Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!ucsd!sdcsvax!trantor.harris-atd.com!melmac!chuck From: chuck@melmac.harris-atd.com (Chuck Musciano) Newsgroups: comp.cog-eng Subject: Re: Typing versus Handwriting Keywords: typewriting keyboards handwriting tablets Message-ID: <2203@trantor.harris-atd.com> Date: 13 Jun 89 19:47:22 GMT References: <1440001@hp-ptp.HP.COM> <11581@megaron.arizona.edu> <8181@boring.cwi.nl> <751@cogsci.ucsd.EDU> Sender: news@trantor.harris-atd.com Reply-To: chuck@trantor.harris-atd.com (Chuck Musciano) Organization: Advanced Technology Dept., Harris Corp., Melbourne, Fl. Lines: 58 This discussion is quite interesting, although I feel that I am off the "norm" presented by previous posters. Personally, I can type much faster than I can write, and I am not a touch typist. I am a four-finger/two-thumb typist, and sometimes achieve great bursts of speed, as long as I can look at the keyboard while I type. This makes me very fast when I am typing thoughts, and horribly slow when I am retyping something else. I would like to see a computer which could read my handwriting, since a lot of the time, *I* can't read my writing. My handwriting was never good, and since I find myself typing almost everything I need to write, my hand- writing has atrophied to the point where I have a hard time remembering certain little used cursive letters, like capital Q. If I want to be clear, I print, which is horribly slow and tedious. When I write out greeting cards and the like, I usually have hand cramps after about 15 lines of text. Now that I can reach my parents via e-mail, I don't even need to write letters. My use of computers has evolved along similar lines. When I started out, I would write out programs in longhand, and then type them in (on an ASR-33 teletype at 110 baud!). After a while, I would just note down psuedo-code, and convert to real code as I typed. Finally, I just started composing code on the fly. I haven't put a line of code on paper in about six years. I compose all my code using top-down decomposition, usually after thinking about the problem until it just "becomes obvious". Frankly, anything with only a written interface would be completely unacceptable to me. I can think of no other single thing which would hamper my productivity more than having to write, rather than type. This is on a tangent, but my discussion about my programming techniques started me thinking (always dangerous :-). When I am faced with a problem to be solved (requiring some programmed solution) I sort of think about it initially, and then don't think about it. Sometime later, maybe days, maybe weeks, the full solution just pops into my head, and I sit down and type all the code in. If I try to force the issue, and type in the code before I am ready, the results are usually disastrous. If I am patient, I usually wind up with an elegant solution. This often works in a heirarchical manner, too. Often, the initial solution is the top level structure of the program, particularly in the case of complex problems. After I get that stubbed out, the lower level details start filling in, in a similar manner. Even big things I have written, with many thousands of lines of code, all formed this way. I suppose my question is, is this a common problem solving method? Do others have this approach? I don't know if it is the traditional "Aha!" method, since I can "queue" jobs up in my mind and just have them get solved in some order at a later date. Any thoughts on this? Am I totally weird? What sort of interface design criteria might be applicable to take advantage of this sort of mindset? Chuck Musciano ARPA : chuck@trantor.harris-atd.com Harris Corporation Usenet: ...!uunet!x102a!trantor!chuck PO Box 37, MS 3A/1912 AT&T : (407) 727-6131 Melbourne, FL 32902 FAX : (407) 727-{5118,5227,4004} Oh yeah, laugh now! But when the millions start pouring in, I'll be the one at Burger King, sucking down Whoppers at my own private table! --Al Bundy