http://www.perlmonks.org?node_id=1040001


in reply to Re: Capturing parenthesis and grouping square brackets
in thread Capturing parenthesis and grouping square brackets

BrowserUk: I don't know about Eily, but I type my regexes at 30-40wpm, I think that's close enough.

Sorry, but I do not believe you. Unless you make a frequent habit of copy-typing existing code.

If the regex is so simple that you can mentally construct it at 30wpm(1), then it is so short that sum of the sub-second differences between typing Alt-Gr shifted-characters over a non-shifted characters will be less than the time taken to find the position in the code to type it.

And if the regex is long enough for those sub-second differences to add up to anything substantial, no human being can formulate the regex in their head fast enough to supply their fingers at 30wpm. Nobody!

Indeed, the same can be said (and proven) for all programming. Touch typist programmers may type short bursts(2) of 30-40wpm; but then they have to stop and think.

Their actual rate averages out to something like 10-20 lines per day.

Most of a programmers time is spent editing what exists not producing new; and in both cases, deciding what to type and where, is a such a huge proportion, 95-98%, of the total time, the speed the actual tokens are entered is totally inconsequential.

(1What constitutes a 'word' in a regex anyway?)

(2And in (informal) testing of 5 experienced programmers who were also touch typists, whilst they generated lines of code in short burst of speed (mostly less than 20 tokens/second), they also spent far longer than non-touch-typists going back and deleting/re-typing chunks, lines and whole sections as they realised they had used a bad name for a variable; or used a for loop where a while loop was better; or typed themselves into an algorithmic dead end.)


With the rise and rise of 'Social' network sites: 'Computers are making people easier to use everyday'
Examine what is said, not who speaks -- Silence betokens consent -- Love the truth but pardon error.
"Science is about questioning the status quo. Questioning authority".
In the absence of evidence, opinion is indistinguishable from prejudice.