Tarmak may well be the best transitioning mechanism (not only in the colemak universe, but in layouts period).

There are indeed a lot of metrics programs/sites.  Carplax is well-renowned, Keyboard Layout Analyzer easy to use.  I haven't tried to deeply analyze any metrics, however; I imagine that'd be more your area.

A couple other things I've posted about recently:

https://forum.colemak.com/viewtopic.php … 560#p12560

https://forum.colemak.com/viewtopic.php … 514#p12514

or another modifier layout - see Dreymar's sig for one that uses caps.

The main pro is that you can reach AltGr more easily, and that the /? moves from the questionable pinkie to the strong index.  The main con is that, on ascii keyboards, the "' get displaced to the top row.  Also, it's harder to reach the middle two keys, leading to possible waste (I still don't really know what rare character I should put there).

You can make just about any layout wide with AltGr mappings, but you'd probably have to make it yourself.  Also, you should optimize the AltGr layer for your own usecase/languages. I'm not even sure mine is particularly well-optimized; will have to do a serious study when I get spare time later this summer.

Note that Amphetype (I think python programs in general) does not play very well with AltGr "command keys".  You have to insert them into the program manually.  Fortunately, that is not too difficult.

I hadn't really thought of that; I guess it might help.

@lalop

I think this is the first time I wish I had a German keyboard, they have another key next to O one could use for '". So how did you learn your wide layout? Started with Colemak and then transitioned? Also, in you wide layout, which symbols does AltGr mode activate?

edit: How do you use your layout on other computers? I know there is a file one can put on a usb drive to use colemak but does that work for your layout as well?

@Tony

yeah I've had some difficulties with my Java security settings but finally managed to get it running. Neat site!

Ok thanks, I think I'll probably do it like that as well. Start out with "simplified" Colemak using Tarmak, and then eventually switching to the wide layout. Although I like the way you use Backspace and Ctrl...

Drop the layouts from PKL_vk_Tarmak.zip\PKL_vk_Tarmak_0-5\ into the layouts directory for your pkl and then add to the layouts line in pkl.ini e.g.
layout = colemak,vk_Tarmak1(E):Tarmak 1

Might be good to have a standard package that we can put up though. Maybe Dreymer could include it in his PKL package along with the widemod? Otherwise I'll put one up somewhere.

I think Dreymar has it set to work with his Extend mapping by default (see his sig thread).

If you want backspace, this commented-out line in the layout.ini looks promising:

;CapsLock = OEM_1    0    ={backspace}    *{CapsLock}    ={backspace}    ={backspace}    ={backspace}    ; Caps Lock

So I've been practising roughly 45-75 minutes in Amphetype every day for the past ten but didn't do a lot of other typing besides that. It's good to finally be on Colemak and not having to go back to a shit speed tomorrow haha. Hopefully I'll be able to go up to 50wpm within the next 7-10 days. Annoying words over the time were: thoughts, people, yourself.

I updated the initial post for more statistics.

I guess that depends on how you define very comfortable. Personally for me comfort has a lot to do with flow. And flow has a lot to do with being able to type at a certain base speed without making mistakes all over the place. I think personally for me, the magic numbers are a flow of ~40WPM and an accuracy of 97%. Whenever my accuracy was <95% I felt like I was making a lot of errors.

As you can see in my results, I only ever once came close to the magical 40WPM. But that's fine, I decided that as long as my accuracy is around 97% and the speed around 30WPM I'm still comfortable enough to level up. Which for me I guess proved to be right.

It is also interesting to notice how over time the average second day speed gets lower and lower. This for me is due to not being comfortable with a few keys that aren't trained as often as the others. I remember on Tarmak 1 I had problems with K for about 4 days, just because it is not used as often as E and N.

I think focusing on accuracy is very important when considering when to level up. From my experience I suggest the aim should be between 95-100% combined with a speed of >25WPM. Having a greater speed initially helps, as performance will very likely decrease when adding more keys from the colemak layout.

Nice graph. According to your result I think Tarmak would be the best way to learn Colemak, since each transition phase is very gradual and average users can endure it without much pain while keeping credibility at work.

try to see how quick you can type the Dutch word "karsten". It's such a fun word to type in colemak, just a shame that it's barely used in day to day language. Well, maybe if you're a Dutch geologist, but I doubt that.

Hi! Glad you're enjoying Tarmak and PKL and everything.

It's too bad that PKL isn't better documented; this mostly stems from the fact that Farkas Máté is Hungarian and doesn't speak English too well – and he hasn't been heard from in quite a while. So while it's the most awesome layout changing app for Windows I know of, it's kind of an abandonware project. :(

Fun fact: Karsten is a name in Norway! It's a variant of Christian. Now I need to find some people with that name and convert them to Colemak... ;)

Didn't like typing the word "doesn't" either, used to group the letters by thinking "do" followed by "es" then "n't" but now I've trained myself to type it like "d" "oe" "sn't" and it's slightly easier.