Slashdot Mirror


Keyboards are Good; Mouses are Dumb

An anonymous reader writes "Most emacs/vi users know this, but it seems the more I use the mouse, the less output I am making. The keyboard does seem to make much more of a mind-meld than the imprecise mouse. Paul Tyma hits it on the head."

4 of 569 comments (clear)

  1. inprecision by unk1911 · · Score: 0, Redundant

    I agree completely. The mouse is imprecise and takes too long, requires very good hand/eye coordination. When I have to work on a repetitive task I can either write a macro or have the exact sequence of key-strokes down and do the job much faster.

    The mouse is better when the datasets that you are working on are not localized / scattered around the screen (it's like a cassette tape vs. cd-rom which can quickly access random parts of data without rewinding)

    --
    http://unk1911.blogspot.com/

  2. Re:Thinly veiled "I love emacs" article by ZephyrXero · · Score: 0, Redundant

    All hail gedit! :P

    --
    "A truly wise man realizes he knows nothing."
  3. I remember when GUIs were really taking off... by smug_lisp_weenie · · Score: 0, Redundant

    ...the Mac Zealots were the first to adopt the idea- Suddenly, around the time Windows 3.0 came out, GUIs were all over TV and had gripped the imagination of the general non-geek population and it became unthinkable to release a computer without a GUI.

    When this happened, my mac friends ribbed me by saying "Look we were right! GUIs are better!"

    But I still consider the GUI a step back in computer usability, for many of the reasons outlined in Paul's essay, plus many more!

    A keyboard is just a perfect way to enter commands into a computer-

    Sorry folks- you're just gonna have to learn how to type in commands without clicking on perty pictures if you want to learn how to use a reasonably complicated application efficiently :) Unfortunately, many programs can no longer run on just a keyboard, due to the GUI devolution.

  4. Re:1980 by brettper · · Score: 0, Redundant

    Shut up