Ask HN: Writing code on portrait screen | Hacker News Reader

Ask HN: Writing code on portrait screen

5 pointsenesunal7 comments

Are there anyone who like to code on portrait screen orientation?

Maybe anybody want to hear that: I'm writing in portrait mode since a couple of days, and it's unpredictably awesome! o.O

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I've done this while at work - I don't anymore as my code responsibilities are fewer. It forces you to consider cleaner code arrangements and also gives an unexpectedly better overall picture of what you're doing.

Functions become clear from one to the next, especially if they're closely related. It also gives a "non-hard-coded" limit to function length. Instead of X-lines, I now see if the function is getting long enough to cover most of the screen. This also helps weed out my own failures in logic and draws attention to other aspects like clarity.

Ideally, I'd use two screens. One for code in portrait mode and one landscape for other work. Maybe a third monitor for YouTube ;-)

I have recently joined Big Bank as senior contracting peon (official title) and been supplied with two, and snagged a third widescreen monitor. After some judicious screwdriver work I am the proud month long user of three portrait widescreen monitors.

It is awesome. :-)

The upsides: I can read whole functions, and see more of where it fits in the whole module.

It snowballs - have your docs, your shell and your code in different monitors, but keep them all in consoles and 80 chars and everything stays in the right place in my brain and in the monitor.

Most websites are even better - the world is optimising for portrait length even when most of us are landscape or phone sized.

The downsides:

You need IDE support - most of the time your work is done at the last two lines of the screen - which is right down lower than on your laptop. I am moving my eyes around too much - so I would be much much happier with emacs (C-'el') and probably a tiling window manager. I can eventually get emacs past the security folks but xmonad - hah!

So I am playing with raising the bottom of the monitor physically up till the top gets silly - but otherwise I fully recommend it.

I've tried this a few times and really enjoyed it, not just for code: long-scroll webpages look great like this, too.

I've always switched back due to "unrelated" problems like the viewing angle of my monitors being optimized for landscape orientation and not liking the missing chunk of screen real-estate that comes with an L-shaped desktop area.

I speculate that if I had three large, identical monitors with good viewing angles in portrait mode, I'd be able to leave them like that.

But, if I'm going to daydream about hypothetical money, I might as well imagine myself buying a single 4k projector. :)

I've toyed with this a couple of times with an HP screen that would go into portrait mode. I found it best when I coded on my primary monitor on landscape mode but had my secondary monitor in portrait to either review other section of code or browse stack exchange etc. I have my app dock on the left rather than the bottom so in portrait mode, horizontal real estate takes a hit. Maybe without that it would work better.

Almost as awesome as portrait mode is the price of these monitor stands from monoprice:

http://www.monoprice.com/Product?c_id=108&cp_id=10828&cs_id=...

Yes, I had my monitor in that same orientation, but I have to get a new stand. When you have one portrait screen orientation it allows you to search more of the code, and review it in greater length.

I always have a portrait monitor if I can help it. For me, it's more natural to be able to see longer chunks of text/code. Less scrolling when reading.

Only real problem I've found is when idiot web designers who think everything is landscape and/or all monitors are >1024 px wide.

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