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Comment by doktrin | Hacker News Reader

I thought this was a given? I am absolutely CPU bound and I don't know a single developer who isn't. Do any of you actually code (efficiently) at your maximum typing speed?

At the risk of painting with a wide brush, I am currently under the impression that any developer who sits down and cranks out code non-stop at their maximum typing rate is either :

a) cranking out a complete mess that will require extensive refactoring down the road

b) the protagonist of "Hackers" or "Swordfish"

For what it's worth, I am a reasonably fast typist (~115 wpm, qwerty) and can't even imagine myself ever coding as fast as I can type. I wouldn't mind for this to be the case, though :)

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115 wpm?! o_O

Well then. Time for me to get busy on one of those touch-type-training applications, that's nearly 2x what I just did.

Indeed at that speed you're sufficiently CPU bound to make that claim.

But can you crack a 2048 bit RSA code in your head within a minute while .. you know? Plus, in the later scene when he was doing the real job, he wasn't just typing at 115wpm, he was simultaneously dancing around at at least 145bpm. So there's always room for improvement.

Us 115wpm qwerty guys aren't "reasonably fast" - we're way up there - and to be sure, the only reason I have to improve my speed is because it's a sort of hobby.... it won't help me code better. Being able to type with my left hand faster than my friends can type with both is always fun - as is constructing passwords and other shortcuts that can be done with a single hand in the blink of an eye... but that's all just fun and games.

You don't always bang out code at your max typing speed. But you do have bursts of fast code writing at times, which is extremely useful.

Also, I live in the shell and typing 200 char long one liners to do something useful and if you are a fast typist very quick too. It's great for generating on the fly reports, searches etc. This is the kind of thing that would take a slow typist a lot of time. Most of slow typists I know don't bother with these things because it takes too long. As a consequence they also get rusty with their shell foo, or never get good at it to begin with.

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