Ask HN: Coding speed | Hacker News Reader

Ask HN: Coding speed

7 pointssnihalani8 comments

Hello All,

I realize that I am not coding very fast. (49 wpm only). I am using only two fingers (index for characters and thumb for coding). I wish to increase my typing speed. If any one has made an app that helps people practice over text, give statistical information with correct finger to be used for each letter or anything close to my description, please provide me the url for it.

thanks.

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I'm far from an expert, but I agree with veteran programmers who say that typing speed and coding speed are not related.

If you're refactoring, you may be deleting and reworking code, not typing at full speed. Sometimes you have to stop and think through your code to make sure you're not making mistakes.

For a typing speed, 49 WPM is pretty good, especially for 2-finger typing. If you want to improve your typing speed, there are lots of programs - Mavis Beacon was one from 20 years ago, newer and better typing programs likely exist today.

This incorrectly assumes that typing speed is a bottleneck on coding. Most of the time is spent thinking therefore typing speed is pretty much irrelevant.

Agreed.

Personal example:

I design on a notebook. Write the code with a pencil to work out the structure. Then type it at a fairly slow speed to lessen errors. Then test.

You don't need fancy statistical information, you simply need to force yourself to use all ten fingers. You place your index fingers on the f and j keys, and from there the correct finger for each keys is simply the one closest to it. If you do it right your hands should move very little if at all. It might help to switch to a new layout such as dvorak or colemak, to start with a clean slate and learn typing with ten fingers from the ground up. I agree with the others that typing is not the bottle neck in programming, but typing correctly will also be less straining so I think it's worth the effort to work on it.

I'd suggest this to help increase coding typing speed. http://wwwtyro.github.com/keyzen/

I think that while coding typing speed is not everything. If you type really fast but end up having to write your code twice because it's wrongs you will be a lot slower than taking it your time, think, look at it, "mentally debug" and go on.

I have a son with oddly shaped hands. He suffers dysgraphia and many other issues because of this. He finds the standard typing position physically painful. I homeschooled him. We tried a few different typing programs. He stayed with one he liked until he could type 35 wpm with few errors. That's about what I type much of the time, when thinking and typing. I type about 60 wpm for timed tests where I am only copying.

I encouraged him to play online games to get his speed up. He types with two fingers and a thumb at probably 80ish wpm when "chatting" with friends. This is based on how it sounds. I know what 80ish wpm sounds like because that is what his dad typed.

You can try typing programs and online games, etc, if you want. You may or may not benefit from learning to position your hands "correctly", depending on the underlying reason for your odd habits.

Best of luck.

"I am using only two fingers (index for characters and thumb for coding)."

Seems like the problem is not that you are coding slow. Problem is that you are typing slow or incorrectly since use of 2 fingers is not the right way to type anything. I had the same problem more than a decade ago and one day I decided to fix it. Check out: www.learntyping.org (googled it but looks fine)

Once you get to a decent level, you can play typing games at www.typeracer.com

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