Saturday, May 16, 2009

Do yourselves a favor and learn how to type!

I used to type while looking at the keyboard. I would tell people that I used all ten fingers. But when I started to think about it, I noticed that I used all the fingers on my left hand--almost in the way you're supposed to--while my right forefinger would hop around the right side of the keyboard like a woodpecker, and the rest of my right-hand fingers stood idly by.

Then one fine day I told myself, "If you (I?) are (am?) going to spend so much time in front of a computer, might as well learn how to type." So I did. I used goodtyping.com. And when I finished their lessons, I practiced at keybr.com And the rest is history.

I consider the decision to learn how to type properly one of the few wise things I have done in my life. It made life so much easier. Among other things, it transformed my online chatting experience. In the pre-touch-typing days, I was always rushing to get my thought across before my chatting partner said something which would render my thought irrelevant. And as I typed, there was always this pressing question: what if he already wrote something? What if I'm too late?

Now I can read and write at the same time. Chatting is purely pleasurable.

Now, whenever I see people pecking at their keyboards one letter at a time, instead letting their fingers flow to the sound of graceful tapping, I feel like shouting at them, "Go to goodtyping.com! Release yourselves from the bondage of staring at your keyboard, when the real action is on the screen!"

16 comments:

  1. I'm happy that you've seen the light.

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  2. I type with the thumb and first two fingers of each hand.
    " Chatting is purely pleasurable. "
    That is a classic e. quote.

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  3. Yeah there are some pretty cute quotes in here. I type with 8 of my fingers without looking. Do I really need to learn how to type properly?

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  4. trs: this was not a recent happening. I saw the light a long time ago. When you told me that you can chat and google simultaneously, that contributed to my decision to learn how to type.

    Mottel: imagine how much quicker and more accurately you could type if you learned how!! Trust me; it's worth it.

    le7: when you type "properly" you also only use 8 fingers. You only use your thumbs for the spacebar.

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  5. I can type without looking at the keyboard (although new keyboards need a little practice before I am fully comfortable with them), but I'm not sure I type "correctly". Whatever I know, I learned from chatting online.

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  6. Hmm. Okay then I type with 6 fingers.

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  7. C: once you're looking at the screen and not at the keyboard, I think you're all right.

    le7: six fingers? why not use all of them!!

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  8. Because in some ways my left hand is dominant. I think it's because the left hand has a very important job when playing cello....

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  9. because your left hand is dominant, that's why you use only six fingers to type?

    BTW, the way the keyboard is set up, you need to use your left hand more, whether your a cellist or not.

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  10. Yay!! I got someone's approval :).

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  11. Glad to be of service. Just tell me what else you do right, and I'll be glad to approve!

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  12. My right hand is dominant in writing, and my left hand is dominant in everything else.

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  13. and what this has to do with typing?

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  14. I'm clarifying I'm right handed even though more of my left hand fingers type.

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  15. the wonders of home school - i took typing tutorials in elementary school. and i was pretty good. only now i have my new laptop, which is tiny, which i love - except certain icons are different places, which is engendering far more typos than was my norm. any tips?

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Forth shall ye all hold.