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Comment by thanhhaimai | Hacker News Reader

For people looking to try a new layout, I recommend a Carpalx optimized layout. They have very detailed analysis on the layout:

http://mkweb.bcgsc.ca/carpalx/?full_optimization

I've been using it on my Kinesis for a while, and it's totally worth it:

https://github.com/qmk/qmk_firmware/blob/master/keyboards/ki...

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I am using the qgmlwy along with a few custom layers and custom modifier keys. Most of the improvements come from touch typing (not a custom keyboard). But a custom keyboard is still an improvement. The biggest issue for me is not the learning part (even though this took months), but the setup: whenever you want to switch os, reinstall, setting up the keyboard is a huge pain.

I have setup my layout on ubuntu with xkb and this took days of full-time work, because xkb is so convoluted. On osx, I just use a custom C script that transforms each keystroke, the code is ugly but this is easy to work with.

> and it's totally worth it

How would you characterise it? Speed, comfort, typo rate, something else?

What layout(s) did you touch type on before carpalx?

I might be interested in switching (after 15 years of increasingly customized dvorak).

I've been using qgmlwb for 4 years or so. It's difficult to compare with qwerty, since I didn't type properly before, but it feels pretty comfortable and effortless. I feel like my right hand is overused, but I doubt it has anything to do with the layout, I just don't like using my right pinky; or, rather, it doesn't like to be used.

I'm long aware of this website. Fascinating stuff. I wonder how this Workman Layout would fare, evaluted by their algorithm?

There is an analysis of Workman here:

http://mkweb.bcgsc.ca/carpalx/?popular_alternatives

Indeed, thanks!

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