
Touch-typing feels good but isn’t for me - solidist
https://medium.freecodecamp.org/touch-typing-feels-good-but-isnt-for-me-2cfbafee2074
======
alunchbox
As a programmer I needed the keyboard to be an extension of myself. I can't be
looking down every 2 seconds to position my hands correctly or find that one
key.

Originally I never followed home row position and had orchestrated my own
abomination of touch typing that would work for all letters. The problem began
when I started needing to use () and {} more often since my old typing
position would never let me do that with ease. Not to mention capitalizing
letters and even using numbers I would almost always need to look down or lose
my position and train of thought.

I was at about 30 WPM using this method. Eventually I took about 2 months
using www.ratatype.com and following through the lessons to pick up home row
position and such. Now I can average 80 WPM without trying on most of those
speed typing games and 120 WPM on rare occasion.

Now I can easily find home row and the keyboard is truly an extension of
myself where I don't feel bogged down by typing (using VIM now too). The
mental barrier is gone and I only think about the problem and not having to
switch context between looking down and finding a key while thinking about the
problem. 10/10 would recommend anyone not using home row to try and learn it.

side note: I would never have picked up VIM/Emacs if it wasn't for me using
home row.

~~~
theandrewbailey
> I can't be looking down every 2 seconds to position my hands correctly or
> find that one key.

Agreed 100%. I bought 2 blank keyboards[0] a few years ago. I relish the looks
people give. I usually follow up by asking "Do you know how to type?"

[0]
[https://www.daskeyboard.com/daskeyboard-4-ultimate/](https://www.daskeyboard.com/daskeyboard-4-ultimate/)

~~~
mbjorkegren
One option if you're on a laptop, is to use a Dremel to remove the labels from
each key.

~~~
rahuldottech
Ow. Reading that physically hurt me, lol. I'd rather use a marker or a
sticker.

------
ordu
My experience with a guitar suggests that it is a wrong mood to learning new
tricks. When I was told that my right hand thumb position is not right, and I
should try to change it, I didn't challenged the idea at first, I knew that if
I try to change it, I would face problems, it would be harder for me to make
it right, even if "right" is a way to a mastery. A few hours a day in a month
or two, and I learned how to do it right. Now I can do both ways, because each
has its upsides and downsides. I'm playing classical pieces with "right"
position of my thumb, it is really good, but when I use guitar as a rhythm-
driver I prefer to use thumb to silence some strings.

There are no point to compare a new way and the old one before you mastered
new. And there are no point in thoughts like "my natural ways are different
and should be preserved for the sake of keeping my personality". If your
physiology is near enough to averages, than all the differences are
neurological or mental. These differences can be overcome. But because they
are mental, the mood of yours when you are learning is the very important to a
learning.

~~~
jacobolus
> _If your physiology is near enough to averages, than all the differences are
> neurological or mental._

Independent control over the last three fingers of the hand is one of the
places where there are some pretty important anatomical differences between
people.

[https://scholar.google.com/scholar?q=anatomical+variation+fi...](https://scholar.google.com/scholar?q=anatomical+variation+finger+extensor)

~~~
cjbprime
Huh! I don't have this independent control in either hand -- I can't bend my
pinky without also bending ring finger -- but I touchtype at 130wpm peak.
Maybe this isn't actually relevant for speed typing?

(Despite trying most mech keyboards/switch types, I've always been faster on
chiclet/low profile/low force style: it would've saved a lot of time if
someone had pointed out that mech keys aren't actually about typing efficiency
at all.)

~~~
jacobolus
Chris:If you get a chance see if you can try some of these Alps switches from
the 1980s in decent condition,

[https://deskthority.net/wiki/Alps_SKCP_series](https://deskthority.net/wiki/Alps_SKCP_series)

I am guessing you could type faster on those than whatever chiclet board. The
advantage they have is that the plate spring pops back up, reducing the amount
you need to use the extensors (it’s faster to just contract and then relax the
flexors than to deliberately lift the fingers). [Unfortunately they weren’t
built into too many keyboards, and some of the ones that do have them are
crappy for other reasons.]

There are a bunch of relevant keyboard design factors which are not really
properly considered by keyboard makers. For example:

\+ The relative height of the tops of the keys (sadly most keyboards ever made
have screwed this up, and it has only gotten worse over time, because most
keyboard designers were just copying past designs without understanding the
anatomical considerations). If the further rows (top letter row, number row, F
row) are aggressively raised, the fingertips can reach them without needing to
bend at the first knuckle, meaning those keys can be pressed without as much
hand movement while the fingers remain in the most comfortable and fastest
part of the main flexors’ range of motion. By contast the bottom row of
letters should be the same height as the home row.

\+ The separation, tilt, and tent of the two halves of the keyboard. Ideally
the keyboard should be oriented so that the forearms and back of the hand are
comfortably flat with wrists and arms in a neutral position, and key axis on
each half of the keyboard should be perpendicular to the plane of the
forearm/hand.

\+ The placement of more keys within a close range of hand/finger motion, and
the elimination of keys further away. (This gets us decidedly away from
standard keyboard shape.) In particular there should be a lot more more
accessible thumb keys.

\+ The letter arrangement. Qwerty is optimized for the original keyboard from
the 19th century. Dvorak is optimized for the shape of 1930s typewriters
(where the consistent aggressive height differences mean that the close letter
row is quite hard to reach but further rows are relatively easy). More recent
efforts to optimize arrangement make no effort to make sure that several-key
sequences on one hand can be typed in one fluid motion. In practice people who
type quickly can line up several fingers on the same hand and press the keys
in quick succession using one medium-scale motion, alternating between
stretches on one hand and the other.

~~~
cjbprime
Thanks, I'll try to! At the moment the fastest mech board I've found is the
(cheap, as mech keebs go) Havit with new low-profile switches:

[https://www.amazon.com/Mechanical-Keyboard-Extra-Thin-
Switch...](https://www.amazon.com/Mechanical-Keyboard-Extra-Thin-Switches-
Rollover/dp/B0722GG88M)

------
nevi-me
For someone who "float" types, that's an impressive speed. I tried out the
typing website that 's mentioned on the post, and it reminds me/makes me
realise the potential flaw in these types of typing tests.

After trying it out for about 10 minutes, I get an average 40 WPM; but I see
that it's because I pause for a few seconds after each round of words
(probably my brain adjusting from the garbage that it just digested).

Typing, and fast typing, is a function of the brain being able to process
either an auditory, mental or visual data source, and the hands converting it
to keystrokes. If one thinks of the brain as a data buffer, the brain receives
info and interprets it, and sends it to the hands. There's almost always some
lag, and that lag is mainly how fast one types (my opinion of course).

When you're given a test that's got words that don't have much meaning, it
takes some adjusting to process them, because I had to rely on reading them
word-by-word (I learnt some speed-reading when I was younger, so I tend to
process a lot more words at a time). I noticed that I typed better when the
words made sense, because the brain could buffer words, which I'd rely on not
reading completely, but using my previous knowledge of how to spell them.

The test also doesn't account for the human mind self-correcting. It was only
after about 3 minutes where I reduced the habit of backspacing to correct what
I noticed to be a typo, but don't know if I get penalised for it.

Going back to the author's views on touch typing. I think if he/she spends
more time on it, they could improve their speed. The micro/milliseconds that
your 4 fingers spend moving would make a difference.

~~~
Mirioron
I completely agree with the criticism you raise towards the website. The
nonsensical words make typing them much more difficult, but the real crux of
the issue is that you can't issue corrections.

I prefer 10fastfingers as a typing test, because it's a list of actual easy
words without silly capitalization and symbols. In my opinion, it's more
representative of the way I would type most of the time than most of the other
tests I've seen.

I will say though, that 40 WPM blows my mind. What kind of a result do you get
on 10fastfingers.com? Because I can do 30-40 WPM on my phone with Swype.

EDIT: I used keybr for a longer period of time now and I think the start of
the website gives a bad impression. The lessons don't feel quite normal, but
once you finish them it ends up much similar to regular typing tests, where
most of the words are actual English words.

~~~
coldtea
> _I prefer 10fastfingers as a typing test, because it 's a list of actual
> easy words without silly capitalization and symbols._

Well, if you write novels, sure.

But programming is all about typing silly capitalization and symbols.

~~~
horsawlarway
eh, I disagree.

More symbols? sure. But most everything is still an English language word.
Admittedly, sometimes smashed together in the thisVarIsHere way, or
this_var_is_there way, but mostly still just normal words where having a
"typing vocabulary" of words you can type from muscle memory is hugely
important.

------
AceyMan
I'm kind of gobsmacked that anyone working in a modern office hasn't learned
to touch type. The payoff seems so clear to me.

Thankfully my parent (mom) was an amazing typist (scientific secretary) and
encouraged me to take typing in high school. This was just as personal
computers were coming around (Apple II, IBM PC). I was the only boy in the
class ... which was fine by me (hey, I was 14). When I began college, being
able to type papers without hunt-and-peck was a clear win, and as
terminals/computers became the norm the advantage proved even greater.

FWIW, I'm considering trying out a non-QWERTY layout and so far the Workman
scheme looks like the best-of-breed; the designer is an engineer who gave it
real analysis and it's wisely thought out, IMHO.

~~~
horsawlarway
I guess I'd ask you to define touch typing then.

I can certainly type without looking at the keyboard (hell, I can air type
every key/symbol from memory) but I sure as shit don't use the standard touch
typing scheme.

I float over the keyboard with my primary 3 fingers on each hand doing most of
the work and my thumb and pinky handling modifiers.

I happen to have hands the size of large dinner plates though, and just
keeping fingers on the home row starts to cramp after a little bit. I probably
have about half my spoken vocab as muscle memory on a keyboard and I reach
about 100 WPM without having to deal with wrist/finger pain at the end of the
day.

------
chrismeller
25 days is, admittedly, longer than I expected him to try, but I still have
trouble accepting the conclusion that it’s just not right for the author.
There are many reasons touch typing is the preferred method and why it’s
taught in schools and typing speed isn’t necessarily the most important.

As someone who does touch type and has tried to switch from QWERTY to DVORAK
it’s also widely advocated that you switch entirely, even if you’re dirt slow
at first, because the real gains come after your brain finally switches over
and it truly becomes muscle memory, not actively remembering where keys are in
whichever layout you’re using at the time.

In another 10 years I wonder if he’ll regret not switching to get that
decreased muscle strain benefit too...

~~~
SuperPaintMan
>because the real gains come after your brain finally switches over and it
truly becomes muscle memory This was half the reason I picked up blanks for my
keyboard, sure the first few weeks were absolutely filled with glances
downwards toward nothing useful, but eventually my brain managed to
compensate. I found the hardest part was homing back to a known position on
the board and would frequently mistype as I was floating back and forth. Turns
out that was most of my issue.

Somehow I ended up designing a keyboard (Gergo & Georgi!) and eventually
settled on a layout that minimized wrist motion (or in the case of Georgi,
finger motion). The default layouts ([0], [1]) naturally happened over a few
months of programming, once the brackets were moved to be accessible with
index fingers, thumbs for mods and enter and the funky Control/Backspace. It's
entirely different to any other board that exists, but it works, for me and
has helped with ergonomics.

I guess trackballs are kind of the same, once you pick it up you'll be
inefficient and clumsy. If you throw out your mice you'll be good enough
before you know it.

[0]
[https://qmk.fm/keyboards/gergo/keymap.png](https://qmk.fm/keyboards/gergo/keymap.png)
[1] [http://docs.gboards.ca/Unboxing-
Georgi#modes](http://docs.gboards.ca/Unboxing-Georgi#modes)

------
interfixus
I used a typewriter long before I could read or write, banging out sheet after
sheet of gibberish. In school, I turned in any assignment typewritten whenever
I could get away with it. My own two-finger system, of course, but I did get
reasonably proficient over time.

Come seventh or eighth grade, an optional typewriting class made it unto the
curriculum (this was in the seventies, a good while before computers entered
the picture). A walkover for me, of course, the _only_ one in class who had
ever done any typing at all.

Except it wasn't. I flunked. Miserably. The only one to do so. My habits
turned out to be a hindrance, I never got the hang of ten fingers and a
keyboard shielded from view and strange, difficult ways of doing things. To
this day I haven't. Whether because of my early, possibly misguided training,
or because catastrophic failure convinced me for good that I couldn't do it, I
am not entirely decided.

~~~
RenRav
I had similar results in the 90s with school courses and I still haven't
learned the sightless method.

------
aidenn0
Somewhat off-topic, but the touch-typing website linked showed an example of
simpsons paradox after I tried it for 10 minutes to get a baseline.

My overall speed decreased over the 10 minutes of practice, but each letter
either was flat or improved; the tool is apparently designed to give you more
practice with the keys you are slower at, so as it figured out which keys I'm
slow with, my overall speed decreased.

------
ezrast
I like the way the author characterizes the "feel-good" nature of bouncing
between keys with traditional touch typing. I type mostly in Dvorak these days
(with some modifications to make it less terrible for programming), but when I
do foray back into QWERTY there's often a moment where I'm struck by how nice
it feels to stretch my fingers away from the home row, and the novelty of
typing mid-size words with only my left hand. It doesn't hold up over time
with QWERTY, but now I'm pondering devising a keyboard layout that optimizes
for "fun" motions the way modern layouts optimize for finger-travel distance
(and how awful the results would be in terms of hand strain!).

------
WorldMaker
Speed and accuracy may be the wrong metrics to focus on as they don't
necessarily account for ergonomics. On the other hand the brief mention that
it feels better to touch type should probably be seen as an indicator warning
to the author that perhaps their self-taught method may be anti-ergonomic. If
so, the author should maybe consider the switch to avoid future pain/trouble.

(My self-taught form was an "float" of sorts with my right hand travelling a
lot to compensate for a left-shifted left hand, which favored the modifier
keys. I very much believe that I was very close to needing RSI surgery in grad
school, and am very glad I relearned to touch type.)

------
Mirioron
I do touch-type, but I don't seem to do it in the quite orthodox way. My
"homerow" seems to be shift-A-W-D or F and K-O-P-between ' and ENTER.
Sometimes my right hand's homerow is also between K and L-P-[-ENTER. When I
touch-type my hands actually encroach on each other's territory at times,
where the middle buttons can be pressed by either hand.

I do find keybr to be very non-representative of typing AT FIRST. It becomes
much better after you get through the "lessons". After the lessons it ends up
being more like a regular typing test.

~~~
magduf
>I do touch-type, but I don't seem to do it in the quite orthodox way. My
"homerow" seems to be shift-A-W-D or F and K-O-P-between ' and ENTER.

The problem here is your QWERTY keyboard. We're taught to use the "home row"
and to keep our hands in that position, yet the keys are layed out in almost
the _most_ unoptimal way for this: the home-row keys are some of the least-
used keys! It's an entirely idiotic layout for a keyboard if you want speed
and comfort (from moving your fingers the least).

If you want to actually touch-type correctly, you need a different keyboard
layout like Dvorak, where the home-row keys are actually the ones you use the
most.

~~~
Mirioron
But why would I want the keys I use the most to be all near one another? I
find that I type the fastest when I have to press keys that are far from one
another. What complicates the Dvorak suggestion further is that I use the same
keyboard to type two other languages.

My hands rest where they do because of games, because that's what I'm most
used to.

~~~
magduf
>But why would I want the keys I use the most to be all near one another? I
find that I type the fastest when I have to press keys that are far from one
another.

Science and physics says you're wrong. Also, it sounds like you've never
actually tried learning another keyboard layout.

------
userbinator
From personal experience as someone who types 140-150WPM on average and 200+
in short bursts without using the "official" key-finger mapping but something
quite close, the key point (no pun intended) to typing effectively can be
summarised in a single sentence:

It is more important to know where the keys are, than to know which fingers to
use to press them.

Once you don't have to think to know where the keys are, and force yourself to
use all your fingers, you'll naturally use whichever finger happens to be
closest, and that will give you the first big jump in speed. Then type long
enough and you'll "chord" keys, typing frequent combinations as a single
uninterrupted sequence instead of letter-by-letter. I discovered I could type
60-70WPM _with only one hand_ , because I see entire "words" at a time and
already know where on the keyboard to reach.

I tried out that keybr.com site and got penalised badly due to the "almost-
words" that I constantly mentally autocorrected, it felt like I was typing
phrases from the poem Jabberwocky; nonetheless I don't think I did too badly:

[https://i.imgur.com/T85hFdn.png](https://i.imgur.com/T85hFdn.png)

(I found it amusing that the automatically generated sentences had very high
occurrences of "cons", "tory", "taxes", "the union", and "war"...)

------
MikeTheGreat
Of course you can also go all-in on touch-typing, even going so far as to look
for keyboards that minimize travel distance, etc.

I'm mostly done assembling my own ErgoDox
([https://www.ergodox.io/](https://www.ergodox.io/)) but haven't used it yet.
I'm hoping that it'll make it easier to type (less stress/tension in my
hands). It'll be more fun, for sure.

Anyone else here interested in assembling/designing their own keyboards?

~~~
jompe
I've got the Ergodox as well and like it in general but I think the thumb keys
are a bit too far away from the rest of the keys. A very interesting project
is Mitosis[1] which uses PCBs both for keeping the switches in place as well
as connecting the swithces.

[1]:
[https://www.reddit.com/r/MechanicalKeyboards/comments/66588f...](https://www.reddit.com/r/MechanicalKeyboards/comments/66588f/wireless_split_qmk_mitosis/)

~~~
MikeTheGreat
And it looks beautiful!

And it looks cheap (-ish, of course).

Do I understand this correctly that it's essentially two separate keyboards
wirelessly connecting to the computer?

------
danaliv
I've been typing since I was six or seven and I guess I just sorta picked up
touch-typing. I was never taught how to type but I don't have to look at the
keyboard. (Usually, that is. I switch between English and Icelandic layouts,
and it takes me a moment to find punctuation/special characters after
switching. And Icelandic keyboards are _awful_ for programming.) I think
starting at such a young age got it wired in deep.

I find that I rest my fingers on the officially designated home row, but aside
from that I couldn't even begin to tell you if I'm touch-typing "correctly."
According to keybr.com I have trouble with Q and W (top left/pinky keys, which
seem to require repositioning my hand) and B and Y (which I discovered I use
the "wrong" hand for when I tried a split keyboard).

Whatever I'm doing, it works: I average 100 wpm, and max out at 150 if I'm in
a hurry. My partner says my typing sounds like "evil bugs." :)

~~~
bonniemuffin
I found that using a split keyboard for a while helped me identify and correct
cases where I used the "wrong" finger for a key, which improved my overall
typing speed and comfort in the end. (And I still use a split keyboard because
I prefer it now.)

~~~
markmark
When I decided it was time to knuckle down and learn to type properly I bought
myself one of those Microsoft ergonomic keyboards for exactly that reason, to
help force myself to use the correct fingers. I ended up loving it and now use
a Kinesis Advantage.

------
b_tterc_p
Keybr.com is great. I really appreciated their charts on layouts.

I typed above 85 wpm on average, maxing at about 110. My left hand is proper
home row. My right hand is angled with index and middle on j and n, moving
around a bit. The chart finally explains why I do this. The left hand side is
mostly evenly distributed (on QWERTY). The right hand side is sort of
diagonally bimodal. It also clicked with me that I do this to get quick access
to backspace with my pinky. Backspace doesn’t appear as a consideration for
many keyboard layouts. I hit it a lot.

------
wtmt
Can someone list good resources (preferably free or low cost) to learn touch
typing on a QWERTY U.S. English keyboard?

------
keithnz
the problem I find with touch typing and programming is that the right pinky
area is responsible for far too much

things like -> I do by "floating hand", given I use Vim bindings I often think
about trying to make certain things work nicer with homerow touch typing

------
cgrealy
If most of your time programming is spent typing, you're doing it wrong.

