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Comment by tyleo | Hacker News Reader

I recently switched to the programmer dvorak keyboard layout and haven't looked back since. I switched in December and purchased keyboard stickers from Amazon (http://amzn.com/B00IPGZC54). I also practiced on Keybr (http://www.keybr.com/) for about 2 hours a day until I had practiced 20 hours. Luckily I was on vacation so I didn't have to worry about how I would work. After my initial 20 hours of training I had already reached 30 words per minute which was suitable for getting back to work. I now type at a blistering 70 words per minute compared to the 50 words per minute I would reach on qwerty. In my personal opinion though, most of the speed comes from the practice I have done on Keybr rather than the switch in keyboard layout.

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Your situation seems familiar to mine. I was never a comfortable typer using QWERTY, I would resort to hunt-and-peck after any hesitation or typo. I bought into the hype that DVORAK was more ergonomic and faster, so I gave it a try. I don't know if any of that is actually true nor does it really matter. The end result is that I am comfortable with DVORAK and I no reason to switch back. I can still type in QWERTY just as well (read: poorly) as I did before and I still use QWERTY for my mobile devices (sans physical keyboard).

I bought the stickers for my home only because if I left the layout in DVORAK (as I usually do), then my wife wouldn't be able to login. Or, at least, that was true when I made the switch. Now most lock screens have an easy way to switch layouts.

At work and with my personal laptop (that isn't shared), I do not use the stickers because it prevents me from looking at the keyboard. Plus, when I do look down and see the stickers, I see white-letters and blue-letters. It makes it more confusing which key I am about to press. I end up mixing up words between DVORAK and QWERTY regardless of layout.

I always read glowing reports from switching to Dvorak, so here's my experience:

I switched to the Dvorak keyboard about 5 years ago. Previously, I typed 110 WPM on QWERTY, and while learning Dvorak my WPM rose quickly from 10 to 70 WPM, but remained there. I now type at about 80 WPM, but even with practice I have not been able to regain my previous speed. I can switch to Qwerty, but my WPM has gone down too -- it's about 80 WPM now.

I realized that I had been achieving 110 WPM because I had unconventional hand positions (I never learned to type "correctly", so it just developed). Learning and staying with the "correct" hand positions brought down my WPM. Previously, my hands flew around the keyboard, but now they're mostly stationary on the home row. The positive outcome of this is that I can now use non-traditional keyboards such as the Kinesis, where I cannot move my hands around while typing.

I don't regret going to Dvorak because of the great comfort it brings to my tired hands, but I do miss the speed from time to time.

Is there really a need for blistering-fast WPM? Outside of transcribing/typing up documents (and how many people really do that anymore?) is there any real point to it?

I don't know that I manage more than a sentence a minute - the limiting factor there isn't my typing speed, it's thinking through and editing what I'm going to say. Programming, it's probably on the order of 10-15 characters a line, and unless I'm doing mindless boilerplate, that line takes a minute or two to think through.

My experience is pretty similar to yours and copperx's. I'm no faster or slower but my hands have felt a ton better and I haven't had hardly any RSI issues since. Been typing in dvorak for about 15 years now. It was pretty painful for two weeks but I'm glad I switched.

Are you sure you've been using a good form? You should easily be able to get over 50WPM on qwerty if you use a reasonable form and have been doing it for a while. Taking a keyboarding class as an elective in high school brought me from maybe 50 or 60 to 120. I didn't follow the part about keeping your fingers over the home row at all times though - they'll generally hover in the middle of typing when not hitting a key.

I didn't much pay attention to form when I was using qwerty. When I started to learn a whole new layout I decided to do it right. I reckon that is the cause of most of my additional speed.

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