I don’t think that using [Esc] to exit a funcion on itself is the problem, on it’s self that is what that button is for, to cancel / escape an operation.
I think the real problem is a lot more subtle, and not a single thing, but an amalgamation of a bunch of little inconsistencies.
For example, just recently I was placing a lot of No Connect crosses in a schematic. I placed a few (all single clicks because the function staid active, which is good) Then I focused on a bigger IC, so I placed one No-Connect cross on the left top pin and depressed [Ins] to repeat the last operation a bunch of times and this also worked as expected. Then I moved the mouse cursor to another place and wanted to place some more no-connect crosses but that did not work. It turns out that pressing the [Ins] key dropped me out of the “Place No-Connect” function and that was unexpected. In my mind I was still placing No-Connect crosses.
I’m ambidextrous, though I write and use the mouse with my right hand.
It is easy to imagine what you feel when using the esc key: the same feeling I have when I hit the enter/intro keys.
On my pointing device (trackball here, but this can apply to mice as well) I have extra programmable buttons. I have one of those buttons set to <ENTER>. I have this same set up on my main work computer as well as my personal computer. And when I use one of the lab computers that have an inexpensive, bog-standard mouse I really miss that enter button on my pointing device. I don’t think I can justify to my boss the extra expenditure to outfit the 20 lab computers with mice that have extra programmable buttons only for me.
This might be an option for a lefty if they have extra programmable buttons on their pointing device. But in their case, map a button to <ESC>.
