As a programmer I needed the keyboard to be an extension of myself. I can't be looking down every 2 seconds to position my hands correctly or find that one key.<p>Originally I never followed home row position and had orchestrated my own abomination of touch typing that would work for all letters. The problem began when I started needing to use () and {} more often since my old typing position would never let me do that with ease. Not to mention capitalizing letters and even using numbers I would almost always need to look down or lose my position and train of thought.<p>I was at about 30 WPM using this method. Eventually I took about 2 months using www.ratatype.com and following through the lessons to pick up home row position and such. Now I can average 80 WPM without trying on most of those speed typing games and 120 WPM on rare occasion.<p>Now I can easily find home row and the keyboard is truly an extension of myself where I don't feel bogged down by typing (using VIM now too). The mental barrier is gone and I only think about the problem and not having to switch context between looking down and finding a key while thinking about the problem. 10/10 would recommend anyone not using home row to try and learn it.<p>side note: I would never have picked up VIM/Emacs if it wasn't for me using home row.
My experience with a guitar suggests that it is a wrong mood to learning new tricks. When I was told that my right hand thumb position is not right, and I should try to change it, I didn't challenged the idea at first, I knew that if I try to change it, I would face problems, it would be harder for me to make it right, even if "right" is a way to a mastery. A few hours a day in a month or two, and I learned how to do it right. Now I can do both ways, because each has its upsides and downsides. I'm playing classical pieces with "right" position of my thumb, it is really good, but when I use guitar as a rhythm-driver I prefer to use thumb to silence some strings.<p>There are no point to compare a new way and the old one before you mastered new. And there are no point in thoughts like "my natural ways are different and should be preserved for the sake of keeping my personality". If your physiology is near enough to averages, than all the differences are neurological or mental. These differences can be overcome. But because they are mental, the mood of yours when you are learning is the very important to a learning.
For someone who "float" types, that's an impressive speed.
I tried out the typing website that 's mentioned on the post, and it reminds me/makes me realise the potential flaw in these types of typing tests.<p>After trying it out for about 10 minutes, I get an average 40 WPM; but I see that it's because I pause for a few seconds after each round of words (probably my brain adjusting from the garbage that it just digested).<p>Typing, and fast typing, is a function of the brain being able to process either an auditory, mental or visual data source, and the hands converting it to keystrokes. If one thinks of the brain as a data buffer, the brain receives info and interprets it, and sends it to the hands. There's almost always some lag, and that lag is mainly how fast one types (my opinion of course).<p>When you're given a test that's got words that don't have much meaning, it takes some adjusting to process them, because I had to rely on reading them word-by-word (I learnt some speed-reading when I was younger, so I tend to process a lot more words at a time).
I noticed that I typed better when the words made sense, because the brain could buffer words, which I'd rely on not reading completely, but using my previous knowledge of how to spell them.<p>The test also doesn't account for the human mind self-correcting. It was only after about 3 minutes where I reduced the habit of backspacing to correct what I noticed to be a typo, but don't know if I get penalised for it.<p>Going back to the author's views on touch typing. I think if he/she spends more time on it, they could improve their speed. The micro/milliseconds that your 4 fingers spend moving would make a difference.
I'm kind of gobsmacked that anyone working in a modern office hasn't learned to touch type. The payoff seems so clear to me.<p>Thankfully my parent (mom) was an amazing typist (scientific secretary) and encouraged me to take typing in high school. This was just as personal computers were coming around (Apple II, IBM PC). I was the only boy in the class ... which was fine by me (hey, I was 14). When I began college, being able to type papers without hunt-and-peck was a clear win, and as terminals/computers became the norm the advantage proved even greater.<p>FWIW, I'm considering trying out a non-QWERTY layout and so far the Workman scheme looks like the best-of-breed; the designer is an engineer who gave it real analysis and it's wisely thought out, IMHO.
25 days is, admittedly, longer than I expected him to try, but I still have trouble accepting the conclusion that it’s just not right for the author. There are many reasons touch typing is the preferred method and why it’s taught in schools and typing speed isn’t necessarily the most important.<p>As someone who does touch type and has tried to switch from QWERTY to DVORAK it’s also widely advocated that you switch entirely, even if you’re dirt slow at first, because the real gains come after your brain finally switches over and it truly becomes muscle memory, not actively remembering where keys are in whichever layout you’re using at the time.<p>In another 10 years I wonder if he’ll regret not switching to get that decreased muscle strain benefit too...
I used a typewriter long before I could read or write, banging out sheet after sheet of gibberish. In school, I turned in any assignment typewritten whenever I could get away with it. My own two-finger system, of course, but I did get reasonably proficient over time.<p>Come seventh or eighth grade, an optional typewriting class made it unto the curriculum (this was in the seventies, a good while before computers entered the picture). A walkover for me, of course, the <i>only</i> one in class who had ever done any typing at all.<p>Except it wasn't. I flunked. Miserably. The only one to do so. My habits turned out to be a hindrance, I never got the hang of ten fingers and a keyboard shielded from view and strange, difficult ways of doing things. To this day I haven't. Whether because of my early, possibly misguided training, or because catastrophic failure convinced me for good that I couldn't do it, I am not entirely decided.
Somewhat off-topic, but the touch-typing website linked showed an example of simpsons paradox after I tried it for 10 minutes to get a baseline.<p>My overall speed decreased over the 10 minutes of practice, but each letter either was flat or improved; the tool is apparently designed to give you more practice with the keys you are slower at, so as it figured out which keys I'm slow with, my overall speed decreased.
I like the way the author characterizes the "feel-good" nature of bouncing between keys with traditional touch typing. I type mostly in Dvorak these days (with some modifications to make it less terrible for programming), but when I do foray back into QWERTY there's often a moment where I'm struck by how nice it feels to stretch my fingers away from the home row, and the novelty of typing mid-size words with only my left hand. It doesn't hold up over time with QWERTY, but now I'm pondering devising a keyboard layout that optimizes for "fun" motions the way modern layouts optimize for finger-travel distance (and how awful the results would be in terms of hand strain!).
Speed and accuracy may be the wrong metrics to focus on as they don't necessarily account for ergonomics. On the other hand the brief mention that it feels better to touch type should probably be seen as an indicator warning to the author that perhaps their self-taught method may be anti-ergonomic. If so, the author should maybe consider the switch to avoid future pain/trouble.<p>(My self-taught form was an "float" of sorts with my right hand travelling a lot to compensate for a left-shifted left hand, which favored the modifier keys. I very much believe that I was very close to needing RSI surgery in grad school, and am very glad I relearned to touch type.)
I do touch-type, but I don't seem to do it in the quite orthodox way. My "homerow" seems to be shift-A-W-D or F and K-O-P-between ' and ENTER. Sometimes my right hand's homerow is also between K and L-P-[-ENTER. When I touch-type my hands actually encroach on each other's territory at times, where the middle buttons can be pressed by either hand.<p>I do find keybr to be very non-representative of typing AT FIRST. It becomes much better after you get through the "lessons". After the lessons it ends up being more like a regular typing test.
From personal experience as someone who types 140-150WPM on average and 200+ in short bursts without using the "official" key-finger mapping but something quite close, the key point (no pun intended) to typing effectively can be summarised in a single sentence:<p>It is more important to know where the keys are, than to know which fingers to use to press them.<p>Once you don't have to think to know where the keys are, and force yourself to use all your fingers, you'll naturally use whichever finger happens to be closest, and that will give you the first big jump in speed. Then type long enough and you'll "chord" keys, typing frequent combinations as a single uninterrupted sequence instead of letter-by-letter. I discovered I could type 60-70WPM <i>with only one hand</i>, because I see entire "words" at a time and already know where on the keyboard to reach.<p>I tried out that keybr.com site and got penalised badly due to the "almost-words" that I constantly mentally autocorrected, it felt like I was typing phrases from the poem Jabberwocky; nonetheless I don't think I did too badly:<p><a href="https://i.imgur.com/T85hFdn.png" rel="nofollow">https://i.imgur.com/T85hFdn.png</a><p>(I found it amusing that the automatically generated sentences had very high occurrences of "cons", "tory", "taxes", "the union", and "war"...)
Of course you can also go all-in on touch-typing, even going so far as to look for keyboards that minimize travel distance, etc.<p>I'm mostly done assembling my own ErgoDox (<a href="https://www.ergodox.io/" rel="nofollow">https://www.ergodox.io/</a>) but haven't used it yet. I'm hoping that it'll make it easier to type (less stress/tension in my hands). It'll be more fun, for sure.<p>Anyone else here interested in assembling/designing their own keyboards?
I've been typing since I was six or seven and I guess I just sorta picked up touch-typing. I was never taught how to type but I don't have to look at the keyboard. (Usually, that is. I switch between English and Icelandic layouts, and it takes me a moment to find punctuation/special characters after switching. And Icelandic keyboards are <i>awful</i> for programming.) I think starting at such a young age got it wired in deep.<p>I find that I rest my fingers on the officially designated home row, but aside from that I couldn't even begin to tell you if I'm touch-typing "correctly." According to keybr.com I have trouble with Q and W (top left/pinky keys, which seem to require repositioning my hand) and B and Y (which I discovered I use the "wrong" hand for when I tried a split keyboard).<p>Whatever I'm doing, it works: I average 100 wpm, and max out at 150 if I'm in a hurry. My partner says my typing sounds like "evil bugs." :)
Keybr.com is great. I really appreciated their charts on layouts.<p>I typed above 85 wpm on average, maxing at about 110. My left hand is proper home row. My right hand is angled with index and middle on j and n, moving around a bit. The chart finally explains why I do this. The left hand side is mostly evenly distributed (on QWERTY). The right hand side is sort of diagonally bimodal. It also clicked with me that I do this to get quick access to backspace with my pinky. Backspace doesn’t appear as a consideration for many keyboard layouts. I hit it a lot.
the problem I find with touch typing and programming is that the right pinky area is responsible for far too much<p>things like -> I do by "floating hand", given I use Vim bindings I often think about trying to make certain things work nicer with homerow touch typing