English Language & Usage: Multi-Layered Discourse Room

nosmoking

20:00

@GeorgePompidou nice

George Pompidou

yeah. it's all really fun!

nosmoking

a small ubuntu

Alraxite

BTW, what do you guys think of using the ring finger to type Z as opposed to the pinky?

George Pompidou

very tiny. I can even get Java for it if one day I decide that I hate myself and my life is too pleasant.

Alraxite

On QWERTY.

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

20:01

@Alraxite that's what I use

George Pompidou

triez typing lotz of wordz with z in them

tchrist

@Alraxite I recommend Hanon’s School of Velocity.

Alraxite

Ring?

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

yeah

George Pompidou

I use fourth finger. don't know what Ring means.

pinky is awkward. I only type enter and A with pinky.

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

20:02

@GeorgePompidou the one the ring goes on

nosmoking

I have an AZERTY so can't say

George Pompidou

I can put a ring on any of my fingers.

tchrist

Those with training use finger 5.

Those without training use other fingers, often 2.

Alraxite

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 OK. I'm considering switching to use ring.

@tchrist 5 is awkward.

George Pompidou

yeah, it is.

5 is for shift, A, and caps lock.

Q and Z are 4.

tchrist

20:02

1 min ago, by tchrist

@Alraxite I recommend Hanon’s School of Velocity.

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

@GeorgePompidou I use 5 for q

tchrist

19 secs ago, by tchrist

1 min ago, by tchrist

@Alraxite I recommend Hanon’s School of Velocity.

George Pompidou

that's strange too.

don't tell me about hanon @tchrist

what do you know about hanon

nosmoking

25 secs ago, by tchrist

19 secs ago, by tchrist

1 min ago, by tchrist

@Alraxite I recommend Hanon’s School of Velocity.

George Pompidou

is a virtuoso

tchrist

20:03

@GeorgePompidou Good for developing the 4–5 spannage.

George Pompidou

my piano teacher made me do more hanon exercises than a chinese baby.

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

what hand do y'all use to hit "b"?

George Pompidou

left.

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

I use right

George Pompidou

cause most letters that come after b are on the right side.

tchrist

20:04

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 What is with all these weird fingering questions? Where the heck did you guys take shorthand anyway?

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

er, really?

@tchrist "take shorthand"?

George Pompidou

fingers tchrist

man finger

tchrist

You have to use the left thumb, as it is closer to the key than the right one is.

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

I learned to type by putting my hands on the home row and then mashing keys until I could do it. There were no courses involved.

tchrist

Plus that’s you were taught.

George Pompidou

20:05

same.

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

gods no. thumbs are only for space.

tchrist

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 Then you weren’t learned, nor are.

George Pompidou

^ agreed. thumb on anything else is ludacris.

nosmoking

I learned to type by doing the opposite of my mom, she uses her two indexes to type, like a crab

George Pompidou

I am still trying to beat my mom's average typing speed.

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

20:06

@tchrist I'm rolling my eyes so hard right now

George Pompidou

she's well in the 150wpm

tchrist

Who doesn’t lovingly recall typing away at the typewriter to the tune of Pizzicato Popcorn?

Alraxite

@tchrist Anway, you would type Z with the ring for the same reason you would type the full stop with the ring finger.

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

@Alraxite my comma is on the home row, my z isn't.

Alraxite

Z is offset from S by the same amount the comma is from L.

Mitch

20:07

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 I type only with my thumbs.

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

oh wait, comma

Alraxite

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 Which keyboard are you using?

Oh wait,

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

@Alraxite my mistake. I use ring finger for comma.

Mitch

...on a regular keyboard.

Alraxite

No, I meant full stop.

Mitch

20:08

but pinkies only on my phone.

Matt Эллен

I use all my fingers for all the keys at once. that's why I'm so fast

Alraxite

My bad.

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

@Alraxite ah, so did I. I looked at the keyboard and both the comma and . are worn off and understood which key you meant

Mitch

When I want to type fast I use my fists.

George Pompidou

hooray

10fastfingers.com/speedtests/generate_screenshot_result/…

tchrist

20:09

@Alraxite Not after the Sammath Naur, you wouldn’t!

George Pompidou

I'm getting there.

Matt Эллен

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 faux ring finger?

Alraxite

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 Also, I use my thumbs to type the keys beside the spacebar.

Matt Эллен

or, I should say, orthodox ring finger

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

@Mitch I tried that just now, to reply to you, and instead of typing fast, I activated a bunch of hotkeys all once and messed up my entire desktop.

@MattЭллен no, I meant for period

Alraxite

20:10

Which are currently mapped to control.

George Pompidou

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 Autohotkeys?

Matt Эллен

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 my full stop key is also on the right

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

@GeorgePompidou no, what do you think I am, some kind of dutchman?

George Pompidou

a dutch rudder.

Mitch

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 That's probably what was what should have been done, rather than the message you thought you were going to type. That's how good it works.

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

20:10

@MattЭллен oh, you were referring to the hand.

Matt Эллен

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 yes :D

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

@MattЭллен yeah so on my right hand, I have a ring, but it's an Iron Ring, so I wear it on my pinky.

Matt Эллен

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 cool. that's pretty snazzy

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

Iron Ring

The Iron Ring is a ring worn by many Canadian-trained engineers, as a symbol and reminder of the obligations and ethics associated with their profession. From a concept originated in 1922, the ring is presented to graduates in a closed ceremony known as The Ritual of the Calling of an Engineer, developed with the assistance of English poet Rudyard Kipling. Accepting the ring is not a prerequisite to becoming a Professional Engineer, but is instead worn as a constant reminder to graduates of their responsibility to the public. == Material and design == The Iron Ring is made from either wrought iron...

tchrist

Mitch

20:12

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 your ring finger is iron intolerant?

Alraxite

@tchrist Relevant: onehandkeyboard.org/standard-qwerty-finger-placement

Matt Эллен

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 they even include software engineers?! how open minded of them

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

@Mitch No. But the Iron Ring is designed to damage gold rings if worn adjacent, and it is meant to be worn on the smallest finger of your working hand.

@MattЭллен only the ones trained in the engineering program.

tchrist

Alraxite

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

20:13

Not the faux-software-engineers who trained in the Computer Science program.

Mitch

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 What if you quit your engineering job to become a professional ballroom dancer? do you have to give it back? or can you put it on your toes?

Alraxite

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 Is you finger placement like the above?

George Pompidou

I am much better at typing on my mac keyboard.

Matt Эллен

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 I'm fake-faux: I trained in the psychology dept.

George Pompidou

other keyboards are of inferior quality.

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

20:13

@Alraxite yes

tchrist

George Pompidou

and make more noise.

tchrist

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

@Mitch I have a friend who quit engineering to teach swing dancing.

Alraxite

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 Cool. I'm thinking of switching to that.

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

20:14

@MattЭллен I know several people who followed similar paths.

Mitch

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 Exactly.

probably a change in income though.

George Pompidou

@tchrist nice laptop. I have the same ^.^

Matt Эллен

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 e.g. @KitFox :D

George Pompidou

the keyboard makes sense though. my dad uses something like that. he programs in perl. it all pieces together in the end.

Alraxite

You could just map Caps to Control.

tchrist

20:15

Alraxite

Oh, there's the Esc too.

Meh, you coud just map the tilde to Esc.

Cerberus

@GeorgePompidou Haha Sheeple!

All laptop keyboards are bad.

The best keyboards are those mechanical ones.

George Pompidou

not at all.

tchrist

@Cerberus I keep posting them.

George Pompidou

if you grew up with advanced Apple keyboards, those are best. you should know it's all about what you're used to ;)

Matt Эллен

20:17

my laptop keyboard is good, except that the home/end/pgup/pgdn keys are 2nd functions of the arrow keys.

George Pompidou

(the Apple thing is a joke, but modern keyboards are very shallow buttony keyboards and my generation is much better at typing on them)

RegDwigнt

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 funny how it works. I'm looking at a HH right now, it's been standing right next to this monitor for a full year, and if you asked me, I'd have sworn it only has like ten of those parts, on the porch. And now that you mention it I looked closer and there's literally a hundred of them everywhere else. And in plain sight, too.

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

@Mitch Judging by his Facebook photos he no longer wears his Iron Ring

George Pompidou

I have no trouble at all typing on my laptop keyboard, and all the trouble typing on those clunky old pieces of shit

it's just different times

tchrist

You need Topre switches.

Alraxite

20:18

I'm now used to typing on my laptop keyboard.

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

@RegDwigнt And that's just ONE part/colour that overwhelms my boxes.

It also has a million of those 2x1 plate with bar, and 1x1 sand-green bricks, and also a pile of 2x4 lt-bley plates, not to mention those huge slopes on the roof

RegDwigнt

This is bad news. My storage will be overflowing as well. And I only just de-overflowed it a couple months ago, splitting bley slopes from two boxes into four. And already I can't use any again, in any size. The inverted two by two in dbley in particular is like the most common part ever.

There must be literally like ten of them in every set ever made or something.

Alraxite

Also, does anyone think the backslash/pipe key is way too far?

Also, backspace, but nvm that.

RegDwigнt

The solution is simple, of course. I won't disassemble it ever.

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

@RegDwigнt heh. I know. It's so great. But it has so many good pieces that I wanted to use.

RegDwigнt

20:21

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 all of these except for the last are no problem, Or perhaps the last two because those two by fours are like everywhere as well.

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

I already pillaged all it's lt-bley brickbricks for my restaurant, but I didn't notice that it had a zillion dark-tan brickbricks too, which I could have used.

@RegDwigнt everywhere, yes, but there are LOTS in this set.

tchrist

@GeorgePompidou You can have the Bösendorfer or Schimmel action, or you can have a fricking touchscreen. Your choice.

RegDwigнt

Sand-green is basically what I bought the set for in the first place, so I won't be complaining about that one.

But bley is a plague.

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

@RegDwigнt oh, no complaints. But getting a sudden burst of parts in a certain colour always unbalances the storage.

@RegDwigнt I'm -> <- this close to moving all the lt bley into its own box.

tchrist

@Alraxite What would you use a “backspace” key for when Control-H is right under your home row?

RegDwigнt

20:23

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 I have like twelve.

tchrist

Sounds nuts cause it is nuts.

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

@RegDwigнt well, yes.

Alraxite

@tchrist Yes, I know you use that.

tchrist

My fingers do the walking, not my eyes.

George Pompidou

@tchrist I'm more of a Fazioli guy.

RegDwigнt

20:24

And I already am trying to save space by mixing dbley and lbley. Which I don't do with most other colors.

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

@tchrist that only works if A) you remap control and capslock, and B) you like using two keys instead of one.

@RegDwigнt yeah I do that in some cases. Or mix dbley and dgrey

tchrist

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 Better two keys under my fingertips than one key somewhere out in East Bumford.

RegDwigнt

Those in turn are too similar to mix.

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

@RegDwigнt it works fine for me. Unlike the other "new" colours, I can easily tell the difference in any lighting.

@tchrist whatever works for you.

tchrist

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 Now, CAPS_LOCK is a key that belongs even further away than East Bumford. Buy it a one-way ticket on the Orient Express.

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

20:26

I don't remap control because I like to be able to type on un-fucked-with-keyboards

Alraxite

The distance of the backslash key doesn't make up for the number of times I need it...

tchrist

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 BYOHHKB

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

@tchrist I agree with you but feel it's better for me to be proficient on random keyboards than to bother remapping those.

Alraxite

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 Ctrl is in a bad position.

RegDwigнt

I mix orange with lime, green with reddish brown, azure with purple, bright light orange with medium lavender, things like that.

Easy to tell apart.

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

20:27

@RegDwigнt I mix whatever's in low supply.

RegDwigнt

Well yes.

Alraxite

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 You can take a small EXE that does the swapping with you.

AHk can compile one.

RegDwigнt

But within that group, I still try to mix as distinct colors as possible.

Matt Эллен

@Alraxite are you @Cerberus in disguise?

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

@Alraxite Assuming I want to bother carrying that around, and that it will actually work on the target system, which isn't always windows.

Alraxite

20:28

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 Ah, OK. It won't work on anyting other than windows.

@MattЭллен I'm not very good at it though. I only began using it a few weeks back.

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

@Alraxite I could, of course, carry a keyboard around, or a multitude of keyboard-remapping-thingies. or something.

tchrist

@Alraxite The backslash represents only 0.1333% of what I need to type. Therefore, it is immaterial.

And yes, I measured.

Matt Эллен

@Alraxite good luck!

George Pompidou

oh man…

Alraxite

@tchrist For Latex you do need it a lot.

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

20:30

@tchrist what about the |?

Alraxite

@MattЭллен Thanks!

George Pompidou

I love Elton John

listens to Lion King CD

cries a bit

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

I wonder if there's a usb dongle that remaps keyboards, and works as some kind of pass-through thing?

tchrist

Only 50,913 of 38,193,349 bytes are backslash.

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 About 60% of the backslash. I have 29,443 | instances and 50,913 \ instances in 38,193,349 bytes.

I dunno. Maybe DeMorgan is my friend. What can I say?

Alraxite

Oh, this reminds me.

@tchrist how do you type the Options key?

Ring?

Or thumbs?

tchrist

20:33

@Alraxite That’s gonna depend.

George Pompidou

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 there sure is. tons of keyboard-fucking dongles. I used to mess with the IT guys at my high school with them.

Alraxite

@tchrist How?

tchrist

For example, the ’ key was a crazy thing: 2-3 chord on the LH and 5 on the right, all at once.

Alraxite

How do you type it now?

And how do you type the Options key...

tchrist

But it’s so natural for me now I don’t know what I’d do otherwise.

I just told you.

I don’t.

I type things that use it.

“Like this”.

I don’t think of “typing the option key”.

It does nothing alone.

Alraxite

20:35

Press, then.

But I presume you meant the pinky?

tchrist

It still makes no sense.

No.

Alraxite

Well, you still need to use a finger.

OK.

tchrist

So, for example the ¡ is a 1-3 chord with 1 on Alt and 3 on !.

Alraxite

How about

OK.

The index in that case.

tchrist

I never, ever, ever “type the option key”.

Matt Эллен

20:37

you just did then!

tchrist

I type characters that need it as part of a chord, and which finger grabs it depends on what chord I’m making.

Alraxite

I think I'll use my ring to press Alt.

On both hands.

I could use my thumbs too.

But that's less comfortable. Or so I think

tchrist

So I have no idea what finger I use. Ask me to play some chord and I’ll tell you what grabs it. I won’t know till then.

Jasper Loy

Someone downvoted my "life" answer, so I did an edit to make my rep a multiple of 5 again.

tchrist

So like for café.

Alraxite

20:39

@tchrist Options+J?

tchrist

é is 1-3 then 3.

I don’t have a key labelled “Options”.

But Alt-J is ∆.

George Pompidou

@tchrist this is correct. he meant option, which is what the alt key says on it.

Alraxite

Which finger did you use for that?

tchrist

5.

Alraxite

Cool. OK.

I think I'll use ring.

tchrist

20:41

Good luck with that.

You’ll need it.

Alraxite

The ring is more comfortable to type Alt than the pinky if I assume an inwards hand position.

Which I should clarify,

tchrist

I don’t know what that means. I have stay-at-home hands.

Alraxite

is an inverted V shape.

tchrist

Due to formal training at an impressionable age. It’s all in muscle memory lo these past two score years.

Alraxite

Couldn't find a better image:

Your hand comes in from the side.

This is awkward.

tchrist

20:46

If you say so.

Alraxite

Forcing to keep your hands straight.

That's why Z should be typed with the ring.

And X with middle.

tchrist

43 mins ago, by nosmoking

25 secs ago, by tchrist

19 secs ago, by tchrist

1 min ago, by tchrist

@Alraxite I recommend Hanon’s School of Velocity.

George Pompidou

@RegDwigнt your song titled "This Song Has No Title" is all wrong

it clearly has a title

Alraxite

And C with index.

George Pompidou

a very clever one, too

Alraxite

20:48

@tchrist I'm not reading that whole book to know why you feel otherwise

tchrist

@Alraxite hahahhahhahahaahhaahhahhahhah

You.

Totally.

Don’t.

Get.

It.

►

HTHAHANID

If that fails, try Czerny.

George Pompidou

hahaha

tchrist you're throwing my childhood piano torture at this guy

tchrist

Misery loves company.

George Pompidou

actually, I still have to do Hanon. just cool ones that are a bit less tedious.

and they look impressive to non-pianists so I can show off with simple exercises

but then that's what the Moonlight Sonata is for.

tchrist

@GeorgePompidou Well, or BWV 851.

The Prelude, of course, not the Fugue.

►

George Pompidou

20:56

and the Fantaisie-Impromptu. actually people get the most impressed by that.

I don't do much Baroque because I didn't start early enough with it.

tchrist

It really does not take a great deal of virtuosity to execute.

George Pompidou

the Moonlight is the most confusing though. why do people think fast arpeggios are difficult?

Matt Эллен

As an avid fan of Terry Pratchett, reading FF's answer makes me entirely confused about what kind of books he's been reading that I haven't. Never once do I recall an allusion to Batman. It just seems so unlikely in a discworld novel. They're fun, sometimes politically adroit, books. They don't tend to reference 60s sitcoms.

George Pompidou

oh! I know that prelude/fugue!

I never performed it.

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English Language & Usage: Multi-Layer…