 intrigue  Washington, D.C. March 15 2009 04:54. Posts 9271 | Profile Blog # |
for those of you unfamiliar with the story, the keyboard we currently use was made intentionally inefficient so as not to jam typewriters. it's called the Sholes keyboard, after their inventor. however, another well-known one is called the Dvorak keyboard - here is a short wikipedia excerpt:
Dvorak studied letter frequencies and the physiology of people's hands and created a layout to adhere to these principles:
* Letters should be typed by alternating between hands.
* For maximum speed and efficiency, the most common letters and digraphs 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 little finger to index than vice versa. This motion on a keyboard is called inboard stroke flow.[3]
it has always bugged me immensely that i'm expending much more energy typing things out than is necessary. now that we don't use typewriters, it's really dumb to keep this archaic system. how many unnecessary kilojoules a year do i waste with this keyboard?
you may switch keyboards in windows xp by going to control panel => language/regional settings => language tab => clicking on the 'details' tab, clicking 'add', and checking the box with dvorak in it. it also helps to turn on the language bar to switch back and forth easily. i've also written the dvorak keys with a sharpie on my laptop keyboard, though it's probably smarter to print it out and stick it on top.
i'm heading out for food right now but the next time i get back, i will be using only dvorak until i get the hang of it. i'll still have to switch back for starcraft but it'll be pretty cool being 'bilingual' in keyboard knowledge. or so i think. preemptive apology for those who talk to me on irc/aim/msn, because i'll take forever to respond in the first few days.
anyone wanna join me in this noble quest for efficiency? i think i'll type out the time it takes me to make each post in seconds at the bottom of my posts for a few days.
Last edit: 2009-03-15 05:01:10
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| Nytefish United Kingdom. March 15 2009 04:59. Posts 3419 | Profile Blog # |
| I would like to switch over to dvorak completely, but I don't think I could be a "bilingual typist" without a lot of time spent practising both for a long time. |
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 SonuvBob Administrator March 15 2009 04:59. | Profile Blog # |
| Takes a week or two to get used to it, I switched back after a while cause I couldn't get used to the punctuation being in weird places. |
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| ondik Czech Republic. March 15 2009 05:01. Posts 2858 | Profile Blog # | |
| | Bisu. The one and only. // Save the cheerreaver, save the world (of SC2) |
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 yoshtodd United States. March 15 2009 05:02. Posts 418 | Profile Blog # |
| Do they sell actual keyboards that are laid out this way? I remember reading something similar awhile ago. The guy that created bittorrent was advocating the keys being perfectly uniform and adjacent, instead of staggered. |
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 boesthius United States. March 15 2009 05:02. Posts 9785 | Profile Blog # |
i tried this a few years ago and i STARTED to get the hang of it but my journalism class made me stop because it was taking too much time to write articles, rofl.
one of my friends is completely switched over to dvorak right now, idk if he's gonna go back or not. maybe i'll try it again, who knows. |
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| Hyperionnn Turkey. March 15 2009 05:04. Posts 4877 | Profile Blog # |
| I think this style sucks for turkish or maybe i'm just not used to this dvorak thingy but i like the archaic system and i'm used to it so it will be so hard to change whole keyboard imo |
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| SnowFantasy March 15 2009 05:04. Posts 3653 | Profile Blog # |
god switching to this would ruin my sc abilities.
not like i have many but they would just get worse.Last edit: 2009-03-15 05:05:46 |
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| intrigue Washington, D.C. March 15 2009 05:06. Posts 9271 | Profile Blog # |
[][][][] oh the brackets are up there now what the hell where is my question mark oh???
4 minutes to type 8( |
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| Polemarch Canada. March 15 2009 05:07. Posts 1549 | Profile # |
i learned dvorak when bored at work one term... i still use it for msn sort of conversations, but not for programming or starcraft.
i'm about the same speed in both now, but dvorak does feel like less effort than qwerty, your fingers don't have to dash around the keyboard as much |
| | I BELIEVE IN CAPITAL LETTER PUNISHMENT!!!!! |
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| iPAndi Costa Rica. March 15 2009 05:24. Posts 2204 | Profile Blog # |
| lol keep posting progress!! |
| | Nightmare1795 wrote: I played a guy in bronze who said he was Japanese. That was the only game I ever dropped a nuke, which was purely coincidental. |
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 semioldguy United States. March 15 2009 05:25. Posts 7263 | Profile Blog # |
I'll take any workout I can get... can we try to find the least efficient keyboard layout for typing to maximize the amount of workout I get while hardly doing anything strenuous?
I might be on board to try that. |
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| yoshtodd United States. March 15 2009 05:51. Posts 418 | Profile Blog # |
On March 15 2009 05:25 semioldguy wrote:
I'll take any workout I can get... can we try to find the least efficient keyboard layout for typing to maximize the amount of workout I get while hardly doing anything strenuous?
I might be on board to try that.
Well you can always keep a can of beer handy to work your biceps lifting it to your mouth. |
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| vAltyR United States. March 15 2009 05:52. Posts 580 | Profile Blog # |
On March 15 2009 04:54 intrigue wrote:
i've also written the dvorak keys with a sharpie on my laptop keyboard, though it's probably smarter to print it out and stick it on top.
Alternatively, you could remove the keys on your keyboard and move them into the Dvorak positions. Just hope you don't break a key if you decide to do that. |
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 LosingID8 Harlem. March 15 2009 06:44. Posts 10371 | Profile Blog # |
On March 15 2009 05:06 intrigue wrote:
[][][][] oh the brackets are up there now what the hell where is my question mark oh???
4 minutes to type 8(
noob |
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| Exteray United States. March 15 2009 06:47. Posts 1094 | Profile Blog # |
| Yep ive heard of this. My friend uses and he once tried to convince me. I do believe it drastically improves typing speed but out of habit I'm too lazy to change. Plus i think if u use someone else's computer or at the library's computers u can't really use this layout anymore. |
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| paper March 15 2009 06:55. Posts 10719 | Profile Blog # |
On March 15 2009 06:47 Exteray wrote:
Yep ive heard of this. My friend uses and he once tried to convince me. I do believe it drastically improves typing speed but out of habit I'm too lazy to change. Plus i think if u use someone else's computer or at the library's computers u can't really use this layout anymore.
it's not like dvorak is replacing your knowledge of the qwerty keyboard rofl |
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| Zoler Sweden. March 15 2009 06:56. Posts 5922 | Profile Blog # |
On March 15 2009 06:47 Exteray wrote:
Yep ive heard of this. My friend uses and he once tried to convince me. I do believe it drastically improves typing speed but out of habit I'm too lazy to change. Plus i think if u use someone else's computer or at the library's computers u can't really use this layout anymore.
If everyone jumped of a cliff I guess you would too? Sounds wierd but you know what I mean 
My friend uses this and I guess it's better, I've just been too lazy to try it yet, maybe I'll do it soon.Last edit: 2009-03-15 06:57:10 |
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| Realpenguin United States. March 15 2009 07:03. Posts 8250 | Profile # |
I'm way too used to qwerty now, although the dvorak layout does look appealing.
I'll try it out someday. |
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| SpiritoftheTunA United States. March 15 2009 07:06. Posts 5840 | Profile Blog # |
| argh this is tough at first |
| | :3 || “So shall it be in the end of the world: the angels shall come forth, and sever the wicked from among the righteous, and shall cast them into the furnace of fire: there shall be the weeping and the gnashing of teeth.” Matthew 13:49-50 | |
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![[image loading]](http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/2/25/KB_United_States_Dvorak.svg/400px-KB_United_States_Dvorak.svg.png)
