In the world of typing and keyboard layouts, few subjects are as debated as the Dvorak Simplified Keyboard. Patented in 1936 by August Dvorak and his brother-in-law, William Dealey, this would be a keyboard that was born out of an aim to make the operation of typing a lot more efficient. Dvorak’s inspiration was based on the inefficiency he perceived in the QWERTY layout, then standard, that had dominated the landscape for over six decades and one that, when used for typing, precipitated error and fatigue.
Dvorak was an explicitly engineered design intended to rectify the perceived flaws of QWERTY. The design aimed to minimize finger motion and errors while potentially speeding up typing. It deliberately placed the most common letters and bigrams on the home row-that is, where your fingers rest while you do your typing-and spread the load of typing a bit more evenly between both hands. This was vastly different from QWERTY, where much of the typing is done by the left hand and can include awkward finger contortions to make common letter combinations frequently require jumping over the home row.
Dvorak’s principles were very straightforward: the alternating use of hands for more of a rhythmic typing experience, lay the most frequent letters under the strongest fingers, relegate least common letters to the bottom row, and because most people are right-handed, the right hand does more work. Based on Dvorak’s research into letter frequencies, bigrams, and physiology of the hand,.
Despite its more considerate design, Dvorak did not dethrone QWERTY; the common arguments include that QWERTY had a head start in widespread use and that Dvorak has disputed, relatively minor advantages. Modern operating systems do offer users the ability to switch their keyboards to Dvorak, though, which shows evidence for the fact that it is still quite relevant.
From it, several modifications emerged through the years. Thus, a variety was given the name Dvorak Simplified Keyboard or American Simplified Keyboard. While it is somehow different from the original, it still adhered to the guiding principles set out by Dvorak and Dealey.
The history of the Dvorak keyboard
The history of the Dvorak keyboard has been tied in with the professional career of August Dvorak as an educational psychologist and professor. He started off in keyboard design when he advised a student’s thesis concerning the problems of typing errors, whereby he concluded that QWERTY was bad. In collaboration with Dealey, Dvorak launched an exhaustive program of research to construct a better layout. Their work resulted in the Dvorak Simplified Keyboard, which they felt should start a revolution in typing.
He entered Dvorak-trained typists in typing contests and ran an experimental program in a Tacoma school district. The results seemed promising: students learned Dvorak in one-quarter the time it took to learn QWERTY. Eventually, however, the program was terminated by a new school board.
The most significant challenge to the Dvorak layout came from a study by the General Services Administration led by Earle Strong. The study entailed retraining typists from QWERTY to Dvorak and vice-versa but did not seem to indicate that the Dvorak layout had any advantage. Strong’s study was not without controversy, having been known to be biased against new keyboard designs.
But despite such setbacks, the Dvorak keyboard created a lasting mark by leading the way for other optimized layouts and adaptations for different languages. Its principles have gone into making the likes of Colemak, German Neo, and French BÉPO, illustrative of how some other keyboard designs may grant improvements in typing efficiency.
All these have resulted in the ANSI Dvorak layout through the years of shifting symbol keys that have taken place. Though it’s another layout from his original, it still offers the benefits of his ergonomic principles. The presence and availability of the Dvorak layout across major operating systems and devices such as PCs and smartphones speak volumes about its enduring presence in the world of keyboard layouts.
The journey of the Dvorak keyboard layout is an intriguing journey of innovation, research, and challenges in trying to change established norms. But from early promise and the support of its creator’s extensive studies, the Dvorak layout has faced an uphill battle to dethrone the entrenched QWERTY standard. The story of the Dvorak keyboard is also the description of the human factors that intervene in the adoption of a new technology.
Among the landmarks marking the history of the Dvorak keyboard comes the Navy study, conducted by August Dvorak himself. This study is the one most quoted by adherents of the Dvorak layout to prove its superiority. Dvorak maintained that typists could be retrained to his layout in only 10 days, a fraction of the time it would take to master QWERTY. Yet, a study can be valid; Dvorak owned the patent on the keyboard layout that he was promoting. That had created a conflict of interest in their study findings and brought an equally dividing argument about its efficacy on the layout.
Despite the controversy over the Navy study, the Dvorak layout has gained a very enthusiastic niche following. These design principles that underlie the layout-alternation of hands, reduction of finger motion, and placing the most common letters under the strongest fingers-have turned many to be quite taken with this layout. These are principles designed to be more comfortable and efficient in typing and have convinced a number of individuals to break with QWERTY and learn Dvorak.
Interest in alternative keyboard layouts has experienced a renaissance of sorts in the modern computing era, and the Dvorak layout has benefited from that. The Dvorak layout is now an option in most major operating systems today, including but not limited to Windows, macOS, Linux, and most distributions of BSD. This has enabled persons who are interested in trying out this layout to have the opportunity without necessarily having to invest in hardware with the setup. Smartphones and tablets further extended the reach of the Dvorak layout. This is supported by iOS and Android.
The Dvorak layout’s influence extends beyond its own keys
It also left room for further optimizations like Colemak, but also German Neo and French BÉPO, which adapted the same principles to other languages’ linguistic needs. The same is true for these layouts, which have taken the basic principles of Dvorak and applied them to the unique needs of each of these respective languages, showing the versatility and impact of Dvorak’s research.
Despite being available and the ardent advocacy of its users, Dvorak has never come even close to replacing QWERTY. There are several reasons: QWERTY had a large head start in history, and the retraining of typists was an expensive proposition. More than that, however, the advantages of the Dvorak layout-while intriguing in the abstract-have never really been shown to be significant in real life. Other keyboard layouts have been found to yield similar typing speeds as both QWERTY and Dvorak when typists are adequately trained, suggesting that the layout may be merely one of the factors in typing efficiency.
The odyssey of the Dvorak keyboard speaks volumes about how ingrained human-machine interaction is and the level of inertia that comes with established standards. Although it did not change the world of typing as its originator had hoped, the Dvorak layout is memorable for its place in the history of keyboard design. Its premises go on to inspire and challenge our ideas about what makes efficient and ergonomic typing, which means that talk about keyboard layouts is never dull.
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