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If software used for typing competitions is anything like a typing test in a typing tutor program (which give similar WPM + accuracy measures at the end), then

by derefr 5y ago

If software used for typing competitions is anything like a typing test in a typing tutor program (which give similar WPM + accuracy measures at the end), then it would track the number of incorrect inputs you make, but also wouldn't let you proceed (i.e. would ignore all further input) while any incorrect input remains in the buffer. With such software, you're expected to correct each word you type before moving on to the next; the moment that you submit the corrected word is the moment the word is acknowledged as "a word" counting toward your WPM. With such programs, the WPM score measures how many total times per minute you "finished" a correct word, including any time spent correcting the word; with the accuracy score measuring how much extra work was done, on average, doing those corrections.

Someone 5y ago
This doesn’t work like that. It moves on to the next word the moment you type a space. Also, https://monkeytype.com/about https://monkeytype.com/about says: stats wpm - total amount of characters in the correctly typed words (including spaces), divided by 5 and normalised to 60 seconds. raw wpm - calculated just like wpm, but also includes incorrect words. acc - percentage of correctly pressed keys. char - correct characters / incorrect characters. Calculated after the test has ended. consistency - based on the variance of your raw wpm. Closer to 100% is better. Calculated using the coefficient of variation of raw wpm and mapped onto a scale from 0 to 100. So, they assume the average word has 5 characters. Makes sense for computing wpm in random text.
- fragmede 5y ago
  You can go back and delete errors, and also the default corpus is random words which probably average out to close enough to 5 characters. There are other modes which include punctuation and capitalization, as well as longer quotes to type, as well as expert and master modes (which fails you on a wrong word or character, respectively). I've never heard about this site before but it's pretty full featured!
nosianu 5y ago
In addition to the other reply, if they did that the test would be so far from real world typing to be meaningless and nothing but an inconsequential curiosity. Only in tests is there an option to check against what is expected. In the real world you could at most apply some dictionary and grammar checks, and we know those can go either way. Those tools don't know what you actually wanted to write after all, and still suggest without comprehension.
- gowld 5y ago
  Even if you type without making corrections, you still need to go back and make corrections, so you need an estimate for the time spent on corrections. Forcing corrections midstream is a decent approximation.
  - derefr 5y ago
    It'd be neat if the test 1. used a fuzzy autocorrect of the same kind mobile OSes and word processors have (not correcting to the known text, but instead only doing what such logic usually does — only attempting to correct words if they're not recognized as words; and only moving them to the lowest-Levenstein-distance match.) 2. treated words that are correct after autocorrection as being "correct", with no ding to accuracy. Since accuracy is about how much extra time and effort the human typist has to spend to get the text correct, and since text that can be auto-corrected requires zero human time and effort to correct, it shouldn't really be considered incorrect. Or, to put that another way: if I'm typing really fast on my phone's keyboard, and all the right words are ending up on the screen, what does it matter if I'm hitting the right keys with my thumbs? It's the WPM and accuracy of the cybernetic system composed of me + the auto-correct that matters. In that sense, you can sort of think of an auto-correct as actually being a very similar thing to a stenographic keyboard (at least, in the hands of a person who knows how to take advantage of it): it's really a system to enable accelerated typing, by allowing you to key in the letters of a word out-of-order or simultaneously and have the word come out in-order.
- watwut 5y ago
  In real world, there is check for typos - your eyes. You fix them after yourself.
Izkata 5y ago
> but also wouldn't let you proceed (i.e. would ignore all further input) while any incorrect input remains in the buffer. I hated these ones so much in school because I'd be like 3 letters past the typo and reflexively hit backspace 4 times to get rid of the typo, which just registered as more mistakes because it had blocked those 3 additional letters and so would only accept 1 backspace. (I'd already learned how to type from having to quickly enter chat messages in StarCraft multiplayer)

by derefr 5y ago

Someone 5y ago

This doesn’t work like that. It moves on to the next word the moment you type a space. Also, https://monkeytype.com/about https://monkeytype.com/about says: stats wpm - total amount of characters in the correctly typed words (including spaces), divided by 5 and normalised to 60 seconds. raw wpm - calculated just like wpm, but also includes incorrect words. acc - percentage of correctly pressed keys. char - correct characters / incorrect characters. Calculated after the test has ended. consistency - based on the variance of your raw wpm. Closer to 100% is better. Calculated using the coefficient of variation of raw wpm and mapped onto a scale from 0 to 100. So, they assume the average word has 5 characters. Makes sense for computing wpm in random text.

fragmede 5y ago
You can go back and delete errors, and also the default corpus is random words which probably average out to close enough to 5 characters. There are other modes which include punctuation and capitalization, as well as longer quotes to type, as well as expert and master modes (which fails you on a wrong word or character, respectively). I've never heard about this site before but it's pretty full featured!

nosianu 5y ago

In addition to the other reply, if they did that the test would be so far from real world typing to be meaningless and nothing but an inconsequential curiosity. Only in tests is there an option to check against what is expected. In the real world you could at most apply some dictionary and grammar checks, and we know those can go either way. Those tools don't know what you actually wanted to write after all, and still suggest without comprehension.

gowld 5y ago
Even if you type without making corrections, you still need to go back and make corrections, so you need an estimate for the time spent on corrections. Forcing corrections midstream is a decent approximation.
- derefr 5y ago
  It'd be neat if the test 1. used a fuzzy autocorrect of the same kind mobile OSes and word processors have (not correcting to the known text, but instead only doing what such logic usually does — only attempting to correct words if they're not recognized as words; and only moving them to the lowest-Levenstein-distance match.) 2. treated words that are correct after autocorrection as being "correct", with no ding to accuracy. Since accuracy is about how much extra time and effort the human typist has to spend to get the text correct, and since text that can be auto-corrected requires zero human time and effort to correct, it shouldn't really be considered incorrect. Or, to put that another way: if I'm typing really fast on my phone's keyboard, and all the right words are ending up on the screen, what does it matter if I'm hitting the right keys with my thumbs? It's the WPM and accuracy of the cybernetic system composed of me + the auto-correct that matters. In that sense, you can sort of think of an auto-correct as actually being a very similar thing to a stenographic keyboard (at least, in the hands of a person who knows how to take advantage of it): it's really a system to enable accelerated typing, by allowing you to key in the letters of a word out-of-order or simultaneously and have the word come out in-order.
watwut 5y ago
In real world, there is check for typos - your eyes. You fix them after yourself.

Izkata 5y ago

> but also wouldn't let you proceed (i.e. would ignore all further input) while any incorrect input remains in the buffer. I hated these ones so much in school because I'd be like 3 letters past the typo and reflexively hit backspace 4 times to get rid of the typo, which just registered as more mistakes because it had blocked those 3 additional letters and so would only accept 1 backspace. (I'd already learned how to type from having to quickly enter chat messages in StarCraft multiplayer)