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I've worked with some programmers who were so slow at typing I would find myself reluctant to help them with their "hands on" work, like directing them to try s

I've worked with some programmers who were so slow at typing I would find myself reluctant to help them with their "hands on" work, like directing them to try something in the REPL for example, or even just asking them to run a shell command. It was a struggle for me not to excuse myself as soon as possible once they started typing. They seemingly couldn't get a single word out without a typo, and would frequently hunt down other places in the code so they could copy paste that 6 character variable name, etc. Being able to type 30~40 WPM is good enough though, no need to be super speedy.

hanoz 7y ago
> couldn't get a single word out without a typo, and would frequently hunt down other places in the code so they could copy paste that 6 character variable name The latter seems a good strategy for coping with the former, does it not?
- leetcrew 7y ago
  it's more like a pathological workaround. it's similar to people who spend years doing "hunt and peck" typing. if you practice enough, you can get up to a decent speed, but you would have been much better off taking a couple weeks to become a mediocre touch typist.
  - Intermernet 7y ago
    I was a mediocre touch typist, and then spent many years doing hands on, IT support. I usually had to type on other people's keyboards while I was offset to one side, or even on the other side of the desk. I'm now a terrible touch typist, but a pretty good upside down, one handed typist!
- Dylan16807 7y ago
  It requires more effort and more precision. So I'll say no. Having trouble with something and compensating by doing a more difficult task is only a good coping strategy when it's something you very rarely have to do.
- Phillipharryt 7y ago
  A far better solution would be setting up their IDE to have autocomplete enabled, no time searching for variables, as they come up with the first few letters entered. The search and copy suggests method they're not using their tools to their best extent.
Retric 7y ago
A big part of this is what kind of measurement your doing. I can easily boost my typing speed with a few errors. However, I would much rather type at 99.98% accuracy at 35WPM when programming or doing data entry than 80WPM at even 99.9% accuracy. However, if your spending most of the day emailing people extreme accuracy is effectively pointless.
WalterBright 7y ago
One of the best courses I ever took was a 2 week summer school class in typing in the 8th grade. We were taught to touch type on a heavy mechanical typewriter where you really had to hammer the keys. Those few hours have paid off enormously for me. Not having to look at the keys while typing about doubles the speed. The letters painted on my keys have long since worn off anyway :-)
- gwd 7y ago
  > One of the best courses I ever took was a 2 week summer school class in typing in the 8th grade. We were taught to touch type on a heavy mechanical typewriter where you really had to hammer the keys. In my school, we had a full semester of touch-typing on mechanical keyboard in both the 7th and 8th grades. Everyone had to take it. I had a couple of friends who, like me, were very interested in computers and programming. But instead of taking the opportunity to hone a skill that they knew they'd be using several hours a day for the next 60 years of their life, they screwed around, and left the class hunt-and-pecking as much as they ever had; and as far as I know they do that to this day. It never made any sense to me -- like, you have to be here anyway, why not just get something out of it instead of being bored? (I meanwhile practiced with Mavis Beacon Teaches Typing on my home computer until my speed drills were consistently between 90 and 100 WPM.)
  - WalterBright 7y ago
    > In my school, we had a full semester of touch-typing on mechanical keyboard in both the 7th and 8th grades. It's good they offered the class, but two full semesters of it sounds like terribly inefficient teaching. What's funny is I don't know what many of the commands are for my text editor. But my fingers know. Sometimes I'll just watch my fingers to see what the command is, but I have to be careful - when I think too much about "what is the command" my fingers forget it.
visarga 7y ago
I think it's good practice to copy variable names in order to avoid typos, at least in plain text editors.
- tcoff91 7y ago
  Usually you can just start typing and then use some kind of automatic completion, much more efficient than hunting down multiple variables in code and copying them.

hanoz 7y ago

> couldn't get a single word out without a typo, and would frequently hunt down other places in the code so they could copy paste that 6 character variable name The latter seems a good strategy for coping with the former, does it not?

leetcrew 7y ago
it's more like a pathological workaround. it's similar to people who spend years doing "hunt and peck" typing. if you practice enough, you can get up to a decent speed, but you would have been much better off taking a couple weeks to become a mediocre touch typist.
- Intermernet 7y ago
  I was a mediocre touch typist, and then spent many years doing hands on, IT support. I usually had to type on other people's keyboards while I was offset to one side, or even on the other side of the desk. I'm now a terrible touch typist, but a pretty good upside down, one handed typist!
Dylan16807 7y ago
It requires more effort and more precision. So I'll say no. Having trouble with something and compensating by doing a more difficult task is only a good coping strategy when it's something you very rarely have to do.
Phillipharryt 7y ago
A far better solution would be setting up their IDE to have autocomplete enabled, no time searching for variables, as they come up with the first few letters entered. The search and copy suggests method they're not using their tools to their best extent.

Retric 7y ago

A big part of this is what kind of measurement your doing. I can easily boost my typing speed with a few errors. However, I would much rather type at 99.98% accuracy at 35WPM when programming or doing data entry than 80WPM at even 99.9% accuracy. However, if your spending most of the day emailing people extreme accuracy is effectively pointless.

WalterBright 7y ago

One of the best courses I ever took was a 2 week summer school class in typing in the 8th grade. We were taught to touch type on a heavy mechanical typewriter where you really had to hammer the keys. Those few hours have paid off enormously for me. Not having to look at the keys while typing about doubles the speed. The letters painted on my keys have long since worn off anyway :-)

gwd 7y ago
> One of the best courses I ever took was a 2 week summer school class in typing in the 8th grade. We were taught to touch type on a heavy mechanical typewriter where you really had to hammer the keys. In my school, we had a full semester of touch-typing on mechanical keyboard in both the 7th and 8th grades. Everyone had to take it. I had a couple of friends who, like me, were very interested in computers and programming. But instead of taking the opportunity to hone a skill that they knew they'd be using several hours a day for the next 60 years of their life, they screwed around, and left the class hunt-and-pecking as much as they ever had; and as far as I know they do that to this day. It never made any sense to me -- like, you have to be here anyway, why not just get something out of it instead of being bored? (I meanwhile practiced with Mavis Beacon Teaches Typing on my home computer until my speed drills were consistently between 90 and 100 WPM.)
- WalterBright 7y ago
  > In my school, we had a full semester of touch-typing on mechanical keyboard in both the 7th and 8th grades. It's good they offered the class, but two full semesters of it sounds like terribly inefficient teaching. What's funny is I don't know what many of the commands are for my text editor. But my fingers know. Sometimes I'll just watch my fingers to see what the command is, but I have to be careful - when I think too much about "what is the command" my fingers forget it.

visarga 7y ago

I think it's good practice to copy variable names in order to avoid typos, at least in plain text editors.

tcoff91 7y ago
Usually you can just start typing and then use some kind of automatic completion, much more efficient than hunting down multiple variables in code and copying them.