Ask HN: How did you learn to 10 finger type?

5 points by wrftaylor 3 years ago | 14 comments

Hey HN. I'm looking to develop my typing skill, but I've found breaking my "6 finger" habit difficult. Would love to know any tips or resources.

Currently on a Macbook Pro.

johnjacobkenny 3 years ago |

It's practice. And the most difficult part is the initial few days, where you get frustrated that you can look and type faster than you can touch type. The key is to push through that phase and keep practicing without reverting back to the old habits.

In terms of software I used Tipp10 - https://www.tipp10.com/en/download/. Nowadays I have found https://www.keybr.com/ as an excellent resource.

At the end of the day, you will need to keep practicing to get better at it. A little consistency will get you far! Don't spend money on fancy hardware until you get to a point where you feel that the hardware is slowing you down. (80wpm or more)

usr1106 3 years ago |

I went to a typewriter course in the 1970s as a teen. A couple of years before I saw the first computer.

The interesting question would be do you use "correct" 10 finger typing?

I don't. I use some 6-8 fingers mostly blindly. Actually I have to do it blindly because the keys E-R-T and U-I-O on my current keyboard are so worn off that I cannot read the letters anymore. So I take a bit of pride that I can type blindly and don't replace my keyboard:)

This works well as long as I don't think about it. But as soon as I start to look at the keyboard and think about it, especially R and T or I and O get difficult to get right.

Yes, some colleagues type faster than myself. But the correlation between a fast typist and productive programmer is not very high in my experience.

jqpabc123 3 years ago |

Why do you want to touch type?

The QWERTY keyboard layout was purposely designed to be akward and unnatural with the most frequently used keys on the least dexterious fingers.

This was done in order to *decrease* typing speed --- because the original typewriters were mechanical with slow response time and the keys and closely spaced strikers would get jammed and stuck if you went too fast.

But perhaps the biggest negative today is the horrible ergonomics of touch typing has been associated with carpal tunnel syndrome.

https://www.jonathanshultsmd.com/blog/can-typing-cause-carpa...

jprete 3 years ago |

I learned in ancient times in a high school class, on a physical typewriter, one character at a time. There were lots of rote exercises intended to teach my brain that pressing the key on a particular finger, displaced from the home row by a particular distance, would physically produce a particular character. Words only came later.

This resulted in my brain making a positional map of QWERTY, which not only makes ten-finger typing faster, but also two-finger and touchscreen typing.

abudabi123 3 years ago |

I have seen a first person shooter game in the horror genre that presents a word or sentence to type as fast as you can against the clock or you take damage. Using ten fingers gives you an edge in the game and you learn while at play. Try to avoid developing bad habits leading to repeat strain injury. For example, the right wrist fast flick to reach the right shift key to capitalize the left hand keys.

zamnos 3 years ago | |

That's Typing of The Dead, which was originally released in 1999 to arcades, to Windows in 200, to the Sega Dreamcast in 2001, and to PS2s in 2004.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Typing_of_the_Dead

ricopags 3 years ago |

I achieved what proficiency I now possess by chatting with people on IRC, newsgroups, forums, and IM platforms in the 90s[0]. I took a typing class in high school on clicketyclack typewriters and was buzzing around 80-90wpm much to the chagrin of my instructor.

[0]relevant xkcd https://xkcd.com/386/

belrak 3 years ago |

I switched from Qwerty to Dvorak. That reset forced me to type blind and with 10 fingers. It's a very nice layout to do 10 finger typing, but it comes with some downsides as well, such as not being able to buy a decent keyboard with that layout, and when tinkering with hardware and/or other people's computers, typing in qwerty becomes painful.

GianFabien 3 years ago |

In my early days, somehow I ended up being a tester for a computer based touch typing course. By the time the program was fully debugged, I got pretty good. Easily maintain 100-120 wpm rate. Very useful for long CLI commands, etc. When programming, thinking time slows me down, except during brief bursts of inspiration.

layer8 3 years ago |

Not what you’re asking for, but after developing RSI, I decided that I’m probably better off not learning 10-finger touch typing. Especially on a laptop keyboard there’s a risk involved.

gregjor 3 years ago |

Typing class in high school back in the ‘70s. Easy credit and lots of girls. Got the credits and can touch-type reasonably fast. Did not get a girlfriend.

jgrahamc 3 years ago |

I went to typing school.

ricopags 3 years ago | |

Not a class, but a whole school? Wow. For how long did you attend?

jgrahamc 3 years ago | | |

I think I spent about six months but I also learnt shorthand as well. I was going to evening classes.