From: Asmus Freytag (asmusf@ix.netcom.com)
Date: Sat Dec 29 2007 - 14:10:01 CST
My view is that there's nothing wrong with using a distinctive label on
a keyboard, even to the point of choosing the lowercase letter for some
keycaps. I suspect that most users would try that key with a shift to
get the uppercase and not think twice about the inconsistency.
When consistency gets in the way of getting the job done, it's no longer
a help, but a hindrance.
Using dead-key hacks seems a terrible idea - unless it allows you to
achieve a consistency of approach. In other words, a keyboard layout
where all diacritics can be typed as deadkeys has a certain consistency
of its own, and might be easier to use for those typists that need to
copy a wide variety of letter forms (e.g. from a list of names).
Learning a dozen deadkeys would seem way easier than to learn three or
four times that many key-combinations (not key-strokes) for precomposed
forms.
The worst design would be one, where you could never predict which
combination might be available via dead-keys and which might not be, for
example if the barred D required a deadkey but the Polish barred L might
not.
On the other hand, if I had to guess which design a standards body might
come up with...
A./
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