this post was submitted on 23 Jun 2023
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ErgoMechKeyboards

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Ergonomic, split and other weird keyboards

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Posts must be of/about keyboards that have a clear delineation between the left and right halves of the keyboard, column stagger, or both. This includes one-handed (one half doesn't exist, what clearer delineation is that!?)

i.e. no regular non-split¹ row-stagger and no non-split¹ ortholinear²

¹ split meaning a separation of the halves, whether fixed in place or entirely separate, both are fine.
² ortholinear meaning keys layed out in a grid

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Hey all, I just purchased a Moonlander and after using it for a day, I unplugged it and packed it back up because I noticed my muscle memory on my laptop was already deteriorating!

I want to be an ergomech user, but I also need to frequently use my laptop by itself with a standard keyboard. Is it possible to keep my muscle memory for both? Have any of you had success switching back and forth between a split ergo and a standard keyboard?

Any advice or reassurance is appreciated. This was a massive purchase for me and this issue has me very disheartened at the moment.

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[–] yanma@lemmy.world 2 points 1 year ago

Just a short term thing. You asked your fingers to think twice before typing. They are giving you opportunity to rewire muscle memory. Once you are done learning they will go back to normal.

[–] rafaelromao@lemmy.world 1 points 1 year ago

I use a custom layout that is way different than qwerty, in ortho and column staggered boards, for about 2 years. And for my surprise I still can type as fast as before in my laptop. If you go for a layout that is not similar to qwerty, it might help retaining your muscle memory.

I can consistently switch between Ortho and my laptop, hitting nearly 70WPM on both. I would say it took about a month before something clicked in my brain and I stopped trying to use my thumbs for mods on my laptop and miss hitting the key locations. Just give it more time. Your muscles can remember a ton of different things, brain just needs to figure out how to organize it.

[–] dan@lemm.ee 1 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

If you stick with it you’ll make steady consistent progress. One thing that really helped me was tracking my progress with monkeytype.com - it might not feel like you’re getting better but seeing how closely correlated practice and improvement are really kept me motivated to stick with it.

I haven’t lost the ability to type as I previously did, though I do find myself resenting being forced to use laptop keyboards. I can do like 60wpm hunt and peck on a row staggered keyboard, and a bit more touch typing on an ortho/ergo/split, but I can’t touch type on a row staggered kb and I can’t hunt and peck on an ortho/ergo/split, haha

[–] crankin@kbin.social 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

No worries, I routinely swap between my 34 key weirdo keyboard and my laptop without any trouble.

One thing that you might find helpful is to get some really unique keycaps on the ergo board so it feels different. I had MT3 keycaps on my ergo board while I was learning it, although that being said, now I’ve switched to choc switches with essentially laptop keycaps, and I can still type on my laptop just fine.

[–] orbekk@lemmy.world 1 points 1 year ago

This has been my experience as well. I made no effort to practice with my laptop keyboard, just occasional usage, and it's been easy to switch between.

[–] BigWuk@pathfinder.social 1 points 1 year ago

I work on both a 36 key split board and my laptop's board and I find it pretty easy to go back and forth. I think it helps to have a fairly different layout on the ergo board, it helps keep the muscle memory separate. I still use qwerty on both, but the modifiers and everything are all different.

I will say I mess up keys like x and c a little more often on the laptop now. Those keys are in similar places, but the difference in row stagger can trip me up a little...

[–] anaumann@lemmy.world 0 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I‘m typing with 50WPM on a Moonlander with Colemak-DH Layout and still can type on a QWERTY MacBook keyboard with my usual 70-80WPM

During the initial leaning phase, switching is hard. From my experience it’ll be easier once you are able to type subconsciously on the Moonlander as well.

Speaking from personal experience here, your mileage may vary.

[–] Necromnomicon@lemmy.world 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I have found keeping qwerty to normal staggered boards and colemak to Ortho/columnar staggered has kept my muscle memory for qwerty pretty intact. 2 different muscle memories for 2 different tools

[–] epocsquadron@kbin.social 1 points 1 year ago

I recommend this method as well. I use a Hands Down variant on my ergo doc ez, while leaving my laptop keyboard standard QWERTY. Makes keeping them separate much easier. I initially tried to keep a QWERTY layer on the ergodox but found myself stumbling with zxcv keys a lot as the columnar positions are very different. Keeping the layouts different solved that entirely.

[–] ForthEorlingas@lemmy.fmhy.ml 0 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I work on standard 104 key keyboards for my day job, but run an Iris Plus with custom keymap at home. I found that during the period that I was learning the Iris, my ability to type on a regular keyboard diminished slightly. I attribute this to the fact that for the first time in years I regularly had to think about what I was typing because I was learning a new layout. Once I pretty much had the layout memorized, I had no problem whatsoever switching back and forth.

It might have also helped that I wasn't typing exclusively on the ergo, so it may benefit you to practice on a standard layout every so often if you are concerned about slowing down.

[–] Lanthanae@lemmy.blahaj.zone 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

This makes me feel a lot more confident in learning the split ergo then. Is your Iris a QWERTY layout or something else?

[–] ForthEorlingas@lemmy.fmhy.ml 1 points 1 year ago

The alphanumerals no the base layer are QWERTY, yes.