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Shorthand

en.wikipedia.org

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Re: Shorthand

#31

Post by empath75 »

slantyyz wrote: post #30
monkeynotes wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think the point was that Wikipedia exclusively documents obscure knowledge that used to be common. Wikipedia obviously contains information about all the things, but shorthand used to be very common and it's funny to see it now observed as a curiosity on HN and referenced on Wikipedia.

>> shorthand used to be very common and it's funny to see it now observed as a curiosity on HN Seeing this Wikipedia link made me feel old. Shorthand was indeed very common, my older sister took Pitman shorthand courses in high school, but by the time I hit high school in the mid 80s, it was no longer offered at my school. By the time the 90s rolled around, it was probably a dying craft. Heck, in the early 90s, I had…

When I was in high school in the 90s, I took a typing class on actual typewriters, and it was definitely taught with the idea of training people to be secretaries and not software developers.

Re: Shorthand

#32

Post by [deleted] »

delinka wrote: post #23
strainer wrote: post #21

An optn is t jst lv ot al vwls excpt at th bgnnng of wrds. Its qt esy t rd hwvr it mght nt be wrth it fr jst thrty prcnt incrs in wrd dnsty.

I don't find it "easy" to read that, but it's not impossible. And depending on personal levels of experience, eliminating vowels might take more effort than just writing full words.

[deleted]

Re: Shorthand

#33

Post by [deleted] »

delinka wrote: post #23
strainer wrote: post #21

An optn is t jst lv ot al vwls excpt at th bgnnng of wrds. Its qt esy t rd hwvr it mght nt be wrth it fr jst thrty prcnt incrs in wrd dnsty.

I don't find it "easy" to read that, but it's not impossible. And depending on personal levels of experience, eliminating vowels might take more effort than just writing full words.

[deleted]

Re: Shorthand

#34

Post by addingnumbers »

delinka wrote: post #23
strainer wrote: post #21

An optn is t jst lv ot al vwls excpt at th bgnnng of wrds. Its qt esy t rd hwvr it mght nt be wrth it fr jst thrty prcnt incrs in wrd dnsty.

I don't find it "easy" to read that, but it's not impossible. And depending on personal levels of experience, eliminating vowels might take more effort than just writing full words.

Those criticisms are not specific to this method, indeed they are against every possible form of shorthand.

Re: Shorthand

#35

Post by finder83 »

gepoch wrote: post #22

I've been teaching myself Gregg simplified since late last year. I probably put in 30 minutes a day, and an hour or two on the weekends. First of all, it's very fun (the main reason I got into it) I currently can write about as fast as I type. Somewhere in the range of 40 - 80 WPM depending on how many complex words I need to use (those slow you down a lot more than common ones) The biggest negative for me right now:…

There's a site that I've been following on which the author regularly uploads transcriptions into various Gregg versions, including simplified -- https://gregg-shorthand.com/?tag=readingmaterial+simplified

I'm still early in learning, so I'm not sure how much it helps, but I've heard that regularly reading material written in Gregg that you don't know beforehand is the fastest way to increase your reading speed.

Re: Shorthand

#36

Post by finder83 »

tigerlily wrote: post #6

I wonder what the fastest achievable words per minute is with a modern shorthand?

There are still some court reporters in the US using Gregg shorthand, and are able to record at over 200 words per minute. [1]

Modern" shorthand is really largely the same as shorthand as done in the early 20th century though. Gregg and Pitman are both phonetical, so there's really nothing particularly special about modern language that doesn't apply, other than that there may not be brief forms for words such as "cell phone" or "computer", but they could be created, though all it'd do if you don't is slow down your top speed. They're still not ultra-common words though.

[1] https://www.courtreporteredu.org/2015/08/some-federal-court-...

Re: Shorthand

#38

Post by jwilk »

strainer wrote: post #21

An optn is t jst lv ot al vwls excpt at th bgnnng of wrds. Its qt esy t rd hwvr it mght nt be wrth it fr jst thrty prcnt incrs in wrd dnsty.

An option is to just leave out all vowels except at the beginning of words. It's quite easy to read, however it might not be worth it for just thirty percent increase in word density.

Re: Shorthand

#39

Post by seandougall »

andyjohnson0 wrote: post #3

My mother taught Pitman shorthand (as well as related secretarial skills) for many years until probably the early nineties. My father still has many of her old textbooks, and some of them are novels translated into shorthand for reading and comprehension practice. They're kind of odd things to look at - page after page of squiggles that are somehow clearly artificial rather than natural orthography. Also, it is inter…

Back when I was in college, our department secretary often mused about being the last person left on campus who used shorthand, having started at a time when it was how all meetings were transcribed.

Then again, she was also the only person on campus who could get away reasonably safely with writing her passwords on Post-Its around her monitor.

Re: Shorthand

#40

Post by strainer »

jwilk wrote: post #38
strainer wrote: post #21

An optn is t jst lv ot al vwls excpt at th bgnnng of wrds. Its qt esy t rd hwvr it mght nt be wrth it fr jst thrty prcnt incrs in wrd dnsty.

An option is to just leave out all vowels except at the beginning of words. It's quite easy to read, however it might not be worth it for just thirty percent increase in word density.

Thnky fr prvdng th sltn t m awkwrd phr[a]s[i]ng.
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