To make it really easy to know where U and H are, because you never want to be unable to type uhhhhh without looking at the keyboard
This comment has been brought to you by Dvorak, it would be great if it were more supported
Why would we need dvorak?
I was required to take typing classes in middle school, and the teach put cardboard over our hands
I learned touch typing as a result of MSN messenger, in the dark, with a keyboard that would slide under the desk. I think phone contracts have resulted in a lot of people younger than me not being able to touch type.
My cousin types far faster than me, and he credits Typing of the Dead for that skill.
I’m in my 50s. I don’t know anyone who has ever been taught to type.
30’s, and we definately had typing lesson and practice in Information Technology classes.
Maybe people older than me had typing classes and people younger had IT classes then - my age group didn’t have anything like that.
Shifting of focus (eyes to keyboard then back to screen) can slow you down a lot. With computers I just stare at the keyboard and type. Problem with this is when something happens on the screen and the cursor is no longer where I think it is.
What I hate is the forced use of the mouse. Either make it all mouse or all keyboard navigable. In fact, with people having to use screen readers, all forms need to be keyboard navigable.The best typing training I ever got was IRC. You had to learn to type fast or some idiot wouldn’t know how wrong he was.
This definitely prepared me for a career where 90% of my interaction with coworkers is via chat.
IRC and Diablo 2 for me. You had to type fucking quick if you wanted to say something while your character was running to the spot you clicked on because you couldn’t click again until you finished and hit enter on that message lol.
it took me quite some time to learn not to automatically append “:D” at the end of messages in business chat
I took typing lessons back in the mid ‘90’s, which was VERY uncommon for teens to do. When we got the first online multiplayer games, they only had text chat. I certainly had the fastest, foulest mouth in chat 😂
I had a high school class in the mid-90s that taught you how to type. It was taught on typewriters.
There we go!
I spent more time socializing on World of Warcraft than actually leveling. Had lots of friends, and since been happily married to my best one!
Touch typing skills were essential, especially mid-combat.
…Or being the undiagnosed ADHD socialite I was, keeping like 8 running whisper and guild chats going in the game’s single chat window at once… 😂
Arguing with strangers on the internet taught me more than any teacher ever could.
Nuh uh! :p
JK, me too. XD
While I can also say IRC, wasn’t anything like proving someone wrong, just keeping up with the speed of the conversation required being able to type without looking at the keyboard.
Yeah, for me it was all AIM chats, though I had a couple friends who used IRC. But if you wanted to be part of the conversation, you better know how to type. You wanna make a quip? Better be quick, because so does everyone else.
Yeah, I feel like Discord (ugh) got that way quick, too, in more populated rooms. IIRC, IRC didn’t have that “quote for context” either, so if you were hunt-and-pecking the conversation already moved on lol.
Playing MUDs felt like an advanced typing course to me. Especially before scripts and shit became available in the front end. Running around, going through attacks, spells, changing stances, running back to town, roleplaying with other players, reading description text and needing to figure out if a had to go through or climb something and it would get real fun if someone was fighting a mob in the room you entered. Raids and stuff were just insane. Trying to keep up with everything and typing constantly without using the mouse for anything. I haven’t thought about playing those games for a long time, thanks for the walk down memory lane!
Also a great way to learn Dvorak. Memorize the key combo to switch between the two depending on how detailed you need to be in telling them they are wrong, but as long as you keep making yourself spend a little more time on the less familiar layout, you’ll eventually become fluent and won’t have to contort your fingers as much regularly to type quickly.
Though typing games can help, too.
I should start out playing Zork with a Dvorak layout.
Zvorak or something
My parents had me partake in a touch typing course. Only a few years later, after becoming a wbb2 forum mod, did I truly begin to appreciate and practice that skill.
I was too late for IRC, but i was just in time for chat websites. Never was interested in 10-finger-typing, until i discovered online chats. After that, i was one of the fastest in my class.
Is anybody gonna tell this oblivious 30 year old who’s not particularly bad at typing what the lines are for?
So you can place your index fingers on the correct key without looking at the keyboard.
Huh, the more you know. Cheers!
I don’t see how one wouldn’t naturally get that, no offense. I mean, if one didn’t paticularly really ever use a keyboard and typed like gen-x or olders, with index fingers, sure.
But surely if you’re 30 and used a keyboard all your life you don’t need to look at the keyboard while typing…?
No offense. I may just be way overusing one since I was a teenager idk.
I’ve seen an incredible number of people who were never taught to properly touchtype and where each finger goes and developed bizarre techniques to type with 4, 6, or 8 fingers that may be almost as fast as the proper one but horrendously non-ergonomic. Ubiquity of staggered layouts (instead of proper ortholinear) does not help — it’s almost like it’s begging to type Z with ring finger and X with middle one.
I’m deep into my 40s, and I’m one of those. I can get up to 70 words per minute for short stretches, but it’s still a weird dance that combines muscle memory and hand-eye coordination.
I did learn just enough to know to hover my hands and keep my arms at a good posture, so I’ve never had any RSI from typing. That also may be partly because that I’m so inconsistent that I don’t get enough of the R for RSI, LOL.
I touch type , and yes I figured out what the lines were for… But I definitely don’t use them as reference points when I’m typing.
Doesn’t really have to do whether youre good or bad. When they teach you officially, they show you that the j and f are the home row where your index fingers go. If you’re self taught you might not know that and that’s totally fine as long as you can still type.
I’m self-taught as well, and someone knowing the “proper” way to type could probably have a stroke looking at my hands on the keyboard lmao. But yeah since I don’t need to look at the keys when I’m typing, and I still type pretty fast and without mistakes, who cares? If it works it works, even if it looks insane
Wow, they really don’t teach you kids typing anymore, huh.
I need a new keyboard. Those little nubs are worn off mine and I’m constantly putting my fingers on the wrong keys unless I keep looking down at it.
Put a small dot of clear nail polish or glue on the key to recreate the bump.
Hot glue applied via toothpick, problem solved.
I taught myself a personal typing style, because I found touch typing to be awkward, unpleasant and quite frankly shitty to follow.
So yeah, not okay with the implications that not knowing those lines means not knowing how to type.
Whether you touch type per the formal method or not, if you don’t know what the lines are for, ot means you weren’t taught (or weren’t paying attention) typing.
I was taught it in school in typing class, so the meme is accurate, but could be rephrased to something like: What do you mean you don’t know that the lines are for? Are they not teaching that in school anymore?
It’s not about not knowing how to type it’s about not being /taught/ to type. Touch typing and the home row or whatever is what is formally taught.
I also don’t formally touch type but it’s just a meme.
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The last keyboard I built, I went with blank keycaps to force myself to learn to fully use the keyboard without looking.
I also can’t spell
I grew up with a computer in the 80s and for years i would stare at the keyboard while mentally keeping track of what I was typing.
I took keyboarding in middle school and learned to touch type but it took years of practice to break the habits I formed as a child.
Now I’ll be typing something and my husband will walk in so I’ll pause and look over to see what he needs. One time he said “don’t stop on my account” so I started typing again while staring at him.
I can hold a full conversation while doing this but have to slow down to around 60wpm to avoid transcribing the conversation.
Just showing off, excuse me
Well, username checks out.
Genuinely made me laugh
Homeboy mixed up his username and his password.
I hope autofill did that. That’s for sure a rando password right?
This guy types so much, friction completely erased the prints
it wasn’t there in the first place :p
get in touch with their support if you haven’t already
I think you misunderstand, i payed 10€ to not have the prints, because not only it’s wrong when the layout changes (i do this a lot) but it is also way cooler looking
It’s actually good to have the wrong layout printed. You’ll get multiple times the confusion, especially with non-touch-typists, who’ll just assume they hit all the wrong keys, and will try again and again.
aaaaaalright
Hard mode on, I see.
I had key caps like that in grad school both in my home and school computers. Made it real awkward when friends would come over and try to use my computer for something (e.g. look up some songs to put on a Spotify playlist).
My main keyboard was a blank das keyboard for a while, and I had a Fisher price learning keyboard that I’d pull out for my friends if my keyboard intimidated them.
I had a more sedate keyboard for those I didn’t know well enough.
That is very funny trolling and exactly how one should treat their friends
well i have no friends, so am safe
Now make it dvorak
I’m with yaHehe solid choice 😎 have a nice day/evening
I can handle most typing by touch but there’s no way I’m going to remember the ampersand, carrot, and percentage keys.
Oh, you’d learn if you tried. Sounds way harder than it is.
I’d learn if I practiced.
The problem is that I’m not using those keys very often, so it doesn’t stick in my mind.
And there’s no way I’m going to practice either. There’s basically no point for me.
Start using vim and you’ll learn real quick
Those keys still have the lines on them
You still need the lines. The lines are there to identify where to put your fingers, not to tell you what key you’re on.
framework spotted! (13 pro? wink wink)
I see another fella 😉
If only, I have a 10 year old Macbook Air lmao
I thought the pro only came in the black/graphite
Wish they offered ortho too.
No one makes this for iOS that I can tell
Blank phone keyboards heh :)
Your confidence is intimidating
That’s the nipples. You rub em and the keyboards like ‘hey fj r over here!’
As my 13yo would say, “why? I can just voice to text”
For when you need to do an assignment due the next day but your roommate keeps yelling at you to shut the fuck up already because they are trying to sleep while you slowly dictate the introduction to your 5 page essay, which then gets you kicked out of your class because you missed removing a few of the "SHUT THE FUCK UP!"s that your voice to text helpfully added for you.
They don’t teach typing anymore. Which is like. Makes zero sense.
I see college kids typing out essays with two index fingers.
No one learns typing unless forced. It’s super boring.
They need to make it mandatory in public schools. Or future generations will be unable to type properly.
I learned it back in like 8th grade or something.
When I was a kid they taught us how to type in school. But they taught everybody how to type wrong: with your hands parallel to each other, instead of wrists straight. I nearly got carpal tunnel syndrome and had to learn how to type a second time!
Split keyboards for the win! Mine and my wife’s Microsoft Natural Keyboard 4000 is the epitome of “perfect keyboard”. We both dread the day they die since they’re no longer available.
We were taught the same. With a paper over our hands so we couldn’t cheat. My hands naturally moved off home row because it felt awkward to have my wrists bent. I hate the “natural” keyboards but my hands rest like they’re designed
I learned to keep my hands like that thanks to a really weird looking A4Tech ergonomic keyboard, then I realized I could just keep my wrists like that on any keyboard.
I used to have one of those ergonomic keyboards at my last job. Took a week probably to get fully used to (I typed all day). But I recall liking it.
I have small hands but even I feel like most keyboards are cramped. Especially laptop ones.
the egonomic one felt more open and relaxed. But it was wonky to use at first.
Was something like this one.
8th grade? I had typing lessons in 4th!
Really depends on your age. I self-taught with my mom’s typewriter when I was like 8 or 9 and then wasn’t officially taught until 8th grade when computers became more commonplace in schools. Then I had to relearn when I went to school for transcription in my 20s because apparently my 8th grade teacher did a bad job.
Love typing though, my first video game was a typing game on a floppy disk on our windows 97.
That’s actually so cool. I’m just a bit too young to have done so, but I would have loved to have learned on a typewriter. I’ve only ever touched one as a fun relic of the past, never for actual use.
