Table 1

Ten second keying of two fingered adjacent lateral sequences, in kps. Average kps rate for ten experienced keyboard operators, 5 on electric; 5 on mechanical.

Left hand

Right hand

Fingers* 1/2 2/3 3/4 3/4 2/3 1/2

% decrease fastest to slowest

Letters as sd df jk kl l;
Electric 6.34 7.84 9.08 11.00 8.24 6.64

jk-as=42.36%

Mechanical 3.46 3.80 4.74 5.58 3.66 3.36

jk - l; =39.78%

*Numbers for fingers: 1 = little fingers; 2 = ring fingers; 3 = middle fingers; 4 = index fingers

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Table 2

Ten second keying of two fingered contra-lateral sequences, in kps. Average kps rate for ten experienced keyboard operators.
Fingers

1

2

3

4

Letters

a;

sl

dk

fj

% decrease fastest to slowest

Electric

10.32

10.32

10.74

10.62

dk-a;=3.91%

Mechanical

7.90

8.50

8.96

8.78

dk-a;=11.83%

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Table 3

Ten second keying on fastest two-key lateral (jk) and fastest two-key contra-lateral (dk). Average kps rate for two experienced operators, each operatoron voth mechanical and electric keyboards.

Operator 1

Operator 2

Keyboards

Fingers

Sequence

Letters

Mechanical

Electric

Mechanical

Electric

rh 4/3

lateral

jk

5.2

9.8

6.2

9.0

3/3

contra-lateral

dk

10.1

9.6

7.2

8.5

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Table 4

Ten second keing on four-fingered inward lateral, outward lateral, and contra-lateral sequences. Average kps rate for two experienced operators, each operator on both mechanical and electric keyboards.

Operator 1

Operator 2

Keyboards

Sequence

Letters

Mechanical

Electric

Mechanical

Electric

INWARD
lateral

asdf;lkj

5.4

6.6

6.0

11.4

contra-lateral

a;sldkfj

5.5

6.4

7.0

7.6

OUTWARD
lateral

fdsajkl;

5.0

5.1

5.6

10.6

contra-lateral

fjdksla;

4.8

4.4

7.7

7.7

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Table 5

Results of ten second keying of lateral and contra-lateral sequences on 'qwerty' keyboards. Mechanical and electric. 20 operators: all right handed: 6 male 14 female.
Group 1: Experienced, Group 2: no keyboard experience,
Group 3: Experienced, Group 4: After 6 weeks' training.

*Operators designated by alpha letters.

Electric keyboards Group 1

Fingers

Letters A B C D E Av.kps
Lateral

1/2

as

87 61 56 54 59 6.34

left hand

2/3

sd

105 87 64 68 68 7.84

3/4

df

126 85 72 102 69 9.08

right hand

1/2

;l

87 69 65 51 60 6.64

2/3

lk

113 87 69 69 74 8.24

3/4

kj

139 107 90 116 98 11.00
Each op. Av. kps 10.9 8.3 6.9 7.7 7.1
Contra-lateral

1/1

a;

127 107 88 98 96 10.32

2/2

sl

115 113 83 109 96 10.32

3/3

dk

131 114 85 111 96 10.74

4/4

fj

126 104 89 116 96 10.62
Each op. Av. kps 12.5 10.9 8.6 10.9 9.6
Lateral

asdf;lkj

126 104 114 71 66 9.62

fdsajkl;

94 113 106 80 51 8.88
Contra-lateral

a;sldkfj

118 89 76 59 64 8.12

fjdksla;

120 101 77 63 44 8.10

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Electric keyboards Group 2

Fingers

Letters

F G H J K Av.kps
Lateral

1/2

as

61 23 60 60 60 5.28

left hand

2/3

sd

61 57 58 55 58 5.78

3/4

df

63 59 60 59 58 5.98

right hand

1/2

;l

38 30 30 34 53 3.70

2/3

lk

66 60 62 70 81 6.78

3/4

kj

77 108 138 91 88 10.04
Each op. Av. kps 6.1 5.6 6.8 6.1 6.6
Contra-lateral

1/1

a;

74 85 75 88 82 8.08

2/2

sl

81 85 80 87 81 8.28

3/3

dk

68 90 101 88 75 8.44

4/4

fj

71 86 81 89 84 8.22
Each op. Av. kps 7.3 8.7 8.4 8.8 8.1
Lateral

asdf;lkj

32 25 31 27 61 3.52

fdsajkl;

37 32 32 29 55 3.70
Contra-lateral

a;sldkfj

33 16 23 22 49 2.86

fjdksla;

31 26 34 24 48 3.26

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Mechanical keyboards Group 3

Fingers

Letters L M N P R Av.kps
Lateral

1/2

as

32 26 31 45 39 3.46

left hand

2/3

sd

38 23 31 54 44 3.80

3/4

df

48 38 38 59 54 4.74

right hand

1/2

;l

48 22 23 45 30 3.36

2/3

lk

39 21 33 51 39 3.66

3/4

kj

50 32 40 90 67 5.58
Each op. Av. kps 4.2 2.7 3.3 5.7 4.6
Contra-lateral

1/1

a;

72 67 67 102 87 7.90

2/2

sl

83 65 71 111 95 8.50

3/3

dk

90 62 78 116 102 8.96

4/4

fj

85 68 75 111 100 8.78
Each op. Av. kps 8.3 6.6 7.3 11.0 9.6
Lateral

asdf;lkj

40 -- 38 55 48 4.53

fdsajkl;

45 32 33 48 29 3.74
Contra-lateral

a;sldkfj

-- 36 56 51 67 5.25

fjdksla;

57 35 44 60 43 4.78

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Mechanical keyboards Group 4

Fingers

Letters S T U V W Av.kps
Lateral

1/2

as

35 38 38 32 41 3.68

left hand

2/3

sd

48 38 43 38 43 4.20

3/4

df

54 50 62 47 51 5.28

right hand

1/2

;l

36 38 42 34 38 3.76

2/3

lk

48 46 46 37 41 4.36

3/4

kj

65 54 53 52 61 5.70
Each op. Av. kps 4.8 4.4 4.7 4.0 4.6
Contra-lateral

1/1

a;

90

Table 6

Allocation of most frequently used letters to home row keys. Percentage of letters keyed on the home row.
All language % 100 commonest words %
Qwerty

43.62

51.88

Dvorak

73.31

86.25

Maltron Mark II

77.89

90.52

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Table 7

Number of occurrences of single finger keying twice in succession and of hurdles. All language.

Single finger keying
twice in succession

Single finger
hurdles

Qwerty

273,450

82,200

Dvorak

83,700

3,474

Maltron Mark II

24,826

321

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Table 8

Percentage of index finger stretches to centre keys. All language.

Left index finger %

Right index finger %

Qwerty

12.27

13.73

Dvorak

9.33

7.52

Maltron Mark II

4.90

5.50

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Table 9

Balance of keystrokes to each hand. Percentage of all language.

Eight fingers only

Fingers and thumbs

Left hand %

Right hand%

Left hand%

Right hand%

Qwerty

57.03

42.97

47.35

52.65

Dvorak

44.51

55.49

36.95

63.05

Maltron Mark II

48.76

51.23

46.00

54.00

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Table 10

Balance of keystrokes to fingers and thumbs. All language including most used punctuation and space bar.

Left hand

Right hand

Fingers

1

2

3

4

Th

Th

4

3

2

1

Qwerty 6.7 7.2 15.7 17.75 -- 17.0 15.7 7.5 10.3 2.15
Dvorak 6.75 7.2 11.0 12.00 -- 17.0 14.15 11.4 11.4 9.10
Maltron Mark II 7.7 7.35 7.3 12.75 10.9 17.0 14.9 7.0 6.6 8.50

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