docs(README): credit the video-game radial lineage; foreground one-handed typing

- Name video games as the source for the radial/pie menu (weapon/emote wheel)
  alongside acme/sam/plumber, Emacs, and Sublime.
- Stop understating the one-handed-typing shift: state plainly that it is the
  driving ergonomic constraint — the reason the mouse carries the reaching and
  chords are off the table — in the intro, the design-constraints list, and the
  radial section.
This commit is contained in:
Levi Neely 2026-10-08 20:53:42 +02:00
parent e31fee664e
commit 94d609f3ab
1 changed files with 17 additions and 4 deletions

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@ -5,7 +5,15 @@ live in Plan 9's [acme](http://acme.cat-v.org/) most of the time, but I like a
lot of what Kate offers — and I don't like menu-driven workflows. So this is a
suite of Kate / KTextEditor plugins that pulls in ideas from the tools I reach
for — acme, sam, and the plumber from Plan 9; `M-x` from Emacs; a Sublime-style
fuzzy palette — and bends Kate toward them.
fuzzy palette; and the radial/pie menus that video games have used for years to
put actions a flick away from the cursor — and bends Kate toward them.
The deeper reason is ergonomic: I've moved to typing one-handed, and that
reshapes everything. A workflow built on two-handed chords and reaching across
the keyboard simply doesn't work anymore. The mouse does the reaching, the
keyboard stays under one hand, and no action is allowed to require a chord or an
F-key. This isn't a preference knob — it's the constraint the whole design is
built around.
The aim is a text editor driven by the mouse at the cursor and by plain-letter
keyboard input — never by hunting through nested menubars or memorizing complex
@ -16,8 +24,11 @@ chords.
These are hard constraints that shape every decision:
- **Mouse-heavy.** The fastest input is the mouse, used *locally* at the caret
(radial / floating surfaces), not a trek to the menubar.
- **One-handed typing.** Keyboard input must work comfortably with one hand.
(radial / floating surfaces, in the spirit of a game's weapon wheel), not a
trek to the menubar.
- **One-handed typing (the driving constraint).** Input must work comfortably
with a single hand. This is not a convenience toggle; it is why the mouse
carries the reaching and why chords are off the table.
- **No complex chords.** Single modifier at most (`Ctrl`+letter). No leader-key
chord trees, no multi-cursor keybinds.
- **Compact keyboard.** F-keys and nav clusters live on a layer toggle, so they
@ -199,7 +210,9 @@ discovered from the active document (VCS root, else its directory).
![The Deft radial caret menu](docs/img/deft-radial.png)
A multi-level pie menu for actions that **complete in place** (cut, copy, paste,
comment, case changes…), so the mouse stays at the text.
comment, case changes…), so the mouse stays at the text. The model is the
weapon/emote wheel from games: a quick flick toward a direction, not a hunt
through a list.
- **Open:** `Alt+R` (at the caret) **or press the right mouse button** in the
editor (at the pointer; the normal context menu is suppressed while enabled).