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Learning all VSCode shortcuts evolved my developing habits in unexpected ways

tkainrad.dev

3 pointstkainrad3 comments

interesting, although it reads like a school assignment with a minimum word count requirement. ironic.

> I have never seen someone recommend splitting up blog posts into multiple files.

i guess author has never worked with a marketing department.

Hmm, never got that kind of feedback before. Always thought I am pretty decent at writing, even though English is my second language. If you have any tangible suggestions on how to improve my writing style, I'd be grateful.

It's true though, I never worked in marketing. In my day job, I mostly work on enterprise Java projects. I think I am picking up more marketing skills recently because I try to promote my side-project https://keycombiner.com .

Do you have a link you could drop that describes how marketing professionals split up blog posts into multiple files? Ideally explaining the reasons.

sorry, missed your reply. i try to followup to replies. maybe too much time has passed and you won't see this, but here goes anyway.

you are good at "writing", for sure. what your article is not good at is presenting the point concisely. it's a well edited stream of consciousness. but this type of advice article can benefit from being half the size. you don't need examples and then say "YMMV". that's a complete waste of the reader's time. ONE example is sufficient to get the point across. and then don't apologize for the example or go on at length about how it might not seem so to the user. they can figure it out themselves. you only need to take the user to the water, you don't need to fill their cup and drink it for them. i specifically mean for this type of article. other types of articles addressed to other audiences could very well benefit from a more protracted exposition.

as for smaller blog posts, have you ever read anything at tom's hardware or anandtech etc? or "photo essays"? the more pages you have, the more clicks you get and the more ads you can serve. As well, the more SEO action you can generate.

Even for non-ad-generator blogs, attention spans are limited. Casual readers can only absorb 1-2 points. It's why mainstream news articles always have to have a photo, even if it's stupid photo and doesn't add value to the article. Readers need to see an image to have any interest in the article whatsoever. A giant wall of text is off-putting and bye bye clicks. So even with images sprinkled throughout, 2 main points per page is great. Then the user can click to page 2/3/4 for more info, where you can show another ad, or make it seem like you have many more "pages" of content than you really do. And the user can pace themselves, and aren't intimidated by a giant article with many things to absorb. Even if the overall length is the same, breaking it up into pages increases user willingness to commit to it. "I read 3 pages, there's only 1 more and that's the summary so I really want to see where this went, so ok I'll finish it". vs "This article is too long nevermind" and they don't read it at all.

Part 1/ Part 2 style blog posts are extremely common.

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