Anyone else practice typing skills? I’ve been enjoying trying to improve my speed for the past few months; I switched to the Colemak keyboard layout and average about 65 WPM. I lost my muscle memory with QWERTY though, so now I type really poorly on other people’s computers 
Typing
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I tried to learn to type correctly. I crashed and burned. 
I am back to doing it “my way.”
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I tryed te tipe proer fist bot eht spil kheker koodn’t kop wi ma mistooks 
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Hello Siri - Can you tell me what part of the 20th Century Michael_Mark is from?
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I learned to type on one of these back in the early 70’s…Mom had an instruction book & I’d run through the exercises when I wasn’t typing song lyrics out.
Later took typing class in high school on electric machines…it was like switching from acoustic guitar to electric: big technique difference, and far less sore fingers.
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This all got me to thinking and remembering when my Dad bought our first electric calculator.
Got it from Kmart for $88.88. You plugged it into the wall socket, measured about 8" square, and it would add, subtract, multiply & divide.
About two years later you could get one that was hand-held and ran on batteries for like 10-20 dollars.
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Every young girls dream to be able to type back in the 50s 60s kept them out of the dirty factories. We had an old Olivette similar to the one in the photo the keys were very stiff to move and would jam together every third stoke.
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I do it every once in a while gotta stay sharp.
Typing in the 20th century:
Typing today:
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The last time I practiced to improve speed was in the late 70’s when I took a typing class…against my will. I remember it so vividly because my Dad insisted I take the class, and could not see why I would EVER need those skills. In this class, we used IBM Selectric typewriters kinda like the one pictured below. On the plus side, I was one of the only two guys in a class full of girls.
sigh
Dad was right, though. I need keyboard skills every day now. Even to respond to this post.
sigh
After posting this, I realized I’m a little OCD…the position of the rollers on the paper bar is driving me crazy. I would have wanted to divide the paper in thirds and place the rollers accordingly…
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All you need is three fingers to type just like playing banjo. Any mistooks just repeat and folks think your improvising.
I should add those IBM typewriters were still in use here in the UK when I worked for the company on contract.
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It does trigger the mental “flow state” that reminds me of playing an instrument, which is probably why I like it.
From Wikipedia:
Musicians, especially improvisational soloists, may experience a state of flow while playing their instrument. Research has shown that performers in a flow state have a heightened quality of performance as opposed to when they are not in a flow state. In a study performed with professional classical pianists who played piano pieces several times to induce a flow state, a significant relationship was found between the flow state of the pianist and the pianist’s heart rate, blood pressure, and major facial muscles. As the pianist entered the flow state, heart rate and blood pressure decreased and the major facial muscles relaxed. This study further emphasized that flow is a state of effortless attention. In spite of the effortless attention and overall relaxation of the body, the performance of the pianist during the flow state improved.
Groups of drummers experience a state of flow when they sense a collective energy that drives the beat, something they refer to as “getting into the groove” or “entrainment”. Likewise drummers and bass guitarists often describe a state of flow when they are feeling the downbeat together as being “in the pocket.” Researchers have measured flow through subscales; challenge-skill balance, merging of action and awareness, clear goals, unambiguous feedback, total concentration, sense of control, loss of self-consciousness, transformation of time and autotelic experience.
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On first pass, I misread the last word as “entertainment.”
I like my misreading better
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This is me 100%. My wife is as good as they come typing…she watches me and says “Oh my goodness that looks so weird watching you type”. I actually type really quickly, but I rarely look at what I type…and I make substantial errors. Oh well “good enough” hit enter or “send” and move on.
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I enjoyed typing class back in the mid-80’s. We started the for 6 weeks of class on the manual typewriters then moved to IBM Selectric typewriters. I had an older teacher and she believed everyone should start on the manual typewriter (similar to everyone back then learned to drive using a standard transmision stick shift where I grew up)
I don’t remember the words per minute I typed, but we had a pretty competitive group and we really pushed each otther.
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haha… I too do it my way only! I can’t type at crazy speeds, but good enough for programming even though slow. As I was never a “key punch operator” to have the typing skills needed!
Years ago, our offices had those type of type writers that Dave, Mark posted.
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Hey Mike do you have a word like your first or last name you use to get you in the proper postion when you start typing for the first time of the day?
To get my hands into position I alsways start with the letter “A”. Starting there first because it is such a common place for me to start typing since my last name is “Anderson”. If I stick my hand up there where I think they should be (it’s just a guess) I then look down to see where the “T” and “Y” are then make an upper case “A” so the pinky finger hits “shift” and the next finger gets the “A”. If I pull that off then I travel all the way up to “backspace” with my ring finger of my right hand. If that “A” is then “backspaced” and cleared?..it’s off to the races.
It’s kind of like cozying into a quilt on your bed on a cold night…you have to wiggle around a bit to find that sweet spot that you know is there somewhere, Once you find it ? “Lights out” and yer pickn’ in netherland.
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I ought to have a word to get anchored. Unfortunately, I don’t so I sometimes type things shifted a key left or right
I guess I do generally place my left pinky on the “a”, but once I get going, things kind of move around.
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I must be one of those “everyones,” because I too started on a manual, then got a job where I had to type daily on a manual.
Years later, long after I was out of that line of work, my daughter & I were examining our very first home computer, a Gateway. She had been using computer keyboards in school for some time. As she watched me typing away, she observed, “Gee Dad, you must have learned on a manual typewriter.
You don’t have to pound the keyboard so hard!!!”
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My typing skills are too weak that’s why I’m practicing daily for making my typing skills good.
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