# Keyboard Layouts (re: Cadey)

This post is in reply to Cadey's post about learning colemak:
=> gemini://cetacean.club/journal/08-11-2020-keyboard-thonks.gmi Cadey's original post
=> gemini://carcosa.net/journal/20200813-colemak.gmi Prosthetic Conscience's reply to Cadey

About 10 years ago I switched from QWERTY to Dvorak. My motivation for the change was 80% due to RSI and 20% dreaming of speed increases. 10 years later my results:

* My speed is pretty much the same in Dvorak as it was in QWERTY
* My RSI is fixed completely
* I can no longer touch-type in QWERTY because I didn't keep up with it during the transition
* I have zero regrets

My situation was unique in that I had quit my job that required me to work on a computer. I was going into religious life and the only time I was on the computer was to send emails home or look up recipes I was cooking for the community. That sort of freedom was wonderful for stress-free transitioning. Even with that, it took most of a week to get to a place where I could hit every key without looking reliably even if it was slow. It took another 3 weeks before my brain stopped having to actively think about the individual characters. Words went back to patterns and my hands translated transparently. I hit my full speed after 2 months.

Colemak doesn't move nearly as many keys around, so hopefully it'll go faster for you. Best of luck!

Originally Published 2020-08-13 at:
gemini://tilde.team/~tomasino/journal/20200813-keyboard-layouts.gmi

If you have questions or thoughts to add please send me a link to your response.
=> /~tomasino/about.txt Contact Information
