Dvorak Simplified Keyboard - AbsoluteAstronomy.com

The Dvorak Simplified Keyboard is a keyboard layout

Keyboard layout

A keyboard layout is any specific mechanical, visual, or functional arrangement of the keys, legends, or key–meaning associations of a computer, typewriter, or other typographic keyboard....

patented in 1936 by Dr. August Dvorak

August Dvorak

August Dvorak was an educational psychologist and professor of education at the University of Washington in Seattle, Washington. He and his brother-in-law, William Dealey, are best known for creating the Dvorak Simplified Keyboard layout in the 1930s as a replacement for the QWERTY keyboard layout...

and his brother-in-law

Brother-in-law

A brother-in-law is the brother of one's spouse, the husband of one's sibling, or the husband of one's spouse's sibling.-See also:*Affinity *Sister-in-law*Brothers in Law , a 1955 British comedy novel...

, Dr. William Dealey. Over the years several slight variations were designed by the team led by Dvorak or by ANSI

American National Standards Institute

The American National Standards Institute is a private non-profit organization that oversees the development of voluntary consensus standards for products, services, processes, systems, and personnel in the United States. The organization also coordinates U.S. standards with international...

. These variations have been collectively or individually also called the Simplified Keyboard or American Simplified Keyboard but they all have come to be commonly known as the Dvorak keyboard or Dvorak layout. Dvorak proponents claim the Dvorak layout uses less finger motion, increases typing rate, and reduces errors compared to the standard QWERTY

QWERTY

QWERTY is the most common modern-day keyboard layout. The name comes from the first six letters appearing in the topleft letter row of the keyboard, read left to right: Q-W-E-R-T-Y. The QWERTY design is based on a layout created for the Sholes and Glidden typewriter and sold to Remington in the...

keyboard. This reduction in finger distance traveled was originally purported to permit faster rates of typing, and also in later years, it was purported to reduce repetitive strain injuries

Repetitive strain injury

Repetitive strain injury is an injury of the musculoskeletal and nervous systems that may be caused by...

including carpal tunnel syndrome

Carpal tunnel syndrome

Carpal Tunnel Syndrome is an entrapment idiopathic median neuropathy, causing paresthesia, pain, and other symptoms in the distribution of the median nerve due to its compression at the wrist in the carpal tunnel. The pathophysiology is not completely understood but can be considered compression...

.

Although the Dvorak Simplified Keyboard (“DSK”) has failed to displace the QWERTY keyboard, it has become easier to access in the computer age, being compatible with all major operating system

Operating system

An operating system is a set of programs that manage computer hardware resources and provide common services for application software. The operating system is the most important type of system software in a computer system...

s (such as GNU/Linux, Mac OS X

Mac OS X

Mac OS X is a series of Unix-based operating systems and graphical user interfaces developed, marketed, and sold by Apple Inc. Since 2002, has been included with all new Macintosh computer systems...

, Microsoft Windows

Microsoft Windows

Microsoft Windows is a series of operating systems produced by Microsoft.Microsoft introduced an operating environment named Windows on November 20, 1985 as an add-on to MS-DOS in response to the growing interest in graphical user interfaces . Microsoft Windows came to dominate the world's personal...

and BSD

Berkeley Software Distribution

Berkeley Software Distribution is a Unix operating system derivative developed and distributed by the Computer Systems Research Group of the University of California, Berkeley, from 1977 to 1995...

) in addition to the standard QWERTY layout. Most major operating systems have the option of toggling to the Dvorak layout. It is also supported at the hardware level by some high-end ergonomic keyboard

Ergonomic keyboard

An ergonomic keyboard is a computer keyboard designed with ergonomic considerations to minimize muscle strain and a host of related problems. Typically such keyboards are constructed in a V shape, to allow right and left hands to type at a slight angle more natural to the human form.-Keyboard...

Overview

The Dvorak layout was designed to replace the QWERTY

QWERTY

keyboard layout (the de facto standard keyboard layout, so named for the starting letters in the top row), in which keys are arranged to avoid mechanical jams on the first generation of economically successful typewriter

Typewriter

A typewriter is a mechanical or electromechanical device with keys that, when pressed, cause characters to be printed on a medium, usually paper. Typically one character is printed per keypress, and the machine prints the characters by making ink impressions of type elements similar to the pieces...

s. The original QWERTY keyboard suffers from many problems that Dvorak himself identified:

Many common letter combinations require awkward finger motions.
Many common letter combinations are typed with the same finger.
Many common letter combinations require a finger to jump over the home row.
Many common letter combinations are typed with one hand while the other sits idle.
Most typing is done with the left hand, which for most people is the weaker hand.
Many common letter combinations are typed by adjacent fingers, which is slower than using other fingers.
About 30% of typing is done on the lower row, which is the slowest and most difficult row to reach.
About 52% of keyboard strokes are done in the top row, requiring the fingers to travel away from the home row most of the time.

Dvorak studied letter frequencies

Letter frequencies

The frequency of letters in text has often been studied for use in cryptography, and frequency analysis in particular. No exact letter frequency distribution underlies a given language, since all writers write slightly differently. Linotype machines sorted the letters' frequencies as etaoin shrdlu...

and the physiology

Physiology

Physiology is the science of the function of living systems. This includes how organisms, organ systems, organs, cells, and bio-molecules carry out the chemical or physical functions that exist in a living system. The highest honor awarded in physiology is the Nobel Prize in Physiology or...

of people’s hands and created a layout to alleviate the problems he identified with the QWERTY layout. The layout he created adheres to these principles:

Letters should be typed by alternating between hands (which makes typing more rhythmic, increases speed, reduces error, and reduces fatigue).
For maximum speed and efficiency, the most common letters
ETAOIN SHRDLU
ETAOIN SHRDLU is a nonsense phrase that sometimes appeared in print in the days of "hot type" publishing because of a custom of Linotype machine operators. It appeared frequently enough that it became part of the lore of newspapers...

and digraphs
Digraph (orthography)
A digraph or digram is a pair of characters used to write one phoneme or a sequence of phonemes that does not correspond to the normal values of the two characters combined...

should be the easiest to type. This means that they should be on the home row, which is where the fingers rest, and under the strongest fingers (Thus, about 70% of keyboard strokes on the Dvorak Simplified Keyboard are done on the home row).
The least common letters should be on the bottom row, which is the hardest row to reach.
The right hand should do more of the typing, because most people are right-handed.
Digraphs
Digraph (orthography)
A digraph or digram is a pair of characters used to write one phoneme or a sequence of phonemes that does not correspond to the normal values of the two characters combined...

should not be typed with adjacent fingers.
Stroking should generally move from the edges of the board to the middle. An observation of this principle is that, for many people, when tapping fingers on a table, it is easier going from little finger to index than vice versa. This motion on a keyboard is called inboard stroke flow.

The Dvorak layout is intended for the English language. In other European languages, letter frequencies, letter sequences, and digraphs differ from English. Also, many languages have letters that do not occur in English. For non-English use, these differences lessen the supposed advantages of the original Dvorak keyboard. However, the Dvorak principles have been applied to the design of keyboards for these other languages.

The layout was completed in 1932 and was granted in 1936. The American National Standards Institute

American National Standards Institute

(ANSI) designated the Dvorak keyboard as an alternative standard keyboard layout in 1982; the standard is X3.207:1991 (previously X4.22-1983), “Alternate Keyboard Arrangement for Alphanumeric Machines”. The original ANSI Dvorak layout was available as a factory-supplied option on the original IBM Selectric typewriter

IBM Selectric typewriter

The IBM Selectric typewriter was a highly successful model line of electric typewriters introduced by IBM on July 31, 1961.Instead of the "basket" of individual typebars that swung up to strike the ribbon and page in a traditional typewriter, the Selectric had a type element that rotated and...

.

Some researchers challenge the established view that the Dvorak layout is ergonomically superior to the QWERTY one, and hold that QWERTY emerged through a quite rigorous process of competition and eventual acceptance in the marketplace. However, the findings of these researchers themselves have been challenged. For instance, even though QWERTY did emerge from a process of competition, at the time few, if any, other typing machines had keyboards; therefore the QWERTY keyboard layout itself was subject to very little, if any, competition.

In 1984, the Dvorak layout had an estimated 100,000 users.

Keyboard strokes

Touch typing

Touch typing is typing without using the sense of sight to find the keys. Specifically, a touch typist will know their location on the keyboard through muscle memory. Touch typing typically involves placing the eight fingers in a horizontal row along the middle of the keyboard and having them...

requires a typist to rest their hands in the home row (QWERTY row starting with "ASDF"). The more strokes there are in the home row, the less movement the fingers must do, thus allowing a typist to type faster, more accurately, and with less strain to the hand and fingers. Motion picture studies prove not only that typing is done fastest in the home row, but also typing is the slowest on the bottom row. If the fingers must move, it is easier to move them up to the top row (QWERTY row starting with "QWERTY") rather than down to the bottom row (QWERTY row starting with "ZXCV").

Key stroke distribution
Row	QWERTY	Dvorak
Top	52%	22%
Home	32%	70%
Bottom	16%	8%

It is notable that the vast majority of the Dvorak layout's key strokes (70%) are done in the home row (the easiest row to type because the fingers rest there). In addition, the Dvorak layout requires the fewest strokes on the bottom row (the most difficult row to type). On the other hand, QWERTY requires typists to move their fingers to the top row for a majority of strokes and has only 32% of the strokes done in the home row.

Because the Dvorak layout concentrates the vast majority of key strokes to the home row, the Dvorak layout uses about 63% of the finger motion required by QWERTY, thus making the Dvorak layout more ergonomic. Because the Dvorak layout requires less finger motion from the typist compared to QWERTY, many users with repetitive strain injuries have reported that switching from QWERTY to Dvorak alleviated or even eliminated their repetitive strain injuries.

The typing loads between hands differs for each of the keyboard layouts. On QWERTY keyboards, 56% of the typing strokes are done by the left hand. As the left hand is weaker for the majority of people, the Dvorak keyboard puts the more often used keys on the right hand side, thereby having 56% of the typing strokes done by the right hand.

Awkward strokes

Awkward strokes are undesirable because they slow down typing, increase typing errors, and increase finger strain. Hurdling is an awkward stroke requiring a single finger to jump directly from one row, over the home row to another row (e.g., typing “minimum” (which often comes out as "minimun" or "mimimum") on the QWERTY keyboard). In the English language, there are about 1,200 words that require a hurdle on the QWERTY layout. In contrast, there are few words requiring a hurdle on the Dvorak layout and even fewer requiring a double hurdle.

Hand alternation

Alternating hands while typing is a desirable trait because while one hand is typing a letter, the other hand can get in position to type the next letter. Thus, a typist may fall into a steady rhythm and type quickly. However, when a string of letters is done with the same hand, the chances of stuttering are increased and a rhythm can be broken, thus decreasing speed and increasing errors and fatigue. The QWERTY layout has more than 3,000 words that are typed on the left hand alone and about 300 words that are typed on the right hand alone (the aforementioned word "minimum" is a right-hand-only word). In contrast, with the Dvorak layout, only a few words are typed using only the left hand and even fewer with the right hand. This is because a syllable requires at least one vowel

Vowel

In phonetics, a vowel is a sound in spoken language, such as English ah! or oh! , pronounced with an open vocal tract so that there is no build-up of air pressure at any point above the glottis. This contrasts with consonants, such as English sh! , where there is a constriction or closure at some...

, and all the vowels (and "y") are on the left side.

Standard keyboard

QWERTY enjoys advantages over the Dvorak layout due to its position as the de facto standard keyboard:

Keyboard shortcuts in most major operating systems, including Windows, are designed for QWERTY users and can be awkward for Dvorak users, such as Ctrl-C (Copy) and Ctrl-V (Paste).
Some public computers (such as in libraries) will not allow users to change the keyboard to the Dvorak layout
Some standardized exams will not allow test takers to use the Dvorak layout (e.g. Graduate Record Examination
Graduate Record Examination
The Graduate Record Examinations is a standardized test that is an admissions requirement for many graduate schools in the United States, in other English-speaking countries and for English-taught graduate and business programs world-wide...

)
Games can prove nearly impossible to play with the default keyboard mapping, especially those which use W,A,S,D as controls.
People who can touch type
Touch typing
Touch typing is typing without using the sense of sight to find the keys. Specifically, a touch typist will know their location on the keyboard through muscle memory. Touch typing typically involves placing the eight fingers in a horizontal row along the middle of the keyboard and having them...

with a QWERTY keyboard may be less productive with alternative layouts even if these are more optimal. Re-learning touch typing is an investment, with average level courses costing $ 320 or about, not counting the time of the student, and these are still not the true professional studies.

History

August Dvorak was an educational psychologist and professor of education at the University of Washington

University of Washington

University of Washington is a public research university, founded in 1861 in Seattle, Washington, United States. The UW is the largest university in the Northwest and the oldest public university on the West Coast. The university has three campuses, with its largest campus in the University...

in Seattle, Washington

Seattle, Washington

Seattle is the county seat of King County, Washington. With 608,660 residents as of the 2010 Census, Seattle is the largest city in the Northwestern United States. The Seattle metropolitan area of about 3.4 million inhabitants is the 15th largest metropolitan area in the country...

. Dvorak became interested in the keyboard layout while serving as an advisor to Gertrude Ford, who was writing her master’s thesis on typing errors. Touch typing

Touch typing

had come into wide use by that time, so when Dvorak studied the QWERTY layout he concluded that the QWERTY layout needed to be replaced. Dvorak was joined by his brother-in-law William Dealey, who was a professor of education at the then North Texas State Teacher's College

University of North Texas

The University of North Texas is a public institution of higher education and research in Denton. Founded in 1890, UNT is part of the University of North Texas System. As of the fall of 2010, the University of North Texas, Denton campus, had a certified enrollment of 36,067...

in Denton, Texas

Denton, Texas

The city of Denton is the county seat of Denton County, Texas in the United States. Its population was 119,454 according to the 2010 U.S. Census, making it the eleventh largest city in the Dallas/Fort Worth Metroplex...

.

Dvorak and Dealey’s objective was to scientifically design a keyboard to decrease typing errors, speed up typing, and lessen typer fatigue. They engaged in extensive research while designing their keyboard layout. In 1914 and 1915, Dealey attended seminars on the science of motion and later reviewed slow-motion films of typists with Dvorak. Dvorak and Dealey meticulously studied the English language, researching the most used letters and letter combinations. They also studied the physiology of the hand. The result in 1932 was the Dvorak Simplified Keyboard.

In 1933, Dvorak started entering typists trained on his keyboard into the International Commercial Schools Contest, which were typing contests sponsored by typewriter manufacturers consisting of professional and amateur contests. The professional contests had typists sponsored by typewriter companies to advertise their machines. Ten times from 1934–41, Dvorak’s typists won first in their class events. In the 1935 contest alone, nine Dvorak typists won twenty awards. Dvorak typists were so successful that in 1937 the Contest Committee barred Dvorak’s typists for being “unfair competition” until Dvorak protested. In addition, QWERTY typists did not want to be placed near Dvorak typists because QWERTY typists were disconcerted by the noise produced from the fast typing speeds made by Dvorak typists.

In the 1930s, the Tacoma, Washington, school district

Tacoma Public Schools

Tacoma Public Schools is the main school district for Tacoma, Washington, USA.-District facts:-2004-2005 Budget:-School board:*Kurt Miller, President, Term expires: November, 2009*Connie Rickman, Vice President, Term expires: November, 2009...

ran an experimental program in typing to determine whether to hold Dvorak layout classes. The experiment used 2,700 students to learn the Dvorak layout, and the district found that the Dvorak layout students learned the keyboard in one-third the time it took to learn QWERTY. However, a new school board was elected and chose to close the Dvorak layout classes.

Writer Barbara Blackburn was the fastest English language

English language

English is a West Germanic language that arose in the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms of England and spread into what was to become south-east Scotland under the influence of the Anglian medieval kingdom of Northumbria...

typist in the world, according to The Guinness Book of World Records. Using the Dvorak Simplified Keyboard, she was able to maintain 150 words per minute (wpm) for 50 minutes, and 170 wpm for shorter periods. She has been clocked at a peak speed of 212 wpm. Blackburn, who failed her QWERTY typing class in high school, first encountered the Dvorak keyboard in 1938, quickly learned to achieve very high speeds, and occasionally toured giving speed-typing demonstrations during her secretarial career. Blackburn died in April 2008.

Original Dvorak layout

Over the decades, symbol keys were shifted around the keyboard leading to variations in the Dvorak layout. In 1982, the American National Standards Institute (“ANSI

Ansi

Ansi is a village in Kaarma Parish, Saare County, on the island of Saaremaa, Estonia....

”) implemented a standard for the Dvorak layout known as ANSI X4.22-1983. This standard gave the Dvorak layout official recognition as an alternative to the QWERTY keyboard.

The layout standardized by the ANSI differs from the original or “classic” layout devised and promulgated by Dvorak. Indeed, the layout promulgated publicly by Dvorak differed slightly from the layout for which Dvorak & Dealey applied for a patent in 1932—most notably in the placement of Z. Today’s keyboards have more keys than the original typewriter did, and other significant differences existed:

The numeric keys of the classic Dvorak layout are ordered: 7 5 3 1 9 0 2 4 6 8
In the classic Dvorak layout, the question mark key [?] is in the leftmost position of the upper row, while the slash key [/] is in the rightmost position of the upper row.
The following symbols share keys (the second symbol being printed when the SHIFT key is pressed):
- colon [:] and question mark [?]
- ampersand [&] and slash [/].

Modern U.S. keyboard layouts almost always place semicolon and colon together on a single key, and slash and question mark together on a single key. Thus, if the keycaps of a modern keyboard are rearranged so that the unshifted symbol characters match the classic Dvorak layout then, sensibly, the result is the ANSI layout.

Modern operating systems

The Dvorak Simplified Keyboard (“DSK”) is included with all major operating system

Operating system

s (such as Microsoft Windows

Microsoft Windows

, Mac OS X

Mac OS X

Mac OS X is a series of Unix-based operating systems and graphical user interfaces developed, marketed, and sold by Apple Inc. Since 2002, has been included with all new Macintosh computer systems...

, Linux

Linux

Linux is a Unix-like computer operating system assembled under the model of free and open source software development and distribution. The defining component of any Linux system is the Linux kernel, an operating system kernel first released October 5, 1991 by Linus Torvalds...

and BSD

Berkeley Software Distribution

Berkeley Software Distribution is a Unix operating system derivative developed and distributed by the Computer Systems Research Group of the University of California, Berkeley, from 1977 to 1995...

). Changing a computer running on a major operating system to the Dvorak layout can be done within 30 seconds.

Early PCs

Although some word processor

Word processor

A word processor is a computer application used for the production of any sort of printable material....

s could simulate alternative keyboard layouts through software, this was application-specific; if more than one program was commonly used (e.g., a word processor and a spreadsheet

Spreadsheet

A spreadsheet is a computer application that simulates a paper accounting worksheet. It displays multiple cells usually in a two-dimensional matrix or grid consisting of rows and columns. Each cell contains alphanumeric text, numeric values or formulas...

), the user could be forced to switch layouts depending on the application. Occasionally, stickers were provided to place over the keys for these layouts.

However, IBM-compatible PCs used an active, “smart” keyboard, where the keyboard was actually a peripheral device (powered by the keyboard port

Computer port (hardware)

In computer hardware, a port serves as an interface between the computer and other computers or peripheral devices. Physically, a port is a specialized outlet on a piece of equipment to which a plug or cable connects...

). Striking a key generated a key “code”, which was sent to the computer. Thus, changing to an alternative keyboard layout was most easily accomplished by simply buying a keyboard with the new layout. Because the key codes were generated by the keyboard itself, all software would respond accordingly. In the mid- to late-1980s, a small cottage industry for replacement PC keyboards arose; although most of these were concerned with keyboard “feel” and/or programmable macros, there were several with alternative layouts, such as Dvorak.

Amiga

Some Amiga operating systems can modify the keyboard layout by opening up the keyboard input preference, and selecting "Dvorak". Earlier Amiga systems also came with the Dvorak keymap available on the "Extras" disk that came with the computer. By copying the keymap to the Workbench disk, editing the startup scripts, and then rebooting, Dvorak was usable in many Workbench application programs.

Windows

According to Microsoft

Microsoft

Microsoft Corporation is an American public multinational corporation headquartered in Redmond, Washington, USA that develops, manufactures, licenses, and supports a wide range of products and services predominantly related to computing through its various product divisions...

, versions of the Windows operating system including Windows 95

Windows 95

Windows 95 is a consumer-oriented graphical user interface-based operating system. It was released on August 24, 1995 by Microsoft, and was a significant progression from the company's previous Windows products...

, Windows NT 3.51

Windows NT

Windows NT is a family of operating systems produced by Microsoft, the first version of which was released in July 1993. It was a powerful high-level-language-based, processor-independent, multiprocessing, multiuser operating system with features comparable to Unix. It was intended to complement...

and higher have shipped with support for the U.S. Dvorak layout. Free updates to use the layout on earlier Windows versions are available for download from Microsoft.

Earlier versions, such as DOS 6.2

MS-DOS

MS-DOS is an operating system for x86-based personal computers. It was the most commonly used member of the DOS family of operating systems, and was the main operating system for IBM PC compatible personal computers during the 1980s to the mid 1990s, until it was gradually superseded by operating...

/Windows 3.1, included four keyboard layouts: QWERTY, two-handed Dvorak, right-hand Dvorak, and left-hand Dvorak.

In May 2004 Microsoft published an improved version of its Keyboard Layout Creator (MSKLC version 1.3 – current version is 1.4) that allows anyone to easily create any keyboard layout desired, thus allowing the creation and installation of any international Dvorak keyboard layout such as Dvorak Type II (for German), Svorak

Svorak

Svorak is one of many Swedish versions of the Dvorak keyboard layout.The Svorak layout places the three extra Swedish vowels on the leftmost three keys of the upper row, which correspond to punctuation symbols on the English Dvorak layout...

(for Swedish) etc.

Another advantage of the Microsoft Keyboard Layout Creator over third-party tools for installing an international Dvorak layout is that it allows creation of a keyboard layout that automatically switches to standard (QWERTY) after pressing the two hotkeys (SHIFT and CTRL).

Unix-based systems

Many operating systems based on UNIX

Unix

Unix is a multitasking, multi-user computer operating system originally developed in 1969 by a group of AT&T employees at Bell Labs, including Ken Thompson, Dennis Ritchie, Brian Kernighan, Douglas McIlroy, and Joe Ossanna...

, including OpenBSD

OpenBSD

OpenBSD is a Unix-like computer operating system descended from Berkeley Software Distribution , a Unix derivative developed at the University of California, Berkeley. It was forked from NetBSD by project leader Theo de Raadt in late 1995...

, FreeBSD

FreeBSD

FreeBSD is a free Unix-like operating system descended from AT&T UNIX via BSD UNIX. Although for legal reasons FreeBSD cannot be called “UNIX”, as the direct descendant of BSD UNIX , FreeBSD’s internals and system APIs are UNIX-compliant...

, NetBSD

NetBSD

NetBSD is a freely available open source version of the Berkeley Software Distribution Unix operating system. It was the second open source BSD descendant to be formally released, after 386BSD, and continues to be actively developed. The NetBSD project is primarily focused on high quality design,...

, OpenSolaris

OpenSolaris

OpenSolaris was an open source computer operating system based on Solaris created by Sun Microsystems. It was also the name of the project initiated by Sun to build a developer and user community around the software...

, Plan 9

Plan 9 from Bell Labs

Plan 9 from Bell Labs is a distributed operating system. It was developed primarily for research purposes as the successor to Unix by the Computing Sciences Research Center at Bell Labs between the mid-1980s and 2002...

, and most Linux distribution

Linux distribution

A Linux distribution is a member of the family of Unix-like operating systems built on top of the Linux kernel. Such distributions are operating systems including a large collection of software applications such as word processors, spreadsheets, media players, and database applications...

s, can be configured to use the U.S. Dvorak layout and a handful of variants. However, all current Unix-like

Unix-like

A Unix-like operating system is one that behaves in a manner similar to a Unix system, while not necessarily conforming to or being certified to any version of the Single UNIX Specification....

systems with X.Org

X.Org

X.Org refers to several things related to the X Window System:* X.Org, the organisation in charge of X standards from 1999 * The X.Org Foundation, a community-based foundation which took over X stewardship in 2004...

and appropriate keymaps installed (and virtually all systems meant for desktop use include them) are able to use any QWERTY-labeled keyboard as a Dvorak one without any problems or additional configuration. This removes the burden of producing additional keymaps for every variant of QWERTY provided. Runtime layout switching is also possible.

Apple computers

Apple

Apple Computer

Apple Inc. is an American multinational corporation that designs and markets consumer electronics, computer software, and personal computers. The company's best-known hardware products include the Macintosh line of computers, the iPod, the iPhone and the iPad...

had Dvorak advocates since the company’s early (pre-IPO) days. Several engineers devised hardware and software to remap the keyboard, which were used inside the company and even sold commercially.

Apple II

The Apple II had a keyboard ROM that translated keystrokes into characters. The ROM contained both QWERTY and Dvorak layouts, but the QWERTY layout was enabled by default. A modification could be made by pulling out the ROM, bending up four pins, soldering a resistor between two pins, soldering two others to a pair of wires connected to a DIP switch

DIP switch

DIP switches are manual electric switches that are packaged in a group in a standard dual in-line package...

, which was installed in a pre-existing hole in the back of the machine, then plugging the modified ROM back in its socket. The “hack” was reversible and did no damage. By flipping a switch on the machine’s back panel, the user could switch from one layout to the other. This modification was entirely unofficial but was inadvertently demonstrated at the 1984 Comdex

COMDEX

COMDEX was a computer expo held in Las Vegas, Nevada, each November from 1979 to 2003. It was one of the largest computer trade shows in the world, usually second only to the German CeBIT, and by many accounts one of the largest trade shows in any industry sector...

show, in Las Vegas

Las Vegas metropolitan area

The Las Vegas Valley is the heart of the Las Vegas-Paradise, NV MSA also known as the Las Vegas–Paradise–Henderson MSA which includes all of Clark County, Nevada, and is a metropolitan area in the southern part of the U.S. state of Nevada. The Valley is defined by the Las Vegas Valley landform, a ...

, by an Apple employee whose mission was to demonstrate Apple Logo

Logo (programming language)

Logo is a multi-paradigm computer programming language used in education. It is an adaptation and dialect of the Lisp language; some have called it Lisp without the parentheses. It was originally conceived and written as functional programming language, and drove a mechanical turtle as an output...

II. The employee had become accustomed to the Dvorak layout and brought the necessary parts to the show, installed them in a demo machine, then did his Logo demo. Viewers, curious that he always reached behind the machine before and after allowing other people to type, asked him about the modification. He spent as much time explaining the Dvorak keyboard as explaining Logo.

Apple brought new interest to the Dvorak layout with the Apple IIc

Apple IIc

The Apple IIc, the fourth model in the Apple II series of personal computers, was Apple Computer’s first endeavor to produce a portable computer. The end result was a notebook-sized version of the Apple II that could be transported from place to place...

, which had a mechanical switch above the keyboard whereby the user could switch back and forth between the QWERTY layout and the Dvorak layout: this was the most official version of the IIe Dvorak mod. The IIc Dvorak layout was even mentioned in 1984 ads, which stated that the World's Fastest Typist, Barbara Blackburn, had set a record on an Apple IIc with the Dvorak layout.

The Dvorak layout was also selectable using the built-in control panel applet on the Apple IIGS

Apple IIGS

The Apple , the fifth and most powerful model in the Apple II series of personal computers produced by Apple Computer. The "GS" in the name stands for Graphics and Sound, referring to its enhanced graphics and sound capabilities, both of which greatly surpassed previous models of the line...

Apple III

The Apple III

Apple III

The Apple III is a business-oriented personal computer produced and released by Apple Computer that was intended as the successor to the Apple II series, but largely considered a failure in the market. Development work on the Apple III started in late 1978 under the guidance of Dr. Wendell Sander...

used a keyboard-layout file loaded from a floppy disk: the standard system-software package included QWERTY and Dvorak layout files. Changing layouts required restarting the machine.

Apple Lisa

The technical documentation available to third-party developers does not mention keyboard mapping, though it was purportedly available through undocumented interfaces..

Mac OS

In its early days, the Macintosh could be converted to the Dvorak layout by making changes to the “System” file: this was not easily reversible and required restarting the machine. This modification was highly unofficial, but it was comparable to many other user-modifications and customizations that Mac users made. Using the “resource editor”, ResEdit

ResEdit

ResEdit was a developer tool application for the Apple Macintosh, used to create and edit resources directly in the Mac's resource fork architecture. It was an alternative to tools such as REdit, and the resource compiler Rez. For the average user, ResEdit was generally easier to use, because it...

, users could create keyboard layouts, icons, and other useful items. A few years later, a third-party developer offered a utility program called MacKeymeleon, which put a menu on the menu bar that allowed on-the-fly switching of keyboard layouts. Eventually, Apple Macintosh engineers built the functionality of this utility into the standard System Software, along with a few layouts: QWERTY, Dvorak, French (AZERTY

AZERTY

AZERTY is a specific layout for the characters of the Latin alphabet on typewriter keys and computer keyboards. The layout takes its name from the first six letters to appear on the first row of alphabetical keys...

), and other foreign-language layouts.
Since about 1998, beginning with Mac OS 8.6

Mac OS

Mac OS is a series of graphical user interface-based operating systems developed by Apple Inc. for their Macintosh line of computer systems. The Macintosh user experience is credited with popularizing the graphical user interface...

, Apple has included the Dvorak layout. It can be activated with the Keyboard Control Panel and selecting "Dvorak". The setting is applied once the Control Panel is closed out. Keyboard layouts can be switched back and forth by firmly pressing ⌘ + Space or ⌘ + Option + Space. Apple also includes a Dvorak variant they call “Dvorak – Qwerty ⌘”. With this layout, the keyboard temporarily becomes QWERTY when the Command (⌘/Apple) key is held down. By keeping familiar keyboard shortcuts like “close” or “copy” on the same keys as ordinary QWERTY, this lets some people use their well-practiced muscle memory and may make the transition easier. Mac OS and subsequently Mac OS X allows additional “on-the-fly” switching between layouts: a menu-bar icon (by default, a national flag that matches the current language, a ‘DV’ represents Dvorak and a ‘DQ’ represents Dvorak – Qwerty ⌘) brings up a drop-down menu, allowing the user to choose the desired layout. Subsequent keystrokes will reflect the choice, which can be reversed the same way.

Mobile phones and PDAs

A number of mobile phones today are built with either full QWERTY keyboards or software implementations of them on a touch screen. Sometimes the keyboard layout can be changed by means of a freeware third-party utility, such as Hacker's Keyboard for Android, AE Keyboard Mapper for Windows Mobile

Windows Mobile

Windows Mobile is a mobile operating system developed by Microsoft that was used in smartphones and Pocket PCs, but by 2011 was rarely supplied on new phones. The last version is "Windows Mobile 6.5.5"; it is superseded by Windows Phone, which does not run Windows Mobile software.Windows Mobile is...

, or KeybLayout for Symbian OS.

The RIM

Research In Motion

Research In Motion Limited or RIM is a Canadian multinational telecommunications company headquartered in Waterloo, Ontario, Canada that designs, manufactures and markets wireless solutions for the worldwide mobile communications market...

BlackBerry

BlackBerry is a line of mobile email and smartphone devices developed and designed by Canadian company Research In Motion since 1999.BlackBerry devices are smartphones, designed to function as personal digital assistants, portable media players, internet browsers, gaming devices, and much more...

lines support only QWERTY and its localized variants AZERTY

AZERTY

and QWERTZ

QWERTZ

thumb|175px|A computer QWERTZ keyboardThe QWERTZ or QWERTZU keyboard is a widely used computer and typewriter keyboard layout that is mostly used in Central Europe...

. Apple's iOS 4.0 supports external Dvorak keyboards.

Controversy

Through its history the Dvorak layout and the benefits it claims have come under much scrutiny. Many claim that the experiments determining its superiority in terms of speed of typing are biased, with the most famous being conducted by Dvorak himself, and insufficiently rigorous. One major test in 1956 conducted by the U.S. General Service Administration found Dvorak no more efficient than QWERTY.

Resistance to adoption

Although the Dvorak layout is the only other keyboard layout registered with ANSI and is provided with all major operating systems, attempts to convert universally to the Dvorak layout have not succeeded. The failure of the Dvorak layout to displace the QWERTY layout has been the subject of some studies.

In 1956, a General Services Administration

General Services Administration

The General Services Administration is an independent agency of the United States government, established in 1949 to help manage and support the basic functioning of federal agencies. The GSA supplies products and communications for U.S...

study by Earle Strong, which included an experiment involving ten experienced government typists, concluded that Dvorak training would never be able to amortize its costs. The study was a large obstacle for the wide adoption of Dvorak for many firms and government agencies. One criticism of the experiment is that it did not involve any beginning typists; however, Liebowitz notes that it parallels the decision that a real firm or government agency would need to make: Is it worthwhile to retrain its present typists? A second critique of the study points out that the Dvorak typists were not given adequate time to reach their potential competence, and what promise had been demonstrated by the Dvorak typists was ignored by the researchers. Strong's objectivity with regard to the Dvorak keyboard has also been questioned. Seven years before the study began Strong wrote “I have developed a great deal of material on how to get this increased production on the part of typists on the standard keyboard. Consequently, I am not in favor of purchasing new keyboards and retraining typists on the new keyboard. ... I strongly feel that the present keyboard has not been fully exploited, and I am out to exploit it to its utmost in opposition to the change to new keyboards.” Furthermore, there is evidence of a strained business relationship between Strong and Dvorak. When researchers had asked Strong for the data to his study, it was found that Strong had destroyed it.

However, in considering resistance to the adoption of the Dvorak layout, different segments of the market differ in the extent, nature, and motivation of their resistance. Furthermore, the influence of these factors on the different segments of the market has changed over time, following changes in technology and awareness of Dvorak as an alternative keyboard layout. Factors against adoption of the Dvorak layout have included the following:

Dvorak introduced his layout during the Great Depression, a time when businesses and people did not have the resources to invest in the new layout.
With World War II came the conversion of typewriter manufacturing plants into small arms plants, thus halting production of new typewriters (including the Dvorak Layout).
The publication of Earle Strong's aforementioned report.
Failure to achieve the general population's awareness that the Dvorak layout existed. This improved somewhat following the Guinness Book of Records 1985 publication of Barbara Blackburn’s achievement of 212 wpm
Words per minute
Words per minute, commonly abbreviated wpm, is a measure of input or output speed.For the purposes of WPM measurement a word is standardized to five characters or keystrokes. For instance, "I run" counts as one word, but "rhinoceros" counts as two...

using a Dvorak keyboard, and again in the mid-1990s when computer operating systems began to incorporate the Dvorak layout as an option.
Failure to overcome an investment in competence in the QWERTY layout made by a large number of typists and typist trainers prior to the general availability of the Dvorak layout. This investment has proved the most powerful influence up until the 1990s. Typing training in schools and secretarial colleges is almost always done on the QWERTY layout both because it conforms with the expectation of industry and because it is the layout with which most teachers or trainers are already familiar.
A reduction in efficiency while learning the Dvorak layout further impedes its adoption by typists already competent with QWERTY, and the organizations that employ them.
Failure to persuade large typewriter manufacturers to produce significant volumes of typewriters equipped with Dvorak layouts.
Converting standard mechanical typewriters to Dvorak (or any alternative, e.g. international layout) was often impractical and excessively expensive, so switching to Dvorak usually required a new, dedicated machine. A notable exception was the popular IBM Selectric typewriter
IBM Selectric typewriter
The IBM Selectric typewriter was a highly successful model line of electric typewriters introduced by IBM on July 31, 1961.Instead of the "basket" of individual typebars that swung up to strike the ribbon and page in a traditional typewriter, the Selectric had a type element that rotated and...

, which used a single spherical typing element rather than individual character hammers; it could easily be converted by replacing the QWERTY typing element with a Dvorak equivalent.
This problem was effectively eliminated with the advent of PCs, where computer programs can change the character produced when a particular key is pressed. This capacity benefited not only Dvorak typists, but those who typed in languages other than English. With early computers, this required the contents of the character-generator ROM to be changed, but with subsequent designs only a table in memory or the disk file storing this table needed to be changed. By the mid 1990s the Dvorak layout was a standard option on most computer systems.
Incompatibility between the two keyboard layouts on computers, where keys are assigned additional functions within software programs. In some cases related additional functions are assigned to keys that are physically proximate on the QWERTY layout, but not so in the Dvorak layout; for example, the Unix
Unix
Unix is a multitasking, multi-user computer operating system originally developed in 1969 by a group of AT&T employees at Bell Labs, including Ken Thompson, Dennis Ritchie, Brian Kernighan, Douglas McIlroy, and Joe Ossanna...

text editor vi
Vi
vi is a screen-oriented text editor originally created for the Unix operating system. The portable subset of the behavior of vi and programs based on it, and the ex editor language supported within these programs, is described by the Single Unix Specification and POSIX.The original code for vi...

uses the keys H, J, K and L to cause movement to the left, down, up, and right, respectively. With a QWERTY layout, these keys are all together under the right-hand home row, but with the Dvorak layout they are no longer neatly together. In many video games, keys W, A, S and D are used for arrow movements (their inverse-T arrangement on a QWERTY layout mirrors the arrangement of the cursor keys). In the Dvorak layout, this is no longer true, although most video games allow keys to be remapped, and many will automatically recognize the normal key locations regardless. Common computer keyboard shortcuts for undo
Undo
Undo is a command in many computer programs. It erases the last change done to the document reverting it to an older state. In some more advanced programs such as graphic processing, undo will negate the last command done to the file being edited....

, cut, copy and paste operations are Ctrl (or Command) + Z, X, C, and V respectively; conveniently located in the same row in the QWERTY layout, but not on a Dvorak layout. While some applications do compensate for this, these issues do add a layer of complexity to using the many computer applications that do not.
Some confusion regarding which of the keyboard layouts designed by August Dvorak is the “real” Dvorak layout. This arose in part due to the existence of, in addition to the standard layout, layouts for left-handed (only) and right-handed (only) use. Also, while Dvorak specified a particular layout for the number sequence at the top of the keyboard, most implementations of the Dvorak layout retain the ‘1,2,3...9,0’ arrangement; most people who want to type numbers quickly will use the numeric keypad rather than the top row.

An appreciation of the strength of the resistance factors (particularly the investment in typewriter manufacturing) suggests that the Dvorak layout would need to have been significantly superior to the QWERTY layout in order for the former to displace the latter in widespread use in the past. If the Dvorak layout is inherently at least as efficient as, or more efficient than, the QWERTY layout, then one might expect to see an increasing rate of use as resistance factors (such as lack of awareness, non-programmable machines, and one-style formal training) become less powerful. There are no surveys or studies looking at the rate of use of the Dvorak layout over time.

A discussion of the Dvorak layout is sometimes used as an exercise by management consultants to illustrate the difficulties of change

Change management

Change management is a structured approach to shifting/transitioning individuals, teams, and organizations from a current state to a desired future state. It is an organizational process aimed at helping employees to accept and embrace changes in their current business environment....

. The Dvorak layout is often used as a standard example of network effect

Network effect

In economics and business, a network effect is the effect that one user of a good or service has on the value of that product to other people. When network effect is present, the value of a product or service is dependent on the number of others using it.The classic example is the telephone...

s, particularly in economics

Economics

Economics is the social science that analyzes the production, distribution, and consumption of goods and services. The term economics comes from the Ancient Greek from + , hence "rules of the house"...

textbook

Textbook

A textbook or coursebook is a manual of instruction in any branch of study. Textbooks are produced according to the demands of educational institutions...

Alternatives

Because of the radical differences between QWERTY and Dvorak, existing typists find that it takes considerable time and effort to make the change. As a consequence, some attempts have been made to design alternative layouts that follow the principles involved in the Dvorak keyboard layout but preserve many of the QWERTY key positions, thereby making it easier for users to make the transition. Programs such as the Microsoft Keyboard Layout Creator and KbdEdit allow this to be done very easily. One such popular variant is the Colemak keyboard layout.

One-handed versions

During the 1960s, Dvorak applied a similar approach of minimizing distance traveled when he designed quite different arrangements for touch-typing with only the left hand or with only the right hand. This can provide increased accessibility to single-handed users who might struggle with excessive lateral hand movement when using two-handed keyboards. Note that the right-handed and left-handed Dvorak layouts not only differ from each other dramatically, but also differ from two-handed Dvorak layout quite dramatically as well. Some users with full use of both hands enjoy the ability to simultaneously type with only a single hand while concurrently controlling a mouse with the other hand, or in the case of police officers, operating vehicular controls with their left hand while touch-typing with their right hand on a dashboard-mounted laptop computer. The arrangements have been designed for each hand to minimize distance traveled by fingers as well as to minimize lateral distance traveled by the hand as a whole. Note that the hand is intended to rest near the center of the keyboard in order to reach the entire keyboard, eliminating the need for the split ergonomic keyboard layout.

Note that the left-handed Dvorak and right-handed Dvorak keyboard layouts are substantially mirror images of each other, with the exception of keys that are wider than the normal keys and the tilde

Tilde

The tilde is a grapheme with several uses. The name of the character comes from Portuguese and Spanish, from the Latin titulus meaning "title" or "superscription", though the term "tilde" has evolved and now has a different meaning in linguistics....

–grave-accent

Grave accent

The grave accent is a diacritical mark used in written Breton, Catalan, Corsican, Dutch, French, Greek , Italian, Mohawk, Norwegian, Occitan, Portuguese, Scottish Gaelic, Vietnamese, Welsh, Romansh, and other languages.-Greek:The grave accent was first used in the polytonic orthography of Ancient...

key. Some left-handed Dvorak keyboards have “)(” in strict compliance with the mirror-image concept whereas others have “” in the customary order. Shown at the right is Dvorak's original ")(" placement of the parentheses, which is the more widely-distributed layout, such as the one that Microsoft

Microsoft

supplies with Windows

Microsoft Windows

Other languages

Although DSK is implemented in many languages other than English

English language

, there are still potential issues. Every Dvorak implementation in other languages leaves the Roman characters

Latin alphabet

The Latin alphabet, also called the Roman alphabet, is the most recognized alphabet used in the world today. It evolved from a western variety of the Greek alphabet called the Cumaean alphabet, which was adopted and modified by the Etruscans who ruled early Rome...

in the same position as the English DSK. However, other (occidental) language orthographies

Orthography

The orthography of a language specifies a standardized way of using a specific writing system to write the language. Where more than one writing system is used for a language, for example Kurdish, Uyghur, Serbian or Inuktitut, there can be more than one orthography...

can clearly have other typing needs for optimization (many are very different from English). Because Dvorak Simplified Keyboard was optimized for the statistical distribution of letters in English text, keyboards for other languages would likely have drastically different distributions of letter frequencies. Hence, non-QWERTY-derived keyboards for such languages would need a keyboard layout that might look quite different from the Dvorak layout for English.

An implementation for Swedish

Swedish language

Swedish is a North Germanic language, spoken by approximately 10 million people, predominantly in Sweden and parts of Finland, especially along its coast and on the Åland islands. It is largely mutually intelligible with Norwegian and Danish...

, known as Svorak
Svorak
Svorak is one of many Swedish versions of the Dvorak keyboard layout.The Svorak layout places the three extra Swedish vowels on the leftmost three keys of the upper row, which correspond to punctuation symbols on the English Dvorak layout...

, places the three extra Swedish vowels (å, ä and ö) on the leftmost three keys of the upper row, which correspond to punctuation symbols on the English Dvorak layout. These punctuation symbols are then juggled with other keys, and the Alt-Gr key is required to access some of them.

Another Swedish version, Svdvorak by Gunnar Parment, keeps the punctuation symbols as they were in the English version; the first extra vowel (å) is placed in the far left of the top row while the other two (ä and ö) are placed at the far left of the bottom row.

The Swedish variant that most closely resembles the American Dvorak layout is Thomas Lundqvist’s sv_dvorak, which places å, ä and ö like Parment’s layout, but keeps the American placement of most special characters.

The Norwegian

Norwegian language

Norwegian is a North Germanic language spoken primarily in Norway, where it is the official language. Together with Swedish and Danish, Norwegian forms a continuum of more or less mutually intelligible local and regional variants .These Scandinavian languages together with the Faroese language...

implementation (known as “Norsk Dvorak”) is similar to Parment’s layout, with “æ” and “ø” replacing “ä” and “ö”.

The Danish layout DanskDvorak is similar to the Norwegian.

An Icelandic

Icelandic language

Icelandic is a North Germanic language, the main language of Iceland. Its closest relative is Faroese.Icelandic is an Indo-European language belonging to the North Germanic or Nordic branch of the Germanic languages. Historically, it was the westernmost of the Indo-European languages prior to the...

Dvorak layout exists, created by a student at Reykjavik University - currently hosted at [about:blank download mirror needed]. It retains the same basic layout as the standard Dvorak but features special Alt-Gr functions to allow easy usage for common characters such as “þ”, “æ”, “ö” and dead-keys to allow the writing of characters such as “å” and “ü”.

A Finnish

Finnish language

Finnish is the language spoken by the majority of the population in Finland Primarily for use by restaurant menus and by ethnic Finns outside Finland. It is one of the two official languages of Finland and an official minority language in Sweden. In Sweden, both standard Finnish and Meänkieli, a...

DAS keyboard layout follows many of Dvorak’s design principles, but the layout is an original design based on the most common letters and letter combinations in the Finnish language. Matti Airas has also made another layout for Finnish. Finnish can also be typed reasonably well with the English Dvorak layout if the letters ä and ö are added. The Finnish ArkkuDvorak keyboard layout adds both on a single key and keeps the American placement for each other character. As with DAS, the SuoRak keyboard is designed by the same principles as the Dvorak keyboard, but with the most common letters of the Finnish language taken into account. Contrary to DAS, it keeps the vowels on the left side of the keyboard and most consonants on the right hand side.

The Turkish F keyboard layout (link) is also an original design with Dvorak's design principles, however it's not clear if it is inspired by Dvorak or not. Turkish F keyboard was standardized in 1955 and the layout has been a requirement for imported typewriters since 1963.

There are some non standard Brazilian Dvorak keyboard layouts currently in development. The simpler design (also called BRDK) is just a Dvorak layout plus some keys from the Brazilian ABNT2 keyboard layout. Another design, however, was specifically designed for writing Brazilian Portuguese

Brazilian Portuguese

Brazilian Portuguese is a group of Portuguese dialects written and spoken by most of the 190 million inhabitants of Brazil and by a few million Brazilian emigrants, mainly in the United States, United Kingdom, Portugal, Canada, Japan and Paraguay....

, by means of a study that optimized typing statistics, like frequent letters, trigraphs and words.

The most common German Dvorak layout is the German Type II layout. It is available for Windows, Linux, and Mac OS X. There is also the Neo layout and the de ergo layout, both original layouts that also follow many of Dvorak’s design principles. Germans may also use a standard Dvorak layout with ß at the shift+W position (on QWERTY) and the umlaut dots as a dead key accessible via shift+E.
There are also two French and three Spanish layouts, and also
a proposed Esperanto version.

A Greek version of the Dvorak layout was released on Valentine’s Day 2007. This layout, unlike other Greek Dvorak layouts, preserves the spirit of Dvorak wherein the vowel keys are all placed on the left side of the keyboard. Currently this version is for Mac OS X.

An Italian

Italian language

Italian is a Romance language spoken mainly in Europe: Italy, Switzerland, San Marino, Vatican City, by minorities in Malta, Monaco, Croatia, Slovenia, France, Libya, Eritrea, and Somalia, and by immigrant communities in the Americas and Australia...

Mac

Macintosh

The Macintosh , or Mac, is a series of several lines of personal computers designed, developed, and marketed by Apple Inc. The first Macintosh was introduced by Apple's then-chairman Steve Jobs on January 24, 1984; it was the first commercially successful personal computer to feature a mouse and a...

layout, optimized for this language and with all the accented vowels on the left, is being developed by Paolo Tramannoni. Several PC

Personal computer

A personal computer is any general-purpose computer whose size, capabilities, and original sales price make it useful for individuals, and which is intended to be operated directly by an end-user with no intervening computer operator...

versions, consisting in the original layout with accented vowels added, are also being developed.

A Romanian version of the Dvorak layout was released in October 2008. It is available for both Windows and Linux.

United Kingdom (British) layouts

Whether Dvorak or QWERTY, a United Kingdom (British) keyboard differs from the U.S. equivalent in these ways: the " and @ are swapped; the backslash/pipe [\ |] key is in an extra position (to the right of the lower left shift key); there is a taller return/enter key, which places the hash/tilde [# ~] key to its lower left corner (see picture).

The most notable difference between the U.S. and UK Dvorak layouts is the [2 "] key remains on the top row, whereas the U.S. [' "] key moves. This means that the query [/ ?] key retains its classic Dvorak location, top left, albeit shifted.

Interchanging the [/ ?] and [' @] keys more closely matches the U.S. layout, and the use of “@” has increased in the information technology age. These variations, plus keeping the numerals in Dvorak's idealised order, appear in the Classic Dvorak and Dvorak for the Left Hand and Right Hand varieties.

Programmer Dvorak

Programmer Dvorak is a special-purpose variant of the Dvorak Simplified
Keyboard created by Roland Kaufmann which is targeted towards programmers.
It is available in operating systems that uses the X Keyboard Configuration Database,

such as Linux

Linux

and FreeBSD

FreeBSD

, or as an add-on for Microsoft Windows

Microsoft Windows

and Mac OS X

Mac OS X

Mac OS X is a series of Unix-based operating systems and graphical user interfaces developed, marketed, and sold by Apple Inc. Since 2002, has been included with all new Macintosh computer systems...

.

While the alphabetic keys are placed as on the standard Dvorak layout, the top row is
devoted to symbolic characters and digits

Numerical digit

A digit is a symbol used in combinations to represent numbers in positional numeral systems. The name "digit" comes from the fact that the 10 digits of the hands correspond to the 10 symbols of the common base 10 number system, i.e...

are accessed using the
shift key

Shift key

The shift key is a modifier key on a keyboard, used to type capital letters and other alternate "upper" characters. There are typically two shift keys, on the left and right sides of the row below the home row...

, like the French layout.
Following August Dvorak's original design, the numerals are not placed in ascending order,
but rather with the most used digits on the strongest fingers.
Placement of the symbols is claimed to follow the same principles as for the letters, but
using source code

Source code

In computer science, source code is text written using the format and syntax of the programming language that it is being written in. Such a language is specially designed to facilitate the work of computer programmers, who specify the actions to be performed by a computer mostly by writing source...

instead of prose

Prose

Prose is the most typical form of written language, applying ordinary grammatical structure and natural flow of speech rather than rhythmic structure...

as underlying statistics.
It assumes an alternate finger assignment like the one used
on some ergonomic keyboard

Ergonomic keyboard

s such as the Microsoft Natural keyboard

Microsoft Natural keyboard

The Microsoft Natural Keyboard is a computer keyboard that was introduced by Microsoft in 1994. The keyboard was a split keyboard with each half of the keyboard separated and tilted upwards and down from the center of the keyboard...

,
where the top row is intended accessed with a slightly rightward-curving motion of the fingers
with respect to the home row (see picture) instead of following the left-leaning column.

Notable users

Piers Anthony
Piers Anthony
Piers Anthony Dillingham Jacob is an English American writer in the science fiction and fantasy genres, publishing under the name Piers Anthony. He is most famous for his long-running novel series set in the fictional realm of Xanth.Many of his books have appeared on the New York Times Best...

, author of the Xanth
Xanth
Xanth is a fantasy world created by author Piers Anthony for his Xanth series of novels, also known as The Magic of Xanth.-History:The name Xanth is in itself an unintentional pun, which matches the playful tone of the books...

novels, often wrote in the 1980s author's notes in the books about how his Dvorak use prevented him from converting to a word processor. This was made even more difficult because he uses an alternative Dvorak layout (swapping the hyphen and apostrophe keys – the apostrophe key on his keyboard is where the hyphen key is on a standard U.S. keyboard (and vice-versa)).
Barbara Blackburn, world typing speed record holder
Bram Cohen
Bram Cohen
Bram Cohen is an American computer programmer, best known as the author of the peer-to-peer BitTorrent protocol, as well as the first file sharing program to use the protocol, also known as BitTorrent...

, inventor of BitTorrent
Terry Goodkind
Terry Goodkind
Terry Goodkind is an American writer and author of the epic fantasy The Sword of Truth series as well as the contemporary suspense novel The Law of Nines, which has ties to his fantasy series, and The Omen Machine, which is a direct sequel thereof. Before his success as an author Goodkind worked...

, author
Author
An author is broadly defined as "the person who originates or gives existence to anything" and that authorship determines responsibility for what is created. Narrowly defined, an author is the originator of any written work.-Legal significance:...

of The Sword of Truth
The Sword of Truth
The Sword of Truth is a series of thirteen epic fantasy novels written by Terry Goodkind. The books follow the protagonists Richard Cypher, Kahlan Amnell and Zeddicus Zu'l Zorander on their quest to defeat oppressors who seek to control the world and those who wish to unleash evil upon the world of...
Holly Lisle
Holly Lisle
Holly Lisle is an American writer of fantasy, science fiction, paranormal romance and romantic suspense novels. She is also known for her work in educating writers, including her e-book Mugging the Muse: Writing Fiction for Love And Money, the Forward Motion Writers' Community web site, and her...

, American author
Matt Mullenweg
Matt Mullenweg
Matthew Charles Mullenweg is an online social media entrepreneur, web developer and musician living in San Francisco, California. He is best known for his development of the free and open source web software, WordPress...

, co-founder of WordPress
WordPress
WordPress is a free and open source blogging tool and publishing platform powered by PHP and MySQL. It is often customized into a content management system . It has many features including a plug-in architecture and a template system. WordPress is used by over 14.7% of Alexa Internet's "top 1...
Nathan Myhrvold
Nathan Myhrvold
Nathan Paul Myhrvold , formerly Chief Technology Officer at Microsoft, is co-founder of Intellectual Ventures. Myhrvold, usually with coinventors, holds 17 U.S. patents assigned to Microsoft and has applied for more than 500 patents. In addition, Myhrvold and coinventors hold 115 U.S...

, former CTO of Microsoft
Steve Wozniak
Steve Wozniak
Stephen Gary "Woz" Wozniak is an American computer engineer and programmer who founded Apple Computer, Co. with Steve Jobs and Ronald Wayne...

, co-founder Apple Computer
Apple Computer
Apple Inc. is an American multinational corporation that designs and markets consumer electronics, computer software, and personal computers. The company's best-known hardware products include the Macintosh line of computers, the iPod, the iPhone and the iPad...
Eliezer Yudkowsky
Eliezer Yudkowsky
Eliezer Shlomo Yudkowsky is an American artificial intelligence researcher concerned with the singularity and an advocate of friendly artificial intelligence, living in Redwood City, California.- Biography :...

, artificial intelligence researcher and writer: "I switched to Dvorak after a bout of RSI (Repetitive strain injury
Repetitive strain injury
Repetitive strain injury is an injury of the musculoskeletal and nervous systems that may be caused by...

), and the RSI never came back."

External links

DvZine.org – A print and webcomic
Webcomic
Webcomics, online comics, or Internet comics are comics published on a website. While many are published exclusively on the web, others are also published in magazines, newspapers or often in self-published books....

zine
Zine
A zine is most commonly a small circulation publication of original or appropriated texts and images. More broadly, the term encompasses any self-published work of minority interest usually reproduced via photocopier....

advocating the Dvorak Keyboard and teaching its history.
A Basic Course in Dvorak – by Dan Wood
A Basic Course in Dvorak with javascript – by Dan Wood and Marcus Hayward
LinkedIn group of Dvorak users
Dvorak vs Qwerty – Online tool that compares the efficiency of the Dvorak layout and the standard Qwerty layout.
http://mkweb.bcgsc.ca/carpalx/?popular_alternatives – Comparison of common optimal keyboard layouts, including Dvorak.

The source of this article is wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. The text of this article is licensed under the GFDL.