QWERTY, DVORAK, and COLEMAK, Oh My

One of the first, and most important decisions, when the typewriter was first commercialized in the late 19th century, was how to organize all of the letters on the keyboard. Thus, the QWERTY layout was born. Because of the success of the machine that used the QWERTY layout, it became a standard and was used by most other manufacturers of typewriters in that era. Since standards tend to be self-reinforcing, we've all been using QWERTY ever since!

But there has been a robust debate over the years about QWERTY and its alternatives. Is QWERTY the best layout for a keyboard? Is it worth trying others? Am I wasting years of my life by typing less efficiently than I could?

All worthy questions. This page will not answer all of those questions, but it might help you think more about your typing and keyboard than you ever have before. And maybe it will inspire you to try something different...