
Ask HN: Do you subvocalize when reading code? - anderspitman
Subvocalization, ie &quot;sounding&quot; words in your brain while reading, is to my understanding generally considered a bad thing by proponents of speed reading. I&#x27;m a rather slow reader myself and always subvocalize. I&#x27;m curious if other programmers do so when reading code. I&#x27;d be especially interested in hearing from any who also consider themselves speed readers and read books without subvocalizing.
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p333347
We read code in order to understand it, and I believe one must read code with
whatever technique that lets them understand it best (I know nothing of this
subvocalizing thing; I came here to see what it was). For me, reading code is
a deliberate activity, in that one must spend some time with it and not whiz
past it. Further, speed reading seems irrelevant, not to mention counter
productive, when dealing with code.

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pluma
Considering the drawbacks of speed-reading (it's not just "reading, but
faster") are really counter-productive in programming, I don't think actual
speed-reading techniques are helpful when reading code.

I certainly do find myself "skimming" code in larger code bases but then I'm
also not speed-reading but simply looking at the visual structure (which is
where consistent formatting matters) and looking at words in fixed locations
(e.g. names in function definitions).

When you actually have to _read_ code (rather than just skim it by looking at
structure and words in fixed locations) that usually means you need to focus
and carefully follow each expression -- the bottleneck in this case is
comprehension, not reading speed (unless you have to keep track of each
character, such as when dealing with short and confusing variable names or
intentionally obfuscated code).

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soboleiv
I visualize graphs sometimes or draw them on paper for particularly tricky
pieces of code.

I was subvocalizing things to remember to do before learning to use task
tracking software for that.

You might want to benchmark yourself e.g. with
[http://www.readingsoft.com/](http://www.readingsoft.com/) (I ranked 398 wpm
and I know my bottleneck is eye movements)

Also I think code reading speed is only a part of a larger process (e.g. code
review or making a fix). For both of these external tools are available making
reading speed not as important (iterative development / unit tests for fixing
+ static code analysis tools for reviews)

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baccheion
I'm not conscious of doing so, though I often subvocalize when reading. You
can try humming (vibrating/pulsing the voice box area) or listening to
brainwave entrainment audio to lower the amount of subvocalization. Brainwave
entrainment audio should also help you better concentrate/focus and relax.

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Cozumel
Interesting question. With code I don't unless it's 'complex' and I'm trying
to work something out and I just realised I don't with music either, but I
definitely wouldn't consider myself a speed reader either.

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psyc
By the strict definition of subvocalize, definitely yes. I don't move my lips,
though. Also, it's nothing at all like reading English. I'm trained to read
logic directly as logic.

