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Split Keyboard Journals

Day 1

• I may have been a bit too optimistic with using my split keyboard for the whole day. Considering the fact that I now have to take notes, type school assignments, do practice exams, and play games using such an unfamiliar keyboard, I’ve failed to realize how much I took my fast typing speed for granted
• The time it’s taken me to do things has virtually doubled, and it’s been taking a toll on my overall productivity throughout the day
• When I was typing notes for the book I was reading, my slower typing speed forced me to write concise jot notes instead of the elaborate thoughts I was used to, which wasn’t necessarily a bad thing
• Of course, the major issue I had today was the placement of symbols. I got used to the letter placement fairly quickly, but I struggled immensely to type things like add and equals, which is in such a weird spot man
  • If worse comes to worse, I might end up remapping it to where backspace traditionally is
    • Speaking of backspace, I’ve gotten used to its new location near my thumb. When I tried using my old keyboard, I kept pressing my right thumb on the space bar out of habit
• When I was writing my computer science practice test, I think I spent more time figuring out where keys were than actually answering the questions
  • I said I would use the keyboard throughout my whole day, but I might make an exception solely for this since this exam is kindddd offff important
  • I don’t want to switch up the way I code days prior to writing an AP exam
• Also, It’s weird to give the pinky such little room to press keys
  • I’m used to the width of traditional modifiers, so now I tend to hit one key too far to the right when using shortcuts like copy and pasting
• As ergonomics go, I like how I can easily pivot my elbow to switch between my keyboard and mouse
  • Previously, I had to move my whole arm and bring it back, which was quite tedious when simply correcting small errors
  • I still have yet to designate the locations of my arms, but right now its similar to my regular posture with my left arm straight and my right arm a bit turned towards it
• different profile keycaps haven’t been an issue, and have even helped me with knowing where the brackets are
• Seeing that my typing tests were done a bit later in the day, I was already a bit used to the new keyboard after hours of painstaking typing. Here’s today’s typing speeds.
• Now that I’m starting to get a bit used to the lily, I’ll try out some of the new key locations presented by the different layers

Day 2

• Unfortunately, I didn’t put much emphasis on using the unique mapping of some keys. On the bright side however, I began to quickly get accustomed to the new layout. I was able to peak at 80 words for both monkeytype and typeracer, but my speedcoder results lagged behind and actually went down…

  • After rewatching my typing footage, it seems like my habit of mainly using my index finger has continued to persist when using the lily. From now on, I’ll try to be more conscious of spreading the keys amongst my fingers more evenly, but this decision will probably end up harming my typing speeds.

• When using it for my computer science practice testing, my growing familiarity and practice has made coding less of a burden. I think I’ll be able to confidently type on this keyboard after this week, so there’s going to be absolutely no switching between this keyboard and my normal keyboard.

• To further utilize the hotkey convenience this keyboard provides, I want to think of ways to cram as much hotkeys for my note-taking app obsidian on the left hand side

• Furthermore, I also want to think about what to map these function keys to, since I mainly just use the ones on the lower layer. Same goes with the arrow keys and blank keys.

• Later today, I’ll try also to find a sufficient wrist rest that doesn’t consist of presidential socks.

• Overall, I’m feeling suprisingly comfortable using this keyboard despite it only being my second day

Day 3

• After further consideration (and definitely not because of my laziness), I didn’t bother trying to fix my index typing habits. Surpisingly enough, the issue only persists with my left hand, as on my right hand my pointer only covers two columns. My middle and ring finger are still useful for the two most left letter columns so I don’t think it’s dragging me down too much.
• I also spent some time searching for a new wrist rest, but decided to stick with the sock wrist wrest, as it seems to be working just fine.
• Not gonna lie, I was surprised to see that my typing speeds haven’t stagnated yet. I was able to hit 94 wpm on monkeytype, and improve my overall averages across all 3 typing websites. I wasn’t expecting to hit 100 wpm within my first week of switching, but at this rate, I might even catch up to my previous typing speeds :o
  • I’m starting to grow an appreciaton for the thumb buttons; after getting used to them, it makes my thumbs more useful and makes doing things like hitting backspace and enter less tedious
• Tomorrow, I’ll actually get to thinking of possible optimizations when using this keyboard.

Day 4

• I felt super sluggish typing today, but somehow, I managed to hit new personal bests in both typeracer and speedcoder

• After getting a feel of the keyboard, I’m thinking of switching the keycaps, as I think the uniform keycaps are holding me back. If I alter my typing posture a tiny bit, I end up missing keys more often, so maybe switching to keycaps with more sculpture will be more forgiving

• As for possible hotkeys, I haven’t had any inconveniences recently with the layout, so I haven’t been able to think of potential adjustments for the upper layer.

• After even more introspection, I think I’ve found the origin of my wack left index typing habits. Since I’m a gamer, I leave my fingers on the movement keys WASD. I’m surprised it took this long for me to figure this out lmao

• when I tried typing on my laptop keyboard, I was surprised by how easily I was able to get used to the traditional layout

• I tried to sort through my keycaps, but quickly realized that most of my sets wouldn’t have enough for the space bar keys.

Day 5

• Nothing special happened today, other than the fact that I hit 96 wpm on typeracer :o
  • I was curious so I tried doing the 10 word option on monkeytype, and I ended up hitting 120ish words per minute
    • I guess my stamina is preventing me from getting high scores so I’ll have to consciously remember to maintain the pace
• My dad gave me a wrist rest to replace my sock, and the extra width has helped with giving my wrist more flexibility to move around
• When I was doing my code typing, I decided to actually pay attention to the mistakes diagram and realized that most of my mistakes are from the right hand side
  • This makes sense, as when typing on a regular keyboard I’m used to having my hand angled
• Also, I think I’m experiencing fatigue with my left hand, which isn’t a good sign xd

Day 6

• I did it, I finally hit it. On a standard keyboard I’m able to type 100+ frequently on typeracer, but I’m still proud of hitting 100 on monkeytype nonetheless
  • I zoomed through the first part and almost choked, but thankfully I didn’t
• I would say that the 100 is fairly accurate in my comfortability with typing in a split, I haven’t looked at the keys for days, and just learned by seeing what key i misinputted
• Although my monkeytype score zoomed, my other ones didn’t see much improvement
• I was thinking of switching my keycaps to my the SA profile on my normal keyboard, but after seeing how close I was to hitting 100, I didn’t want to change anything up
• I decided to move the two halves even further and angled the right one a bit upwards, which might be the better play long term for ergonomics

Day 7

• Surprisingly enough, my 100 wpm from yesterday was not a fluke, seeing that I was able to do it again. I even almost hit 97 wpm on typeracer :o
• Speedcoder was still a struggle, but I feel like I still have lots of room for improvement if I start to use numbers and icons on different layers
  • however, I think it’s important that I get the basics down like letters and the traditional keys for symbols, which I feel super confident in now
• It might seem weird, but telling myself to take it slow allows me to make less errors and overall type faster than if I were to try and push myself
• This week flew by super fast