5 ms·

Correct me if I'm taking this the wrong way, but I don't think WPM even applies to programming. To audio typers, secretaries, etc. it's a good measure of how we

Correct me if I'm taking this the wrong way, but I don't think WPM even applies to programming. To audio typers, secretaries, etc. it's a good measure of how well you can keep up. To a programmer, you can only go so fast when you're not even dealing with human language that has no natural flow, and the quirks of the editor of your choice. Especially on, say, a Mac, where you could be typing a '#' far more times than you ever would in any other situation, or a backtick or pipe. It's probably telling that we're favouring languages that reduce the syntactic complexity of coding, like CoffeeScript in favour of Javascript, Ruby, maybe Python, Clojure, and the functional languages like Haskell and Erlang. Not just because it's easier to read, but because it's easier to type. I might just be talking rubbish, of course. But I wouldn't use typing speed as a performance metric for a programmer.

jiggy2011 15y ago
It's not much of a performance metric , but I don't really enjoy typing very much in situations where I have decided what I'm going to do and then have to type it out. I can't generally think and type very well at the same time. This means for me that trying a random idea I have quickly is much more enjoyable in say python that it is in Java. Sometimes I want to just try something random in Java but I really can't be bothered to type all the code required to create a new class, handle exceptions and then also do the compile and run. If I had super fast typing skills or a more concise language I would find much less friction is doing that, this would make my programming time much more educational and make me better in the long run.
- ploversteno 15y ago
  It's the fluency that steno lends to composing text or code that's far more useful than the speed. Tab-complete requires that you pause for a short time to read your options while you flip through them. Steno is entirely deterministic; you can implement the command in one stroke without twisting your hands around (unlike metacommands, especially those used in emacs, which can result in the dreaded emacs claw), and you know exactly what the result is going to be. Because you're writing entire words with each stroke, if you accidentally hit the wrong key, you'll be able to reverse the error in a single "delete last stroke" command, rather than having to backspace 20 times to correct a letter transposition error you made several words ago. Qwerty requires commands and variables to be broken down into minuscule portions, with the potential for error occurring each time a key is deployed. Steno reduces that error potential drastically by chunking words and variables into single-stroke entities, requiring less vigilance for error and allowing for a much smoother flow of thought and composition.

jiggy2011 15y ago

It's not much of a performance metric , but I don't really enjoy typing very much in situations where I have decided what I'm going to do and then have to type it out. I can't generally think and type very well at the same time. This means for me that trying a random idea I have quickly is much more enjoyable in say python that it is in Java. Sometimes I want to just try something random in Java but I really can't be bothered to type all the code required to create a new class, handle exceptions and then also do the compile and run. If I had super fast typing skills or a more concise language I would find much less friction is doing that, this would make my programming time much more educational and make me better in the long run.

ploversteno 15y ago
It's the fluency that steno lends to composing text or code that's far more useful than the speed. Tab-complete requires that you pause for a short time to read your options while you flip through them. Steno is entirely deterministic; you can implement the command in one stroke without twisting your hands around (unlike metacommands, especially those used in emacs, which can result in the dreaded emacs claw), and you know exactly what the result is going to be. Because you're writing entire words with each stroke, if you accidentally hit the wrong key, you'll be able to reverse the error in a single "delete last stroke" command, rather than having to backspace 20 times to correct a letter transposition error you made several words ago. Qwerty requires commands and variables to be broken down into minuscule portions, with the potential for error occurring each time a key is deployed. Steno reduces that error potential drastically by chunking words and variables into single-stroke entities, requiring less vigilance for error and allowing for a much smoother flow of thought and composition.