Dvorak and Colemak Keyboard Layouts on Gentoo

I've recently tried both Dvorak and Colemak Keyboard layouts. They're both good but Colemak is better and easier to learn.

Dvorak is included in Gentoo by default but you should install the Colemak layout yourself.

download and extract the layout:

# wget http://colemak.com/pub/unix/colemak-1.0.tar.gz
# tar xzf colemak-1.0.tar.gz

install console keymap:

# cd colemak-1.0/linux_console
# cp colemak.iso15.kmap colemak.map && gzip colemak.map
# mkdir /usr/share/keymaps/colemak && mv colemak.map.gz /usr/share/keymaps/colemak/

install xorg symbol:

# cp colemak-1.0/xorg/colemak /usr/share/X11/xkb/symbols/

You can switch between console layouts using loadkeys:

# loadkeys colemak
Loading /usr/share/keymaps/i386/colemak/colemak.map.gz

or:

# loadkeys dvorak
Loading /usr/share/keymaps/i386/dvorak/dvorak.map.gz

to switch back to qwerty:

# loadkeys us
Loading /usr/share/keymaps/i386/qwerty/us.map.gz

for xorg you can use setxkbmap:

# setxkbmap colemak

or:

# setxkbmap dvorak

to switch back to qwerty:

# setxkbmap us

if you want the layouts to be set automatically:

for console edit /etc/conf.d/keymaps:

KEYMAP="colemak"

or:

KEYMAP="dvorak"

for xorg edit /etc/X11/xorg.conf:

Section "InputDevice"
    Identifier    "Keyboard"
    Driver        "evdev"
    Option        "Device"           "/dev/input/event2"
    Option        "CoreKeyboard"
    Option        "XkbLayout"        "us"
    Option        "XkbVariant"       "colemak"
EndSection

or:

    Option        "XkbVariant"       "dvorak"

I've also repositioned my laptop's keys too. You can print the layout on paper to use it as a reference(it's not possible with all keyboards since the keys vary in size/shape).