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Making an Improved Colemak

  • Started by stevep99
  • 26 Replies:
  • Reputation: 117
  • From: UK
  • Registered: 14-Apr-2014
  • Posts: 978

I think we have discussed these weights before, the above is not perfect, and probably my own assessments have evolved a little since I created that image too. But I'd still say it's still a decent reprentation overall, and I am a reluctant to change it now as I'd have to regenerate the results for all the layouts on the comparison page!

The Qwerty V/N keys are hard to assess - I am still not very keen on them because of the (albeit small) lateral hand motion involved, so 2.6 seems about right to me. For example, are they better than the bottom-row ring-finger keys? I'd say it's debatable at least, yet those are rated 2.8. I agree the pinky finger ratings could easily be higher. I think a good case could be made for saying the new D/H keys are better than A/O even! The tricky part is that A and O are OK on their own but can be more difficult in certain bigram combinations, which single keys ratings can't account for. I nearly did have F and U cyan, but I suppose I also had a motivation to highlight the D and H keys specifically as being near home-row quality.

Using Colemak-DH with Seniply.

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  • From: Viken, Norway
  • Registered: 13-Dec-2006
  • Posts: 5,361

I thought about the results thing, yeah. I guess you don't want to tweak the weights any more. But my main sentiment was about the color range in the image. It has a significant impact on people's perception.

In my head, it'd be rather nice to show the pinky home keys in the same color as the Curl home positions – the color of Nearly Full Home! And actually, the F and U too since those positions are very good. We love ridiculing QWERTY for putting E away from the home row but it's in fact a nearly-home position which any blindingly fast QWERTY typist will probably attest to. Depends a bit on finger lengths and wrist angles and natural curl and whatnot, though.

In the World Of Curl, the Holy Home Row is no longer straight and narrow, which makes both the upper middle finger and lower index finger positions better. So in sum, I'd suggest having six cyan keys: AO/FU/DH. :-)

I'd also use dark blue on the 2.5 weights. Because the middle finger curls are quite okay really, much better than the ring finger ones and more on par with those dark blue keys above.

To sink in the point a little further, I'd personally consider mixing in a little more green in the cyan. But maybe you're committed to a stricter color scheme.

On a side note: If the little finger home positions are cyan(-ish), what then about the ring fingers? Well, I agree with your weights. The ring fingers are stronger than the little fingers by a good margin, but interestingly they're a lot less independent. So their home positions are good, but their stretches not so much. The little fingers handle a lot of stretches quite dexterously, given their inferior strength! (But that still doesn't quite save the QZ etc positions.)

Last edited by DreymaR (15-Aug-2017 12:43:15)

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