Keyboard Layouts

Do you ever think about your keyboard? And I don't mean think about it like, "Stupid keyboard, I know I hit the spacebar, why didn't I jump his rocket?!" I mean think about the comfort, shape, and layout of the keys.

I'm sure everyone has used someone else's keyboard and been thrown off by a few slight changes in key positions. I used to get all messed up when the backslash key was placed next to the backspace key, instead of below it. Oh, and that modern trend towards the block of keys around Page Up and whatnot? You know, where there's the really large Delete key and the block is oriented vertically? That really F's me up every time I try to use it.

But I digress. That's not what I was planning to write about, although apparently some part of me wanted to. What I wanted to write about was ergonomic keyboards and the Dvorak layout.

History

Back when Sholes & Glidden created the QWERTY layout (Wikipedia), (sounds like I was actually there, eh?) the goal was (supposedly) to prevent the typebars from jamming together. Some theories about this include it being designed to be inefficient, so the user simply could not type fast enough to jam the keys, or, that by placing common letters far away, the internal mechanisms were less likely to conflict.

So, basically, the layout was not designed for comfort.

Dvorak

The Dvorak layout, however, was. By studying letter frequencies in the English language, Dr. August Dvorak designed the layout with these goals (copied from Wikipedia):

• Letters should be typed by alternating between hands.
• For maximum speed and efficiency, the most common letters and digraphs [two-letter combinations] should be the easiest to type. This means that they should be on the home row, which is where the fingers rest, and under the strongest fingers.
• The least common letters should be on the bottom row, which is the hardest row to reach.
• The right hand should do more of the typing, because most people are right-handed.
• Digraphs should not be typed with adjacent fingers.
• Stroking should generally move from the edges of the board to the middle. An observation of this principle is that, for many people, when tapping fingers on a table, it is easier going from the little finger to index than vice versa. This motion is called inboard stroke flow.

So what does this mean for you? Probably very little, since most people aren't willing to put in the time to relearn how to type. But, if you are not yet a touch typist, or you have difficulty with the standard QWERTY layout, it may be worth the switch.

I am a touch typist. I have been for a long time, at least 14 years (that may not sound like a very long time to some, but I'm only 26). I learned on QWERTY. But last year I started to have problems with my hands; I would have trouble gripping stuff, some of my fingers would go numb, and my wrists always hurt. So I decided to make the switch.

I also got an ergonomic keyboard for work (already had one at home, thanks to my wife; that was an awesome birthday present) for my wrists, since changing the layout wouldn't help there.

How did it go? Well, thankfully there are keyboard shortcuts that you can set in both Windows and Linux for switching between layouts, since fighting your habits about which keys are where is draining. Additionally, I'm a programmer, so not being able to get my thoughts out quickly enough can be disruptive to my workflow. So I would use Dvorak as long as I could stand it (generally about half an hour at a time at first), and then switch to QWERTY to relax for a while. Probably three or four times a day I'd fight my way through some less-intensive work using Dvorak for practice.

It paid off. After about two weeks I'd gotten up to 20 WPM (there's a good WPM test here, which also makes for good practice). As a reference, I'm generally around 75 WPM using QWERTY.

After three more weeks I'd hit 40 WPM. Another month and I was around 60 WPM, which is comfortable enough to switch over full time. Now, a year and a couple months after starting, I am at 75ish WPM (I just took the test again), although I haven't improved significantly in quite some time.

Oh, and QWERTY? Can I still type that way? Yep. It takes a minute to warm up, and I'll make more mistakes (at least at first) than I used to, but I can still do it. I'll take the WPM test now to see how I do... 56... 67... I can't seem to get above 67. Probably because I haven't been practicing as much as I used to.

How do I keep going with both? I use Dvorak at work and QWERTY at home. That forces me to keep going with QWERTY, although I do have a tendency to switch to Dvorak if I will be typing something longer than an email. Lately I haven't been using my computer at home so much (now that we have a house, there's too much other stuff that needs to get done).

And I'm not the only one interested in switching; one of the guys at work has decided to take the plunge as well! I hope he has as good an experience with it as I did; he complained to me the other day about how it is getting harder to type on QWERTY now. Speaking of, I typed the first half of this article using Dvorak, and the second half using QWERTY.

How To Try It

Windows XP: Open up the control panel, choose "Regional and Language Options", switch to the "Languages" tab, click the "Details..." button, click the "Add..." button, leave the input language as is, and choose "United Sates-Dvorak" for the layout. Once you've OK'd your way out, pressing Ctrl+Shift will switch between the layouts for the program that owns whatever window you are currently in.

Fedora: Open the Control Center, expand "Regional & Accessibility", choose "Keyboard Layout", click "Enable keyboard layouts", choose an available layout, and then choose the "dvorak" layout variant. You can also set up options for whether the layout is per-application (like Windows), or for the session.

I would have outlined Ubuntu here, but apparently I don't have a VM of it like I thought I did. As for Mac OSX... You're on your own, I have no access to a Mac, so I can't even walk myself through it.

I recommend leaving a Notepad (or gedit or whatever) window open in which you've typed out the key layout, just as a reference in case you get stuck. You may want to find a layout diagram to print out (here's one). Also, there's a good, free, online beginner's course called ABCD (A Basic Course in Dvorak). The version that I used seems to be gone, but someone created a Flash-based version here.