Category Archives: dvorak

June 10, 2007 · 12:31 pm

Dvorak update

My stopwatch is dead. Where’s Sylar when you need him?

Forward Motion’s annual Dvorak challenge has started. I am going to try to get my speed and accuracy up. I type around 50-55 wpm now, with 1-2 mistakes per minute, according to the test I just took. The other day I did a telephone interview for an article and had just as much success keeping up with the conversation as I did when I took notes in qwerty, so I don’t really need to speed up, but I do make too many typos. And typing faster wouldn’t exactly hurt.

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May 27, 2007 · 5:59 pm

Crochet, Dvorak, and Links

Today I redesigned the afghan I’m crocheting to account for the impending shortage of yarn. I decided to try adding to more colors to it: it’s off-white and navy and dark green, so some lighter shades of blue and green should work.

Went to two stores (the third was closed) and they didn’t have a large selection. I may try the third store tomorrow, or go to a real yarn store (although the real yarn store does not sell the brand I want, according to their website). I don’t want to buy online because I need to compare the colors. I have plenty of time to find yarn, since I still have 48 green and white squares to make.

Had more success at Lowe’s: we now have tomato, hot pepper, and basil plants, along with some lettuce, parsley, mint, and morning glory seeds. But I have to go back and get more dirt.

Meant to go to the park today for more flower photos, but everything took forever.

Links:

  • Dvorak driver for the Palm Universal Wireless Keyboard! — Hacked together by some random guy. The []{} aren’t there (instead there are two sets of -_=+), but I can live with that. This makes me very happy, as I like to take my Palm to the bookstore to write, and I can’t type in qwerty very well anymore.
  • A review of the three tutorials I used to learn Dvorak — I don’t think I linked to that before. I need to go back and practice some more to increase my speed.
  • Read It and Lacrimate — Tired of reading jargon-filled press releases, Gene Weingarten of the Washington Post decided to ask the PR folks some similarly worded questions to see if they understood them:

    Me: Vis-a-vis the implementation of SAP technology, what is the source-related derivation of the acronymically based identifier of the service entity, and how does it operate so as to enhance production and profitability or, alternatively, improve the business model of the shelf-stable protein supplier of which Clarkston is now a client?

    He was surprised at the results.

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January 28, 2007 · 5:24 pm

Dvorak Update

Found a nice tutorial and am starting to learn letters that are off the home row.

Also found this site, which calculates wpm and errors made. I can do the first lesson (eight letters aoeuhtns) at about 45 wpm with 5-9 errors. I did the qwerty version (asdfjkl;) at 46 wpm with 6 errors… (Hey, the qwerty version is a lot harder, ok? And I'd been typing in Dvorak for at least 20 minutes before hand…)

Random online sites tend to put my qwerty typing speed at around 70-80 wpm with a horrendous amount of errors. One problem I have with those tests is that it's so ingrained in my hands to hit backspace and fix typos as I make them (because I make lots of them), and the tests don't like it if you do that. But I learned to type in 7th grade and it's not like I've officially practiced since then.

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