[_-__---]

QWERTY was laid out (at least partially) with the intent of preventing typewriter jams and increasing productivity. This was done by placing commonly paired letters far apart from one another; maybe this was also taken into account when designing each other language's keyboard. Letter pairs will differ, presumably, so the important keys to separate will change from language to language.

That's my intuition, anyways.

[minikites]

I knew that but that's a good reminder, did other countries have their own typewriter layouts too or did they just use US/UK English layouts?

[qb45]

Those computer keyboard layouts are based on formerly used typewriter layouts.