Fkeys (was: Re: the same old IBM/Lexmark keyboards)

[Eric Van Tassel 101233.342@xxxxxxxx]

Just to put in my two cents' worth, I paid quite a bit more than two cents
(and had to enlist the help of a fellow list member) to obtain a keyboard
with two sets of F keys, one on the top and one on the side. (Anyone who
ever learns where to buy such a keyboard is invited to contact me: I intend
to start a heterogeneous collection if I can.)

My crying need for such a keyboard is just another illustration of the
truth that *what you're used to* turns out to be what God intended. I
started using an employer's computer, whose keyboard was my first to
include F11 and F12, only months before I switched to Xy4. So Shft+F12 for
function RD (can't even remember what it was in Xy3) was my first
application for either of those two extra F keys; then I programmed F11 and
F12 as extra shifting keys (is that the term of art? what I mean is, I
created two new "tables" in my EVT.KBD file, so that I input [e.g.]
accented letters by F11+[letter]). Because left-hand F11 and F12 are an
awkward touch-typing reach (I have a small hand), I started using the
along-the-top versions of those keys.

Now I'm habituated to quite irrational F-key preferences. For some reason,
I almost always use the upper F2 for on-the-fly SaveGets (even though I've
just realized for the first time that half of those SGs would be *much*
easier to use with the left-hand F2); but I invariably use the left-hand F3
and F4 for defining text. I wouldn't know *how* to use the upper F10 with
Alt for toggling between two screens, or the upper F6 for cycling through
screens; yet I'm ambidextrous when it comes to F5 to open the CM line.

Go figure.

Cheers
Eric Van Tassel