I have used dvorak for around 15 years now, and I'm very happy with it. Took me 2-3 weeks to type as fast as in QWERTY, and hands feel way more relaxed and easy.
For those who are afraid that it will somehow affect QWERTY typing speed, such fears are totally unfounded, I can type QWERTY as easily as I could before, just with some more strain compared to Dvorak.
That said:
- for developers, the typing speed is not the productivity bottleneck, so you are unlikely to see any real gains
- hotkeys are generally a MESS, especially if you use 2 languages on a system. More so on Windows. Less so on Ubuntu.
As a counterpoint, my ability to type on Qwerty is shot now that I am on Dvorak. I'm back to searching around on the keyboard with my eyes and tapping with single fingers. I feel sure people question my ability to work on computers when I have to go and fix something on their computers and spend ages just typing out basic stuff..
I learned to type on Dvorak 20 years ago and my ability to type on QWERTY still did not recover to even 1/5th of my previous speed.
It is pretty embarrassing sometimes.
On the other hand I use completely unmarked keyboard which coupled with Dvorak makes me largely invulnerable to pranking by coworkers by writing mail in my name (assuming I forget to lock my workstation which happens about twice in a decade).
I can still type on QWERTY without looking at keys but my skill definitely took a hit because I never use it. I bet I'd be up to par if I spent a day or two only on QWERTY again.
One time I had an interview where they handed me a Windows laptop on QWERTY to code some problem and I looked like I could barely use a computer :D
It took me two years before I could switch between Dvorak an Qwerty without much difficulty. Four years later, I can now rapidly switch between the two. The only problem is remembering which layout I have turned on, but once that's clear, there's not a problem anymore. I haven't practiced since the first year, but all that time I frequently switch because I work with multiple computers and RDP sessions where the layout doesn't carry over. Touch typing with Dvorak came after learning the muscle memory for typing characters, and afterwards with Qwerty, it was muscle memory for words/phrases that got me typing well again.
I was in this boat as well for quite some time. Early COVID, I bought a programmable (QMK-based) keyboard and hard-coded the keys to match the Dvorak layout, since most of my interactions with PCs was via RDP-like situations (Horizon Web Client, VMs, RDP). This way, I could keep everything configured to QWERTY and just use my keyboard. On my laptop, I have it set up with both layouts, so that if I don't have my QMK keyboard connected (in my lap, travelling, etc), I can just hit Ctrl-Shift and switch the built-in keyboard to Dvorak.
To me, this is the best setup. Only pain point is that it required me to configure the 2 PC games I play to fit with my Dvorak configuration, since the PC sees it as me typing on a QWERTY keyboard with alien hands.
Maybe you weren't all that good with qwerty before? I always felt it's like learning an extra foreign language: learning French doesn't make your German worse.
I can type Qwerty, Dvorak, and Colemak all over 100wpm (https://youtube.com/watch?v=mQ6iSYMMHv0). You definitely have to practice all three together if you don’t want to lose them.
Also happened with language learning. I speak English and Spanish natively. Learned Italian (very similar to Spanish) in high school. After college learned Chinese in China. One day I ran into an Italian person in China and tried to talk to them in Italian. I kept jumbling Italian and Chinese, even though on paper Italian is so much easier for me than Chinese. It was like my brain only had space for all native languages, and just one foreign language. I’m sure with practice I could speak both Italian and Chinese, but that’s the whole point of this comment. It takes practice to maintain them all.
If your speed did not fall it means you did not learn well.
I actually learned to type at school (yeah, funny business school my parents sent me to). We had an actual specialist teacher to teach us to type on electric typewriters using pretty nice methodology.
To learn to type well is to train "muscle memory". This means you think the letter and your body does it for you, automatically, without any part of your conscious brain involved.
I don't know where keys are on my keyboard. It is unmarked, so I can't look it up. If somebody asks me, I need to lay my hands on it and think the letter and see which finger "wants to" press the button. In that regard I am a passenger and once I think a word or sentence I don't have any further control -- it is some uncontrollable part of my brain that takes over and does it for me.
Even when typing at speed I am still free to think about anything else. Just as when you walk you don't need to think about walking itself and can concentrate on whatever else you want.
YMMV but after 3-4 weeks of dvorak, I actually did have difficulties when using qwerty. I gave up dvorak because I don't want to have to modify every keyboard/system I'm on, as opposed to just sitting down at a terminal and getting work done.
I think you might have tried a bit more. I'm typing this on my wife's qwerty laptop and have zero issues with blind typing on it, just a little more strain from having to move fingers more that it is possible on Dvorak.
I have to agree with the other poster. My typing speed was in the 70+ WPM on qwerty prior to learning dvorak, and now I'm a glorified hunt-and-pecker on qwerty keyboards.
The only exception to this is typing on my mobile device, which is configured to qwerty.
I could touchtype like crazy on qwerty before. It's possible because I learned dvorak when I was older - early 40s - I only have space in my brain for a single layout now..
It does actually. The time you spend practising French is time you are neglecting German and hence, your knowledge will decay. If it's not a long time you won't notice it (maybe some very specific words that you rarely use will be forgotten).
Any long-term migrant learns this over the years, sadly. Obviously you can still use the language, but the farthest borders of language-specific knowledge become frail and tend to fall off the edge of your brain. I now struggle to give "flourish" to my speech in the "old" language, and have to make a conscious effort to remember difficult words.
True. But you can't be isolated from QWERTY in the real world: my wife's computer uses it, as do a lot of computers out there, so I still do get practice with it from time to time.
Some folks seem to be able to switch and keep their old ability and some can't. I was able to switch back to Qwerty pretty easily, but it made my wrists contort in such odd ways that I never noticed before. So I generally wouldn't go back to it.
Colemak all muscle memory for me, so it's nearly impossible for me to remember my Qwerty muscle memory now.
One place that really sticks out is job interviews. Asking your interviewer to change keyboard layouts is a bit intrusive. It's not a huge deal on a Mac, but it's a challenge on Windows since Colemak isn't built in.
When I was around 12 I learned Dvorak and lost the ability to touch type in Qwerty, then my parents forced me to go back to Qwerty because I kept leaving the family computers in Dvorak. Because of that I can type in both, though my Dvorak is still faster.
I'm at about 15 years with Dvorak as well. It completely healed my RSI issues which were getting quite bad. Learning it was a mental challenge and re-learning Vim wasn't really fun.
I could type around 90 WPM in QWERTY and now I hunt and pick at it. I'm at that speed in Dvorak now so it doesn't really matter. If you play games at all it kind of sucks having to switch back and forth, but that's a small price to pay to not have career ending RSI.
Wouldn't it still be difficult? The HJKL row makes sense to remap to DHTN. But other commands are mnemonic and would make more sense to follow the key to its new location.
So you have collisions. ("Does Y mean "yank"? Or does it now mean "to"? Well "to" can't be T anymore, because that's now the motion up command.")
So you have to either remap everything back to qwerty positions, and learn the new mnemonics, or keep the letter associations the same, and give up on the clustered motion commands.
I'm thinking it's probably better to do the latter, but I'd love to hear from vimmers that use non-qwerty layouts.
I'm not a power vim user but sticking to the default keybinds on Dvorak isn't so bad. JK are still right next to each other, and HL are on the right index and pinky, respectively, so the basic spatial relationships between the keys are somewhat preserved.
I find that remapping shortcuts is generally not worth it. Yeah, undo/cut/copy/paste are weird and that sucks, but it's better than fighting every application you ever use, on every machine, including machines you SSH into, until you die.
For gaming, on the other hand, mixed up keybinds are intolerable. I just switch back to QWERTY for that.
I type Dvorak and simply use the default Vim key bindings. Vim defaults are weird with Dvorak, but significantly more intuitive than what the situation is with Colemak. Here's the Vim and Dvorak inspired custom keymap I use on my programmable keyboard: https://github.com/1MachineElf/qmk_firmware/tree/_sb4dv/keyb...
I've been on Dvorak full-time since 2008, and even though I generally don't use vim itself for programming, I do still use vim-mode in my editors and IDE. But I gave up on using hjkl long before switching to Dvorak, and I've always just either used motions like w/b/f/t/n/etc, or moved to the arrow keys for shorter motions. This also lets me share more of the muscle memory for movements when I'm typing into standard text boxes like this.
Kind of ironic. I'm on a 75-key keyboard, with no arrow keys. Instead, they're mapped to a layer under (drumroll...) HJKL.
So even if I ever did make the jump to Colemack or Dvorak, I'd probably keep those mappings to the same physical keys. Working in vim, I'd just use my "arrow" keys rather than the native motion keymappings.
I also try to avoid using them in the first place (instead using w/b/f/t/n/etc), but sometimes it's faster to just tap the key a few times rather than "formulate a plan" to reach my target
I've been using vim user for about 10 years and a colemak user for probably 9 years. At first I remapped the hjkl keys to maintain the muscle memory for movement, but ended up going down the rabbit hole of remaps. Eventually I gave up and reverted to the default keybindings. At first it was weird, but after a month or so I got used to it.
I would definitely advise against remapping vim bindings. The first is because if you ever has to use vim on a non-colemak machine, figuring out the keys will be very painful. Secondly because vim has influenced a lot of other programs (man, less, gvim, etc) and most of them are much harder to rebind if they even support it at all.
> For those who are afraid that it will somehow affect QWERTY typing speed, such fears are totally unfounded
What! :- ) Well founded fears, I'd say: I've been typing in Colemak for 10+ years and if I switch to QWERTY I'm significantly slower than before I started using Colemak. — But I'm still glad I made the switch.
> the typing speed is not the productivity bottleneck
Yes agreed. I'd only recommend a software person to switch, if they think the learning process seems fun. But maybe if one writes novels, it's nice to type faster? Or someone who writes a lot here at HN :- )
> What! :- ) Well founded fears, I'd say: I've been typing in Colemak for 10+ years and if I switch to QWERTY I'm significantly slower than before I started using Colemak.
I'm not a Colemak user, but from my experiences with Dvorak, I have a theory on why this happens. Precisely because it shares many keys with QWERTY!
Explanation: when I type in Dvorak or QWERTY, the only hesitation is when I type the first letter of a text I need to type. Then, a muscle memory kicks in and I type without thinking. The only exception: words starting with letter "A". This letter is special, because it is the only key that has the same position in both Dvorak and QWERTY!
So when I type words starting with "A", my muscle memory kicks in not on first typed letter, but on second! With Colemak, I guess this effect might be in full swing for almost every letter you type, and THAT would be a significant problem. So what is sold as being Colemak's advantage is probably a disadvantage if you need to type on different types of keyboards.
Then you don't use the letter M?
Oh, this reminds me showing Dvorak to a colleague. He asks: "So, where is the letter A?"
- "Mmm, right here, where it is in Qwerty."
- "OK. And where is, for example, letter M?"
- "Mmm, right here, where it is in Qwerty."
- "So, what's the point, then?"
Also, if I have two passwords AA and AB that are similar to each other, then, if I use only AA for a while, I easily forget AB, or start including parts of AA in AB. — Is there a word for this? For forgetting and messing/mixing up things, because they are too similar to each other
As a full time developer, I'm sure my typing speed directly affects my productivity (probably between 80-100 wpm in Dvorak). There are a lot of times I'm typing at full speed for hours, aided by code auto-completion and vim macros, and since the program already exists in my head, the limiting factor is how fast I can type it out. Other times not so much, I'm sitting there reading code, or debugging line by line, or whatever. But when I'm ready to code, my typing speed is the single biggest factor of how fast I can get it out.
Hmm I have a bit forgotten how things were, before Colemak. I was typing mostly software things, when I decided to switch. I think I a bit felt like you do.
> But when I'm ready to code, my typing speed is the single biggest factor
Especially when writing docs / comments for that code, then it's mostly English words (rather than `(){};!+-,[]` things)
So did you switch from Dvorak to Colemak? I just did a typing test on code-like things, and my typing speed is much slower, around 45 wpm, although that's normally accelerated by an IDE. I started learning Colemak for about a day a few years ago, and then decided that it wouldn't actually benefit me over Dvorak, especially because vi keybindings are quite important. Is the big improvement that it leaves {} in their original place instead of the farther reach?
I just had a quick look at Dvorak, and then picked Colemak instead because of more similar shortcuts. — It took weeks or months to get up to speed in Colemak. But it was a bit fun, fortunately. (How long did it take, with Dvorak?)
When the typing speed difference between Dvorak and Colemak is so small (it is?), I would say to myself that any of them is better than good enough and be happy :- )
There's also tools like tmux and fzf / skim, don't know if you're using them already; if not, I'd guess they'd save more time than learning Colemak.
> especially because vi keybindings are quite important
Oh I have nice Vi keybindings in Colemak — I use Vi always: VSCode, IntelliJ etc.
On the keyboard, I've mapped the N physical key to down, H to up, and left is Backspace (and Y which I never use), and right is Space and U. So I don't use the HJKL keys for navigation (well, H but it means Up for me).
This leaves the J K L keys available to do their usual things, in Vi — they map to N E I in Colemak (apparently you've noticed this :- )) which I use all the time.
> Is the big improvement that it leaves {} in their original place
I don't think so. I'd say, it's probably the shortcuts, and that many shortcuts continue working with the left hand only (e.g. using the mouse to select text, then the left hand to CTRL+C +V copy-paste).
Dvorak plays pretty nice with default vi keybindings, for the most part. Both y (yank) and p (put) are on the left hand, as well as x (delete characters), . (repeat last), u (undo), q (record macro), @ (execute macro) and " (choose register). And even though d is technically on the right hand, it's still in easy stretch range of the left. You can do a lot quite quickly with those keys and a mouse. So I don't miss ctrl-c/v too much when I have vi keys available. Whereas the right hand tends to be a lot of movement keys, which are more important when not using a mouse: h (move left) l (move right), b (previous word), f (jump to character), t (jump before character), n (next search result), g (goto top/bottom/line number/etc).
The worst thing I've experienced with Dvorak is typing "ls<enter>" repeatedly. It's really painful on the pinky. Putting L on the right pinky stretch was a really bad decision.
One advantage Dvorak has over Colemak is that it's included with every OS and easy to switch to, whereas Colemak often requires a download and an install to use. And some games include Dvorak keybindings, but I haven't seen one with Colemak keybindings yet.
I learned Dvorak back in college, and got fast by playing muds. Type fast, or you're dead. Took a few months to get up to speed.
> The worst thing I've experienced with Dvorak is typing "ls<enter>" repeatedly. It's really painful on the pinky. Putting L on the right pinky stretch was a really bad decision.
What about `alias s=ls`, a way to avoid the bad decision :- )
> Both y (yank) and p (put) are on the left hand ... right hand .. movement keys, which are more important when not using a mouse ...
Oh I didn't know. That sounds nice. Hmm makes me wonder if maybe I'd preferred Dvorak instead.
> I learned Dvorak back in college, and got fast by playing muds. Type fast, or you're dead
Hmm I wonder if type fast MUDs and spell correctly and the right grammar, or you're dead, could be a fun way to learn languages in high school :- )
I've been typing Dvorak since age 17, so... 37 years. Despite breaking my left hand (not while typing) I haven't lost any typing skill/speed that I can tell, and I haven't ever seen a hint of carpal tunnel syndrome.
Btw there are dvorak layouts for one-handed typing, both for left and right hand. If I ever break my arm so I won't be able to type for some time, I'll definitely try that.
I tried Dvorak for a year and hotkeys are what made me go back.
Hotkeys are this bizarre mix of positional _and_ semantic locations. That is, some are the keys they are because of where the keys are placed (most notably z-x-c-v but also j-k-l-o and many others in various apps), while others are what they are because of their mnemonics. Neither preserving Qwerty locations for them nor using Dvorak everywhere is right.
Just wanted to chime in. Same experience here. Switched to Dvorak over 20 years ago and I had almost the exact same experience.
It's just like knowing a different language, there's some switch somewhere in my brain I can flip and type in either layout. If I use one for a long period of time, the other one gets slower and less easily recalled, but it takes on the order of minutes to come back to 90% speed.
Agree that the main annoyances are hotkeys and what layer of the software you're mapping things in.
This was my experience, except I couldn't switch between them very well, and my RSI more or less went away so I'm back on qwerty now, with no re-flare-ups.
I was at qwerty speed with Dvorak in about 2-3 weeks as well. In the past couple years I tried Colemak, but I could not make the switch for some reason (from qwerty). I don't know why; I can't say it's because of the layout itself; could be that I'm 20+ years older than I was when I did the dvorak switch.
The point about programming languages is fairly irrelevant; the truth is that basically all layouts are bad for programmers, since they inevitably put special characters at the margins, which are hard to reach. I have a short pinkie so it's extra hard for me.
The answer is to use a meta key to add a layer dedicated to those - CapsLock is great for that. I did that last year [0], although I now wish I had that meta-key available on the right side too (I don't want to mess with the traditional Ctrl and Alt, too many programs have shortcuts hard-bound to those). With that extra layer, you can go to town and use the home row for the stuff you really need in your preferred language(s).
As for simple text layouts, I never warmed to Dvorak but picked up Colemak very quickly, and now I just can't look back.
The Neo2 and Bone layouts [1] are very interesting for programmers that have organized special characters as you described. There, Caps Lock and the # key are used for switching layers. Another layer includes arrow keys and number keys and almost eliminate the need to ever take your hands off the home row.
The best part is that most Linux distros already include it! Yes, it's intended to type German, but it should work for English as well since these languages are so similar. Also, it has many dead keys that should help composing accented characters.
Yep, switched to neo2 last June or so after thinking about it for a couple of years. Beginning was tough (relearning Emacs shortcuts, ouch), but now I type faster than on qwerty (~90-100 wpm, still improving though).
It is so great for programming! Also although I'm German, probably 90% of what I type is English. Works perfectly for English as well.
Also being able to type Greek letters is great as a physicist, hehe.
Specifically about Emacs, I'm facing a tough choice between mapping Caps Lock to Mod3 or Ctrl. The latter is a common choice as Emacs shortcuts hail from an era when the Ctrl key was located there.
I settled on Mod3 as it is just way more frequently used and I seem to not be able to consistently hit the other Mod3. Remapping LCtrl-Super-LAlt to Super-Alt-Ctrl kinda works though as I can now use my thumbs for it. Swapping Ctrl and Tab could also work as there is a tab key on Level 4, but it's way more involved to do that.
I also found it necessary to replace Ctrl-X with Ctrl-V because on Bone the X is just too far away and I would have to twist my hand to reach it. Using RCtrl is also a possibility, most Emacs commands are intended to be performed with LCtrl though...
Yes. The rabbit hole that took for me was writing my own firmware using QMK. Make every key close to home row a tap/hold key accessing either modifier keys or extra layers. My fingers finally travel much less (the apparent promise of Dvorak/Colemak) but for the actual work of programming and operating a computuer.
A really affordable entry into this that I've found is Epomaker keyboards. I struggled to find the exact layout I wanted in an affordable QMK keyboard. Their software sucks but it works and profiles are stored to the keyboard so it can come with you wherever. They also have split space-bar and 3 space-bar options which is really nice for adding modifier keys beyond Caps-lock or rebinding backspace or escape into a more comfortable position.
I realize this is starting to sound like an ad, but my biggest challenge getting into fully reprogrammable keyboards was the huge price tag once you start narrowing features. In my case, a 60% keyboard that retained arrow keys would have been $200+ for a QMK supported model. The Epomaker I picked up was $65 or so.
Seems like a pretty good analysis. I've been using Dvorak for 20+ years also. The keyboard shortcuts thing is annoying, though I hadn't heard about the wrist strain they cause. I didn't see this discussed, but I actually find the fact that Colemak shares more keys with QWERTY to be a problem for learning if you already know QWERTY (even though that might be the biggest strength). Dvorak only shares the "A" and "M" with QWERTY, but typing those letters always confused my brain the most when learning, and sometimes I'd fall right back into QWERTY in a really frustrating way.
I switched to Dvorak because of wrist strain/RSI issues. I was in pretty serious wrist pain and now I rarely have any. It probably wouldn't have been worth it otherwise, but that was a huge benefit to me. I'm not sure if other things would've helped since I didn't try a lot of other approaches first.
> I switched to Dvorak because of wrist strain/RSI issues.
I did the same with Colemak, and had the same effect. I think the main thing really is just to not use qwerty - that layout is just extrarodinarily unergonomic.
It probably also helped that, around the same time I switched to Colemak, I took an interest in overall keyboard ergonomics, and invested in a split keyboard.
I taught myself Colemak last summer, as a pandemic project. If anyone is interested in learning, I recommend the "Tarmak" transitional layouts [1].
It's 5 intermediate layouts to transition from QWERTY to Colemak. Each only changes a few keys. So, rather than 1 big change (where you basically can't touch-type for a month) you have 5 little changes that you can learn over a weekend each.
Tarmak is what finally allowed me to switch away from QWERTY. Prior to tarmak I couldn’t deal with the massive productivity loss that I would initially encounter with Dvorak and I would eventually switch back.
The fact that initially steps are the highest impact really helps too.
I've been a happy Colemak user since 2012. One of the first things I do when I get a new computer is rearrange the physical keys, which is a significant advantage of Apple non-butterfly keyboards. [1]
Aside from less overall movement while typing, Colemak keeps many common keyboard shortcuts the same. The first few hours are very frustrating, but the overall time-to-competence is short. There's a lot of upside and little downside.
I wrote about the process of learning Colemak in my book on skill acquisition, and posted a summary of the process and the tools/techniques I used on the book's website. [2]
Having to resort to trial-and-error to find the correct key is painful and completely debilitating. You can still develop muscle memory if the labels are correct.
You're so right about [1], when possible. I should've rearranged them years ago on this mid-2012 MBA 11" .. maybe I should actually do that, today. I'm quite used to 104-key qwerty boards, but if all my keyboards could say aoeui they totally would.
For those chiding the practice, it's not for beginners-still-learning, it's for actual-years-running-users trying to type one-handed once in a while.
As for looking at a qwerty keyboard from a dvorak mindset, I'd say dvorak "wins" in my head like my right eye's image wins over my left. I look down and "see" aoeui .. pyf .. dhtns. But it's still confusing.
The programmer in me wants a numpad for () [] {} +-/*^% &c. (Do any exist, off the shelf, I wonder?)
Do people really type non-stop long enough to make any of the speed gains actually significant? Even when I was writing my dissertation I would rarely type more than a couple sentences at a time and even then I often had to back space because of a typo or something.
If you have some kind of RSI and it helps then it would make sense but at least for me it doesn't make sense for the way I type.
I had RSI issues crop up when I was writing my PhD thesis - a lot of hurried, last minute typing where typos be damned. I'm also mostly hunt and peck, so touch typing would have probably resolved most of my issues.
> If you have some kind of RSI and it helps then it would make sense
I think it makes way more sense to consider the risk and the odds of getting a RSI from qwerty vs. dvorak and take preventative action. You don't want to suffer a learning curve on the rehab side of an RSI, while also kicking yourself in the posterior for something that was avoidable.
I feel like more important and easier measures anyone can take to prevent RSI that doesn't involve learning a new keyboard layout are ergonomic: ensure you have a good chair/posture, use a wrist rest (these are debatable, but I couldn't type without one), and avoid taking your hands off the keyboard (don't use a mouse if possible).
I've been using QWERTY for decades now, and for years have used a ThinkPad keyboard with a TrackPoint instead of a mouse, use a mostly hotkey-driven workflow, and a wrist rest even on a laptop. Anecdotal, but I've rarely experienced strain and can type comfortably for hours.
I know QWERTY is demonstrably worse, but so far I haven't had the need to try another layout. The downsides of losing my current muscle memory, having to remap hotkeys and not being productive on other computers don't seem worth it to me.
My personal data on that is, I have been using all kinds of terrible desks, chairs, and keyboards before I got to a career point that I could buy nicer gear. I gotta credit Dvorak ahead of everything else.
I think the main take-away from that link is "either option is much better than QWERTY." So, if you're trying to decide between Colemak and Dvorak, remember that you're basically guaranteed to win -- either choice is a big improvement!
I'm using the qgmlwy layout for a few years now, pretty happy with it.
I remapped caps & added a new modifier to have a "special chars" layer and it works pretty well.
Overall it's more trouble than it's worth, if I had to redo the whole journey, I would simply learn to touch-type with querty (maybe colemak), but I'm still happy with the end result.
As long as you do not use QWERTY, you'll be fine :)
I have used Colemak for the last 12 years and have never looked back. I started learning Dvorak, but at the time I was using the ctrl+Z/C/V quite much and Colemak became my compromise. Now that I use Vim, the argument about the Z/C/V is not as important anymore. EDIT: Oh, I also used the Q/W (quit, close window) quite much back then because I was using a mac. Still use these in Sway to this day.
I also really like that there is a Norwegian Colemak-layout available in Linux by default. Not sure if this is the case in Windows or macOS these days, but it wasn't 12 years ago.
Interesting data. I’ll just mention that if you are looking at changing layouts and are concerned about cut, copy, paste and undo, don’t be. Within a year it won’t bother you to be typing X, C and V with different fingers.
I used the Dvorak-Command-QWERTY layout on macOS for a long time, it's Dvorak but flips back to QWERTY when you hold Command so that most shortcuts are in the same physical position.
After getting a programmable split keyboard it became too much work to get a similar thing to work so I decided to switch shortcuts to where they should be.
It's been... ok. The positions of shortcuts definitely encode something that you lose, copy/paste not being next to each other is slightly annoying, and not to mention that some shortcuts move in such a way that the failure mode of getting the shortcut wrong is really bad (e.g. Cmd+, for preferences, get it wrong and you Cmd+W which closes the active window).
I'm glad I've switched, but I'm also glad that I didn't switch my shortcuts at the same time that I switched to Dvorak, I think it could have been enough to put me off. Or I guess it might have been easier to do it all at once!
One thing that is annoying with the hybrid approach is some software just doesn't support it (I'm looking at you JetBrains, with your 10 year old issue on your issue tracker).
The AutoHotkey Script I use on Windows works very well in almost all applications. But in IntelliJ on Windows (not in Linux) it happens multiple times per hour that Shift, Ctrl or Alt locks get engaged (which I didn't know even existed) or that the Script reverts to Qwerty without warning. Restarting the script helps, but it's so annoying that I consider running IntelliJ with an external JRE.
I've been using Colemak for 5+ years now. I spent a lot of time researching layouts before I committed to one. My conclusion on efficiency was (1) nobody really knows because everyone types differently (2) raw speed isn't important since most typing I do involves pauses to think.
Dvorak and Colemak would both solve a huge problem for me. Qwerty requires a lot of extreme row movements that were causing me a lot of hand pain. Both Dvorak and Colemak move a significant amount of typing to the home row and eliminate a lot of the movement directly between the extremes of the rows. Choosing an extreme, anecdote, a word like minimum alternates between the top and bottom row between every letter on Qwerty. On Colemak, minimum there's only one extreme jump u => m. I've found that this tends to hold true for much of what I type.
I personally choose Colemak because I liked the transition process a bit easier. The base layout is closer to Qwerty and you can pick a few keys to transition at a time.
I use Dvorak on keyboards and qwerty on touch screens. I am pretty happy with both, but it doesn’t matter a lot regarding my eventual wrist or tendinitis pain.
What’s is important for me is drinking water sufficiently, regular exercise, a good posture, a good keyboard then finally the layout.
I picked up Dvorak for no real reason 10 years ago; I kept up with it but would not really recommend it, specially because of its intense reliance on the right pinky.
Learning Dvorak was one of the best decisions I've made in my career/life. It took a few weeks of effort to get back up to parity with Qwerty but it's paid off for decades.
I’ve been happily using Colemak for 10+ years but recently decided to give Halmak [1] a try. Only a month in so I’m still slow, but it feels really good.
For programming, though, the best decision I’ve made was to add a numpad and common symbols [2] under a second “shift” key to keep my hands on the home row.
I used dvorak for about a year and a half. I had a lot of fun, but my old left hand pain (qwerty) became right hand pain, and the right hand pain was worse. I got a split keyboard, and that alone didn't seem to help.
Now I'm a couple months into using workman, which notably has a very balanced hand usage. About 50/50, unlike qwerty which is mostly left, or dvorak which is mostly right. IIRC colemak and qgmlwb are similarly unbalanced, as it's not a goal of theirs to fix that.
My best speed in qwerty was about 160, I got to the 140s in dvorak, and I'm 100-110 in workman at the moment.
I'm not sure if I'll switch again. The balanced hand usage is a rare trait. If not for that issue, I was thinking of trying the halmak layout.
I'm a little sad that workman is qwerty-like since I'd already bothered to unlearn that with dvorak, and so I had no qualms about most keys being different. I actually get some weird typos now, like typing "sad" instead of "saw" because of similar placement to qwerty on the left.
I also change the layout on my phone with anysoftkeyboard. I've had at least 3 people tell me it's pointless on a touchscreen, but I like the consistency, and the layouts were already made and easy to switch to.
If you use colemak, I hear the mod-dh variant is better, but workman solves the same problem, so I'd recommend just using it if you aren't already years into colemak.
I use a modified English Dvorak layout where I put symbols that I use often to a nicer position and added Umlauts so that I can type German. For example Alt+j (the key) produces { and Alt+k produces }. Modifying keyboard layouts is simple enough that I don't see why I shouldn't adapt mine to suit me best. I don't type on other people's computers often enough that it matters that I have to hunt and peck there.
One new point that I haven't worked into the article is the fact that many keyboard shortcuts require a Right Ctrl key or else they can't be done on one hand. At the same time, many laptops on the market omit the Right Ctrl key, to my utter frustration. Manufacturers need to stop messing with keyboard layouts! Even my humble 13-inch Lenovo ThinkPad X220 from year 2012 had a pretty good layout while being compact, while newer machines keep making keyboards worse despite having the same physical dimensions.
The X220 keyboard is the holy grail of laptop keyboards as far as I'm concerned.
In addition to what you mention, it's got a big fat Escape key that's nice for vi users. This keys has shrunk on newer and competing laptop keyboards, so I've since resorted to exchanging Caps Lock for Escape.
The blatant Qwerty-centrism of Ctrl+Z, Ctrl+X, Ctrl+C, and Ctrl+V is quite annoying for many Dvorak users. In my case, I was looking to cure more than RSI, so before learning Dvorak I incidentally also learned to use a left hand mouse. Combined with Dvorak, theses shortcuts are easier. They're also doubly easier with a left-hand trackball mouse, because you can hold Ctrl down with your left thumb while you control the trackball with your left index/middle fingers, and hit Z/X/C/V, all simultaneously.
Mostly agreed. Regarding X220, I also like its decently arranged block of Delete/Home/End/PgUp/PgDn keys and dedicated volume buttons (whereas other laptop keyboards may require Function Lock or Fn). And it has a Context Menu key, which I actually use; many manufacturers (including later Lenovo) think it's superfluous and silently omit it.
Regarding the QWERTY-centrism of Ctrl+ZXCV, I have absolutely no problem with their Dvorak equivalents and can touch-type these shortcuts without looking at the keyboard. But I must, must, must have a Right Ctrl key to do this effectively. Just for reference for QWERTY people out there, Dvorak ZXCV is equivalent to QWERTY Slash,B,I,Period. For example, Ctrl+C in Dvorak has the same position as Ctrl+I in QWERTY. I would put my left pinky on I and left thumb (or index finger) on Right Ctrl. And I would put my right hand on the mouse to select text or files or draw.
So, for RSI, I have an alternative hypothesis. My issues are only with my right hand. I'm pretty sure the problem is not QWERTY, it's just the ]'/ keys. Having that one extra column of keys to reach across in order to get to the enter and shift keys means my right hand experiences a lot more wrist movement and stretching than my left hand does.
(I find hitting the enter key on an ANSI keyboard to be irritating enough that I'm frankly impressed that anyone tolerates ISO keyboards.)
I'm currently giving an ultra-minimalist keyboard, the Atreus, a shot. I'm still in the adjustment period, but it seems to be promising, and a much smaller adjustment than abandoning QWERTY entirely. Bonus points for not being the size of an aircraft carrier, like most ergo keyboards are.
It might depend on the specific problem a person has. I've never had discomfort with the actual letter keys on QWERTY, and definitely don't feel like I'm having to "reach" to get them. Where, to me, "reach" implies anything that's outside the comfortable range of motion.
For example, on a standard QWERTY keyboard, I find the number keys, the Y key, and the brackets to be a reach. Dvorak actually makes that situation a bit worse for me. It moves a somewhat more frequent letter, F, into the Y key's position, and it moves the brackets further away in order to put keys that I use less often in a more accessible position.
But that's me. I'd guess that this sort of thing varies a lot from person to person, because we all have different hands.
I get great mileage out of the Apple keyboard+number pad. Low profile, short, low-resistance key travel, great key density/spacing for my hands at least. It's a lot to like for a low-impact typist.
If it's only a physical thing for you, you might give the orthogonals a try.
That's where I want to "go next", but I've not yet seen anything on the market equivalent to the average Kinesis (solid, programmable, not horribly expensive, not requiring soldering).
The Keyboardio version of the Atreus is somewhat along those lines. It's very minimalist (44 keys, which is two more than the kit version), but it's well built, has staggered columnar key layout, and is very programmable.
The Mitosis that CarVac mentioned is another interesting option along similar lines, though I can't personally vouch for it.
Colemak user since I taught myself one summer (2012) by spending the first 20 minutes after waking up typing in vim-tutor. I made the switch because I could not stop looking at the keys on QWERTY keyboards no matter what I tried even with blank keys I would look down out of habit. I tried Dvorak and it felt so unnatural. The common key letters for commands were completely in foreign places that I could not get used to at all. After 2 wks of barely getting past 30 wpm on Dvorak I switched to colemak I was able to beat my QWERTY typing speed after only 2 wks of studying and now I can type 200+ words per minutes with over 90% accuracy thinking about spelling slows be down more than anything else.
If you are under 30 I suggest you give an alt keyboard layout a shot. Older than that and the time to learn Colemak/Dvorak vs just improving your QWERTY speed/accuracy might not be worth it.
If you type at 90% accuracy, do you go back through your text to fix all the typos or do rely on some kind of automation to do that for you? I don't type particularly fast, but every time I tried increasing my speed my accuracy suffers sufficiently that going back and correcting mistakes takes more time than typing a bit slower.
200wpm and 90% accuracy is my result from typing tests while using vi-tutor. In real world scenario I would type slower (closer to 120wpm) to be sure I spell and punctuate without having to backspace or use autocorrect.
My experience learning a new keyboard layout was at age 19 an I was not typing for more than a few hours a day.
It takes much longer to both break old habits and form new ones from older ages. If you have been typing for 20+ years in QWERTY and use a keyboard everyday professionally learning a new layout will likely be a very hard and frustrating task. Every time you switch back to QWERTY you are basically reversing the practice you have put in. If you are typing for a profession you likely won't want to suffer months of half your former typing speed or less until you catch up.
Xah Lee’s site and videos were really handy for me, i fired a few $$$ his way to say thanks for his efforts.
My journey went:
1. Qwerty
2. Dvorak (liked the left right alternation, the fact its available on all OS’s, disliked the common keys on weaker fingers)
2. Colemak mod dk (don’t like rolling, alternating is just more natural, easy to go faster)
3. Halmak - favourite of the lot
4. Halmak + home row mod keys
5. Qwerty + gacs
6. Qwerty + gasc - just worked better than gacs for me
Then there was the detour through hardware, zsa moonlander was the most interesting. Very nice key caps.
The bad news is that it’s all been for naught. I’m back to touch typing qwerty on a g915.
I am using AHK and mimicing Xah Lee’s external keypad idea with the num lock toggle - undo, redo, cut copy paste, all single key actions rather than chords.
Good to discuss, but I'm not 100% sure about some of the points here.
- The `h` problem is purely about moving your index finger, so I don't think it makes sense to talk about the bigram being popular. The relevant number is just how many `h`s people have to type in general
- Shortcuts staying the same: saying that there exists a variant of Dvorak created to do this too is a huge point in favour of Colemak. The point is so good that people modified a 70 year old layout to match it! How popular is this variant?
- Saying that Colemak is bad because of Vim, then saying it's good because of CapsLock/Backspace BUT that doesn't really count because you can also do this reprogramming with Dvorak: can you not also change Vim? Maybe this is much harder
Vim is relevant because it is not always possible to customize it. Think of hardened servers or containers. Also, it's an editor of last resort on most Unix systems. It's worth discussing whether nano should take this place instead.
Much more tricky are applications that have hardcoded hotkeys, or who listen to an unholy mix of keys and scancodes. Uncommon nowadays (many games are not great at this), but still sucks if it happens.
I use the default keymapping for Vim with Colemak (Norwegian) and find it a pleasant experience. The up/down movement is reversed, but I got used to it pretty quickly.
Does anybody have recommendations for a layout that works well for a split keyboard (Moonlander, in my case, as and when it arrives)? Learning a split configuration will require work, so may as well learn a better layout at the same time.
I use Neo2 [1] on a Moonlander. I find it works really well. Neo2's distinguishing feature is that there are built-in layers that contain special characters, such as those used for programming, control characters, including a numpad, Pos1/End, ... and also many mathematical symbols for significantly faster TeXing.
What makes it such a good fit, in my opinion, is that the modifiers can be placed on the thumb clusters, and even layers 5 and 6 that otherwise require a combination of modifiers can have their own keys. On the other hand, having all control characters already mapped means you needn't find a good location for them anywhere. I still have 5 keys unmapped.
That said, getting used to the Moonlander took almost no effort at all for me, I was back up to speed in a few days.
Every layout is fine for a split – even QWERTY, as bad, as it is. Just don't switch to a new keyboard and new layout simultaneously. I've done it for Kinesis and Colemak - it is hard. You can't reliably hit a key on the new keyboard, because of the lack of staggering, new thumb cluster and different distance between keys. But when you hit one, it is a wrong one, because Colemak.
In general, however, it is not a problem. Just remember, that adjusting yourself to a new keyboard is similar to learning layout and takes some time. If it is your first ortholinear split with a thumb cluster give yourself a week or two and then switch to other layout.
> Just don't switch to a new keyboard and new layout simultaneously
Why is that? Is it the productivity hit? Frustration?
At least for me, this will be at home personal keyboard, and I'll continue to use the work QWERTY keyboard for the foreseeable future. I might switch the work keyboard once I'm comfortable, but it's not a priority right now.
Productivity hit and frustration, I would say. Motor learning is hard, since it takes a lot of repetitions. Motor re-learning is arguably much harder, since you have an interference of learned and new patterns. Keyboard familiarity is also heavily depending on motor learning - distance between keys, their position, height and so on. So you just have more to learn at the same time.
I also have another warning, based on my experience: it is for many people difficult to keep proficiency in QWERTY after they completely switch to Colemak or Dvorak. It is hard to describe: like you've been touch-typing on QWERTY for 18 years, and you know where the keys are, because if you look down, you immediately find them... but something is blocking you from finding them while typing. If you switch completely at work, find a week or two without much stress. New layout can be infuriating enough :)
I guess I'm a hybrid typist - I generally type only with my index & middle finders, but I can type moderately fast without looking at the keyboard. I had mild RSI issues but it might be the mouse usage.
I write small amounts of python code within an academic setting, so a week or two with low productivity is ... typical :)
I tried dvorak on the moonlander (and have typed dvorak for a looong time before that on regular keebs), but ended up going back to qwerty, and using a layer for the punctuation surrounding the letters. This way you make the most use of the linear layout in the up-down direction, but avoid too much sideways movement and pinky stretching.
Check it out here: https://configure.zsa.io/moonlander/layouts/MJXZ4/latest/0
You might move the punctuation even more central to really keep it 4-columned.
I've been using Colemak on a Ergodox since September of last year and am very happy with it. I too switched to Colemak when I started using my Ergodox. The first weeks my head hurt, but now I'm fine.
I'm sure that's true, though as a person who currently hunts & pecks, even touch typing would be an upgrade. I'm trying to roll all of the improvements to my typing behaviour into a single month of hell :)
I'm currently typing this from a split QWERTY keyboard (KBDFans Maja). As someone who has tried and failed to switch to both Colemak and Dvorak over the years, learning to type on split is much, much easier. You'll smack your fingers into the gap where T/Y, G/H (assuming QWERTY) should be a few times and get used to it really quick.
I use colemak on the Kinesis Advantage II and I love it.
Keeping the C-c/x/v keys the same is great on a split layout, assuming you're right handed. I avoid using the mouse as much as possible, but when I do use it there's a good chance I'm copying or pasting something. With Dvorak you can't use those keys with your hand on the mouse.
I used Dvorak for a couple years before switching back in the mid-2010s. Back then my QWERTY speed was about 120 wpm, and I never got close to that on Dvorak, but really the only time I can even think at 120 wpm is when arguing on the internet so maybe that's not altogether a bad thing. I was never as fast, but typing was a lot more comfortable in general. I ended up switching back due to work computer restrictions (grad student) at the time.
I just switched back to Dvorak, and while it's been a solid six years, it's coming back reasonably quickly :) I forgot how much I enjoyed this layout.
[I don't use either layout and don't have much wrist strain / any RSI]
I wonder how much of the benefit from using these alternate layouts is due solely to the layout, as opposed to some combination of the layout and better awareness of correct ergonomics, using stretching and warmup techniques, etc.
Hard to quantify of course. Would love to hear from anyone that switched to one of these layouts but didn't make any other changes in their wrist health otherwise.
Learned Dvorak when I was in university; reverted to qwerty sometime after that for some reason. I think because the typematrix I was using broke.
Picked Dvorak up again about a year ago after getting one of those fancy ortholinear keyboards.
My qwerty was a quick 'undisciplined' hunt-and-peck. (e.g. typing the 'y' in 'your' with the left hand finger). Dvorak was trained with the 'discipline' of each finger being assigned to a column.
Qwerty feels somewhat disorganised and chaotic compared do Dvorak (even on the same keyboard). Dvorak feels more comfortable.
I use Dvorak on keyboards and QWERTY on touch screens.
I find QWERTY difficult to touch for all the obvious reasons but actually pretty good for 2 to 4 fingers typing on a iPhone / iPad. I have seen people typing faster than I do with only 4 fingers and their thumbs, usually with a machine gun style.
Dvorak is (great for | forcing you into) touch typing, except that right pinky overuse. It feels good but you don’t really have a choice.
My wife doesn’t touch type and is bent over the keyboard, looking down at the keys. Dvorak would not help her until she relaxes down on her chair, and type with more fingers and without looking.
Purely anecdotal, but I switched to Dvorak for ~6 months in middle school and much preferred it to Qwerty. Now that I’ve spent more years having Qwerty drilled into my brain I’m hesitant to make a switch.
I carry around a vortex Pok3r keyboard. It has builtin colmak, so I can plug it into whatever computer and go (I've been thinking about getting a 40% keyboard, but losing the number row is a huge step).
I've been using Colemak for 6 years now. Although not faster, it's much more comfortable, especially in the wrists. Along with frequently switching between mousing, a tented+split keyboard, and remapping programming punctuation on a third layer with QMK, I'm very glad I made the investment to reduce the chance of developing an RSI.
I'm a happy colemak user of 3 years. The h argument is pretty interesting. As an English only writer and a programmer, I did not personally find the remaining arguments compelling. But, this goes to show how complicated the selection process is, and appreciate the analysis nonetheless.
Programming languages mostly boil down to symbols, and I haven't seen standardization efforts around that concern specifically. Some layouts swaps the "shift" state on the number row (i.e. you type ! by default, and have to hold shift to type 1). There are more commonly efforts around dedicated layouts for compact boards, like [Miryoku](https://github.com/manna-harbour/miryoku). You will find a ton of bespoke layouts though. https://configure.zsa.io/ergodox-ez/layouts/Qa34z/latest/1 is what my own layout that places `{}() -_+=` on the homerow. This is heavily dependent on language though. A Haskell person is going to have different symbol histograms from a Javascript person.
Coming from a Nordic country where we use a version of ISO layout I would not go so far as to say that US-ansi layout is optimized for programming, but programming languages are definitely constructed around US-ansi.
With the exception of Dvorak, every English-centric layout I've looked at (Colemak, Workman, Carpalx, probably a couple others) moves only the letters around, keeping punctuation in the same place as QWERTY. This means the right pinky is heavily overloaded for many/most common programming languages, which use far more punctuation than prose does.
Dvorak moves several punctuation keys onto the left hand, which is great, but unfortunately it also moves braces and brackets farther away from the home row, which I found bad enough by itself to prompt me to look elsewhere.
There's a variant called "Programmer Dvorak" which is somehow even worse. Aside from moving the numerals into ridiculous positions, now all the paired delimiters are on number keys but not in any consistent way. Both braces are on the left hand. Brackets and parentheses are on opposing hands, but, depending on how you slide your right hand up to the number row (7 and 8 are both natural resting places for the index finger), one pair will not be on corresponding fingers! And in general, I have a hard time touch-typing the middle part of the number row, so I don't like anything that puts common characters there.
I've come to the conclusion that no, every common keyboard layout is bad for programming (for me). Eventually I gave up trying to find something suitable and made my own custom layout, which I've been using for a few years now.
Code dictation should be entirely possible with language models. Need to understand how the write the code. But acquiring datasets for many languages and reducing latency may be difficult.
> There are Dvorak with QWERTY-shortcuts layout, that comes with Linux
This is not accurate really. This used to be the default but at least with Ubuntu/Debian you need 3rd part software. Which means this statement holds true for windows also.
My suspicion is that whatever efficiency gains are possible are going to be wiped out by the difficulty of learning a new system and then also not being able to readily have your preferred layout everywhere.
For me the efficiency gains were not the point. The point was that changing to Dvorak massively decreased by RSI (although 20 years later I'm discovering that bodyweight strength training may have been even more effective).
Not readily having the preferred layout available is a non-issue. Either I'm using a keyboard for less than ten minutes, in which case I hunt-and-peck on QWERTY, or I'm using it for longer, in which case I switch to Dvorak using the OS keyboard settings. It's never been a problem on Windows or Linux. I don't think I've used a Mac during that period but I imagine it's equally easy.
As I recall the awkward learning period was between a week and a month. Twenty years later I've never regretted the time invested.
I don't find myself to be any faster in Dvorak (70 wpm, like before) and from other users and people online, that seems to be typical. There are some possible gains at the high end, since from what I read most of the confirmed world record holders for typing speed use alternate layouts (for example, https://www.typing.com/blog/fastest-typists/).
I only have 1 data point but it took me about 2-3 weeks to touch type with Dvorak and I found friends who learned QWERTY took much longer, as much as half a year.
I also was learning piano so that may have been a factor.
It took me a long time to gain speed on Dvorak and I'm not much faster than on Qwerty but the amount of effort required to type is significantly less - absolutely worth it.
If you don't touch type, or if you already type at a fairly high WPM rate, then no, an optimized layout doesn't really matter.
Personally, I have been learning to touch type and used the opportunity to use an optimized layout. I have recovered almost all the speed of non-blind Qwerty within a month and plan to stay.
Not being able to use it everywhere is not a drawback to me. For those rare events where I cannot use it, I still have more than enough muscle memory for Qwerty.
Expect to take a few months to get back up to your old speed, perhaps a year to surpass it (not everyone does.) Whether this is a good investment depends on your age, if you have or will likely develop pain from typing QWERTY, and whether you’re able to learn an alternative layout during a time when quick typing isn’t as essential. If you need to regularly use other people’s computers, you’ll retain your ability to type in both layouts.
It would have helped if they compared Dvorak to Colemak mod dh variant. It addresses many of the issues raised here by moving D below T and H below N, and moving the more rare K and G as left-right motions.
For those who are afraid that it will somehow affect QWERTY typing speed, such fears are totally unfounded, I can type QWERTY as easily as I could before, just with some more strain compared to Dvorak.
That said:
- for developers, the typing speed is not the productivity bottleneck, so you are unlikely to see any real gains
- hotkeys are generally a MESS, especially if you use 2 languages on a system. More so on Windows. Less so on Ubuntu.