: Re: Is it worth switching to Dvorak? I've occasionally thought about trying the Dvorak keyboard layout to improve my writing speed. However, I wonder if the speed gain is really worth the initial

@Fox6458700

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First used Dvorak when I was working as a programmer in the early 1990s. It was on MacIntosh, where OS support was far better than Windows. I made the switch to control carpal tunnel, which was bugging me even though I was pretty young at the time.
When I shifted to Windows, I also shifted back to qwerty because I couldn't stand how inconsistently Windows implements keyboard layouts. Keyboard layout support improved with Windows XP. In 2011, the amount of time I was spending on a keyboard was getting closer to what it was when I was a programmer, and age made me even more susceptible to carpal tunnel, I switched back to Dvorak.
I use the Kinesis Freedom 2 keyboard that is split into separate halves. They are willing to custom program the hotkeys strip so that keys are mapped naturally using Windows, but the hotkeys are set to map to the correct commands when the keyboard is mapped to Dvorak. They charged me a reasonable amount to apply the custom firmware. I pay the same amount each time I buy a new keyboard.
I did have one Freedom 2 keyboard that I mapped to behave as Dvorak when Windows was set to qwerty. This was necessary for entering passwords because Windows machines had a BIOS hardwired to qwerty. My most recent couple laptops respect Windows keyboard mapping in the BIOS during startup so I no longer need that keyboard.

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