On Keyboards

So my keyboard at work just broke.  Doesn't happen often, but one of the keys just stopped y'know... putting it's letter on the screen.

So I got given a replacement from somewhere.

Here's the thing - the layout is different.  Any programmer or techie or otherwise-nerd will know what I mean when I say that it's FREAKING ANNOYING!!

Now, there aren't any big changes really.  I mean, all the letters are in the same place, and the F-keys are still above the keyboard and the number pad is the same, but there are enough differences to frustrate someone like me.

The Home-End-PgUp-PgDown-etc. chunk of keys is different.

This is what I used to have:

Here's what I have now:

What that means is that I keep hitting Delete instead of End.  Because it's right below Home now.

I only have one Windows key

And it's on the left - the one I don't go for when I'm locking my computer with Win-L as I stand up to go somewhere.

The F-keys are grouped in threes

Seriously, in threes?  F5 is by far the most common F-key I hit, and now it's in the middle of a cluster instead of on the left.  I have to look at my keyboard now to hit it.

My right Ctrl key is slightly to the left of where it was

Not a big deal you'd think?  Well truthfully it doesn't affect me much - I still usually hit it first go, but it's been moved left to make way for the arrow keys.  So when I don't hit Ctrl, I hit the left arrow key.  That's confusing.

So you're probably thinking, "Oh, you poor little baby! Would you like some cries with your waa-burger?"  And yes, yes I would.

Seriously, it's frustrating.  I know it's only temporary - I'll get a new one soon with a normal key layout.  But my keyboard is by far the most frequently-used tool in my arsenal.  Small things like this slow me down.

Ok, I'm finished complaining now.  You can proceed with your day.

Damian Brady

I'm an Australian developer, speaker, and author specialising in DevOps, MLOps, developer process, and software architecture. I love Azure DevOps, GitHub Actions, and reducing process waste.

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