• Post Reply Bookmark Topic Watch Topic
  • New Topic
programming forums Java Mobile Certification Databases Caching Books Engineering Micro Controllers OS Languages Paradigms IDEs Build Tools Frameworks Application Servers Open Source This Site Careers Other Pie Elite all forums
this forum made possible by our volunteer staff, including ...
Marshals:
  • Campbell Ritchie
  • Jeanne Boyarsky
  • Ron McLeod
  • Paul Clapham
  • Liutauras Vilda
Sheriffs:
  • paul wheaton
  • Rob Spoor
  • Devaka Cooray
Saloon Keepers:
  • Stephan van Hulst
  • Tim Holloway
  • Carey Brown
  • Frits Walraven
  • Tim Moores
Bartenders:
  • Mikalai Zaikin

Left Handed or Right Handed or Both?

 
Bartender
Posts: 1868
81
Android IntelliJ IDE MySQL Database Chrome Java
  • Mark post as helpful
  • send pies
    Number of slices to send:
    Optional 'thank-you' note:
  • Quote
  • Report post to moderator
I'm right handed, or my right side is my dominate side. However a few years ago I switched to using the mouse from my right hand to my left hand to reduce repetitive stress on my right hand. Now I'm 100% comfortable using my mouse with either hand.
One thing that you may not realize is that if you use the standard keyboard layout is that many of the keyboard short cut keys are designed to be completed with your left hand.
If you have the mouse in your left hand then it takes a few moments longer to use these keyboard short cuts. I'm not going to remap my keyboard or rearrange the buttons as I regularly switch which hand I use the mouse with.

I was able to create a C# program to switch the primary and secondary buttons on the mouse, which I've mapped to a mouse short cut. This allows me to change the buttons with only one click and takes only a second to complete.
Away from computing, I am mostly right handed, however I initially learned how to play billiards/pool left handed. As a result I can play billiards left handed, just not quite as good a when I shot right handed.

From what I understand around 89.5% of the population is right handed, around 9.5% are right handed and the remaining few are both (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Handedness).

If you want to challenge yourself, do a common task with the non dominate hand. Some of these tasks could include:
  • brushing your teeth
  • brushing your hair
  • tying shoe/boot laces (change which hand does what)
  • eating
  • using the TV remote

  • It's been said by some people that you need to do something 21 days straight to form a habit.
    Could you do these tasks for 21 days straight with your non dominate hand?
     
    Sheriff
    Posts: 67746
    173
    Mac Mac OS X IntelliJ IDE jQuery TypeScript Java iOS
    • Mark post as helpful
    • send pies
      Number of slices to send:
      Optional 'thank-you' note:
    • Quote
    • Report post to moderator
    You can tie your shoes/boots with one hand?
     
    Marshal
    Posts: 8857
    637
    Mac OS X VI Editor BSD Java
    • Mark post as helpful
    • send pies
      Number of slices to send:
      Optional 'thank-you' note:
    • Quote
    • Report post to moderator

    Bear Bibeault wrote:You can tie your shoes/boots with one hand?


    ... (change which hand does what)

     
    Liutauras Vilda
    Marshal
    Posts: 8857
    637
    Mac OS X VI Editor BSD Java
    • Mark post as helpful
    • send pies
      Number of slices to send:
      Optional 'thank-you' note:
    • Quote
    • Report post to moderator

    Pete Letkeman wrote:Could you do these tasks for 21 days straight with your non dominate hand?


    I could do them right now without any preparation.

    When I born, I born left-handed. At that time our country were occupied by Soviet Union, so in schools we were not able to write with anything else than just right hand, so I learned.
    Since school was just a part of the day, everything else I used to do with my left hand.

    So, how things now? Well, since I didn't write much during my free-time after the school, only the writing I couldn't do with my left hand properly right away, other than that:
  • If I play billiard, I hold stick in my left hand
  • If I need to throw a ball (basketball or just simply throw something), I throw with left hand
  • Tennis play with left hand
  • If I eat, I eat like majority by taking fork to the left and knife to the right. If only holding the fork, then holding with the right by default
  • Computer mouse using with right hand, but just tried with left - right one feels more comfortable to be honest as of now


  • Once went to play golf, well, not to play, just so to have a training session to learn. Trainer asked: do we have left-handed people, I said - yes, me! He gave me a stick for left handed. Then he was showing how to hit the ball, so I putted hands on the stick like right handed (one hand lower than the other), but hit the ball (if I weren't miss it) from the wrong side of the shoulder. Then he said to me - weird guy. But it was most comfortable to me that way.

    So I think I'm broken
     
    Pete Letkeman
    Bartender
    Posts: 1868
    81
    Android IntelliJ IDE MySQL Database Chrome Java
    • Mark post as helpful
    • send pies
      Number of slices to send:
      Optional 'thank-you' note:
    • Quote
    • Report post to moderator

    Liutauras Vilda wrote:in schools we were not able to write with anything else than just right hand, so I learned.


    I recall my Mom saying the same thing about her schooling in Mexico. If you tried to use your left hand for something like writing you would be it smacked.
    But that was many years ago and I suspect and/or hope that for some places this has changed.
    I wonder if North Korea has this type of policy in place, as they leader does seem to do some questionable things.

    Liutauras, would you say that you can do most things equally well with either hand?

    Liutauras Vilda wrote:So I think I'm broken


    We are all broken, just some of us don't know it yet.

    Interesting little tidbit:
    If you Google for 'tie shoelaces one handed' you can find tutorials on how it's done. However I have not tied my shoelaces with one hand.
     
    Rancher
    Posts: 383
    13
    • Mark post as helpful
    • send pies
      Number of slices to send:
      Optional 'thank-you' note:
    • Quote
    • Report post to moderator

    Liutauras Vilda wrote:So I think I'm broken

    ...aren't we all, in one way or another?  

    During the middle ages it was considered "sacrilegious" to be left-handed - a curse. Or, as described as a point of reference in http://time.com/3978951/lefties-history/ (Time article): In the Middle Ages, for instance, the left-hander lived in danger of being accused of practicing witchcraft

    Being a lefty myself I have experienced first-hand some of the challenges in life of being born that way. An example: I play guitar. Walk into most music stores and look at the guitars, bass or otherwise, hanging on the wall for sale (or rent). The majority are for right-handed people. I don't know how many times I have been with friends watching someone play guitar (on TV, or at a concert) and someone inevitably says, "Look, h/she is left-handed" about the guitar player.
     
    Ranch Hand
    Posts: 4716
    9
    Scala Java
    • Mark post as helpful
    • send pies
      Number of slices to send:
      Optional 'thank-you' note:
    • Quote
    • Report post to moderator
    i am predominantly right handed. however i shoot a bow left handed.
     
    Randy Maddocks
    Rancher
    Posts: 383
    13
    • Mark post as helpful
    • send pies
      Number of slices to send:
      Optional 'thank-you' note:
    • Quote
    • Report post to moderator

    Randall Twede wrote:however i shoot a bow left handed



    Funny how, no matter which hand is your dominant one, it seems we use the other when doing some activity, like in your case shooting a bow. In my case, I shoot right-handed when playing hockey, yet throw a ball with my left hand and catch with my right. I try to throw with my right hand and it's really awkward, but I guess that's where practising throwing that way would eventually improve that.
     
    Ranch Hand
    Posts: 234
    12
    • Mark post as helpful
    • send pies
      Number of slices to send:
      Optional 'thank-you' note:
    • Quote
    • Report post to moderator
    I always taught Nadal (the greatest clay-court tennis player in history) was left-handed. I was surprised the other day to learn that he is right-handed but plays left-handed. At an early age, his uncle taught him to play left-handed in order to give him an advantage.
     
    Randy Maddocks
    Rancher
    Posts: 383
    13
    • Mark post as helpful
    • send pies
      Number of slices to send:
      Optional 'thank-you' note:
    • Quote
    • Report post to moderator

    Daniel Cox wrote:At an early age, his uncle taught him to play left-handed in order to give him an advantage.



    That's interesting. I wonder what the Uncle saw in it being an advantage for him to play left-handed. I am thinking maybe he figured since most players would likely be right-handers, playing left-handed would somehow give him a strategic advantage. Sort of similar to the psychology around left- versus right-handed pitches in baseball facing left- or right-handed batters. There apparently is a science to it, but I am by no means an expert on coaching strategies like that.
     
    Daniel Cox
    Ranch Hand
    Posts: 234
    12
    • Mark post as helpful
    • send pies
      Number of slices to send:
      Optional 'thank-you' note:
    • Quote
    • Report post to moderator

    Randy Maddocks wrote:I wonder what the Uncle saw in it being an advantage for him to play left-handed.


    Being a left-handed player can give you an advantage if your opponent hasn’t mastered left-handed ball spins, angles etc.
     
    Liutauras Vilda
    Marshal
    Posts: 8857
    637
    Mac OS X VI Editor BSD Java
    • Mark post as helpful
    • send pies
      Number of slices to send:
      Optional 'thank-you' note:
    • Quote
    • Report post to moderator
    Being able to play snooker both hands, it gives tremendous advantage based on the cue ball position within a table area. A live example is Ronnie O'Sullivan - I like this genius snooker player.
     
    Proudly marching to the beat of a different kettle of fish... while reading this tiny ad
    a bit of art, as a gift, that will fit in a stocking
    https://gardener-gift.com
    reply
      Bookmark Topic Watch Topic
    • New Topic