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Ask HN: Tips for coding with one hand?

After breaking my right (dominant) arm on my bike yesterday, I had to get a cast that restricts the use of my arm to the point where I can only use my left arm with my computer. Seeing that I'll have to wear this cast for at least four weeks, do any of you with experience with this have any suggestions? Typing with just my left hand is very slow and frustrating. Thanks.

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I only type with my right hand so here are my tips for typing fast and affective. 1. Make sure you know where the letters are on the keyboard 3. Make heavy use of keyboard shortcuts (control key almost useless) 4. Get Alfred with powerpack. 5. Never use command+tab. 6. Always use Alfred to switch between programs searching for one letter and hitting enter key fast. 7. Place your hand in the middle of the keyboard about a half an inch above your keyboard 8. Your typing needs to flow with the words. 9. probably more

If you're in or around San Francisco I can show you more of my technique for typing fast with one hand. You can hit me up on twitter tweets @gdi2290

Have you tried xkcd's mirrorboard[0]? I don't know if you're on Linux; if not I think I've seen ports for other OSes floating around somewhere. It takes a little getting used to but is fairly quick to pickup, and cheap (in money and scripting time). It works in the same way that mirror writing left-handed is remarkably easy if you do the motions with your right-hand as well (try it now, if you doubt :) ).

In any case, give it a shot. It's free, right?

[0]: http://blog.xkcd.com/2007/08/14/mirrorboard-a-one-handed-key...

Be careful of RSI, the last thing you want to do is strain your left hand with the additional work. One thing you have to accept is that you will not be as quick as before.

If you focus on anything, let it be this, to reduce strain in your left hand while continuing to work. I personally spend a lot of money on keyboards and mouses as that is your interface with anything you do at a computer.

The most comfortable setup I have found is a small apple bluetooth keyboard (low travel laptop style keys) and a logitech mobile mouse. If you have the money, it might be worth looking into getting a touch pad.

Take a look at some of the links here: http://www.onehandkeyboard.org/linux-one-handed-keyboards/

In college I had a TA who broke his hand. He coped by using a mirror keyboard layout so when a button was held down, the values of all the keys changed.

He ended up being able to type 60wpm and ended up challenging some of his students to a typing contest and beating them.

Use a half keyboard? http://www.matias.ca/halfkeyboard/index.php

Or some Autohotkey script to simulate something similar on a full keyboard. Either investing time into a script or money into a physical keyboard are probably your best bets if you're looking at 4 weeks of something that is going to impact your daily work.

I really feel for you. I broke my arm a few years ago, and never found a good way around it. I really honestly felt like I was mentally handicapped (does anyone else feel like when they're coding they think with their hands?).

The best I can say is take it easy - don't force the use of your broken arm - you could really mess things up if you push it before it's healed.

You will get faster. I sometimes eat with one hand and type with the other. I'd say I get 25 to 30 wpm... which isn't too bad. Mind you, I'm not really trying to improve my one-handed typing speed. You just need to let your left hand gain some dexterity and this will take time.

Use something terse, like maybe J [1]. Java or C++ definitely out of the question, too much boilerplate. Lisp would be difficult with only the left hand due to the location of '(' and ')' keys.

[1] http://www.jsoftware.com/

I had a similar experience in high school. I stuck a pen in my cast and used it as a single finger on the right hand to type with. Seriously.

It's not as fast as two hands, but it's a definite improvement over nothing.

The worst part I imagine would be hitting shift. Maybe onscreen keyboard or remap certain keys for special characters.

If hes on a mac, enabling sticky keys will help with the shift, command and alt keys. On older macs all you had to do was hold down one of those control keys for an extra long period of time to kick it into action.

Spend some time training voice recognition software.

type it all on your phone? swype.com

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