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Write thin to write fast

breckyunits.com

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Re: Write thin to write fast

#111

Post by andix »

TranquilMarmot wrote: post #75
joncp wrote: post #32

On a related note: At one point I switched to working exclusively on a laptop and after a while realized that the smaller screen had forced me to write better code. I wrote smaller methods, made smaller files, kept my concepts together, the whole nine yards. I even wrote better tests since that helped me keep my work small. It didn't last; I'm writing this on a 27" monitor, but I think that has more to do with bad la…

I see some coworkers with ridiculous setups. Three monitors, one vertical, one ultrawide and curved. I don't see why you need that much screen to write code... when pressed they say it's for having references, Slack, etc. up on other screens but then you just end up moving your head around a lot (what a pain in the neck!) I do everything on a single 27" monitor.

I understand you, I also use one primary monitor in front of me. I have another monitor next to it, which I mostly use to put documentation next to the IDE. But the second monitor ist 90% of the time unused. Sometimes I put tool windows (test runner) there. Or something entertaining (YouTube/Netflix) ;)

Re: Write thin to write fast

#114

Post by speleding »

thaumasiotes wrote: post #45
liquid_bluing wrote: post #26

This seems to be kind of a complex topic, with a number of variables. Here is a study: How physical text layout affects reading from screen https://www.researchgate.net/publication/220208446_How_physi... A quote from the Discussion section: "Most of the studies on line length report faster reading with longer lines, and point to the number of characters as the variable responsible for the differences, rather than phy…

> The OP thinks that humans read thinner columns faster. Generally, this seems not to be the case, so maybe we should treat his main conclusion with some skepticism. > In any case, it's probably best to refer to the scientific literature. You might not think so if you read the literature review which takes up most of that paper. The literature covered is generally focused on questions of no obvious interest and then,…

Your points help with discounting the claim that long lines read faster. But that does not say anything about OP's claim that short lines are better.

I'm not convinced by OP's argument "New York Times does it": pretty much any book does the opposite.

Perhaps we need more/better research.

For what it's worth, I set my screen to be very wide when I write because I like to write each sentence on a single line: it allows me to easily spot sentences that are too long, a mistake I often make.

Re: Write thin to write fast

#115

Post by speleding »

TranquilMarmot wrote: post #75
joncp wrote: post #32

On a related note: At one point I switched to working exclusively on a laptop and after a while realized that the smaller screen had forced me to write better code. I wrote smaller methods, made smaller files, kept my concepts together, the whole nine yards. I even wrote better tests since that helped me keep my work small. It didn't last; I'm writing this on a 27" monitor, but I think that has more to do with bad la…

I see some coworkers with ridiculous setups. Three monitors, one vertical, one ultrawide and curved. I don't see why you need that much screen to write code... when pressed they say it's for having references, Slack, etc. up on other screens but then you just end up moving your head around a lot (what a pain in the neck!) I do everything on a single 27" monitor.

I love coding on a huge 40 inch screen: the main reason is that I can view an entire file without scrolling. Less mental overhead to move your hands means more brainpower is left to do useful work.

Re: Write thin to write fast

#116

Post by urxvtcd »

mr_tristan wrote: post #18

Reminded me of the "Rules of Comfortable Measure", from The Elements of Typographic Style, quoted here: http://webtypography.net/2.1.2 I always find myself fighting this on practically every website. But it makes sense to me, that this should be something we think about in, well, most of our editors as well. I debate about the measure of code, but I do find 100 to be a reasonable fit for most languages. The problem,…

Ironic that the lines on the page are well over 200 characters.

Re: Write thin to write fast

#117

Post by ptx »

andix wrote: post #110

That‘s one of the most annoying things for me on HN, that text is rather small and lines are extremely long. Especially difficult in the comment section.

Firefox remembers the zoom level for each site separately, so you can zoom HN to e.g. 110 % to fix the font size.

The line-length issue can be fixed by resizing the browser window. At least that works for me - none of the sites I use require a huge amount of horizontal space. (Many people seem to keep all their browser windows maximized out of habit, but that is not necessarily the optimal window size.)

Re: Write thin to write fast

#118

Post by alkonaut »

thaumasiotes wrote: post #45
liquid_bluing wrote: post #26

This seems to be kind of a complex topic, with a number of variables. Here is a study: How physical text layout affects reading from screen https://www.researchgate.net/publication/220208446_How_physi... A quote from the Discussion section: "Most of the studies on line length report faster reading with longer lines, and point to the number of characters as the variable responsible for the differences, rather than phy…

> The OP thinks that humans read thinner columns faster. Generally, this seems not to be the case, so maybe we should treat his main conclusion with some skepticism. > In any case, it's probably best to refer to the scientific literature. You might not think so if you read the literature review which takes up most of that paper. The literature covered is generally focused on questions of no obvious interest and then,…

> The OP thinks that humans read thinner columns faster.

Tbf, "reading faster" in the linear sense is probably not exactly the metric to use when writing text. When writing, I usually need to jump randomly a lot in the text to cross reference something (from the last paragraph, the last sentence, or the beginning of the current sentence). It's a kind of nonlinear scanning that I'm guessing could be more efficient in narrow column text, even if wider columns would be faster to read from beginning to end.

Re: Write thin to write fast

#119

Post by bambax »

liquid_bluing wrote: post #26

This seems to be kind of a complex topic, with a number of variables. Here is a study: How physical text layout affects reading from screen https://www.researchgate.net/publication/220208446_How_physi... A quote from the Discussion section: "Most of the studies on line length report faster reading with longer lines, and point to the number of characters as the variable responsible for the differences, rather than phy…

> The OP thinks that humans read thinner columns faster. Generally, this seems not to be the case

Really? This is absolutely the case for me. I use "reader view" / "readability" in Firefox whenever possible and it's incredibly helpful.

Re: Write thin to write fast

#120

Post by grey-area »

thaumasiotes wrote: post #45
liquid_bluing wrote: post #26

This seems to be kind of a complex topic, with a number of variables. Here is a study: How physical text layout affects reading from screen https://www.researchgate.net/publication/220208446_How_physi... A quote from the Discussion section: "Most of the studies on line length report faster reading with longer lines, and point to the number of characters as the variable responsible for the differences, rather than phy…

> The OP thinks that humans read thinner columns faster. Generally, this seems not to be the case, so maybe we should treat his main conclusion with some skepticism. > In any case, it's probably best to refer to the scientific literature. You might not think so if you read the literature review which takes up most of that paper. The literature covered is generally focused on questions of no obvious interest and then,…

On HN, your line here is 200 characters in 9pth Verdana, so it's also pretty extreme (perhaps because I have a wider screen). Personally I find the max line length on HN really uncomfortable.

> nature of the longest line, i.e. 132 characters in 12 point Arial (rather than 10 point Arial used by Dyson and Kipping). The line length therefore not only has more characters but is also physically longer because of the larger type size.

I'd say anywhere from 50-100 characters is fine for line length, stray too far outside that and you're not allowing enough words to scan well, or have too many so that it's hard to jump to the next line.

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