3 ms·
Not to detract from the good overall point, but isn't the math here a bit wonky? In the first example, he shows 160k insertions and 130k deletions and claims th
by mrosett 8y ago
Not to detract from the good overall point, but isn't the math here a bit wonky? In the first example, he shows 160k insertions and 130k deletions and claims that therefore he wrote 160k + 130k = 290k lines of prose. That's... wrong? He wrote 160k lines of prose. If you want to express it as a sum, it's 160k (total inserts) = 30k (current size) + 130k (total deletions.)
- VSerge 8y agoCompound this and the likelihood that many line counts are counting method artefacts, and the end ratio is probably more around 3:1. For anyone writing non-fiction, I would highly recommend the book "on writing well" by William Zinsser, who also stresses the importance of editing relentlessly your draft.
- bbeonx 8y agoI second On Writing Well. Great book, and fun to read. It's funny, editing has always been my favorite part of writing. It's when all of my favorite bits typically get written.
- logfromblammo 8y ago"On Writing Well" is now in the 7th edition. Looks like he ate his own dog food.
- lbotos 8y agoAgreed. I think for anyone considering writing you have to know there are two skills: - Building the writing habit of words on a page and how you make that happen. - Being comfortable removing all of the words that are unnecessary through the editing process. I knew I crossed the bridge when I found myself editing my own work and saying: "this is an incredible sentence, but it's not the right one here, axe it."
- sweezyjeezy 8y agoNot to mention that insertions / deletions can come from e.g. just moving code into a new file or moving a file to a new location.
- brikis98 8y agoDeleting prose and lines of code is still work. You have to read the text, think about it, figure out what would happen if you remove it, update all other places accordingly, and so on. The same goes for deleting code. To ignore that 160k lines were deleted as part of the writing process would be to ignore a massive amount of work.