Staggered or not ???
"Yatin Sethi" <[email protected]>
| Newsgroups | gmane.comp.hardware.altkeyboards |
|---|---|
| Message-ID | <[email protected]> |
Hi guys, I have always been reading on the staggered and columnar layouts but haven't got any better clarity. There are discussions to support both the viewpoints. Few quotes: In favor of Staggered layout: "The stagger is important in that you can reach multiple letters with the same finger. Moving those letters directly under a finger reduces efficiency." If the staggering of keys are supposed to have some benefit to your finger movements, why is it then that the whole keyboard is staggered the same way? Doesn't it stand to reason that one side should be staggered the other way? After all, we don't have two right hands... Against Staggered layout: "Today's keyboards descend in a straight line from yesterday's mechanical typewriters. The reason the keys are staggered is because it gives the typewriter engineers more space to place their levers. It too was specifically designed to avoid the collision of the levers." "The staggered key arrangement is a bad thing because it forces your fingers to do a lot of diagonal reaching. When you strike the key down your finger is thus in a particularly vulnerable position and at a mechanical disadvantage resulting in more strain than is necessary." My only confusion that still prevails: Which one is better: staggered or non-staggered .. and WHY ?? We do see many new keyboards coming up with non-staggered layouts (Typematrix 2030) and many other which are still following the staggered layout. Any suggestions guys ?? Regards' Yatin. -- Yatin Sethi www.yatinsethi.com On 3/14/07, Chuck Esterbrook <[email protected]> wrote: > > Pretty cool stuff, but too bad the Apple keyboards are still staggered > instead of columnar... > On 3/13/07, nkmcalli <[email protected] <nkmcalli%40yahoo.com>> wrote: > > Some follow-up about dvorak laptops. Check out these pix on Flickr. > > It's step by step photos of a person moving the keys on their Apple > > MacBook. > > > > http://www.flickr.com/photos/69631394@N00/tags/keyboard/ > > > [Non-text portions of this message have been removed]