the Dvorak keyboard

I love the Dvorak keyboard!

I'd heard about the Dvorak keyboard many years ago, perhaps even the early 1980's, and it seemed like a good idea. I mean, who would have thought that the standard typewriter keyboard was designed to be inefficient? Isn't capitalism supposed to choose the efficient over the clumsy? In this case, though, by the time John Dvorak invented his improved keyboard layout, QWERTY was already entrenched as a standard, and since typewriters can't be rearranged without considerable effort, the choice was to force established typists to relearn how to type, at considerable cost to their employers, or teach new typists to conform to an admittedly inferior standard. Short-term gains won out.

Today, however, those excuses don't apply. Computer keyboards can be remapped instantaneously at no cost, so the only investment is the time to learn the new layout. I will admit, this does take some effort--you have years of habitual muscle training to undo--but the gains are well worth it.

I got started on this in January 1998, when I was searching through www.download.com (or maybe www.shareware.com, I don't recall) and I randomly ran across something called Electric Dvorak, a small Macintosh app that would install the new keyboard layout, so I decided to give it a try. It was hard at first, having to think consciously about every single character I had to type--this was very frustrating to someone who can type at least 80 wpm for the short periods that my tendinitis will allow. But it was also immediately apparent how smooth and fluid the movements would be once I learned them. There was an almost giddy sensation of being in the presence of really good engineering, and I was totally convinced right away.

Just what are the gains?

All the most common letters in English are on the home row, directly under your fingers, so you scarcely have to move to reach them.
All the vowels are in your left hand, and the most common consonants in the right, so that alternations between consonants and vowels are very often performed by bouncing between your two hands, which is easy and fast.
Many of the most common multiple-letter combinations, such as sh, th, nt, ch, wh, -ing, -tion, etc., either center on the home row or involve very fluid movements across the hand in consecutive fingers, like drumming your fingers on a tabletop. Look, for example, at -ion on the standard keyboard: first you have to reach up, and then swing slightly to the right for the letter "o," and then abruptly reverse direction, heading down and to the left for "n." On the Dvorak keyboard, all the letters are on the home row, easy to get to.

Here's the basic layout:

     1  2  3  4  5  6  7  8  9  0  [  ]  [del]
[tab] "  ,  .  P  Y  F  G  C  R  L  /  =  \
[lock] A  O  E  U  I  D  H  T  N  S  -   [ret]
[shift] ;  Q  J  K  X  B  M  W  V  Z   [shift]

This arrangement is right-hand oriented, in that the right hand is a lot busier than the left. This is good for most people, but not for me, because my tendinitis is worse in my right hand. So, before I got too comfortable with the ordinary Dvorak layout, I used ResEdit to make a mirror image of the bottom three rows between "a" and "s." Here are the Macintosh files. I don't have a corresponding layout for Windoze, sorry. If you use Windows and have a keyboard editor, I'd love to have a copy so I won't be toast if I ever have to use a non-Mac machine.

The first couple of weeks were hell. I got headaches from thinking about every letter. Of course, that's because I did it the macho way, just using it for work and email without using a typing tutor (they're available on the web too). But within a couple of weeks, letter combinations started to become more automatic, and after 5-6 weeks, I had almost all the kinks worked out. At the time of this writing, six months later, I'm completely accustomed to it.

Studies have shown that the Dvorak keyboard requires significantly less finger travel (hence muscle effort) than the standard keyboard, for identical texts. That's all very well and good, but how does it feel? Fabulous! Nothing less. Smooth, liquid, effortless. Typing is almost pleasurable. You don't believe me. You don't understand why Dvorak users are passionate about it (it's just a keyboard, for cryin' out loud--but it's something you use almost every day of your life...). Try it, and you will. You'll never want to go back.

Useful sites:

Dvorak International: Promoting the Dvorak Simplified Keyboard

How to set yourself up for free--all in software

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