Comment by kbrwn | Hacker News Reader

Comment by kbrwn | Hacker News Reader

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Colemak user since I taught myself one summer (2012) by spending the first 20 minutes after waking up typing in vim-tutor. I made the switch because I could not stop looking at the keys on QWERTY keyboards no matter what I tried even with blank keys I would look down out of habit. I tried Dvorak and it felt so unnatural. The common key letters for commands were completely in foreign places that I could not get used to at all. After 2 wks of barely getting past 30 wpm on Dvorak I switched to colemak I was able to beat my QWERTY typing speed after only 2 wks of studying and now I can type 200+ words per minutes with over 90% accuracy thinking about spelling slows be down more than anything else.

If you are under 30 I suggest you give an alt keyboard layout a shot. Older than that and the time to learn Colemak/Dvorak vs just improving your QWERTY speed/accuracy might not be worth it.

If you type at 90% accuracy, do you go back through your text to fix all the typos or do rely on some kind of automation to do that for you? I don't type particularly fast, but every time I tried increasing my speed my accuracy suffers sufficiently that going back and correcting mistakes takes more time than typing a bit slower.

200wpm and 90% accuracy is my result from typing tests while using vi-tutor. In real world scenario I would type slower (closer to 120wpm) to be sure I spell and punctuate without having to backspace or use autocorrect.

“I switched to colemak I was able to beat my QWERTY typing speed after only 2 wks of studying and now I can type 200+ words per minutes”

If it only takes a few weeks then wouldn’t people of almost any age benefit if they type 4-5 hours a day?

My experience learning a new keyboard layout was at age 19 an I was not typing for more than a few hours a day.

It takes much longer to both break old habits and form new ones from older ages. If you have been typing for 20+ years in QWERTY and use a keyboard everyday professionally learning a new layout will likely be a very hard and frustrating task. Every time you switch back to QWERTY you are basically reversing the practice you have put in. If you are typing for a profession you likely won't want to suffer months of half your former typing speed or less until you catch up.

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