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Autocomplete as an Interface (2015)

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Re: Autocomplete as an Interface (2015)

#41

Post by seanmcdirmid »

OskarS wrote: post #20

You know, I realize I'm the weird one here, but: when writing code, I almost always turn off autocomplete. Sometimes you basically have to have it on (when the language is demands it) but I usually turn it off. It's too much visual noise, too distracting. It's a thing that pops up that demands your attention. If I want to type if (myVector->empty()) { fillVector(myVector); } autocomplete will pop up a window like 4 t…

Autocomplete doesn’t have to be so intrusive, it doesn’t have to pop up a window over your cursor, it doesn’t have to grab CPU time making your keystrokes skip. These are really interface issues that can be fixed: you can shove the suggestions off to the periphery of the buffer, for example.

Autocomplete is and was never about saving on typing. It is an aide to help you browse and navigate large namespaces, it doesn’t enable long names, it enables deep and vast libraries. The complaint then isn’t about some straw man class name, but about the 200+ methods that can be called on that class.

Re: Autocomplete as an Interface (2015)

#42

Post by gbear605 »

OskarS wrote: post #35
SketchySeaBeast wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm a bit confused - isn't autocomplete utterly benign if you don't use it? Using Visual Studio I've never had to autocomplete unless I wanted to, so I've lost no time by having it on if I just want to trudge through, but there's plenty of times I can auto-complete away whole expressions by typing a letter or two and then hitting tab. Regarding nightmarish Java type names I'd rather the name for things be the fully w…

I'd argue that it's not benign. I think there are very real costs. First off all, "misuse" of autocomplete can be very annoying. Some autocomplete system autocompletes when you press tab, some when you press enter. Many times I've been typing a thing, finished the line with the autocomplete window still open, pressed enter to go to the next line, and instead have auto-complete enter a bunch of stuff I don't want. The…

> regular English

It looks like the trend is toward autocomplete suggestions for English too. On my phone keyboard, there are autocomplete suggestions to choose from when typing, and GMail now has Smart Compose [1] to do the same thing.

[1]: https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2018/may/09/gmail-sma...

Re: Autocomplete as an Interface (2015)

#44

Post by SketchySeaBeast »

OskarS wrote: post #35
SketchySeaBeast wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm a bit confused - isn't autocomplete utterly benign if you don't use it? Using Visual Studio I've never had to autocomplete unless I wanted to, so I've lost no time by having it on if I just want to trudge through, but there's plenty of times I can auto-complete away whole expressions by typing a letter or two and then hitting tab. Regarding nightmarish Java type names I'd rather the name for things be the fully w…

I'd argue that it's not benign. I think there are very real costs. First off all, "misuse" of autocomplete can be very annoying. Some autocomplete system autocompletes when you press tab, some when you press enter. Many times I've been typing a thing, finished the line with the autocomplete window still open, pressed enter to go to the next line, and instead have auto-complete enter a bunch of stuff I don't want. The…

You dismissed your first argument, and I agree, it's just a matter of learning the system - I mean, I don't think anyone here can genuinely argue that VIM is bad because it's hard to learn.

Regarding the autocomplete, GMail does do this. It was a bit jarring initially but now I either accept the option or continue on as if it didn't exist.

I'm not sure what your argument for the third is - that it leads to code that relies on auto-complete? Isn't that in fact an optimization? Those lines don't seem particularly egregious to me. I don't know much C++, but I could see exactly what it was doing with those lines of code by being able to read the variables. Is it verbose? Yes it is. I don't take the idea that coming to rely on a tool is a necessarily a bad thing. C# visual studio debugging is head and shoulders above Console.WriteLine() - is it necessary? No, but it's greatly sped up the development process. Same with not having to go to the command line each time I want to compile and run my application.

I understand you understand you're an outlier, and I know you're just making personal arguments, but it kind of feels a bit "old man yells at cloud" - and that's not bad, I just thought there was value in debate.

Re: Autocomplete as an Interface (2015)

#45

Post by andai »

OskarS wrote: post #35
SketchySeaBeast wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm a bit confused - isn't autocomplete utterly benign if you don't use it? Using Visual Studio I've never had to autocomplete unless I wanted to, so I've lost no time by having it on if I just want to trudge through, but there's plenty of times I can auto-complete away whole expressions by typing a letter or two and then hitting tab. Regarding nightmarish Java type names I'd rather the name for things be the fully w…

I'd argue that it's not benign. I think there are very real costs. First off all, "misuse" of autocomplete can be very annoying. Some autocomplete system autocompletes when you press tab, some when you press enter. Many times I've been typing a thing, finished the line with the autocomplete window still open, pressed enter to go to the next line, and instead have auto-complete enter a bunch of stuff I don't want. The…

Re: editor trying to be helpful but getting in the way

Sublime Text often inserts "matching" quotes and parentheses. But it doesn't always do the right thing, so I usually have to go back and erase it. But then it erases the original one, too. So I have to move the cursor, add a space, and then erase it.

And when the feature does do what I wanted, it's only saving me literally 1 character --- ~0.1 seconds at my typing speed.

Re: Autocomplete as an Interface (2015)

#46

Post by seanmcdirmid »

OskarS wrote: post #35
SketchySeaBeast wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm a bit confused - isn't autocomplete utterly benign if you don't use it? Using Visual Studio I've never had to autocomplete unless I wanted to, so I've lost no time by having it on if I just want to trudge through, but there's plenty of times I can auto-complete away whole expressions by typing a letter or two and then hitting tab. Regarding nightmarish Java type names I'd rather the name for things be the fully w…

I'd argue that it's not benign. I think there are very real costs. First off all, "misuse" of autocomplete can be very annoying. Some autocomplete system autocompletes when you press tab, some when you press enter. Many times I've been typing a thing, finished the line with the autocomplete window still open, pressed enter to go to the next line, and instead have auto-complete enter a bunch of stuff I don't want. The…

No one would design an autocomplete for written language because we remember the words we are going to use, and anyways, if we forget them, there is no hierarchical namespace to browse and navigate.

What autocomplete has enabled are deep and broad namespaces in programming languages that do support such a concept. Yes, you are definitely correct that the massive namespaces designed today are only possible because of autocomplete: libraries can cram in more functionality because developers will be able to use autocomplete to find it. But what’s the alternative? Less functionality in the libraries so they can be used with autocomplete turned off? There is some merit to that point of view, but simplification can only go so far before you are just missing things you wanted to use in some niche use case.

Re: Autocomplete as an Interface (2015)

#47

Post by OskarS »

SketchySeaBeast wrote: post #44
OskarS wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'd argue that it's not benign. I think there are very real costs. First off all, "misuse" of autocomplete can be very annoying. Some autocomplete system autocompletes when you press tab, some when you press enter. Many times I've been typing a thing, finished the line with the autocomplete window still open, pressed enter to go to the next line, and instead have auto-complete enter a bunch of stuff I don't want. The…

You dismissed your first argument, and I agree, it's just a matter of learning the system - I mean, I don't think anyone here can genuinely argue that VIM is bad because it's hard to learn. Regarding the autocomplete, GMail does do this. It was a bit jarring initially but now I either accept the option or continue on as if it didn't exist. I'm not sure what your argument for the third is - that it leads to code that…

> ...but it kind of feels a bit "old man yells at cloud" - and that's not bad, I just thought there was value in debate.

Yes, that is a very accurate description of how I feel when making this argument :)

Re: Autocomplete as an Interface (2015)

#48

Post by seanmcdirmid »

andai wrote: post #45
OskarS wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'd argue that it's not benign. I think there are very real costs. First off all, "misuse" of autocomplete can be very annoying. Some autocomplete system autocompletes when you press tab, some when you press enter. Many times I've been typing a thing, finished the line with the autocomplete window still open, pressed enter to go to the next line, and instead have auto-complete enter a bunch of stuff I don't want. The…

Re: editor trying to be helpful but getting in the way Sublime Text often inserts "matching" quotes and parentheses. But it doesn't always do the right thing, so I usually have to go back and erase it. But then it erases the original one, too. So I have to move the cursor, add a space, and then erase it. And when the feature does do what I wanted, it's only saving me literally 1 character --- ~0.1 seconds at my typin…

It isn’t doing the quote matching to save on your typing, but to keep your scanner from providing the wrong tokens to the parser of your compiler that is running all the time while you are typing.

Re: Autocomplete as an Interface (2015)

#49

Post by adrianmonk »

MadWombat wrote: post #25

> Instead, for most people the killer feature of zsh is that it doesn’t re-output the prompt when you autocomplete Actually, this, coupled with the "complete on first tab hit" is the reason I stayed away from zsh. I tried it a few times, simply because so many people are raving about how much better it is than bash, but never really switched and the autocomplete is one of the major reasons. 1. I like to see autocompl…

Personally, I think neither bash nor zsh have the optimal behavior.

I agree with your point about the extra tab keystroke being useful before a giant list gets printed. I like that about bash.

But sometimes I hit tab too many times. I don't really count keystrokes, I just kind of mash the tab key until I get a list. And I don't need bash to print the list again if I hit tab an extra time. (This seems like it could be changed without breaking compatibility with anything. If you hit tab 3 times, don't print the list twice. Instead, only re-print the list if the string (that the completion is based off of) has changed.)

I guess I don't care too much either way about having the list in my scrollback buffer. I can see how it's useful to refer to it, at least while in the process of trying to use the completion.

Re: Autocomplete as an Interface (2015)

#50

Post by seanmcdirmid »

jasonlotito wrote: post #32
OskarS wrote: post #20

You know, I realize I'm the weird one here, but: when writing code, I almost always turn off autocomplete. Sometimes you basically have to have it on (when the language is demands it) but I usually turn it off. It's too much visual noise, too distracting. It's a thing that pops up that demands your attention. If I want to type if (myVector->empty()) { fillVector(myVector); } autocomplete will pop up a window like 4 t…

Most auto complete that I've seen implemented in the last decade has timing attached to it. So if you are typing empty(), it's not just going to pop up. Rather, it waits for a pause, an indication that you aren't sure. I also don't know of a single language that requires auto-complete for everything. I do know languages that make more use of it, but I also don't now of a single language that benefits from not having…

I find that the timing is actually worse, because then I start waiting for the menu to appear as affirmation for some assumption I made about the namespace. It’s also jarring that it appears out of sync with keystrokes. Turning off the delay and working on menu placement instead could provide for better PX, but it is something that can be user tested a lot, at least.
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