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An underappreciated aspect of programming that is taught well and consistently in the context of writing is the need for iteration. Never publish something wit

by dkarl 5y ago

An underappreciated aspect of programming that is taught well and consistently in the context of writing is the need for iteration. Never publish something without rereading it first. Anything longer than an email, you should have a break between writing a first draft and taking a second look at it. Murder your darlings: learn to recognize things that you're proud of for the wrong reasons, things that other people won't appreciate, and throw them in the trash. The harder something is to write, the worse your first draft is likely to be, and the less likely you are to immediately recognize it when you finish.

deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
pcmaffey 5y ago
To carry the metaphor, iteration is not just about refactoring and optimizing, it’s mostly about debugging. Finding what isn’t working and trying something new. I wrote about how I use my programming logic to “debug my art”.* The same can be applied to writing. *https://www.pcmaffey.com/debugging-your-art https://www.pcmaffey.com/debugging-your-art
- StandardFuture 5y ago
  Great analogy! But it's probably all three: debugging (is it correct?), refactoring (readability), optimizing (succinctness). And likely in that order. Exactly the priority ordering as in programming also. Will keep this in mind!
jborichevskiy 5y ago
> Stephen King had this to say on the art of writing in his book On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft: “Kill your darlings, kill your darlings, even when it breaks your egocentric little scribbler's heart, kill your darlings." https://www.masterclass.com/articles/what-does-it-mean-to-kill-your-darlings#what-are-the-origins-of-the-phrase-kill-your-darlings https://www.masterclass.com/articles/what-does-it-mean-to-ki...
- drawkbox 5y ago
  > “Don’t get discouraged because there’s a lot of mechanical work to writing. There is, and you can’t get out of it. I rewrote A Farewell to Arms at least fifty times. You’ve got to work it over. The first draft of anything is shit. When you first start to write you get all the kick and the reader gets none, but after you learn to work it’s your object to convey everything to the reader so that he remembers it not as a story he had read but something that happened to himself. That’s the true test of writing.” – Ernest Hemingway > “The main thing is to know what to leave out. The way you tell whether you’re going good is by what you can throw away.” – Ernest Hemingway To make anything production quality you have to go many iterations from sketching (prototype), to inking (design/setup) and then many, many passes on the post production iterations. Unfortunately our project management hasn't learned it is a creative art yet. You can't just throw another writer in to make it faster always. Game development is more programming/creative mix and it is clear in that industry, it is easier to argue for delays for polish and game mechanic tuning, others it is almost a perception hit just to delay for a better product with more iterations. Hemingway also had a great tip for any creative or programming or self driven career like writing, leave something you know unfinished that you can start in the morning. So sometimes if you have a solution and implement part of it, prepare to test it or even put a compile error right where you left off, you build and start up the next day at that point. > “The most important thing I’ve learned about writing is never write too much at a time… Never pump yourself dry. Leave a little for the next day. The main thing is to know when to stop. Don’t wait till you’ve written yourself out. When you’re still going good and you come to an interesting place and you know what’s going to happen next, that’s the time to stop. Then leave it alone and don’t think about it; let your subconscious mind do the work. The next morning, when you’ve had a good sleep and you’re feeling fresh, rewrite what you wrote the day before. When you come to the interesting place and you know what is going to happen next, go on from there and stop at another high point of interest. That way, when you get through, your stuff is full of interesting places and when you write a novel you never get stuck and you make it interesting as you go along.” – Ernest Hemingway This next quote about quality/product/content/experience is great, and it can parallel making a good game, or an app that makes someone's life more fun, or a tool that helps someone achieve something. Make your product a friend like a book if you can, you'll probably have to do it yourself as project management systems of today won't allow it. >“All good books are alike in that they are truer than if they had really happened and after you are finished reading one you will feel that all that happened to you and afterwards it all belongs to you; the good and the bad, the ecstasy, the remorse and sorrow, the people and the places and how the weather was.” – Ernest Hemingway []1 https://www.turnerstories.com/book-reviews/2019/4/10/ernest-hemingways-tips-on-writing https://www.turnerstories.com/book-reviews/2019/4/10/ernest-...

by dkarl 5y ago

deleted 5y ago

[deleted]

pcmaffey 5y ago

To carry the metaphor, iteration is not just about refactoring and optimizing, it’s mostly about debugging. Finding what isn’t working and trying something new. I wrote about how I use my programming logic to “debug my art”.* The same can be applied to writing. *https://www.pcmaffey.com/debugging-your-art https://www.pcmaffey.com/debugging-your-art

StandardFuture 5y ago
Great analogy! But it's probably all three: debugging (is it correct?), refactoring (readability), optimizing (succinctness). And likely in that order. Exactly the priority ordering as in programming also. Will keep this in mind!

jborichevskiy 5y ago

> Stephen King had this to say on the art of writing in his book On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft: “Kill your darlings, kill your darlings, even when it breaks your egocentric little scribbler's heart, kill your darlings." https://www.masterclass.com/articles/what-does-it-mean-to-kill-your-darlings#what-are-the-origins-of-the-phrase-kill-your-darlings https://www.masterclass.com/articles/what-does-it-mean-to-ki...

drawkbox 5y ago
> “Don’t get discouraged because there’s a lot of mechanical work to writing. There is, and you can’t get out of it. I rewrote A Farewell to Arms at least fifty times. You’ve got to work it over. The first draft of anything is shit. When you first start to write you get all the kick and the reader gets none, but after you learn to work it’s your object to convey everything to the reader so that he remembers it not as a story he had read but something that happened to himself. That’s the true test of writing.” – Ernest Hemingway > “The main thing is to know what to leave out. The way you tell whether you’re going good is by what you can throw away.” – Ernest Hemingway To make anything production quality you have to go many iterations from sketching (prototype), to inking (design/setup) and then many, many passes on the post production iterations. Unfortunately our project management hasn't learned it is a creative art yet. You can't just throw another writer in to make it faster always. Game development is more programming/creative mix and it is clear in that industry, it is easier to argue for delays for polish and game mechanic tuning, others it is almost a perception hit just to delay for a better product with more iterations. Hemingway also had a great tip for any creative or programming or self driven career like writing, leave something you know unfinished that you can start in the morning. So sometimes if you have a solution and implement part of it, prepare to test it or even put a compile error right where you left off, you build and start up the next day at that point. > “The most important thing I’ve learned about writing is never write too much at a time… Never pump yourself dry. Leave a little for the next day. The main thing is to know when to stop. Don’t wait till you’ve written yourself out. When you’re still going good and you come to an interesting place and you know what’s going to happen next, that’s the time to stop. Then leave it alone and don’t think about it; let your subconscious mind do the work. The next morning, when you’ve had a good sleep and you’re feeling fresh, rewrite what you wrote the day before. When you come to the interesting place and you know what is going to happen next, go on from there and stop at another high point of interest. That way, when you get through, your stuff is full of interesting places and when you write a novel you never get stuck and you make it interesting as you go along.” – Ernest Hemingway This next quote about quality/product/content/experience is great, and it can parallel making a good game, or an app that makes someone's life more fun, or a tool that helps someone achieve something. Make your product a friend like a book if you can, you'll probably have to do it yourself as project management systems of today won't allow it. >“All good books are alike in that they are truer than if they had really happened and after you are finished reading one you will feel that all that happened to you and afterwards it all belongs to you; the good and the bad, the ecstasy, the remorse and sorrow, the people and the places and how the weather was.” – Ernest Hemingway []1 https://www.turnerstories.com/book-reviews/2019/4/10/ernest-hemingways-tips-on-writing https://www.turnerstories.com/book-reviews/2019/4/10/ernest-...