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This past month, I’ve been reevaluating my dev environment and workflow. My goals are to reduce RSI, be more efficient, as well as learn all my tools as deeply as possible. And have fun!

- I’ve ditched VSCode and gone all-in on NeoVim. I’ve spent a bunch of time watching Primeagen, etc., tweaking my vid config and learning how to navigate as efficiently as possible.

- Switched from QWERTY to Colemak-DH to hopefully reduce RSI. I’m at about 70wpm with decent accuracy after 4 weeks. My QWERTY skills are gone. I like Colemak, but we’ll see how I feel in another month or two.

- Finished my custom hot swappable Sofle keyboard, and spent many hours customizing the layout. I think I’m pretty close to feeling comfortable. I’m using home row mods, which I love. Currently using Kailh box whites (clicky). Might switch to Gateron Brown Pros.

- Been going through a “Build your own git” course, to understand git as deeply as possible.

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Strongly urge you to acquire a Logitech MX Vertical mouse. It takes a few days to get used to; now you'd have to pry it from my dead hands.

I went down this path and tried various vertical mice, and settled on the MX V for a few months in the pursuit of reducing wrist pain. After about 4-5 months or so, I started getting strong wrist pain again, and switch backed to a standard mouse. At that point I started looking elsewhere, specifically on strengthening my wrists and joints. I've been doing this about 5 times a week for probably 5 months now, and most of my mouse hand wrist pain has subsided: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iVum3vWlh4Q

Thanks for the video. I’ll definitely try it out. In my original post, I should’ve emphasized that I’ve also been focusing on strengthening/mobilizing my wrists. It’s only been a month or two of concentrated effort, but I think they’re improving a bit.

Congratulations on learning Colemak! I made that journey myself and haven't regretted it once since. I did have to relearn QWERTY, frustratingly, but luckily it isn't nearly as difficult as learning a layout for the first time, and I can now switch between them relatively easily. (For me, a few years on, I now type at 100-120 WPM on Colemak; I was also at 70 WPM four weeks after starting.)

Thanks!

That’s encouraging to hear that you can switch between the two. Awesome!

I’m afraid to start practicing QWERTY too soon, and risk losing my progress with Colemak. Maybe I’ll attempt it in a few months.

I didn't go back to QWERTY until having had a couple of months of uninterrupted Colemak use, so I don't know what the effects of that would be. But yes, I can now switch between the two :) After a few minutes of 'warm up', I can type about 70 WPM in QWERTY and then go straight back to >100 WPM Colemak. Also, I always use QWERTY on my mobile phone, since 'swipe-typing' doesn't really benefit from having frequently-used letters close to each other nor from having them on the home row.

For my issues, the combination of apple trackpad and a proper ergonomic keyboard with a keywell did it: at first Kinesis Advantage 2, then Glove80. Model 100 is also quite good.

Building custom keyboards is fun, but I might bite the bullet and buy a Glove 80.

I don’t own a 3d printer, so designing a custom Dactyl is not very feasible for me.

oooh the sofle. i'm curious about your layout! been using a Moonlander for a few years and while I like it, it's just too big. ordered a sofle variant recently and I've been thinking about switching back to a dvorak or trying colemak when it arrives.

The Sofle has been decent for me. I’m not the biggest fan of thumb key positions (especially the outer one), but I’m getting used to them.

There are only two thumb keys per side. I’ve had to get a bit creative with my layout. One trick I’ve discovered is Mod-Tap. This lets me use my space bar as a layer key (when held), or a normal “space” when tapped. Two functions on a single key. Awesome.

I’ve also been reading this person’s blog to improve my symbol layer and vim navigation (I’m tempted to try the Engram layout, but I’ll stick with Colemak for now): https://sunaku.github.io/engram-keyboard-layout.html

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