XKCD mirrorboard

An experiment based on Randall Munroe's idea of Mirrorboard

Unlike Figaw's version, it doesn't screw with loops and suspend states resulting in mistyped characters.

V1

Same as XKCD, but:

• also with reversed numbers and function keys.
• arrow keys on Caps+LAlt+[WASD]
• Minus, plus/equals are on Caps+LAlt+[123]
• Brackets and colon are on Caps+LAlt+[QEF]

Test results:

Normal typing speed:

• Average: 430 CPM (86 WPM)
• Top: 507 CPM (101 WPM)
• Errors: 1.5%

Left hand only:

• Average: 182 CPM (36 WPM)
• Top: 226 CPM (45 WPM)
• Errors: 5.9%

So, basically, a third of typing speed for half of the hands used. Not as bad as i expected, although, it's very painful to type so slow.

Issues:

• Letters N and H are used very frequently and are awkward to reach

• Curly braces are untype-able Fixed.

• Plus, minus and colon keys are out of reach Fixed.

• IDEA IDE's unsets caps after key presses, so it only works once

• Holding caps and shift at the same time ghosts second column(F2/2/W/S/X) on my particular keyboard.

• Some programs use Alt+[123WASD] hotkeys that get blocked by this script

  V2

  To be done.

• Shifted layout, rather than mirrored - Caps+QWERTY = YUIOP

• Cram in Insert, Delete, Home, End, Page Up and Page Down keys somewhere in there

• Set AltGr as a Right-hand modifier key for the rare case of left hand jerking

Other thoughts:

Native layout rather than intercepting keypresses:

Microsoft Keyboard Layout Creator allows to compile dll's with custom layout, but it does not appear to have an option to use Caps as a modifier key.

Rather, it has an option to use SGCAPS.

For example "hello world" would be typed like

"Caps - G - E - Caps - S - Caps - S - Caps - W - Space - W - Caps - W - R - Caps - S - D"

Other one hand input methods

• Map BAT Keyboard Layout to QWERTY?

• Assuming there is no gap between number keys and function keys, it might be possible to rearrange keys around E button, for example like this. No idea if that would ever work.