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Ask HN: Programming and dyslexia

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Re: Ask HN: Programming and dyslexia

#11

Post by clircle »

salomon812 wrote: post #7

Dyslexic programmer here! Here's some of my tips I use. ALWAYS ALWAYS close your parenthesis/brackets/quotes as soon as you open them then go back to write what's in them. So, if I write: func(arg), the keystrokes for me are: f u n c ( ) Color syntax highlighting is a must! It lets you know your keywords are correct. Copy-and-paste variable names. Write them once and then get fast at copying them. And then some prefe…

> Copy-and-paste variable names. Write them once and then get fast at copying them.

I’m about to blow your mind with dynamic abbreviations in Emacs. Tab complete all your words longer than a few characters.

https://www.gnu.org/software/emacs/manual/html_node/emacs/Dy...

Re: Ask HN: Programming and dyslexia

#12

Post by GianFabien »

throwawayboise wrote: post #5

I am really bad with transposing numbers. I'll often even have trouble correctly reading a 2FA code. I always have to triple check numbers, I often try grouping them in a few different ways, e.g. 327895 I would read as 32-78-95 and then again as 327-895 just to be sure I have not transposed any digits. Other than this sort of discipline I have not found a solution.

I do something similar to you. I have particular difficulty with long numbers with no spaces, or multiple repeating digits. I'm especially careful with account numbers when doing electronic banking. On computer, I prefer copy 'n paste and then re-check.

Re: Ask HN: Programming and dyslexia

#13

Post by gnicholas »

Are you sure he has dyslexia, as opposed to visual issues (especially binocular vision problems) that could show these symptoms as well? These issues relate to how the eyes track together across a page/screen, and are often confused for dyslexia.

Re: Ask HN: Programming and dyslexia

#14

Post by kypro »

scantis wrote: post #2

I use Tab completion alot. I do mostly mathematical programming, I can keep track of horrible extremely short namespaces easily and then use find and replace feature to make everything nice. Even though I have no real concept for it, I just do it to make the code more similar to my colleagues. Every training I had to overcome my dyslexia was absolutely useless. Spellcheck is very important. Fonts and colors don't mat…

> You can't see mistakes, since you basically have an internal autocompletion that doesn't allow you to see mistakes or missing words. Checking the code of my coworkers is surprisingly different, I can find their mistakes quite easily.

Sometimes I'll write something out and reread it several times fully aware that I tend to miss words or misspell things, but in the moments after I've wrote something I'll rarely find any mistakes. However, 30 minutes later after I've sent the email or Slack message I'll reread what I wrote and it's a completely different story. For some reason only then will my brain decide to actually read what was written, but by then it's too late.

I had no idea this was a dyslexic thing. I was diagnosed a while ago and while I know it effects my reading ability I didn't know proofreading specifically was an issue for us.

Re: Ask HN: Programming and dyslexia

#15

Post by GianFabien »

I'm mildly dyslectic with a dreadful memory. I will stumble across a file I wrote a month or so ago and take a while to realize that I wrote it. The things that help me:

Use JetBrains mono-spaced font.

Use three big desktop LCDs, with largish font, green characters on black background and vim syntax highlighting.

Edit my code on the middle monitor and have reference information on the monitors on either side. Copy 'n paste rather than re-type stuff. Heavy use of keyboard short-cuts, avoid mouse when editing, etc. Lots of ALT-TAB switching between windows (Mate/Debian/Linux).

Quietly read aloud to myself to check spellings, etc. User spelling auto-correction.

Use a fast machine and frequently re-compile individual files with maximum warnings level to get the compiler catch my typos.

Re: Ask HN: Programming and dyslexia

#16

Post by bqmjjx0kac »

kypro wrote: post #14
scantis wrote: post #2

I use Tab completion alot. I do mostly mathematical programming, I can keep track of horrible extremely short namespaces easily and then use find and replace feature to make everything nice. Even though I have no real concept for it, I just do it to make the code more similar to my colleagues. Every training I had to overcome my dyslexia was absolutely useless. Spellcheck is very important. Fonts and colors don't mat…

> You can't see mistakes, since you basically have an internal autocompletion that doesn't allow you to see mistakes or missing words. Checking the code of my coworkers is surprisingly different, I can find their mistakes quite easily. Sometimes I'll write something out and reread it several times fully aware that I tend to miss words or misspell things, but in the moments after I've wrote something I'll rarely find…

I don't believe I have dyslexia, but this happens to me.

My trick is that when I'm doing my final proofreading, I usually adjust the size of the window to reflow the text.

Re: Ask HN: Programming and dyslexia

#17

Post by Someone1234 »

I myself am, and I've also had colleagues that are.

Only thing I've noticed is that the way we absorb information and master it is very different from some of my colleagues. RTFM is really a struggle, and instead I do better learning through a million smaller pokes that slowly build familiarity (e.g. videos + playing with actual code, even if you don't fully grasp it).

I struggled more in college with contrived examples and math-like definitions, but you show me how it works and it working, and I get it very quickly.

As far as fonts/IDEs? Nothing unusual, just a high quality code font (monospaced, like Cascadia Code, Jetbrains Mono, etc), with normal autocomplete/AI suggestions. I do set my DPI to 125% but that may be an eyesight/personal preference thing.

Re: Ask HN: Programming and dyslexia

#18

Post by Someone1234 »

justsomehnguy wrote: post #8

There is a couple of fonts aimed to help dyslexics. [0] https://github.com/antijingoist/opendyslexic

That is an incredibly hard to read font, see:

https://opendyslexic.org/about

I struggle far more parsing that than a typical monospaced font. In particular as that is 18pt, turn it down to a more normal 14pt and that's worse than most of Word's default fonts let alone coding specific ones.

Re: Ask HN: Programming and dyslexia

#19

Post by Terry_Roll »

The compiler will normally spot spelling mistakes.

My monitors brightness is turned down so the white sections on a monitor with a lux meter held 5cm away is reading 33 and the room in general is about 100-130lux (I have a lux meter).

I program in a blacked out air conditioned room with a warm white light bulb behind me, so alot like what you might find in a casino lighting levels. Edit:This also helps you lose track of time and become totally absorbed in the code. In the past I even looked into buying an underground military shelter to work in so I can remove all external stimuli in order to focus on the code because the internet is a big enough distraction as it is.

The white colour on the monitor is like the Financial Times "pink" which is more orange but in time you get used to this and dont notice the orangeness.

I program with the MS night light on 50%, have used F.lux (https://justgetflux.com/) before MS introduced it.

This removes the eyestrain enormously so you can spend hours in front of the monitor and ignore the "take regular breaks to avoid eye strain".

I prefer windows ClearType to be off so I can see every pixel in the font like windows 2000/XP, not these new ones which are all smoothed.

Have the "show location of mouse pointer when CTRL is pressed" switched on as its easy to loss the mouse on multiple big monitors.

OS 120dpi font size System Font size 18, but this depends on the size and resolution of your monitors, so you'll need to experiment with your fonts.

Basic text editor a little better than notepad but not as good as notepad++. No code autocomplete or anything.

Re: Ask HN: Programming and dyslexia

#20

Post by jethro_tell »

Someone1234 wrote: post #17

I myself am, and I've also had colleagues that are. Only thing I've noticed is that the way we absorb information and master it is very different from some of my colleagues. RTFM is really a struggle, and instead I do better learning through a million smaller pokes that slowly build familiarity (e.g. videos + playing with actual code, even if you don't fully grasp it). I struggled more in college with contrived examp…

That and tab complete, I tab complete prose, I tab complete commands, I'll tab complete the last letter of the command to make sure it's a command.

I'll tab complete while I code to keep those small errors out of the picture.

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