Brief history on my typing habits,
1. I learnt to type by playing video games.
2. I do not know how to touch type.
3. I can touch type some words I frequently use, like my name and passwords.
4. I am a engineer and most of my work is on my computer.
5. I hunt keys on the keyboard as I type and at best my speed is around only 35-40 wpm.
6. Since I program most of the time I never had to improve my typing speed, since i can only progam as fast I think and not as fast as I type.
7. I am 27 years old.
8. I only use 8 digits to type and I dont use my 2 pinkys for typing other than for pressing Ctrl or Shifts or Return keys.
Why I am trying to learn touch typing?
I felt that I am putting more strain on my eyes and get tired very easily swicting my vision from keyboard to the screen constantly. And I also have some mild pains on my right wrist, due to bad wrist mouse positioning over the years. I don't want to aggreviate the condition with my bad typing habits.
Other than that, over the years I have increased my programming skills and recently I feel like I cant type as fast as I think. I also want to learn to touch type so I dont have to live with this bad habit anymore and improve overall well being of my eyes, fingers and hands.
Back to my original question,
"I do not know touch typing with qwerty, can I still learn colemak?"
I researched online for a bit and decided to learn touch typing. I have been trying it out for the past 2 days on qwerty. Yesterday I went the whole day with touch typing on qwerty although I was slow as a snail at about 10 wpm. I got some sleep and tried to touch type in the morning and feels like I have gotten slightly better. Now I can touch
type much faster at about 15-20 wpm and even faster (Probably because I knew most keys by muscle memory) if I dont use my all 10 fingers and only use 8 (no pinkys).
I am trying to give colemak a shot. Mainly because of the homerow key placements and less finger movement. And feels like a sensible choice. Since I dont know how to type properly anyway, I thought I might as well try it.
I am a Vim user btw. If and when I get comfortable i can remap my keys.
Should I continue learning qwerty or switch to colemak? I am ok if my productivity takes a hit. Today is friday so i have 2 days to practice till monday.
Also, is it ok to use only 8 fingers instead of 10?