The article is mostly about speed, not efficiency. If you care about speed only, then many will argue it's a toss-up. If you care about efficiency over your typing lifetime, then I'd strongly suggest Dvorak has a big advantage.<p>Small slightly loaded example. Try it yourself on any body of text: I just typed your title on Dvorak and QWERTY layouts. The top line are the keys that are on the home row of each, so fingers don't have to move to type them. The second are those you have to move for. Ignores shift.<p>"debunking dvorak vs qwerty myths at reason.com"<p>Dvorak: (home row first)<p>deunindoasetthsateasono<p>bkgvrkvqwrymyr.cm<p>So in this contrived example, the home row has slightly more letters on it than other rows.<p>QWERTY: (home row first)<p>dkdakshsaas<p>ebuninvorvmyttreon.com<p>Here, the home row has far fewer of the letters required, so <i>most</i> of the time you have to move your fingers. Oh, <i>and</i> I removed QWERTY because it was just unfair. Even if you remove the 'reason.com', Dvorak is more efficient. So try it yourself for a few sentences. I suggest you'll find Dvorak has far less finger movement in most cases. Maybe someone will code up a test, scanning HN for home row keys :)<p>Is it for everyone? No. Like Sarah Palin, everyone has a different opinion. If you're happy with QWERTY, use it - there are generally far better things to learn about. Out of 4 friends who tried Dvorak, two of us kept it. I use Programmer Dvorak because it makes coding nicer, but that's even more hassle.