You should learn to type (properly)

I originally learned to touchtype in elementary school.<p>These days I just a Dvorak layout and don't worry too much about whether or not I use the proper form. I also don't concern myself with typing speed too much - if the speed at which your can write is your bottleneck, you are either much too clever to be in normal software development or you should stop using COBOL.

It's probably worth clarifying here that touch-typing is different to typing-without-looking-at-the-keyboard-(much). As knowtheory said, many presume that they're the former, when they're actually the latter.

What an arrogant posting (presumably by a web developer). Go write some mathematical software or anything serious at all and you'll find soon enough that typing is not even remotely the bottleneck.

Blehg, GNU Typist recommends putting two spaces after period. Someone needs a lesson from a typographer.

I don't necessarily touch type since I almost never use my pinky other than to hold down the shift button. I don't really see the need to learn how to hold my hands on homerow to type better, I can type about 98 - 110 wpm without any issues without looking at my keyboard.<p>The way I got better at typing and typing fast was to be on very busy IRC channels where getting a word in edgewise without missing any of the conversation required a lot of fast typing.<p>I understand that most of this was meant for the people that are hunt and peck type. I don't think it is at all necessary for people that are able to type at a rapid rate using their own style to relearn how to type.

I never learned to touch type. But if I use some amount of concentration I can type without looking at the keyboard. It's a bit like playing the guitar. I can see a mental picture of the keyboard and I can hit them with fairly high accuracy. I use most of my fingers but the pinkies are often regulated to hitting modifiers. Strangely I cannot picture many of the punctuation keys very well. Nor digits; top row or keypad.<p>I remember having to hunt and peck. But kids now use the keyboard from a younger age, I think the need for formal typing skills is not going to be necessary.

I have recently created a simple touch typing trainer app for Chrome. It's heavily inspired by "typefortune" mode from gtypist: <a href="https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/okboeogmnhjpgbeaokfogelclpblaemo" rel="nofollow">https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/okboeogmnhjpgbeaok...</a>

I'm a coder and I only learned to touch-type recently (within the last year) in QWERTY, it felt better but QWERTY itself just didn't feel right to me.<p>I've since moved over to Colemak layout and I've never looked back (combined with a TypeMatrix keyboard).

If you're on a mac you can install homebrew[1] and then do the following:<p><pre><code> brew install gnu-typist gtypist </code></pre> [1] <a href="http://mxcl.github.com/homebrew/" rel="nofollow">http://mxcl.github.com/homebrew/</a>

Does using an azerty keyboard slow you down when using Vim? I'm assuming it was developed with qwerty keyboards in mind.

How many developers don't know how to touch type? Is this really a problem? EDIT: Even if you pass the hiring process I think you would get fired pretty immediately.

The home-row (touch) typists I know are without exception, all the non-tech people I know. I can't even think of a single tech person in my entire career that typed like this.<p>When I was in High School we were required to take a typing class. I sat next to two of my nerd friends. When the teacher had little tests or races, we always came in 1st 2nd and 3rd in the class in terms of speed an accuracy, and between the 3 of us we probably used 8 fingers combined.