Monthly Archive for January, 2010

Why don’t we switch to Dvorak?

Published on January 22, 2010 in Geekery. 4 Comments Tags: , , .

I was following a @monkchips link to IgnoreTheCode about smartphone touch keyboard design, and thought about a bigger issue.

Why do we still use QWERTY?

Sure, it’s embedded in tons of hardware – both plastic/metal and muscle for many of us – but isn’t it a good time to switch? The immensely fast pace of learning for younger people, plus the soon-to-be outpouring of new keyboard and input styles seems like we could actually start the switch now.

Not only would touch-screen keyboards be simple to switch, but form factors and tactile feedback are changing for more and more of our data entry. This would be a good time for existing QWERTY folks to start switching their muscles to think AOEUI instead, since we’re already having to adjust to how glass-screen typing feels anyway.

Hmmm, that’d be a great geeky replacement for ROT13 too.

Year in Review

Published on January 12, 2010 in Muse. 1 Comment Tags: , , , , .

First off, apologies to various people I haven’t gotten back to recently, in particular M.G., M.M., and various ASF folks. I actually took vacation around the holidays, and spent several days not reading email at all (gasp!). First time in a long time, and then of course coming back to work is always hectic. Um, and of course setting up that that 360 with MW2 after the holiday hasn’t helped my free time any either. I hope to be more present this week.

  • Check out the new Community Development project at Apache – great stuff, and don’t worry, the Mentoring Programme will accept Americans as well as English speakers.
  • A shout out to the staff at Peet’s in Lexington, my favorite coffee shop.
  • A shout out to the cashier and bagger at Whole Foods in Medford, who were wicked nice last Friday afternoon.
  • Question: did I really miss anything important on Twitter over the past 3 weeks?
  • What am I forgetting to put into my Monoprice order? I’m stocking up on cheap HDMI cables and wall ports for when we upgrade to a wall-mounted medium size flatscreen tv.
  • Interesting read of a website: Letters of Note (via Writing Or Typing) Copies of just plain interesting letters from a variety of historical situations.
  • Big thank-you to D.R. and others for getting Facebook to sponsor Apache!
  • What Facebook-reading app do you use? I have just enough friends inside Facebook that I want to follow the witty conversations, but I’m really tired of the website. There must be better clients to watch the stream of interestingness go by.

What? You thought this was a year in review for last year? Sorry – just a cheap way to get all the little bits stuck in my head of this year so far cleared out so I can start the new year fresh.