Many of the people that I hear of using my tutor are not amputees. Most have lost the use of one hand. There are many reasons for this. The single-handed Dvorak is ideal for anyone who has lost the use of a limb after learning to type with the Qwerty keyboard. Qwerty skills are easily transfered to the Dvorak keyboard either single-handed or two-handed. A US Navy study found that it took one hour per wpm to change from the Qwerty to the two-handed Dvorak. This was done with sailors in a classroom setting. That is to say that if you type 60 wpm in Qwerty then you can type 60 wpm on the Dvorak layout in 60 hours of class time. Since 1/3 fewer Dvorak typist are needed than Qwerty typist, to do the same work, the cost of training could be recovered in a few weeks. I know for a fact that it can be done in much less time than that.
I think any good typist realizes that where the letters are is only a small part of typing. The feel of the keyboard and the rhythm of typing is more important. I remember worrying about where the home E key was so that I was located. I watched good typist and wondered at how their hands seemed so free. Now I know.
I watched a student who was a retired military Morse Code typist switch to the Dvorak keyboard. It took the afternoon session in my vo-tech electronics class. That is 2.5 hours. At the end of that time he could type using the two-handed Dvorak key layout. In a week he was typing 50 wpm. He could switch back and forth between the layouts in an hour or so. Where the keys are is a small part of touch typing. I have watched a number of people learn the two-handed Dvorak. One young lady had a wrist operation because of damage. She learned in a very short time and was amazed at how easy typing was.
