Typing this in a non-qwerty layout on a new ergonomic keyboard. Learning the alphabet anew is of course a challenge, as is getting to know the keys themselves. My pinkies want to rest on the upper row, and the upper thumb keys are hard to reach; I think both these problems could be lessened if the palm rest were higher on the pinkie side.
When I started shopping for a new keyboard, I found quite a rabbit-hole of enthusiasts. The cool kids use home-built boards of only 34 or 36 keys.
My head learned the letters in less than a day, but not my hands.
I keep confusing space and backspace because they are symmetric.
As on all the “keebs” in the aforementioned rabbit-hole, Glove80’s firmware is highly configurable. Like many users I chose to have the home keys (what you know as ASDF JKL;) double as modifiers when held. Most Mac users, according to my very small sample, arrange them (index to pinky) shift, command, option, control. I swapped shift with command because my middle finger feels more suited to the top job.
I soon swapped shift and command to rejoin the herd; this feels more natural.
Meanwhile I half-wish I had gone whole hog to 36 keys. I find the top two rows (Fn and digits) and the outer columns (=+`~\|-_;:) surprisingly hard to reach accurately. I probably felt the same in 1974, and again in 1990 when I began regularly using the Fn keys. On my conventional board, I still often miss the minus key.
It might be easier if I didn’t use the mouse so much and keep having to find the home keys.
Or if I had put reference bumps on the home row.
Today I put the Glove80 back in its box, not for any reason mentioned above but because keeping my right pinky on its assigned key was giving my shoulder a cramp. I am unsure whether it’s excessive ‘stagger’ (adjustment of the columns of keys to reflect the differing lengths of fingers) or the ‘choc’ spacing is too small for my hand; perhaps some of each. We’ll know more when my next keyboard (42 keys) gets here; it has the same keycaps but a different overall shape.
(‘Choc’ is one of two main types of key-switches, the other being Cherry MX. The latter is spaced at 19mm; ‘choc’ is 18 wide by 17 high, I believe.)
I solved the pinky pain problem by twinning the right pinky column, so the finger can harmlessly stray laterally.