Add to Chrome
Add to Edge
Add to Firefox
Add to Opera
Add to Brave
Add to SafariWhen comparing qwpr vs Arensito, the Slant community recommends Arensito for most people. In the question“What are the best keyboard layouts for programming?” Arensito is ranked 11th while qwpr is ranked 13th.
Specs
Question Ranking
Pros
Pro Good for vim users
Qwpr is pretty close to QWERTY, and even the HJKL keys are in the same left-to-right order (though on different rows). Alternatively, the AltGr plane also has arrow keys in a sensible position under the right hand.
Pro Common shortcuts don't move
A, Z, X, C, and V are in the same positions as QWERTY and Colemak.
Pro As easy as Dvorak
It's 32% easier than QWERTY by the Carpalx metric, which is slightly better than Dvorak's 30%. This is probably within Carpalx's margin of error though.
Pro Alternate plane with CapsLock key
CapsLock is pretty useless for most people, but qwpr layout uses it to shift to another plane with easy access to punctuation and arrow keys. This is especially useful for programmers.
Pro Minimal retraining from QWERTY
11 keys move, but except for P and E, they don't change fingers.
Pro Reduces load on pinkies
Pro Emphasizes adjacent finger bigrams
Common bigrams are a fast rolling motion, like Colemak.
Pro Minimizes same-finger bigrams
Pro Puts your thumbs to good use
Your strongest fingers are your thumbs. In this layout (unless you have a keyboard with thumb keys) you shift your hands up one row, and you use your thumbs on the bottom row. (Put your index fingers on QWERTY's T and I keys, and rest your thumbs on VB and NM) The Ctrl and Shift modifier keys now use your strong thumbs instead of your weak pinkies. (Ctrl shortcuts are especially important for programmers.) The modifiers may contribute more to RSI than letters.
Pro Punctuation also optimized for programming
AltGr plane has accessible punctuation and numbers. The most used are directly under your fingers on the (new) home row, and all the bracket types are paired and in easy reach.
Pro Balances load between hands
Statistically, the left and right hand are used about the same amount.
Pro Easy access to common punctuation and numbers
Programmer punctuation and numbers are accessible without stretching on the AltGr plane. (AltGr is now on the spacebar).
Cons
Con Puts E on the pinky
'E' is the most used English letter by far, at almost 13%. That's almost as much as the spacebar. It needs to be on a strong finger. The pinky is the weakest finger and on the right side it is already overtaxed from Ctrl, Shift, and Enter.
Con P and E change fingers from QWERTY
Which makes it harder than necessary to learn from QWERTY. (And makes no sense. 'E' was arguably better in its QWERTY position on a strong finger.) This is due to using the flawed Carpalx effort model.
Con Pointing stick is no longer on the home row
Most keyboards don't have one, but if you use it a lot it becomes a bit of a stretch. On the plus side, a keyboard with a pointing stick will have mouse buttons you could remap to thumb keys instead.
Con Hard to orient in a new position by feel
Most keyboards have bumps on two of the keys to orient touch-typists. On QWERTY, this is usually F and J, but sometimes D and K. On some keyboards you can fix this by swapping keycaps. You could also try adding small stickers with enough thickness.
Con Letter keys as modifiers may cause jamming or ghosting
Cheap keyboards designed for QWERTY might struggle with the use of Arensito's letter keys as modifiers. Gaming keyboards with n-key rollover don't have this problem. And any keyboard with proper thumb keys (Kinesis, Ergodox, Maltron) works properly. There is an older version of the layout that keeps QWERTY's home row that you can use on cheap keyboards, but it's not quite as nice.
Con Copy-paste shortcuts are right-handed
XCV are on the right side. This makes it difficult to cut/copy-paste with the mouse in the right hand.
