|
Some tricks I developed after overusing Emacs: |
|
Hit the left Ctrl Key with your palm as in a karate chop. As the right pinky takes a lot of abuse: bind the right Alt Key to Backspace and hit it with your thumb. If you hit enter a lot, you could bind the right Ctrl Key to Return and hit it with your right palm as in a karate chop. I have switched from Qwerty to DvorakKeyboard, and after a year of it I can definitely say that there is a huge difference. Even if your aim is not efficiency but comfort then it definitely covers that domain (other's will argue that other keyboard layouts are more efficient such as MtGap3?.5, Colemak, etc, but it has been shown that even people who type in Qwerty can exceed the typing speed of those in the "more efficient" layouts...Simply because they use weird finger positioning and do not follow traditional typing practices.) I used to type 60wpm max on Qwerty, and only after a year, I can do 100wpm max, 85pwm constant (used TypeRacer? and 10FastFingers? over the course of 4 months to determine these figures). The fact that is uses two hands and has a 50/50 hand usage ratio is something to envy, although the percentage for fingers is another story. This is why I've been thinking of learning MtGap3?.5 for the sake of comfort, not speed. >I wonder if modal editors, such as ViFamily might have an edge or if a text editor that emphasizes function keys and/or use of the mouse might not be more comfortable in the long run. > >Clearly, avoiding retyping would be very nice. Graphical editors such as Sam and Acme that also provide a command language allow this. Users of these will create a "scratch window" that they put their commands into to re-run later. Any macro-like editing though, personally, should be done in a terminal. As of writing this I am unsure of any text editors that detect changes to files and automatically load those changes without prompting. So you could do something like: sed 's/hello/bye/g' helloworld.c and the text editor with this would re-load the file. You could place many of these in a text file for later as well. There is yet a text editor that allows me to quickly highlight a line and send the command to a shell. There is | < > for Sam and Acme, but they have built-in command languages and 'terminal' windows (not so much Acme...). The Chording mechanism in Acme (and Sam in the plan 9 distribution 9front) satisfies the less typing requirement, allowing text to be copied, pasted, and searched with just mouse clicks. Modal editors I find are even harder on the hands- they require extra typing to indicate modes and parameters ;) |
In other words, use the text editor that gives you the most power for the least amount of pain.
This would tend to preclude editors that require gymastics like the EmacsFamily, which requires the use of extensive CTRL and META/ALT key usage to accomplish tasks.
The Brief command set was good in this respect, the easiest keys - fn keys, keypad -, Ins key etc being allocated to the commonest functions
MinEd optimizes the right (numeric) keypad to provide the most frequent functions of navigation and copy/paste at one hand without repositioning; a central "HOP" key is used to double the number of easily reachable functions.
I wonder if modal editors, such as ViFamily might have an edge or if a text editor that emphasizes function keys and/or use of the mouse might not be more comfortable in the long run.
Clearly, avoiding retyping would be very nice.
It might also make a lot of sense to switch to a DvorakKeyboard instead of using Querty.
WordStar got points from the latter, as all WordStar commands were mapped to Ctrl-key combinations, and a touch typist could do everything without ever shifting their hands from the "home row" on their keyboard.
o However, permanent use of the Control key is not too convenient for the hand, either. --arcor-ip.net
In the days when WordStar grew popular, the Ctrl key was where the Caps Lock key tends to be on current PC keyboards. The first thing I do on a Linux system is use Xmodmap to make Caps Lock another Ctrl key. :-) --DMcCunney
For that matter, there were screams of anguish back in the days when keyboards changed from ten Fkeys in two vertical rows on the left side to a single row of twelve across the top for the same reason. People using Fkey driven applications like WordPerfect could hit fkeys with the little finger of their left hand and not have to venture off the home row.
And a lot of folks still gripe about the change that swapped the position of the Ctrl Key and the Caps Lock key, and an assortment of utilities exit to remap the keyboard to fix that.
Of course, go back far enough, and you get a generation of typists trained on the IBM Selectric typewriter, who never forgave the PC designers for not adopting the Selectric keyboard layout.
Mice, arrow keys, and function keys have uses, but all require that you move one hand off the keyboard, and slow down your typing speed. How much that matters will depend on what you are doing, but it will matter. --DMcCunney
Hit the left Ctrl Key with your palm as in a karate chop.
As the right pinky takes a lot of abuse: bind the right Alt Key to Backspace and hit it with your thumb. If you hit enter a lot, you could bind the right Ctrl Key to Return and hit it with your right palm as in a karate chop.
>I wonder if modal editors, such as ViFamily might have an edge or if a text editor that emphasizes function keys and/or use of the mouse might not be more comfortable in the long run. > >Clearly, avoiding retyping would be very nice.
Graphical editors such as Sam and Acme that also provide a command language allow this. Users of these will create a "scratch window" that they put their commands into to re-run later. Any macro-like editing though, personally, should be done in a terminal. As of writing this I am unsure of any text editors that detect changes to files and automatically load those changes without prompting. So you could do something like:
sed 's/hello/bye/g' helloworld.c
and the text editor with this would re-load the file. You could place many of these in a text file for later as well. There is yet a text editor that allows me to quickly highlight a line and send the command to a shell. There is | < > for Sam and Acme, but they have built-in command languages and 'terminal' windows (not so much Acme...). The Chording mechanism in Acme (and Sam in the plan 9 distribution 9front) satisfies the less typing requirement, allowing text to be copied, pasted, and searched with just mouse clicks.
Modal editors I find are even harder on the hands- they require extra typing to indicate modes and parameters ;)