Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Keyboard lets people type so fast it’s banned from typing competitions

vice.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

11–20 of 477 posts

Re: Keyboard lets people type so fast it’s banned from typing competitions

#11

Post by derefr »

prirun wrote: post #2

"he did win another typing competition using the CharaChorder to hit 267 WPM with 76% accuracy." 76% accuracy doesn't sound so great to me, no matter how fast I can type on it.

If software used for typing competitions is anything like a typing test in a typing tutor program (which give similar WPM + accuracy measures at the end), then it would track the number of incorrect inputs you make, but also wouldn't let you proceed (i.e. would ignore all further input) while any incorrect input remains in the buffer. With such software, you're expected to correct each word you type before moving on to the next; the moment that you submit the corrected word is the moment the word is acknowledged as "a word" counting toward your WPM.

With such programs, the WPM score measures how many total times per minute you "finished" a correct word, including any time spent correcting the word; with the accuracy score measuring how much extra work was done, on average, doing those corrections.

Re: Keyboard lets people type so fast it’s banned from typing competitions

#15

Post by 58x14 »

Shank wrote: post #10
58x14 wrote: post #3

I'm fairly obsessed with alternative HIDs. I bought the Tap Strap 2 but never broke past the initial learning curve. I'm going to buy a CharaChorder now. I'm also a musician, so I'm really interested to see what types of functionality I could map, given the additional interface dimensions. However, I'll need to test the input lag, typically anything > 20ms is rather noticeable for live music; if they have esports as…

> I type ~80WPM with 90%+ accuracy, but I don't find that typing speed is my blocker, rather the speed of a coherent thought. Maybe typing at ludicrous speeds will channel some deep stream of consciousness? I agree with this, at least to some extent. If I'm rote copying something from a text (e.g., from a typing test website), I can achieve 130-140wpm easily. If I'm creating original thought or trying to actually com…

> type while walking outside at speed

Yes, exactly this. I didn't expect the Tap Strap would be refined enough to serve this purpose (too much ambient motion) but I like to keep looking for something novel.

Re: Keyboard lets people type so fast it’s banned from typing competitions

#16

Post by throw10920 »

58x14 wrote: post #3

I'm fairly obsessed with alternative HIDs. I bought the Tap Strap 2 but never broke past the initial learning curve. I'm going to buy a CharaChorder now. I'm also a musician, so I'm really interested to see what types of functionality I could map, given the additional interface dimensions. However, I'll need to test the input lag, typically anything > 20ms is rather noticeable for live music; if they have esports as…

> I don't find that typing speed is my blocker, rather the speed of a coherent thought.

In my case (which probably shares at least a few similarities to yours), I (a) have some tasks where I really do need to type fast (usually either when I'm transcribing my voice notes to text, or when I've already formed an idea into a sentence in my head and just need to get it out) and (b) have highly irregular rates of thought, where sometimes I'll have things I want to write at 300 WPM, and other times I don't have any ideas for minutes on end.

In the former case, faster is always better. In the latter case, while you might not be directly blocked on typing speed, it does allow you to get the typing out of the way faster, so that you can then move on to more thinking, or another non-typing action.

Re: Keyboard lets people type so fast it’s banned from typing competitions

#17

Post by badlucklottery »

prirun wrote: post #2

"he did win another typing competition using the CharaChorder to hit 267 WPM with 76% accuracy." 76% accuracy doesn't sound so great to me, no matter how fast I can type on it.

Yeah, way too low for programming but I wonder how low the bar is for modern autocorrect systems when writing English sentences.

Re: Keyboard lets people type so fast it’s banned from typing competitions

#18

Post by AlexCoventry »

wly_cdgr wrote: post #14

Cool but who needs this? I'd rather see a keyboard that limits you to 10 WPM so you are forced to think before you type

Sometimes it's useful to be able to run a series of quick experiments, each based in some complex way on the outcome of the previous ones, to develop an empirical understanding of how something is working.

Re: Keyboard lets people type so fast it’s banned from typing competitions

#19

Post by tambourine_man »

umvi wrote: post #7

The "500 WPM" video is a little suspect. He types literally one memorized sentence and extrapolates a WPM from that one 10 word sentence. I'd like to see him actually type 500 meaningful words in under 60 seconds. Anyway, this is cool but basically just a modern stenography device. Steno has a learning curve problem that makes it so most people won't use it.

QWERTY has a steep learning curve as well, it’s just that it’s so ubiquitous that most people don’t question or remember the work that was put into.

Re: Keyboard lets people type so fast it’s banned from typing competitions

#20

Post by malshe »

bombcar wrote: post #8
prirun wrote: post #2

"he did win another typing competition using the CharaChorder to hit 267 WPM with 76% accuracy." 76% accuracy doesn't sound so great to me, no matter how fast I can type on it.

Interviewer: "I heard you were extremely quick at math" Me: "yes, as a matter of fact I am" Interviewer: "Whats 14x27" Me: "49" Interviewer: "that's not even close" me: "yeah, but it was fast" Shamelessly stolen, but yeah, 76% accuracy is only 3/4s of characters typed correctly; if that "works" you could probably just train yourself to not even type the lesser used parts of the alphabet ...

Thanks for the chuckle!
Post reply on HN