Re: Info about DVORAK Keyboard Design

Actually, EA and IO are the most common vowel-vowel pair. OU 
is third. also realize that TIO and ION are very popular 
trigrams, and this is, at least for myself, a hindrance to type on 
the current Dvorak layout.
    
    The letter I being so much more common than U means that 
it should be much easier to type. Not just the first-person I, 
but common two letter words begin with I, is, it, in, if. It's 
best not to stretch your fingers to repeat the same key, such as 
Roman numerals. 
   
   I use this site as the reference for frequencies:
   http://deafandblind.com/word_frequency.htm
   Many interesting lists there. Look at the top twenty words 
most used in written English: not a single U.
   
  The index finger travels around a lot already. Putting the I 
there means it stays home more often, so to speak, because I is 
used more than U. If U stays on the home row, it's still quite 
easy to type its vowel-vowel digrams.
   
   If you're really interested in a Dvorak-like layout, checkout 
Klausler Evolved, which was the result of an Evolution Algorithm 
program. The U is on the top middle finger, so vowel-vowel 
digrams are still pretty easy. Statistically, I believe it is slightly 
more efficient than Dvorak. This is a testament to how well-
designed the Dvorak layout is.
   http://klausler.com/evolved.html
   Pic of the winning layout in PDF
   http://klausler.com/evolved.pdf
   
   A page about alternative keyboard layouts that compares the 
various well-known layouts (and some experimental ones):
   http://sagez.net/amuseum/layout.php
    
    --- In [email protected], Don <egr330@...> 
wrote:
    >
    > Hi,
    > 
    > Dvorak didn't just take strength and frequency into 
account.  As others
    > have mentioned, he wanted to increase hand alternation.  
This is why the
    > vowels are placed on the left hand.  He also wanted to 
promote typing
    > from the outside-in, as mentioned, since this is easier than 
typing from
    > the inside towards the outer end.
    > 
    > He thus wanted to make the most common digrams easy to 
type.  TH is the
    > most common digram in English.  It is typed on the home 
row in Dvorak. 
    > Likewise, OU is the most common vowel-vowel digram in 
English.  This is
    > probably the reason Dvorak put the U on the left index 
finger instead of
    > putting I there.  I is about twice as frequent as U in 
English, but the
    > vowel-vowel digrams involving U are about 40% more common 
than the
    > vowel-vowel digrams involving I.  Thus Dvorak slightly 
sacrificed the
    > concentration of keys in the home keys/home row in order 
to facilitate
    > typing the most common digrams.
    > 
    > The frequency of the following U digrams [au ua ou uo eu 
ue ju uj qu uq]
    > exceeds the frequency of the following I digrams [ai ia oi 
io ei ie ji
    > ij qi iq] by about 40% using a sample of english texts.
    > 
    > In other words, I is more common than U, but I is most 
often combined
    > with consonants (which are on the other hand in Dvorak), 
whereas U is
    > most often combined with other vowels.  Some people have 
tried to
    > "improve" Dvorak by swapping the I and the U, but this is 
questionable
    > when one takes into account digrams.
    > 
    > For comparison, a layout like Colemak <http://colemak.com/
> has a
    > slightly higher percentage of keys in the home row than 
does Dvorak, and
    > at first sight, appears slightly better than Dvorak.  But, it 
places H
    > and U off the home keys, which slows down the typing of 
the TH and OU
    > digrams (as well as HE, which is the second most common 
digram in
    > English).  There are also other very common digrams 
involving H, such as
    > CH, SH, and WH.  Those involving U include QU (question
), JU, AU, etc.
    >