[apetrovic]

Because it's easier to touch empty space and adjust fingers. Back when I worked on Thinkpad, I really hated these keys, whenever I accidentally pressed them. I don't say you're wrong, just it's a matter of taste.

It's the same with mechanical keyboards - I can't use these compact 75% keyboards where arrows/Pg Up/Pg Down/Home/End are flush with other keys; but a bit "exploded" layout, with just a bit of space between arrows and the right column keys is perfectly ok with me

What I really hate is that combination of full size/half size arrows on modern laptops, put there just because some designer hate empty space.

[chrismorgan]

Spacing is heavily underrated in current laptop keyboard design. Consider another part of the keyboard: the function key row. On traditional keyboards, it was grouped with gaps between the groups: Esc, F1–F4, F5–F8, F9–F12. (Laptop keyboards will commonly have an extra key or two at the right end, such as Delete and Insert, which historically were part of other clusters.) This grouping is excellent for spatial memory, whether visual or blind. If anything, it’s more valuable than it used to be, with the other functionality of the keys (e.g. brightness and volume adjustments). But somewhere along the way, this gap has been removed from most laptops, in favour of an unproductive uniformity.

(I have an ASUS ROG Zephyrus G15, 2021 model, GA503QM. It has a larger-than-necessary gap between Esc and F1, slightly-smaller-than-ideal gaps between F4 and F5 and F8 and F9, and sadly no gap between F12 and Delete. It also has another row of four keys higher still: XF86AudioRaiseVolume, XF86AudioLowerVolume, XF86AudioMicMute and XF86Launch1. Kinda funny how XF86AudioMute is relegated to Fn+F1. I’m really not looking forward to whenever I switch to a laptop without a dedicated mic mute button, it’s wonderful. I honestly wish they’d added another couple of buttons on this top row.)

[kettro]

Thinkpads still have the F row spacing, though it is small. Their layout is truly the best in laptops.

[chuankl]

IIRC on ThinkPad keyboards, the 6-key navigation block (arrow keys + pgup & pgdn) has a lower baseline -- the bottom of the block is lower than the bottom of the rest of the keys on the keyboard. So it is still easy to find the arrow keys by touch, even without blank space above the left and the right arrow keys.

[tadfisher]

There is also a tactile nub on the Down key, so it's trivial to find it wiith your middle finger and go to town.

[freeplay]

Absolutely agree. I have those keys remapped to an additional left and right arrow on my T480 because I was constantly pressing them while navigating on the command line and it would erase my entire command.

[haspok]

My company laptop is from HP, which has a large-left-right small-up-down setup (basically equivalent to what you describe, except the up-down arrows are even wider than usual).

I cannot possibly convey how much I hate this setup, I find it very uncomfortable. And even though there is a separate row of Home-PgUp-PgDn-End to the right, I can never find the correct key.

Compared to this, the Thinkpad's six-block cursor setup is vastly superior in my opinion. The down arrow has a notch, so it is easy to find as an origo, and the cursor keys are lower / slanted slightly compared to PgUp/PgDn, so it is virtually impossible to not know which is which! This is on a Thinkpad X1C.

All this goes to show that everyone has different preferences, so good luck if you are a laptop maker - you will inevitably make someone very unhappy with your keyboard. Possible solution - replaceable keyboard?...

[imglorp]

Those Thinkpad quadrants have a ridged key to index where to place your up/down finger.

[panick21_]

The thing is, in every application, if you touch one of them by accidents, you can instantly hit the other one and you are right back where you were. On ThinkPad the page key have a different shape then the arrow key, its easy to feel what key your finger is on.

ThinkPads has slightly enlarged arrow and page keys that I think are perfectly usable.

[csdvrx]

> Back when I worked on Thinkpad, I really hated these keys, whenever I accidentally pressed them.

A key can be disabled.

An empty space can't be filled with a key.

[LocalPCGuy]

Disabling a key does not help with the spacial issues having a key there in the first place adds for some folks.