Re: How to type when using Emacs?

[tyler <tyler.smith@mail.mcgill.ca>]

Evans Winner <thorne@timbral.net> writes:

> don provan <dprovan@comcast.net> writes:
>
>     Certainly on a standard keyboard, making caps lock
>     control is just silly [...]
>
> I am not clear still about why this is.  I find it much
> harder and more disturbing of my hand position to have to
> scrunch my pinky way under and left to hit normal ctrl than
> to simply move it an inch left.  

I find the standard positions of the control keys a bit awkward, but for
me, the alt key is definitely worse. I can't hit it with my palm or
whatever it was Xah suggested, nor is it really accessible with my
thumbs. I have little hands, so I may be unusual in this respect.

Anyways, I've remapped capslock to alt, and it has made a lot of the
emacs key-chords available from 'home position'. I know I'm supposed to
use the modifier keys with the opposite hand as the modified key, but
when I'm hopping through text it's a lot easier to rest my left pinky on
caps lock and tap b, f or d with other fingers on my left hand, than to
contort my right hand to access the other alt key. I've had some serious
repetitive strain issues in other venues (former musician), but I've
never yet suffered from the 'emacs pinky' with this setup.

My two cents. Interesting thread!

Tyler

-- 
Research is what I'm doing when I don't know what I'm doing.
                                       --Wernher von Braun