Keyboard Layouts

What keyboard layouts have you used? Share your experience ITT. Mine (pic) is based on colemak DH, with some improvements: 1) Tactical hand separation 2) Strategic hjkl disposition 3) Well-engineered escape key placement Also, what software do you use for configuring yours? I use xmodmap like a caveman because it works over VNC, but the top of the line seems to be kmonad: https://github.com/kmonad/kmonad

I use Programmer Dvorak https://www.kaufmann.no/roland/dvorak/ with rebinds in direct keyboard config: capslock -> ctrl backspace -> backslash backslash -> backspace In vim I use ^C instead of pressing Esc but of course this could also be redefined arbitrarily anyway, so I haven't felt the need to relocate Esc even if there wasn't already an alternative

I use dvorak mainly, I used programmer's dvorak for a while but I was just really LARPing and remembering where the numbers' locations was a bit of a hassle. So I just use dvorak. I'd like to try colemak but making the switch is always a mind twisting process, but the HJKL positioning looks convenient, in dvorak it's all scattered.

I use qwerty but with a split keyboard that has multiple keys near the thumbs for space, tab, enter, and backspace, and where holding down space acts as a modifier that switches to a layout that consists of programming symbols and macros. It's not optimal but it has made programming much more ergonomic without the overhead of learning an entirely new layout.

Realized I made a mistake on the bottom row, fixed the image. Making a custom layout is quite frustrating, it's one of those things where every change is a tradeoff. There's no perfect solution. I wonder if there's another way, maybe using (buzzword warning) AI-assisted typing or something like stenography[^1], or voice recognition (speech-to-text, plus an edit mode for commands like "delete that last sentence"). Maybe typing each character one by one is not always the right way. [^1]: https://yewtu.be/watch?v=8Ixtfo3I4VE https://yewtu.be/watch?v=ru4cRQ2s_v0 >>63976 Nice article, having to use shift to access the numbers looks quite convenient for vim, when going to the end of the line with $ and things like that. And the compose key seems worth looking into. >In vim I use ^C instead of pressing Esc There's also a mapping (or plugin or something) that goes to Normal mode when you type jk fast. And there's ZZ as a replacement for Esc : w q >>63989 >in dvorak it's all scattered Here, made a mockup of dvorak with convenient(tm) hjkl (second pic). But for me the Enter key is so far that in the end it doesn't even matter, and I end up making my own layout almost from scratch by taking the right hand keys all the way to the right. Another option would be to have fast key combinations, like pressing S+R in fast succession to get Return. I'm sure I could do that from within emacs. Maybe I should get better at configuring my text editor instead of staring at my keyboard and making weird-ass layouts. >>63996 kid-with-a-weird-arm-giving-a-thumbs-up-in-front-of-a-computer.jpg Split keyboards look great. I once tried to emulate one with two external usb numpads. It didn't work.

When I was using qwerty I used only 3 to 4 fingers, I decided to learn touch typing and read about alternative layouts and chose dvorak cause it's easy to access (every OS has it as a default option) and I think changing layout actually helped me learn touch typing. My speed is maybe 3/4 or 3/5 of what it was before but since im using all my fingers it is way more comfortable, and dvorak, at least in english, doesn't have much movement out of the homerow so I can just keep typing without getting as tired as before.

>>63997 I actually like hjkl better on dvorak than qwerty. Up/down on the left, left/right on the right. Maybe it's just me, but my hand gets confused when they're all in a row.

>>63997 Trying out some new layouts with a bunch of keyboards I got my hands on. Annoying that most have 11 keys on the home row making your qwfpb unusable, except for one where the key clips for T and J keys are different from the rest so they can only be swapped with each other. Obviously not ideal so I swapped the T/F keys and the J/" keys (although the layout remains the same, just looks like qwtpb). One question, not sure exactly what this character is supposed to be? Acute accent? (picrel) > Also, what software do you use for configuring yours? Just localectl, not sure why I'd need anything else?

what do you guys think of ? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DB_dLeEasL8

>>64805 I wouldn't bother, except for fun. It's important to remember the historical context here. Engelbart developed this chorded keyboard design all the way back in the late sixties for use around the rest of his "Mother of all Demo" equipment [https://dougengelbart.org/content/view/273/] . Aside from the obvious (things which have since become) anachronisms, such has his mouse having only three buttons, no scroll wheel, the universal badness of keyboards back in the day, etc., Engelbart's system consisted of a mouse, traditional keyboard, and chording keyboard (which I'll call a chorder, though I quite like Stanislav's name of violin) ALL TOGETHER, and seems to have largely been designed around the assumption that the GUI would enable and encourage the user to keep their right (mouse) hand on the mouse as much as possible, only moving it and the left (chording) hands back to the traditional keyboard in the middle for extended typing, or perhaps only moving only the right hand back to the keyboard for quick control commands. For the second, this can be, and was, implemented pretty much just the same with the Ctrl/Meta/Super/Hyper modifier set of the Symbolics Lisp machines a decade later, and stuck around even after the rest of the Space Cadet model got cut down to size. The first, though, the case of switching from a primarily keyboard-controlled to mouse-controlled operating system and programming interface, is far more of a cultural than technological question, but still has an almost technological answer today. Try out the chorder some time and you'll find that it's not nearly fast enough to work as a primary text input device for """composition""", writing out extended paragraphs at the computer (although I will admit I'm very tempted by the idea of pairing a handheld version like this [https://twiddler.tekgear.com/] with a head-mounted display for use while mobile with a smartphone or such). Cutting your wpm to what seems to be a hard cap of 20-30 just isn't worth any amount of elegance. But since we're only considering the case of using it to operate the computer and will be keeping a keyboard on hand for that task it shouldn't factor in to our decision. The real question is whether it's worth trying to work a turing machine, or at least the UI to one, with encoded clicks and very terse abbreviations (which I'll admit to hating personally in places like their unix manifestation, although even those might be too long for this system) applied anywhere onscreen or with full phrases and programming language syntax applied only to a limited number of input fields so they can be effectively navigated with just the control-commands of the same keyboard. And the answer reached over the past three-ish decades of experimentation seems to be twofold in favor of the second, in that on the one hand most of the people who want GUIs actually prefer them to be as simple as possible over striking a balance between beauty and power, and on the other hand that building powerful GUIs that don't induce eyebleed and/or just turn commands into a threatening battery of buttons is a difficult task that takes real skill and experience. So much the worse, then, that so few proportionately actually want it. Of course, Engelbart would probably (and, one could argue, rightfully) rebut that he envisioned a much different and much more sophisticated breed of GUI than we've been doing this whole time, so he never really got a fair shake. His own project in the wake of his demo was famously handicapped by his choice to work with the financially anemic bay area universities and grown-up hippie think tanks left behind by the time's narrowing of government funding onto things that weren't so speculative. There's more discussion on this at >>28396 But just for typing? Like I said, no way, man. Way too slow. At the very least you'd want a full, two-handed and multi-row setup like the steno keyboards court reporters use, and probably a specialized form factor to go with it. They have the reputation of going far faster than traditional keyboards, in the ballpark of 200wpm, but as I understand it those don't actually type ASCII text, just phonemes that are re-interpreted later. Not too useful, and likely to mean converting this system would lose you a lot of the speed. Someone does seem to be working on this anyway, though, at [http://www.openstenoproject.org/], though I haven't tried it. A little googling shows this guy even worked out a programming layout [https://keyholesoftware.com/2017/08/14/stenography/], though his link now 404s [https://github.com/qmk/qmk_firmware/tree/master/keyboards/ergodox/ez/keymaps/steno]. I'm sure you can do the legwork to turn up some more if you're interested in the concept.

>>65450 >They have the reputation of going far faster than traditional keyboards, in the ballpark of 200wpm, but as I understand it those don't actually type ASCII text, just phonemes that are re-interpreted later. Not too useful, and likely to mean converting this system would lose you a lot of the speed. Old steno keyboards were like this. They'd print out the keystrokes and the stenographer would review and translate them later, but modern steno keyboard software is good and does the interpretation in real-time. You won't notice any lag when using them. If you search youtube, you can find plenty of videos of people using them in real-time. Steno software also allows for custom interpretations so you can tailor it to your needs. Plenty useful for chatting or writing. Not great for programming

>>63966 I've been using the Programmer Dvorak layout for a decade, with Caps Lock additionally remapped to Ctrl. Pros: - Installed by default in most Linux distros - Much more comfortable than QWERTY, especially for symbol-heavy programming languages - Surprisingly, works well with Vim Cons: - Using other people's computers is now much more annoying

>>63966 I use CarpalX QGMLWY, it is easy to learn and very effective for writing english words.

>>65453 Do you use custom hardware, or just steno software with a regular mechanical keyboard?

>>63998 Samelain I now have about 100/110 wpm in dvorak which is basically what I had before on qwerty, the difference is my hands don't hurt anymore while typing at that speed for long periods of time

>>63997 >There's also a mapping (or plugin or something) that goes to Normal mode when you type jk fast. And there's ZZ as a replacement for Esc : w q Ah yes, I forgot about that. I need to add it to config again, thanks. I've known about ZZ since the beginning of course, but it always felt somehow more noobish than knowing :wq, so I never used it, lol. Also I like being able to inspect and submit it etc

>>65453 Yes, modern electronic steno machines now transcribe the shorthand for you using a customizable dictionary, but you still have to know the shorthand in the first place. Like the pen shorthands, this involves more than knowing a simple alphabet, but rather a system consisting of specific ways of representing various phonemes and rules for their joining and abbreviation. There's a reason court reporter school takes nominally two years and realistically three to five years. Much of this is spent on speed building and other cert prep, especially in the later stages. The foundational theory is the major introductory challenge.