Folk keyboard 744

Beats me where the keymaps are or what format they're in. I just know about the pre-canned keyboard layouts.

I generally like Dvorak. I've been using it for about two years now. It took me about 3 months total going from about 70-80 WPM in QWERTY to "comfortable" in Dvorak, and maybe another 3 months or so to reach cruising speed. I think I'm probably still a little slower in Dvorak than in QWERTY (I must be the exception that proves the rule). I still like Dvorak better in general, though, because my hands really do stay fixed in the home position (and I believe the claims that Dvorak helps reduce or prevent carpal tunnel as a result). My biggest complaints about Dvorak are the posbreastions of the {} keys, since I program primarily in C and having to go all the way up to the top row is a pain. Also, I still stumble over the posbreastions of the Y and F keys, even after two years.

At this point, my QWERTY skills are reduced to "hunt and peck," which is unfortunate, but I only really miss it when I have to use someone elses keyboard (which is rare). It's amusing when you're in, for example, a bank opening a business account and you tell the person you're a professional computer programmer with a Ph.D. in computer science, and they hand you the keyboard to enter some account information, and you're reduced to 3 WPM hunt and peck to type your own name :) "Oh, right, you work with computers. SECURITY!"