A Personal Configuration

I enjoy being intentional with my actions and trying to make things as enjoyable as they can be.

Sleeping? Let me make sure to have the covers I want, the perfect purple pillow.

Using my computer? Let’s make it more enjoyable.

The OS Journey

First it was Mint, then Ubuntu, then PopOS, and finally Arch.

While I might not stay with Arch forever, it has spoiled me dearly.

From being able to configure my computer exactly how I want it, to developing my own Waybar extensions with ease. And now to optimizing my productivity and enjoyment with keybindings.

As I have now gotten more comfortable with my OS, now I need to go ahead and temporarily ruin my process just for it to get even better over time.

This involves two things:

1. ZSA Voyager keyboard
2. Neovim instead of VS Code

The Keyboard

The sum is I am trying to be more intentional and enjoy the process of using my keyboard more.

Historically I have really liked the Mac keyboards, and my main keyboard prior to the Voyager is the Logi Ergo. Which is a fantastic keyboard at what I consider a reasonable price. But it’s big. Plus time for me to switch things up.

I think the Voyager is harder for me to pick up than the average person because I never learned how to type properly — I am prepared to blame that on my homeschooling for my early years.

Never learned home row, or touch typing.

I learned by just typing, and while I can do it fast and even without looking, for the most part I am using only a few fingers and move my hands around the keyboard a lot.

Honestly the ZSA is really comfortable aside from a few things. Starting with the letter C, which requires I bring my middle finger down vertically, something that does not feel natural.

After that the super key used to be on the bottom left, and I would need to pitch my wrist to hit it with my pinky, and then try to reach over to press the number keys to navigate between workspaces — it was torture.

Not even an hour later was I feeling a deep pain in my wrist.

This is actually what stopped me from using the keyboard for a while. But now with Arch, I think I can fix it.

I moved the super key to my thumbs (mapped over delete when holding) and it’s working great! Next I needed to get rid of the other keys that were bothering me. I am trying to use the right shift, but wow, that sucks lol. So hard to get rid of that muscle memory. But it’s better than my wrist cracking every time I move.

HJKL Everywhere

I think my route to success here will be by relying on a Vim keymapping for as much as possible. HJKL is in:

1. Neovim
2. Changing focus between windows with super
3. And I thought I had more, but let’s see what’s next