I have used Colemak every day for two years now, I am very happy with it. But I still mix up "s" and "r", with the embarrassing result of sometimes addressing a "Ms" as a "Mr".
I would be happier with a Colemak where the "s" stays in the same place as on a QWERTY keyboard, and the "r" takes the place of the Colemak "s" i.e. QWERTY "d".
Is it just me, or does anyone else experience the same problem?
I experienced this for a short period when I was learning the layout. You should find that you get used to them after a couple of weeks (hopefully sooner)
You should find that you get used to them after a couple of weeks (hopefully sooner)
Er... he's stated he's still experiencing this issue after two years ;-)
Dvorak typist here. Please take my comments with a grain of salt.
I've been using Colemak for about a year and I tend not to have the problem unless I use QWERTY for most of my day for something at school. I used to make the mistake a lot, even without using QWERTY, so I had to practice focusing on not making the mistake.
I think that would work, and due to all of the convenient finger rolls one should not switch the standard layout.
Colemak typist
I m facing a similar problem. I've been learning Colemak for a couple of weeks, after trying to learn QWERTY (I was stuck around 30 wpm and 96% after 1 months , and I do between 40-50 with my Sight typing), so I switched to Colemak. However I m really struggling to do the r. I don't have any problem for the s but the r really feels awkward. It feel more a physical things than a psycholgical one but I didn't have any problem to do the s in qwerty, so maybe It more in psychological than I thougt.
gor: It's probably a psychological issue. You expect to have trouble and so you do. Your best bet is to slow yourself down and practice typing lots of words with r's and s's in different orders.
Two years and just joined the forum? I wonder how many other quiet Colemakers there are...
"It is an undoubted truth, that the less one has to do, the less time one finds to do it in." - Earl of Chesterfield
The s-r switch was easily my most difficult unlearning/relearning when I switched to Colemak. Simonh's suggestion of practicing lots of r and s words is a good one. There's some muscle memory that has to be unlearned for those two keys in particular, but eventually it stops being an issue.
Why was Colemak designed with the R and S to be like that?
Here's some information about why the R and S are in their respective locations.
That'r weird indeed that many person seem to have this problem. I would personnaly have inverted the F and the R. I think the F event if not on the home row is more accessible than the R.
Well I think that the current configuration of Colemak is to insure that there are the most finger rolls possible. If you kept the S where it is made R index finger then that would make T with the middle finger. It would be nice but the current configuration should have more inward rolls. I think that much compromise with QWERTY is a bit much. The way Colemak is right now is pretty stable, and I think works very well once you get used to. Everytime I switch to QWERTY and come back to Colemak for a specific task, I always make the s and r mistake but then get used to Colemak again.
You could just practice or focus on it like I did when I was doing my training, but I don't think that it's a problem with the layout, because of the convenience that the rs roll provides.
Colemak typist
