I actually think I’m going to take the leap and learn a different typing layout. Doing things better with less effort always appeals to me. I thought originally I would try Dvorak but that layout looked too foreign and I heard it took weeks to learn. I also read that it is difficult to switch back to QWERTY, which will happen often I believe, so I decided against the Dvorak layout.
I learned about the Colemak layout and took this 2 minute typing test. The typing test lets you type some text for 2 minutes, then replay your key strokes in QWERTY, Colemak and Dvorak layouts to see how much effort you would have saved. It turns out that your fingers move 2.2x more using QWERTY compared to Colemak. What’s more, there are many users reporting the ability to use both Colemak and QWERTY interchangeably as the task requires.
1 response so far ↓
1 leo_rockway // Jul 13, 2008 at 12:18 am
I switched to Colemak like two months ago. I believe my typing speed now is pretty much like it was in QWERTY after 12 years or so of touchtyping. That alone should be enough to tell you that switching to Colemak is not too hard, but there’s also the benefit of hand positioning: my hands feel so much better now than what they ever did in QWERTY.
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