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Comment by zavec | Hacker News Reader

I always wonder about the choice of hjkl, because don't people normally rest their hands one row to the left, on jkl;?

It has to do with the codes these keys (used to) emit in combination with Ctrl:

  Ctrl/H - Backspace
  Ctrl/J - Line Feed
  Ctrl/K - Upline
  Ctrl/L - Forward Space

Source - the ADM-3A operator's manual, page 3-5: