We have finite brain power.
The power you dedicate to thinking about what hotkey (/combination of) to press for niche tasks, is not, per say, wasted. But it definitely isn't going towards thinking about what to write, the objective.
Maybe useful for less information-dense writing.
Show HN: I automated half of my typing
211–220 of 331 posts
Re: Show HN: I automated half of my typing
#212This is a very clever idea. However, I realize that I would never want to use something like this that would change over time. E.g. if I ran it every 6 months and last year "db" produced "debug", while this year it produces "database". Because talk about messing up my muscle memory and habits. And the language I write changes very much over time. So I'd actually be much more interested in a "universal" version of thi…
> a "universal" version of this -- if you ran it across books and e-mails and text messages from thousands of authors covering diverse backgrounds and contexts, then what would most reliably help everyone
Isn't this approaching llm territory?
Re: Show HN: I automated half of my typing
#213We have finite brain power. The power you dedicate to thinking about what hotkey (/combination of) to press for niche tasks, is not, per say, wasted. But it definitely isn't going towards thinking about what to write, the objective. Maybe useful for less information-dense writing.
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Re: Show HN: I automated half of my typing
#214We have finite brain power. The power you dedicate to thinking about what hotkey (/combination of) to press for niche tasks, is not, per say, wasted. But it definitely isn't going towards thinking about what to write, the objective. Maybe useful for less information-dense writing.
That's a very important insight. Faster doesn't mean less effort. More efficient doesn't mean more intuitive. I think that today's hacker attitude tends to drastically underestimate the degree to which natural languages have been optimized over time to fit the way our brains work. Most conlangs fall into the same trap. Ithkuil isn't a better form of communication just because it uses fewer characters than English. And Vim isn't a better editor just because you can do things with fewer keystrokes.
Re: Show HN: I automated half of my typing
#215Earlier quoted context omitted.
You could make it append only by default. Only ever add new shortcuts - if db was debug for you before then database would have to take on a new shortcut (e.g. dtb)
That would lead to pointless verbosity over time because the older shortcuts would squat on useful shorter shortcuts for words that are no longer used. It would lead to the "horseless carriage" effect for shortcuts.
Just delete things manually.
Re: Show HN: I automated half of my typing
#216This is like one of those ideas that's too brilliant to be disclosed here - or to anyone, actually. Bravo.
Re: Show HN: I automated half of my typing
#217This is great, would be great if we can train GPT4 directly based on our previous conversations and it can automatically suggest.
Re: Show HN: I automated half of my typing
#218I feel like typing is never really the bottleneck for me except maybe in some chat interactions would have benefited from the extra bandwidth of video or audio. Do you actually save time on task with these kinds of shortcuts?
Saving time may be one aspect of it but I can also see it being useful for people suffering from repetitive strain injury / carpal tunnel syndrome.
Re: Show HN: I automated half of my typing
#219There are many things that slow down my productivity. Typing speed is certainly not one of them..
Re: Show HN: I automated half of my typing
#220Earlier quoted context omitted.
One thing I would check out is short key travel distance. I love my Bloody B975, but I know I type faster on both my Apple keyboard and especially the Magic Keyboard Folio just because of the super short travel. I can hit 80-90sh on the gaming keyboard, but I'm probably at least tickling 120 the iPad.
The newest macbook pro is 10/10 for me on typing speed. By far the best keyboard ive ever used.
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