I’m thinking of switching my thumb keys (currently space and enter and two of them go to a symbols layer) to shift. I find that shift makes me anxious when typing because i have to partially leave the home row, and as a result my pinky placement when typing is bad, my ring finger tends to take over and my pinky has become a mod presser and not a typing finger.

I have tried to overload the home row keys as modifiers but that is a huge mistake as it causes misfires or takes TOO LONG to aviate, there is no middle ground with that one.

  • Aldoo@lemmy.world
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    1 year ago

    I am currently using thumb shift on all my keyboards as it feels very natural: no need to move the whole hand (unlike classical shift) and no priority conflicts (unlike HRM shift: with HRM, if hold is preferred then you shift letters by mistake, if tap is preferred you end up typing erroneous extra chars instead of shifting).

    Actually I combine enter and shift on the same key, giving priority to hold/shift. Since I don’t need to roll enter, there is no conflict.

  • Elw@lemmy.sdf.org
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    1 year ago

    On my Dactyl Manuform I have right thumb managing enter and space and left thumb managing shift and backspace. I also use the option to hold for shift with tap being tab and backspace is Ctrl if held.

  • evo@sh.itjust.works
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    1 year ago

    it causes misfires or takes TOO LONG to aviate, there is no middle ground with that one.

    A lot of people use Miryoku to type fast and accurately. There are settings to fix/alleviate this if you are interested in going down that path.

    If you are using QMK setting the TAPPING_TERM low (200 or less?) and enabling IGNORE_MOD_TAP_INTERRUPT will help a lot I think.

    • Lenbok@lemmy.nz
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      1 year ago

      I use miryoku and typing uppercase is annoying. You are either swapping shift keys as you type or you have to use caps lock (ewww). Let me know if there is a secret.

  • Hazel@keeb.lolM
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    1 year ago

    I’ve been using thumb shift since day one and I don’t see myself changing that.

  • SuperFola@programming.dev
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    1 year ago

    I’m not using the thumb cluster for shift and other mods, but rather homerow mods. It takes a bit to get used to, but I feel like it is very confortable. I have S/shift and L/shift (tap/hold), so if I need to shift a key from the left hand I use the opposed hand to shift and vice versa. Also pressing both S and L at the same time will toggle caps lock which I find very convenient.

    Homerow mods allow me to keep my fingers on/near the homerow and reduce A LOT hand movements.