The author uses dynamic programming to calculate the various costs involved with typing (like finger movement, distance from home row, etc) and uses that to generate better layouts via simulated annealing. I thought it was a nicely quantitative take on a subject that is usually so subjective.
Although he had the right idea, I think this author’s analysis was rather poor. I don’t think he did a good job of modelling the importance of different kinds of typing strains. I like Colemak a lot better.
There’s a really interesting comparison of popular keyboard layouts and proposed optimizations here: http://mkweb.bcgsc.ca/carpalx/
The author uses dynamic programming to calculate the various costs involved with typing (like finger movement, distance from home row, etc) and uses that to generate better layouts via simulated annealing. I thought it was a nicely quantitative take on a subject that is usually so subjective.
Although he had the right idea, I think this author’s analysis was rather poor. I don’t think he did a good job of modelling the importance of different kinds of typing strains. I like Colemak a lot better.