Products · Pattern or everyday thing
Function keys
Raised as a usability problem by 5 people on Hacker News over 10 years (2011–2020), in 5 threads.
No issue was raised by at least 3 people in 3 threads this year.
No issue was raised by at least 3 people in 3 threads in the last 5 years.
Every issue, all time, most people first
Function keys hard to reach, requiring whole-hand movementUnreviewed
20112026- Can't tell which mode the function keys are in, so presses hit the wrong action2020-05-31
- Function keys have different functions per program, so people forget and rarely use them2019-11-13
- Function keys sit too far from the home row, making them awkward to reach2019-07-04
Unreviewed issues were grouped by machine: Claude Haiku labelled each comment as a usability complaint, named what it's about and summed up the problem in a line, and a small model grouped similar problems. Nobody has checked them by hand. Expect mistakes.
The newest 5 complaints
- Can't tell which mode the function keys are in, so presses hit the wrong action2020-05-31
- Function keys have different functions per program, so people forget and rarely use them2019-11-13
- Function keys sit too far from the home row, making them awkward to reach2019-07-04
- Function keys sit in different places across keyboards, so the user must look down to find them2016-10-27
- Function keys are hard to reach, requiring whole-hand movement or an awkward fn key2011-06-02