Getting used to either US or US-International keyboard layout

[Clawish]

I will buy a new Macbook soon. I am german and used to the german keyboard layout:

Since I do alot of coding and many special characters are placed inconveniently on the german keyboard (e.g. { and }) I will purchase either a US or a US International keyboard.

I am tempted to buy the standard US one, because I like to believe that this is the way the ANSI has conceived the keyboard layout to be. However, I am concerned that I will not get used to the small return key, and will accidently press \ often.

US standard:

US International:

What can you recommend me? Do you think I will get used to the small return quickly?

 

[orestes1984]

Buy the standard US keyboard layout, everything else is a just a mess. I honestly don't know how Europeans live with some keyboard layouts that look like someone threw up the contents of a keyboard on and then super glued the keys there.

 

[cjmillsnun]

The second one isn't US International, but the UK layout (it has both the £ and # signs above the 3).

I would get the UK layout, purely because of the fact that the return key is as you are used to it.

Of course the US layout is the ANSI standard. ANSI = American National Standards Institue, however the UK layout is close to what you are used to.

 

[bushido]

I honestly don't know how Europeans live with some keyboard layouts that look like someone threw up the contents of a keyboard on and then super glued the keys there.

all a matter of getting used to the return key on the US one for example is always too tiny for me and i keep hitting \ on a friends keyboard by mistake and some languages like german or spanish have no other choice due to the longer alphabet

 

[orestes1984]

all a matter of getting used to the return key on the US one for example is always too tiny for me and i keep hitting \ on a friends keyboard by mistake and some languages like german or spanish have no other choice due to the longer alphabet

Liike when I was in France...

AZERTY?

Come on what... it took a bit of getting used to indeed.

I would get the UK layout, purely because of the fact that the return key is as you are used to it.

Of course the US layout is the ANSI standard. ANSI = American National Standards Institue, however the UK layout is close to what you are used to.

The UK layout still has a number of peculariaties that may make it difficult if the job requires an ANSI standard keyboard. Certain shortcuts in particular may not work, or you will have to learn what the alternate key combination is.

If the job requires an ANSI keyboard then use one. You will get used to the small return/enter key in time, the keyboard layout on a MacBook Pro isn't quite standard anyway, so I still occasionally hit the wrong key when touch typing.

 

[cjmillsnun]

Liike when I was in France...

AZERTY?

Come on what... it took a bit of getting used to indeed.



The UK layout still has a number of peculariaties that may make it difficult if the job requires an ANSI standard keyboard. Certain shortcuts in particular may not work, or you will have to learn what the alternate key combination is.

If the job requires an ANSI keyboard then use one. You will get used to the small return/enter key in time, the keyboard layout on a MacBook Pro isn't quite standard anyway, so I still occasionally hit the wrong key when touch typing.

Every ANSI shortcut I've used works just fine on my UK keyboard. The key codes are all the same on the same keycaps with the exception of shift 3 which gives £. This can be got around by using Alt 3 instead which gives #. There is one additional key that gives § and ±, but you just don't use it for ANSI use.

 

[orestes1984]

here is one additional key that gives § and ±, but you just don't use it for ANSI use.

Your tilde key can be highly important depending on what you're doing, particularly in CSS, SQL and C programing. In Linux, Unix and Unix like operating systems as well as OS X likewise, it gets you to your home directory. Try cd ~ from the command line...

Don't discount the tilde, it's still there, just in a bit of a weird place.

 

[iKrivetko]

The keyboard layout is a rare case of an american standard being better than its european counterpart.

 

[cjmillsnun]

Your tilde key can be highly important depending on what you're doing, particularly in CSS, SQL and C programing. In Linux, Unix and Unix like operating systems as well as OS X likewise, it gets you to your home directory. Try cd ~ from the command line...

Don't discount the tilde, it's still there, just in a bit of a weird place.

I'm not discounting the tilde. As someone who has used *NIX OS' for a long time and regularly connects to Linux servers, I need the tilde. As you say, it's still there. I'm used to where it is. My other reason for saying go with the UK keyboard is that the spacing and number of keys is the same as the DE one that the OP is used to.

 

[Crugga]

You'll get used to it.
I bought a US Macbook because it was a lot cheaper than buy a UK one and it took about 34 minutes to get used to it after using UK keyboards since I remember.
Its set up for Uk keys so shift and 3 is £.
Uk is identical to the 3rd photo but with a poundsign.

 

[pasadena]

I moved to the US 3 years ago, so I had to switch to the US keyboard and tbh it only took me a couple of weeks to get used to it. I still do have some old reflexes coming up now and then, like hitting the SHIFT key to get the numbers when I'm typing too fast but overall it's so much better than the French layout - especially for the numbers and special characters.

There's no such thing as US International physical layout. Your second pic is the UK one - which may make sense for you if you use the Euro sign a lot. All my keyboards are set up as US International in the OS configuration, because it allows me to get the French accents easily. Got used to it too.

So ymmv but switching KB layouts is pretty easy, although it will probably drive you crazy for a few days. It was much easier than getting used to the Mac keyboard when I got my first MBP !

 

[Clawish]

thank you for your opinions!
I ended up going for the standard US keyboard.
The basic reasoning behind that was that I have to learn the Apple KB layout from scratch anyway, and the horizontal enter key might even be better when typing with 10 fingers.

 

[johannnn]

I honestly don't know how Europeans live with some keyboard layouts that look like someone threw up the contents of a keyboard on and then super glued the keys there.

I will say something that might sound extremely weird for you, but what you explain is excactly how I feed about US keyboard layout. Isn't it fantastic how everyone prefer their own layout?

 

[pasadena]

thank you for your opinions!
I ended up going for the standard US keyboard.
The basic reasoning behind that was that I have to learn the Apple KB layout from scratch anyway, and the horizontal enter key might even be better when typing with 10 fingers.

Just be sure to configure it as US International so it will give you access to various accents and German-specific characters like the ß

http://www.macworld.com/article/1147039/accentinput.html
http://www.forlang.wsu.edu/help/keyboards1.asp

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I will say something that might sound extremely weird for you, but what you explain is excactly how I feed about US keyboard layout. Isn't it fantastic how everyone prefer their own layout?

Everyone prefer the layout they learned at first. I can type on a French keyboard while asleep.

That said, the US one does have its perks when you're a programmer - probably because most programming languages were invented by people using it.

 

[FuNGi]

I use both interchangeably as my rMBP, purchased in Sweden, came with the UK layout and my external wireless keyboard is US layout. At first I occasionally would hit the backslashes instead of the enter key but now don't even think twice. My pinky has just gotten much more accurate. The only time I need to look down is for the tilda.