[dasyatidprime]

As another non-QWERTY user, I usually want desktop keybindings (excluding games) to follow layout changes, because I'm remembering the function by the mnemonic. Most applications have this behavior on my existing FDO/Linux system. On the Windows machine I use sometimes, by contrast, it seems like holding Control effectively forces QWERTY, which has been an unending source of little pains. If I didn't already have the QWERTY keymap memorized and I had to figure out which keys were “actually” which to configure things, it would be a lot harder.

But then, I'm an X user still; I'd like to dip into Wayland, but a combination of fragmentation of protocols and the seeming relative “hardness” of the stack in terms of customizability have caused me to hesitate thus far. And maybe that Windows behavior also means that's what you want to mimic for a lot of other people?

[pxc]

> because I'm remembering the function by the mnemonic.

Perhaps this is also a frequency of use issue— if you're relying on the mnemonic rather than muscle memory, it sounds like a shortcut you don't use very often.

Or does muscle memory for you come in at a different layer somehow, where the mapping to key locations is basically automatic and instant but you do still consider key names as you navigate hotkeys?

[dasyatidprime]

The latter and definitely not the former, in my case. As far as I can tell from internal experience, my automatic procedural memory of where to reach for a character, function, or string transforms along with the layout I currently have it “configured” to use, in a rough mirror of how scancode↔keysym mapping can vary on the OS side. I have used a non-QWERTY layout full time for about 18 months now after being in mostly-QWERTY before, so my QWERTY memory has decayed somewhat, but I have past experience switching back and forth at a time scale of hours. If I want the eyedropper tool in GIMP, I reach for the O, and there isn't a separate conscious step of “okay, so that's O, right?”, it's just a single compound action. If it has to be the O in some other layout than the one I'm using, then I have to stop myself and consciously try to remember where it would be. The tools that I don't use as much I do also have to stop and remember, but that's very distinct in feel.

I wonder sometimes whether it's relevant that I'm a heavy Emacs user, in which short command gestures often include non-modified keys and are conceptually close to the physically more text-based M-x invocations. Maybe that type of experience (or what other types? Maybe CLI?) creates a different mental map of the distinction or lack thereof between text entry and shortcut keymaps. Emacs on Windows is especially awkward for me as a result of the QWERTY-on-Control behavior, because e.g. C-x C-t and C-x t now involve different positions for the T. Or maybe people who start out on non-QWERTY layouts on Windows specifically are pushed to remember shortcuts by their location early because the keysyms are illogical, and then they continue doing that, but people who stay on QWERTY all the time could go either way?

As others have mentioned, this also doesn't happen as much in gaming, where commands are often bound positionally, with WASD motion (GAST motion in my layout…) as a central example. There's still some expected-keysym mnemonic influence in which of multiple candidate keys to bind to a function as one moves away from the central motion cluster. The vi keys mentioned elsewhere are also very positional in nature, but I rarely use vi bindings, and when I do, the nav-cluster keys are usually an accepted alternative…

Gosh. With how much has wound up in this thread, I kind of wonder whether there's more serious ergonomics research on this difference in mental modeling now.

[pxc]

> Emacs on Windows is especially awkward for me as a result of the QWERTY-on-Control behavior, because e.g. C-x C-t and C-x t now involve different positions for the T.

Okay, now that sounds absolutely maddening, mixing layouts in a single sequence like that.

The way of working you describe makes sense to me. I think you might be on to something with the bare letter keys used in Emacs combinations priming users to think one way and the positional, WASD-like nature of vi bindings pointing users another way (when it comes to basic cursor navigation). I use Emacs as well, with a mix of Evil and traditional bindings...

For now I'm glad that I'm just using one keyboard layout! Hehehe.