In addition to using text editors like vim or emacs and using a tiling window manager, what other programs do you use to reduce usage of the mouse? I recently discovered warpd which is similar to vimium’s hint mode but works globally.
to reduce usage of the mouse?
a keyboard?
a keyboard
Corollary: unplugging the mouse?
classy 🙂
I use this haha.
Also since I’m forced to use windows on my work computer, one of the few uselful commands I use in cmd prompt is
shutdown /s /t 0
A terminal file manager like ranger is pretty useful
I’m partial to midnight commander but admit I haven’t used it in a couple of years.
mutt is on my to-learn list.
You’re in for a treat, it’s a PITA to configure if you’re learning it (especially on the UI part, I found). Good luck on the journey :)
Cannot find a software with more appropriate name than this! Mouseless, it works flawlessly on both xorg and wayland.
Even if you dont need to replace your mouse (like me), it works great as a key mapper, much more fluid than AutoHotKey on Windows.
What’s the point?
If you do a lot with your keyboard, it is annoying to get your hand off it and switch to your mouse. And then to switch back. If a task can also be done with the keyboard, you can just stay there and that is quite comfy.
Let me introduce you to my favorite tool https://tex.com.tw/products/shinobi?variant=16969883648090
It has to many keys for me :) I’m currently on my own 42-key design. I have mouse keys on a layer.
I’ve been using a Tex yoda ii for years and I love it. If you want to avoid leaving “home row” nothing beats a 60% keyboard with a trackpoint! I just bought a Tex Shura but haven’t tried it out yet.
I don’t ruthlessly reduce mouse use, but I prefer to stick the keyboard for a handful of reasons: speed, comfort, reducing the likelihood of repetitive stress injury as I age, and flexibility. If my trackpad fails and I can’t find a mouse, I can still do what I need to do.
i think the question is valid: it seems strange first, but the cli-env. is so MUCH MORE POWERFUL.
I find that I prefer a graphical environment to understand what’s going on, then a keyboard-focused environment (usually text based) once I reach the point that I know what to do and want to increase speed and repeatability.
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For the ableists in the room: to reduce mouse usage.
And blocked. You didn’t need to be an asshole.
Don’t reduce it too much. Occasionally reaching for the mouse may save you from RSI.
If that is the only thing saving you from RSI you’re going to get it anyway.
I’ve had the pleasure, and your body posture and mental state of mind are much more important. Getting up every now and then is also important, changing seat position helps, and doing some sport also helps.
Both of my arms did hurt so much I could not cut my own meat. Mouse or no mouse:(.
Am much better now though.
I’m half-kidding about this though. I get that the stuff you mentioned are a lot more important. These are the reasons I started exercising and using break timers.
But the thing with learning keyboard driven workflow is that you tend to develop a habit of spam pressing keys if you can’t immediately think of a way to something with less keyword. Especially in vim. Because if I’m not always pressing something, I don’t feel like an expert enough, damn it! So I resorted to spamming hjkl, lol.
When my RSI problems start to develop. I had to really focus and change that habit to slow down and think of a way to press less keys. But still I stopped using vim key equivalents on browsers though, mouse scrolling relaxes my fingers a bit more than key pressing.
I use vimium browser extension as I noticed a large chunk of my mouse usage was on the browser.
lynx (when possible), fff, cmus, mutt, latex, core-utils, mupdf (vi like keybindings), sxiv, mpv (no-gui)
i only use gui programs if no cli option exists: js-browser, gimp
qutebrowser, vifm, and keyboard plugins for all apps that have them
Ratpoison. :^)
To add to what others have recommended:
- mpv works very well from the cli and can do both video and music
- zathura is great for pdfs
- aria2 for torrents
- epy for reading ebooks
I use tridactyl in firefox. Except for emacs and tiling wms I’m not too deep in applications for reducing mouse usage, I tend to use keyboards with ‘better mouse placement’ for example the tex shura which copies the thinkpad trackpoint, or a corne keyboard with a pimoroni trackball. Or a charybdis nano. Even using a smaller keyboard layout counts imo, my favourite non-ergo keyboard layout is 60% which reduces necessary arm-travel-distance a lot :)
Go full emacs and use eww to browse the web within emacs. Bonus points that it lives in an emacs buffer so you can switch/split between buffers easily
Most GNOME applications can be used without mouse
