I set up a custom keyboard in software years ago and it’s much better than the terrible European layout family for coding. So I can type all code comfortably. I can also type all the special characters that I want comfortably. All those “typographic” characters that make technical people go “that must be LLM, 95% confidence”.

I have considered dedicating time to stenography but it likely won’t happen (95% confidence).

I have tried to set up foot pedals but the crap that I bought wasn’t really that helpful.

I have had some success with an auxiliary little keyboard for special functions. I really like having auxiliaries. Because then I don’t need crazy key combos. I can even have visuals for those auxiliaries.

Going beyond that. I have not RSI issues with my hands which can make typing annoying. So I would definitely be interested in other things to make me type less. Like voice dictation. But truly bless the obiquity of the Open Office, the facilitator of so much collaboration and I don’t know what.

> This was even more common when I was a junior. This would normally involve trying to type special characters all over the keyboard. Hitting angled brackets, hitting various FN keys, striking home, end, tons of modifier keys, contorting my wrist in all sorts of ways that I really should not be. This was part of the motivation to learn to type “the right way”: to reduce these types of problems. Probably something that made it worse is that my hands are much smaller than average as a male. My finger span could barely reach an octave if I tried and much more than this is tough:

Setting up this keyboard software and having learned touch typing 20 years ago[1], avoiding wrist contortion was essential. For example: for single-modifier keys I never strain, I just press the key. And then the other hand presses whatever key is to be modified. I do have multiple-modifier setups. But for those I never have to strain. For example: the equivalent of “Shift AltGr” might be two keys right next to each other that can be pressed by the index and the middle finger. It doesn’t get more comfortable than that for me.

Linux Xkb has the accessibility feature “sticky keys”. Of course, like any “accessibility” there’s nothing that says that people who do not strictly need it cannot have use for it too. I use it all the time. Being able to Shift and then hit A-Z keys is very nice.

[1] A separate topic. But touch typing might not be good ergonomically. Maybe some people who do not touch type have less issues. Ergonomics is really about adjusting a primate body from Africa to fit into an office space. So who knows what the correct objective answer is.

> I have my own set of complicated feelings of LLMs (gone are the bouts of satisfaction I would get hammering out code in an afternoon and watching it work at the end of the day). However, it seems increasingly more likely that from a health perspective perhaps they have been a boon to me. Or perhaps I am just senior enough now that it’s no longer a problem. At any rate, if the machines ultimately let me live a healthier life, then so be it. Without your health, you are nothing after all.

Really? You’re going to use the health truism to wave away any concerns? The “complicated feelings”? There are in fact ways to type more comfortably, and less.

This is all fine if the LLM use is incidental to the typing. We all have to either appease investors as businesses or increase shareholer value as laborers. But as an end in itself, using LLMs to type less is the most banal use case.