Inward vs Outward Finger Rolling

[jpatters]

So I've been reading about alternative keyboard layouts and I came across a page that lists some assumptions:

http://www.arcavia.com/kyle/Projects/Pr ... board.html

One of the assumptions is that when rapping ones fingers on a table, one tends to go from little finger to index finger (inward) and that digraphs should be arranged so that one can roll their fingers in this manor.

This struck me, because I am just the opposite!

This raises the question: How common is this?

Looking at Dvorak, NT and TH are both arranged for inward finger rolls, but for me, maybe outward would be preferable.

I am curious, so I'd putting a poll on this.

[jacobolus]

Try to hold your hand still and roll your fingers each way, tapping on the table, with no whole-hand movement at all. Try using a keyboard and rolling your fingers actually on the keys, but on various combinations of rows, not just all next to each-other.

Also, just try just tapping various combinations of fingers in various orders.

I don’t actually think strictly outside-in or inside-out is what you should shoot for. If we number the fingers starting at 1 = thumb, then the hardest combinations are those like 4-5-3 and 4-3-5 and 5-3-4 and 4-5-2 etc.. Alternating 5-2-5-2-5 or 4-2-4-2-4 for example is actually pretty easy.

To properly analyze difficulty, you need to look at a context of about 3–4 keys and think carefully about what muscle motions are required for the sequence. All the heuristics I’ve seen which take “rolling” into account seem to do so in a heavy-handed and not very realistic way, and when I compare the way they score various words with the subjective difficulty I experience in typing them, I find the scores totally inaccurate.

[OleVoip]

Outward feels awkward (to me).

[Muirium]

You inward rollers sicken me. Have you no shame? Take your twisted antithesis elsewhere than our pure, outward rolling world!

[kbdfr]

After decades of typing and guitar playing, no big difference…

[Ray]

The way I roll 'em is inwards, but for typing on my board I prefer outwards a teeny bit more.

[seebart]

You inward rollers sicken me. Have you no shame? Take your twisted antithesis elsewhere than our pure, outward rolling world!

Looking at the poll you got some sickening to do!

Seebart = bigtime inward roller.

[Muirium]

The righteous life brings great burden.

[seebart]

Unbenannt.PNG (193.83 KiB) Viewed 3912 times

[Oobly]

This is something that bothered me about Colemak. I'm an outward roller. So I gravitate towards an alternating layout rather than a "rolls"-based one. Works for all types. And I happen to think it's faster and more efficent, but without scientific backing for the hypothesis.

(I use a modified version of AdNW Bu-Teck)

[Khers]

Inward roller. It's the only way! Outward rolling feels tremendously weird and not in a good way