
Show HN: A better typing tutor, based upon the OK Plateau Effect - ZaneClaes
http://oktypist.com/
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fudged71
Sometimes it skips to the next word before you are finished a word, and it's
not clear if you need to press space or keep typing, but pressing space skips
to the next word after THAT. Pretty frustrating, actually.

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ZaneClaes
That's exactly the point -- you need to try to keep up. This slight
frustration is the part that makes you get better ;)

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fudged71
But your score includes mistakes that you make! Is a space not a mistake? Is
it not a key that you need to press? When it skips to the next word, it's
quite non-intuitive to not put a space first.

If you don't press space, you're violating the idea of words. If you press
space, the sentence you've constructed in your head is broken. Either way, it
slows me down and frustrates me too much to play :)

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ZaneClaes
The way it's coded, there are 2 conditions that move it forward: either
pressing space, or the timer expiring. Pressing the space thus is not an
error, but rather the condition that moves the text forward. Also, as I
mentioned below, the timer gets faster as you get more words correct.

The original study used only a timer, and had the same frustration which you
speak of here.

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timmclean
>> It will force you to type faster than you are able

The text is appearing really slowly for me. Is there something that I'm
missing? I have to keep waiting for it to catch up to me.

EDIT: I was using Firefox. In Chrome, it's completely different.

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clebio
It was randomly delayed for me as well (granted I'm using Chromium v20...).
That (and the otherwise mentioned skipping to the next word erratically... and
the not explaining visually how errors are handled) made it nearly useless to
me. I would not be inclined to prefer it over, say Type-racer, except as a
curio in the show-HN area.

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ZaneClaes
Thanks for pointing out the Chrome vs. FF. I'll take a look.

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evoxed
Reporting the same. Chrome and Safari are fine, FF lags significantly.

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ZaneClaes
Updated the FF about 30min ago; try again now :)

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evoxed
The number at the bottom isn't updating at all (stuck at 0). Edit: refreshing
twice brought it back– odd. I have to say though, it's quite a bit of fun. I'm
not slow and I can already feel the push, I'm really glad you showed this :)

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leto
It would be a much better experience if it were immediately obvious that words
marked in red must be abandoned.

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ZaneClaes
Each non-matching character counts as an error; but you can still recover. Eg,
if you type "heloo" instead of "hello", it is only 1 error.

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milesokeefe
I normally get a 50-70 WPM score on typing tests, but got a 6 on this. There
was a fair amount of errors but surely 6 isn't the best representation of WPM
with adjustment for errors.

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trishume
I also am getting what I believe to be an inaccurate wpm. I am getting 30 but
I normally score around 65wpm. It might be because it makes the mistake of
counting actual words instead of 5 character chunks.

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ZaneClaes
When you get to the end, it explains that it uses net WPM (NOT Gross WPM),
which is error-adjusted to create an "effective" WPM.

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weisser
Shared with two friends in chat and said, "prepare to be challenged."

Their responses:

"Two seconds in and I'm pissed."

and

"This is infuriating"

So congratulations? These are both people that do extensive amounts of work on
the computer but none of it involves copying quickly.

For me, I'm a bit curious why words per minute matters for people. It seems
like the only time typing so quickly matters is when you are copying things
down (written or spoken). Don't you think it is only a matter of time before
no one will have to copy something down into text format manually ever again?

I have little knowledge about how the brain works when copying information but
it seems that when someone is working hard to quickly copy something down they
are not analyzing the meaning of the content nearly as well as if they were
sitting and listening. It seems like time could be better spent.

I still think this is an interesting site. I would love to improve my typing
accuracy.

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ZaneClaes
Hahaha :) Re: copying... I'm not sure that there's really a necessary
distinction between copying input and simply being able to type fast. In this
scenario, yes, you're simply copying input; for that reason I added a 800 ms
delay to allow the brain to process the word before the variable timer is
enabled, so ultimately what's being tested is your ability to write what is in
your brain already.

That said, I do acknowledge that WPM is not necessarily the best gauge of
efficiency. I'm a programmer, and I'm not sure exactly how WPM relates to my
work (I'd be curious to see a study) since much of what I type is "nonsense"
words to begin with, and WPM is largely a function of your ability to
habitually reproduce the same character sets (aka, common words in your given
language).

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cglace
I find I type slower because the text keeps moving.

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ZaneClaes
The text moves forward a little faster than you are able to type; this is the
principle of the OK Plateau -- you need to be forced to "try" to type faster.
However, it is certainly uncomfortable! But, no pain, no gain.

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ricardobeat
How is it based on the OK Plateau effect? All I'm seeing is an (innacurate)
WPM counter, does something else happen after a certain amount of typing?

edit: ok, I was typing too fast to notice that it automatically moves on after
some time.

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ZaneClaes
Yep, and not only does it automatically move -- it speeds up as it moves. Eg,
as you get more words correct, the speed and which it moves forward increases.

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fudged71
Quite a neat idea.

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spideyunlimited
Sometimes, if you mistype a word or forget a space, it incorrectly matches the
word you're typing to the word on screen. Took me a while to figure that out
and go back a few words to retype them.

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trishume
I made a prettier, nicer and more configurable one of these a while ago that
works in Firefox too for my own use based off of Keyzen. You can set your
preferred target speed and it has more accurate wpm, click measure at the
bottom to to make it skip over words after time runs out.

Try it at <http://thume.ca/keyzen>

Because of this post I also submitted it to HN, upvote if you like it:
<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4829982>

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clebio
It works well and looks nice, but part of typing quickly is seeing the next
word in advance so I know what to start typing after the space. Your app
doesn't show me those words, so I have to hite space-bar and then wait some
time before I know what key to strike next (probably worth mentioning that
part of seeing the next word involves consuming the word, rather than
individual characters -- so that standard letter-groups are queued up).

Edit: ...and now I can reply. Go figure.

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trishume
There is a setting for that, look in the bottom bar. I had some friends test
it out and got the same complaint.

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clebio
Thanks for the quick feedback, and for giving an alternative option. But it
doesn't do what I need: show the word _before_ I finish the previous word. I
look at the next word as I'm typing the current word (something like: parse
word, start typing, load next work, repeat). If I can't see the next word
until I've finished the current, my overall speed goes _way_ down.

Please understand that I'm not trying to be difficult, but that this is how I
normally type. I'm interested because I haven't found the best typing app yet.
But for a typing test to be accurate for me, it has to conform to the way text
(or my train of thought) normally works.

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GlennS
My instinct is to go back and correct my typos, but it seems like this
punishes you for doing that?

If so, I think that not correcting my typos is a habit I would prefer to
avoid.

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ZaneClaes
Actually, the best way to improve is to just keep going, without correcting --
but to keep typing the rest of the word correctly. Eg, if you know you typed
the 2nd character incorrectly, just make sure you get the 3rd right.

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javajosh
Totally hated this, which of course means that you're on the right track!
(They say that your software should evoke strong feelings).

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ZaneClaes
Haha thanks

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ralphleon
The animations when switching a to a new word are _very_ jarring and
distracting. Perhaps a more continuous method (like a tape roll that's
constantly moving) would help with the transitions?

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ZaneClaes
Animations? No animations... perhaps it's slow javascript?

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SeanDav
Running slowly for me, I am having to wait for the text.

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kip_
Does this get more than 2-3 words ahead? Perhaps I'm typing faster than I read
(which makes no sense), but I'm missing words.

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kip_
And it can be gamed as well. Hold the space bar down from the start. 1,380 net
WPM.

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ZaneClaes
True. But you're only cheating yourself ;)

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paozac
The Chrome extension apparently adds a user tracking script

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niels_olson
I feel like I'm in swim practice. Holy hell.

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rogerbhilton
Wow!

