order of preference would be 1, 6, 9, 7, 5, 2, 3, 11, 10, 4 then 8.

Any comments on why you prefer certain movements would also be welcome

Thanks

[Paul Browne]

Welcome to Geekhack!

thankyou very many

[tp4tissue]

Hi, I’m doing some research for a keyboard layout and I would just like to find out what you consider to be the least-to-most strenuous finger movements, starting from the home row, when you are typing. This is regarding the RIGHT HAND ONLY. Anyway here are the movements that I would like you to rank, if you could be so kind.

Contraction of the;

1.   Index finger  (J to M)
2.   Middle finger (K to ,)
3.   Ring finger (L to .)
4.   little finger (; to \)

Extension of the;

5.   Index finger (J to U)
6.   Middle finger (K to I)
7.   Ring finger (L to O)
8.   little finger (; to P)

other;

9.   Linear movement of the Index finger (J to H)
10.   Down and to the left movement of the index finger (J to N)
11.   Up and to the left movement of the index finger (J to Y)

If you could order your preference from least to most strenuous it would be very much appreciated. Although I’m not a touch typist my order of preference would be 1, 6, 9, 7, 5, 2, 3, 11, 10, 4 then 8.

Any comments on why you prefer certain movements would also be welcome

Thanks

Hey Paul Brown, I did some research on this myself recently.

I did digraph counts on the america heritage dictionary via ultra edit.

Any digraph that requires you to use the same finger on the same hand = slow

That's the best general fact underlying any arrangement.

I also looked at bad transitions that  occur because your fingers lay diagonal to the board.

I made an excel file containing these bad key transitions, and their analogues in dvorak,, YES I also accounted for the rows of keys that are present/missing between qwerty / dvorak

Below is a pdf of the bad transitions I looked at and their occurances,, As you shall see, Dvorak is absolutely superior. it has HALF the amount of the bad transitions... I am really wondering about switching to dvorak

[ Attachment Invalid Or Does Not Exist ] 44452[/ATTACH]