Hacker News new | ask | show | jobs
by nitrogen 4869 days ago
Probably because those of us who grew up with PC keyboards instead of workstation keyboards are used to pressing Ctrl with our pinky or palm. Still, Caps Lock remains an essentially useless key ripe for remapping.
1 comments

> pressing Ctrl with our palm.

Probably the piece I was missing. I grew up on PC keyboards but never hit Ctrl with my palm (I can't even figure out how I'd do it). And thus never understood the love some have for a control key in the bottom-left corner (with Fn between Alt and Control): even without the Caps remap, Ctrl next to Alt (as on thinkpads and macs) means easier pinkie travel (almost solely vertical versus an awkward stretch to the bottom and side) compared to a Ctrl stuffed in the far corner.

I guess it's not exactly my palm that I use, but the first joint where the pinky meets the hand. It's more difficult to do this on a laptop keyboard than my Model M.
> I guess it's not exactly my palm that I use, but the first joint where the pinky meets the hand.

Yes, that's how I figured it'd work (as the palm would require having the fingers over the top of the keyboard), but I still find it odd.

Then again, my "desktop" keyboard has been an MS Natural Ergo 4000 for the last decade or so, so it's got a very small control key with precious little definition compared to the surrounding keys, can't help either.