After reading this tweet from Paul Boag, I came across this keyboard that uses e-ink display technology underneath its keys to allow customisable keyboard layouts.

Although I use a keyboard for more than eight hours a day, I actually never thought about why the keys have been arranged the way they are.

I knew there were different keyboard layouts for most languages and that they differ in the arrangement of some single letters and punctuation. I assumed they were all derived from what we know as the QWERTY layout.

But there is another keyboard layout, known as the Dvorak layout, that I had never heard of. Patented in 1936, it was designed to reduce the movement of fingers between keystrokes and therefore allow faster typing and fewer errors. Currently all major operating systems support the Dvorak layout. That’s what I learnt today.