[Gllug] Dvorak Keyboards and vim

[Sarah Ewen]

> > go for a Maltron layout that's explicitly designed for that purpose and
> > does a far better job than either QWERTY or Dvorak anyway.
> That looks very nifty; thanks to images.google.com I've found

I hadn't seen Maltron; oooh. It's very very akin to Kinesis, isn't it?
Can anyone see the escape key on it? I can't work out where it is.
The kinesis one is teeny and one of my biggest gripes.

I totally agree with the comments about increased comfort; the combo
of dvorak & kinesis/maltron makes you wonder how people can stand
using the normal qwerty, which flings your fingers all over the place.
With dvorak I find a lot of pleasant key-runs that happen a lot; thi-, 
the-,tha-,I could list lots but it'd be boring and I can sum it up by
saying that typing really feels effortless, which is possibly why
I'm prone to writing so much drivel when I get started.

Anyway.

The only thing which really sucks and takes a lot of practice is "ls".
Both right hand pinky keys. Eventually you won't care but it does really
get on your nerves for a long time. "ls -l" is major pinky work out :)

> I've run into Karl Fogel singing the praises of Maltron keyboards in the
> past (which means I can be sure that it doesn't annoy Emacs users too
> much :) ).
> 
> Poor old vi people are really in trouble: all those positional
> keybindings are totally broken by any new layout, while the Emacs style
> (almost but not quite `bind the keys at random, let the users get used
> to it') always works. :)

thbthbthb. I use vim very happily with dvorak AND qwerty.

> In a few months, when I actually have some money, I'll get one of these,
> I think. (Then there's only the other machine upstairs and the work
> keyboard to replace. I'll probably have to end up buying several of
> them...)

You can borrow a spare kinesis I have for a couple of weeks trial if
you promise to stop implying that Emacs is superior to vim :)

One last thought about key mappings being printed on the keys; when 
you're learning dvorak, that causes a temptation to look down. Don't
do it! Print out a keymap and tape it up at eyelevel. Touchtype from
day 1 and you'll do yourself a favour.

Sarah.
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