I just finished a very small glass of Disaronno, an Italian liqueur. I’m never sure if you’re supposed to take shots of liqueurs or if you’re supposed to drink them straight. I don’t think I’d want to do a shot alone, and Disaronno is really tasty, so I figured I’d use it as a night cap. Anyway, it’s almost 1:30 and tomorrow I have a doctors appointment at 8 so I should probably get to bed really soon. However, I’m having a hard time getting myself to hit the hay since I’ve been almost finished with my Keyboard Layout Analyzer for a few days now (I decided to rename it from Typing Analyzer since its really analyzing the layout and not the typing).

I’ve had a lot of ideas over the past two weeks, and rather than go in depth on every detail I’ll give you a really quick run down of this app’s updates:

• Pie chart statistics were added for finger, hand, or keyboard row usage. The pie charts were created using Plotkit, an awesome javascript library that uses Mochikit. I don’t know much about Mochikit, but according to Google Trends and its website’s own lack of updates, its future doesn’t look too promising. Which is a shame, since Plotkit is really cool.
• The hot spot visualization was fixed for IE6 users. Apparently IE6 does not like transparent PNG files.
• A tab view was set up to make viewing the data easier. The tab control comes from Yahoo’s kick ass YUI library.
• A fade-in/fade-out effect was added when processing data. I figured this way of displaying information would make more sense to the user. I noticed when I showed my parents to app my mom didn’t realize she needed to scroll down to see the output. This feature doesn’t work 100% of IE yet, but I’m deciding it works “good enough” for now.

To see the app just click the following link: Keyboard Layout Analyzer

Let me know if you have any problems or have any suggestions.

So I was thinking to myself today, “When would I ever use the Typing Analzyer?” The only situation I can think of would be if I got into some kind of argument over which keyboard layout was best, and even then I think I’d be kind of hesitant to play that card. Oh well, I think this project is one of those ones that is neat to make, but isn’t really that useful. Hopefully it can give passer-byers a couple minutes worth of amusement or possibly get someone to check out an alternative keyboard layout.

Besides questioning the relevance of what I’ve been doing, I’ve also made a few updates:

• Added “Left Hand Dvorak” and “Right Hand Dvorak” layouts
• Updated layout graphics
• Added the Shift and Tab keys into the calculations
• Fixed the IE issues (I’ve gotten in the bad habit of only checking my work in FireFox)
• Added a personalized keyboard layout to the output

I stole the last idea from Tritonio, who created his own app for layout generation. I thought the idea was really really cool so I put it in (I’ll make sure and give you a link on the app’s page, once I straighten out the “Other Typing Resources” section). Right now the generated layouts are kind of silly, though they have some semblance of being correct.

I aim to finish up this app next week. I’m going to tweak a few things and then add in some stats and pie charts on finger usage. After that I’m going to move onto a new web app. After a brainstorming session earlier this month I’ve got a collection of neat ideas I want to explore. Part of me wants to do a web app a month until the end of the year, but I don’t want to set goals I’m not sure I can complete. I’ll do the next one and then decide where to go from there.

I’ve created a new web app that allows you to analyze and visualize the typing patterns you create when you use a Qwerty, Dvorak, or Colemak keyboard layout. You can find it here: Typing Analyzer.

If you have no idea what I’m talking about, the keyboard layout you’re currently isn’t the only one that’s out there, and not all keyboard layouts are created equal. Some are better for your wrists and allow you to type faster and with more comfort. Here are the layouts of the keyboards I mentioned above:

Qwerty

Dvorak

Colemak

My interest in keyboard layouts came after I read a Discover magazine article entitled “The Curse of QWERTY”. The article tells the story of the Qwerty and Dvorak keyboard layouts and makes a compelling case for switching from a Qwerty layout to a Dvorak layout. Here is a quick summary of its most important points:

• The Qwerty layout was created in the early 1870’s before touch typing and without speed or comfort in mind.
• The Dvorak layout was created in the 1930’s and is based on years of research. It takes speed and comfort into account.
• On average, the left hand does 56% of the typing when a Qwerty layout is used. With a Dvorak layout, the right hand does 56% of the typing.
• The Dvorak layout forces you to alternate hands more frequently when typing, this causes you to type faster.
• Users type fastest on the home row. With a Qwerty layout, only 32% of your typing occurs on the home row. With a Dvorak layout, 70% of your typing occurs on the home row.
• It’s hypothesized that the Dvorak layout will make it less likely that you’ll develop Carpal Tunnel Syndrome (CTS).
• Anecdotally, people who develop carpal tunnel syndrome seem to find relief when they switch from a Qwerty layout to Dvorak layout.

There are more reasons, but those were the ones that stuck with me. I was so convinced by what I read that I switched my work and home keyboard layouts to a Dvorak layout by configuring some Windows XP settings in the control panel (to see how click here). This lasted for about 6 days (3 of those were over the Labor Day weekend), and then I had to switch back since learning the Dvorak layout was slowing me down at work. I also discovered that the Dvorak layout made all the nice Qwerty keyboard shortcuts (Undo, Cut, Copy and Paste) virtually unusable. This was a big minus since I use those shortcuts constantly. The Dvorak layout also over worked my right pinky. I found myself having to take typing breaks, something I hadn’t done since high school.

After talking to someone who had Carpal Tunnel Syndrome (something I’m worried about getting), I learned about yet another improved keyboard layout that preserved Qwerty’s bottom row short cuts and didn’t put massive amounts of stress on the right pinky. This layout was known as the Colemak. Unlike the Dvorak, the Colemak layout is relatively new (developed within the last 5 years), doesn’t have a lot of research behind it, and it doesn’t have a very large following (online estimates put the number of users between 650 and 1,300). It also wasn’t on my computer at work (I can’t install things on my work computer) so in order to use it, I’d have to talk to some sys admin people. However, the layout looks really promising.

All of this research is what motivated me to create the Typing Analyzer. I wanted to visually compare my typing patterns with the different layouts and get some stats on what hand and which fingers I was using the most (a feature I’ll put in soon).

Hopefully the user interface is straight forward enough. Its in the same vein as the Image Color Palette Generator and the Color Fader, but with some adjustments. I decided to start the page off with a section explaining which fingers you use for which keys, since I know a lot of people don’t know the exact fingerings. In fact, I know people who constantly use a computer yet still hunt and peck for keys. After the chart comes the application’s controls and after that comes a section for the output.

I have more features in mind for this program, but I figured I’d release what I had now just to see how it’d be received and to see if anyone had any suggestions. The other ideas I have in mind are:

• Allowing a user to enter in a feed URL, so that the program can analyze all of their blog posts instead of having the user paste the text into the text box.
• Give stats on finger and hand usage. Possibly also include pie charts.
• Give recommendations to the user on which keyboard layout would benefit them the most.

Oh…

And I haven’t forgotten about patrickgillespie.com. I’m just not as excited about it as I was 10 days ago. I’m going to let myself mull over some more ideas before I take any action. I still don’t think I have the right idea for it yet.