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    Tarmak 1

    • Started by eBloom2021
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    • Registered: 15-Oct-2021
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    This weekend I have begun my journey from qwerty to colemak. These are my first-ever Tarmak 1 sentences. Very humbling. Just a few questions:

    (1) I assume asdf is still home position for the left fingers in Tarmak 1. For the right, is home position nel;? Or, instead, is it hnel?

    (2) Is there a chart that shows all the key changes in the Tarmak series? (The help image doesn't show, for example, where caps lock went.)

    (3) Is there a chart that shows recommended fingers for each key grouping in Tarmak 1, 2, 3, etc?

    Thank you!

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    • From: Viken, Norway
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    Welcome to a wonderful journey into the magic of Colemak and its many possibilities! As the Tarmak creator, I sincerely hope you'll have a pleasant experience with it.

    (つ♡ ͜ʖ ♡)つ

    I just noticed that you've asked this in two places. Maybe delete the questions in the other thread then, for clarity?

    eBloom2021 said:

    Is there online training for Tarmak 1?

    See the BigBag Training page. There's a site named Colemak Typing Club by GNUsenpai that has Tarmak training steps. Or you can train by selecting word lists as described. I've included a set downloadable from the Training page, that you could use on Monkeytype or wherever.

    eBloom2021 said:

    For the right, is home position nel;? Or hnel?

    Tarmak is about small changes. The home position in standard Tarmak steps never changes. In the first step, only the keys ENK(J) change.

    eBloom2021 said:

    Where did caps lock go?

    If you use EPKL, the Caps key was probably turned into a wonderfully powerful Extend key! See the BigBag Extend page. It's very good to start with Extend as soon as possible, so don't wait with it as you'll hate yourself for that afterwards. Meanwhile, press Caps+Esc for the Caps function.

    eBloom2021 said:

    Is there a chart somewhere that shows recommended fingers for each key grouping in Tarmak 1, 2, 3, etc?

    As said, no recommended fingerings change. If your technique was bad beforehand, look at one of the help images with fingering for the finished layout. They are found in the BigBag, in EPKL and on the Colemakmods site. Each finger gets one color. Note that the same fingers hit the X (ring), C (middle) and V (index) keys both with and without the Angle mod! If you have "angle-cheated" by hitting C with your index finger on QWERTY, you should relearn it with proper technique:

    Colemak-ISO-Angle_s0_EPKL.png
      Colemak with only an Angle mod (alias Colemak-A-ISO), on an ISO keyboard. Image from EPKL.

    Cmk-ANS-CAS_s0_EPKL.png
      Colemak-DH (plus Sym, alias Colemak-CAS-ANS), on an ANSI board. Image from EPKL.

    Last edited by DreymaR (18-Oct-2021 11:17:32)

    *** Learn Colemak in 2–5 steps with Tarmak! ***
    *** Check out my Big Bag of Keyboard Tricks for Win/Linux/TMK... ***

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    How do I delete the questions in the other thread? I'm new to how forums work and thought after writing those other questions that maybe I was supposed to start a new post to get new questions seen. My bad.

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    Under posts you have written there should be a DELETE button. If you just want to delete some of it, press the EDIT button and, well, edit it instead.

    It isn't a biggie, don't worry. I just like clarity, that's all.  /(⁎≧∇≦)\

    Last edited by DreymaR (19-Oct-2021 14:41:10)

    *** Learn Colemak in 2–5 steps with Tarmak! ***
    *** Check out my Big Bag of Keyboard Tricks for Win/Linux/TMK... ***

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    DreymaR said:

    press Caps+Esc for the Caps function.

    So how is using two keys for caps lock better than one? Or is this just a sacrifice one must make for the other Extend advantages?

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    eBloom2021 said:

    So how is using two keys for caps lock better than one?

    There are lots of times where two keys are better than one. Two well-positioned, comfortable keys are better than an awkward stretch for one that's badly positioned, for example.
    You should be needing CapsLock only very rarely - therefore the standard placement is way too good for it.

    eBloom2021 said:

    Or is this just a sacrifice one must make for the other Extend advantages?

    It's not even a sacrifice. If anything, preventing CapsLock being activated by accident is a bonus.

    Last edited by stevep99 (21-Oct-2021 08:57:04)

    Using Colemak-DH with Seniply.

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    stevep99 said:

    Two well-positioned, comfortable keys are better than an awkward stretch for one that's badly positioned

    DreymaR said:

    press Caps+Esc for the Caps function

    Pressing Caps Lock + Esc is less awkward than just the Caps Lock alone?

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    The point is the comfort of awkwardness or of an action should be in proportion to how common that action is needed. Since the CapsLock function is rarely used (or at least *should* be rare), it shouldn't be in such a nice place. Whereas, plenty of alternative uses for CapLock (Extend, Escape, an extra Control, or something else), would be used much more frequently. It's only really applying the same reasoning as that for adopting an alternative layout in the first place.

    I don't think Caps+Esc is a very good mapping actually. In fact, the standard Esc key is so far away that I would consider it out of bounds. I use Extend-apostrophe for CapsLock which is better, but in reality I could quite happily have no mapping for it at all. One of the beauties of adopting Extend is you can optimize its mappings to suit your own usage, so if you are (for some unusual reason) a heavy CapsLock user, you could give it a higher priority mapping.

    Last edited by stevep99 (24-Oct-2021 14:15:53)

    Using Colemak-DH with Seniply.

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    Thanks DreymaR and stevep99 -- I am a heavy user of caps (headings for outlines, manuscript editor notes, etc.). I love the idea of using the apostrophe instead of esc so it's not such a huge reach. Any ideas on how to set this up in Tarmak?

    Last edited by eBloom2021 (24-Oct-2021 15:00:23)
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    Of course the CapsLock functionality was demoted, as most people hardly need it. You're obviously a special case there, so you do want a better position and accordingly need to sacrifice something else in turn.

    In EPKL, if you want a really handy key I'd consider remapping Ext+Q since there are other mappings available for Esc – even if that one is damn handy. I'd probably settle for Ext+Backtick myself even if I did need the key often.

    This is the line in the Extend file that maps Ext+Q:
    https://github.com/DreymaR/BigBagKbdTri … d.ini#L138

    Change that entry to CapsLock and refresh EPKL. If you do want to use the apostrophe instead, you'll find it in that file too.

    https://github.com/DreymaR/BigBagKbdTri … d.ini#L166

    Last edited by DreymaR (25-Oct-2021 10:06:30)

    *** Learn Colemak in 2–5 steps with Tarmak! ***
    *** Check out my Big Bag of Keyboard Tricks for Win/Linux/TMK... ***

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    Thanks, DreymaR. I've been using Tarmak 1 since we last chatted, but now I want to just jump cold turkey into full Colemak now, skipping the other Tarmak transitions. But I can't remember how to switch layouts in EPKL. I went to BigBagKbdTrixPKL-master\BigBagKbdTrixPKL-master\Layouts\Colemak but not sure what to do next. Or do I change it within the app itself?

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    Hi again! Yes, of course you can skip as many Tarmak steps as you like.

    The recommended way to change layouts these days is from the app itself. Make sure you have the latest EPKL version. The Layout/Settings... panel can be reached from the EPKL tray menu or via a shortcut, by default Ctrl+Shift+6.

    If you want swift feedback with the possibility to send screenies etc, consider joining the Colemak Discord.  ( のvの) c[_]

    *** Learn Colemak in 2–5 steps with Tarmak! ***
    *** Check out my Big Bag of Keyboard Tricks for Win/Linux/TMK... ***

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