Surely you have noticed that There are small raised dashes on the “F” and “J” keys of the keyboard. They were not placed there by chance: these small design features hide a fundamental function for those who frequently use the keyboard. These small reliefs in QWERTY keyboards, in fact, are not an aesthetic feature, but a practical tool that helps improve the speed and precision in typing words. Their purpose is simple: to help your fingers find the correct position without having to lower your gaze. This technique, known as “blind typing”is based on muscle memory and allows you to type faster and more efficiently.
Because the “F” and “J” keys on the PC keyboard have a raised dash
Placing your index fingers on the keys “F” And “J”the other fingers are automatically distributed on the neighboring keys: la left hand covers “TO”, “S”etc.; there right hand covers “K”, “THE”and so on. THE inchesinstead, they rest on the space barready to be used. This configuration is part of the ten-finger typing method, a standard that allows you to write without having to look away from the screen.
This is not a recent intuition: the keys with protuberances are the result of decades of development in the field of QWERTY keyboards, as demonstrated by the patent June E. Botich of 2002which specifically involved the presence of elements protruding at the edges in some keys – “TO” (left edge), “F” (right edge), “J” (left edge) e “;” (right edge) – precisely to facilitate the positioning of the hand on the keyboard.
The most used solution to date, however, features tactile references only on the keys “F” And “J”as well as in the button “5” present in numeric keypad of keyboards full size which include the latter.
The benefits of blind typing
But what are they? the real advantages of typing “blindly”? First of all, speed: professional typists can achieve speeds between 43 and 80 words per minute or WPM (Word Per Minute) and, as the site points out PCWorld in an article on the topic, «with practice and the right technique, speeds of over 100 WPM are even possible».
Also improving is the precision: by keeping your gaze fixed on the screen, you can immediately identify and correct any errors, thus obtaining an advantage which, spread over long writing sessions, can represent a considerable time saving.
And then there’s the fact that typing blindly simplifies the use of keyboard shortcutsessential for using desktop software as effectively as possible.
The next time you put your hands on the keyboard, remember that those raised dashes on the “F” and “J” keys can be your valid ally when writing texts on the computer. If you’ve never done it before, try using them as they were designed: you might be surprised to discover how much boost it can give such a small detail while typing.
