Do you have any data to back this up? (Be it second hand or third hand)
For the record I’m not actually against improving ergonomic well-being, I’m just interested in the statistical significance. Mostly so I can estimate if it’s worth implementing certain things at the point in time, or if the disruption caused won’t be sufficiently counterbalanced by the benefits.
Also the DVORAK is not necessarily a better layout in practical terms. While for pure typing it surely is a great improvement upon the efficiency of the QWERTY keyboard it has several potentially crippling disadvantages. To start with standard keyboard shortcuts like ctrl-c and ctrl-v become harder to use. And actually learning to type on a different keyboard layout at the same speed as previously is a substantial investment in time. Plus there’s the incompatibility with control systems based on the QWERTY keyboard (this is most noticeable in games where the WASD keys often replace the arrow keys). I’m not sure the increase in performance really warrants such a disruption.
As far as I can tell, that article says that there have been no studies of the ergonomics of alternative layouts, in contrast to hardware changes, which are well-supported. It does say that dvorak and others were designed by people who knew about ergonomics.
Do you have any data to back this up? (Be it second hand or third hand)
For the record I’m not actually against improving ergonomic well-being, I’m just interested in the statistical significance. Mostly so I can estimate if it’s worth implementing certain things at the point in time, or if the disruption caused won’t be sufficiently counterbalanced by the benefits.
Also the DVORAK is not necessarily a better layout in practical terms. While for pure typing it surely is a great improvement upon the efficiency of the QWERTY keyboard it has several potentially crippling disadvantages. To start with standard keyboard shortcuts like ctrl-c and ctrl-v become harder to use. And actually learning to type on a different keyboard layout at the same speed as previously is a substantial investment in time. Plus there’s the incompatibility with control systems based on the QWERTY keyboard (this is most noticeable in games where the WASD keys often replace the arrow keys). I’m not sure the increase in performance really warrants such a disruption.
I expect it would be just as noticeable in games where HJKL keys replace the arrow keys...
Touché
Perhaps I should have said “one of the most common occurrences of this would be,” or something instead.
But… then I wouldn’t have had the chance to signal around the fact that I play obscure games!
True! And that would be a tragedy.
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0169814198000997 should have it but is paywalled.
Luckily, some website called Common Sense Atheism made it available.
As far as I can tell, that article says that there have been no studies of the ergonomics of alternative layouts, in contrast to hardware changes, which are well-supported. It does say that dvorak and others were designed by people who knew about ergonomics.