Keyboards with thumb clusters are definitely the best option, but in my experience, even on a normal keyboard, simply remapping your keys makes a world of difference.
Here are some of my most useful remaps:
- Swap enter and semicolon. Enter is one of my most used keys. It should be "directly accessible"
- Make right command backspace. Backspace is another key I very commonly use, but it's far away and causes a lot of pain. Now, it's right under my thumb! (Regular backspace key is now forward delete).
- Make caps lock and enter control. (When pressed with other keys). This is useful for Emacs commands.
- Caps lock is escape when not pressed with other keys.
- Enter is semicolon when not pressed with other keys.
The "when not pressed with other keys" stuff is interesting. I never thought about that. The only trouble I can see with this is being unable to type effectively on a normie keyboard. I've had the ctrl/caps swap for years and I regular mess it up on a normie keyboard, although it's no big deal to accidentally press caps, of course. What I like is my portable mechanical keyboard has a physical switch, so it works whatever computer I plug it in to.
Here are some of my most useful remaps:
- Swap enter and semicolon. Enter is one of my most used keys. It should be "directly accessible"
- Make right command backspace. Backspace is another key I very commonly use, but it's far away and causes a lot of pain. Now, it's right under my thumb! (Regular backspace key is now forward delete).
- Make caps lock and enter control. (When pressed with other keys). This is useful for Emacs commands.
- Caps lock is escape when not pressed with other keys.
- Enter is semicolon when not pressed with other keys.
I use Karabiner for Mac to do my remappings.