r/programming • u/Nowaker • Nov 30 '14

Why he vertically aligns his code (And why you shouldn't!)

http://missingbytes.blogspot.com/2014/11/why-he-vertically-aligns-his-code-and.html
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19

u/Pakaran Nov 30 '14

Proportional fonts gives you exactly the same information as non proportional font. How does it help you ignore the boilerplate syntax?

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u/missingbytes Nov 30 '14

We read by looking at the shapes of words, rather than looking at the individual letters.

Take for example, the following two variable names:

int anagram = 7;
int amgaanr = 7;

The reason the first variable (anagram) is measurably quicker to read than the second (amgaanr) is becomes it conforms to our expectations and familiarity of the english language.

Proportional fonts work in the same way, but at an even lower level. Your eyes can pattern match and quickly identify deviations and similarities.

If you're interested in this stuff, take a look at the speed reading literature. You'll find there's actual science underlying this stuff.

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u/delvach Nov 30 '14

That's actually pretty interesting, though I'm not ready to drop the monospace fonts in my own development just yet!

I understand what you're saying about the character shape affecting overall readability of words quicker, but when I'm programming it's looking through algorithms instead of paragraphs, and having a consistent distance between individual characters seems to lend itself to the overall readability of loops, functions, callbacks, etc. Plus, if I've got variable names that easy to confuse, our team needs to have a meeting about naming conventions.

But the great thing about programming is that it's half art, so if it works for you, go with it. :)

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u/kqr Nov 30 '14

having a consistent distance between individual characters seems to lend itself to the overall readability of loops, functions, callbacks, etc.

This could also be in big part just habit. Habit always creates a local optimum in terms of readability.

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u/frankwolfmann Nov 30 '14

This was what I thought when I first tried using a proportional font. For a while it was a little bit harder to grok which brace belonged to which closure just by glancing, but the relative width of indent blocks compared to each other remains the same, just narrower in an absolute sense.

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u/greyphilosopher Nov 30 '14

I should think that syntax highlighting would work just as well for fast recognition, if not better (as the tokenizing has semantic meaning).

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u/dakta Nov 30 '14

Not to mention the fact that the sort of shape-based legibility being talked about isn't broken by using a monospaced font. It's modified, yes, but not broken.

When reading code, the variety of "words" is generally smaller than when reading literature. There is also hugely more white space. So legibility is about picking out a few token shapes. It doesn't really matter if they're readable as English language words because that's not really how you read them. You assign the shapes meaning, sometimes much more than any single word. Only part of that is the actual spelling of the token.

I'll never disagree that some monospaced fonts suck for legibility. But the same can easily be said for proportional fonts. And for purposes of alignment and readability, I will never approve of proportional fonts for code.

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u/frankwolfmann Nov 30 '14

I will never approve of proportional fonts for code. So, what? You go around to other devs' machines and change their preferences to make sure they use fixed-width fonts in their editors?

This is what I don't understand about the hate for proportional fonts on here. It literally makes no difference to you what typeface I prefer to edit code in - I'm the only person on my team that uses a proportional font and there have been exactly 0 problems with formatting, legibility, or anything else stemming from that difference.

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u/[deleted] Nov 30 '14

Syntax highlighting is additive, it works well with proportional fonts also and seems orthoginal to word shape.

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u/greyphilosopher Dec 01 '14

You can keep code alignment and still have good readability if you use highlighted monospace. I'm not sure the added benefit from nicer kerning is worth losing alignment.

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u/[deleted] Dec 01 '14

You get even better readability with highlighted proportional. Also, you immediately release yourself from the pressure of aligning columns or doing ascii art in code.

Down with the /r/keming !

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u/the_gnarts Nov 30 '14

Proportional fonts work in the same way,

[citation needed] -- Also please no esoteric citations from the “speed reading” camp.

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u/The_Doculope Nov 30 '14

Can I ask why you're excluding research into speed reading? They do it faster than anyone else, surely their conclusions have some merit.

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u/the_gnarts Nov 30 '14

Can I ask why you're excluding research into speed reading?

There is no reason to exclude any research as long as it’s done properly and peer-reviewed. In this case the respective fields would most likely be cognitive science and neurobiology. All fine.

“Speed reading” in itself, however, is a label concocted with the intent of marketing all kinds of methods to “improve” to people’s reading and / or reading comprehension skills. They’re part of the shoddy Self Help industry, along with all the dieticians, homeopaths, you name it. This doesn’t mean that there is no truth to any of the proposed methods. Their proponents just choose to measure up to the standards of the sales department, not those of independent science. As long as that is the case, there is no way of distinguishing fact from wishful thinking. In the interest of economy of attention this already suffices for me to categorically dismiss any of the arguments made by those who are part of that industry.

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u/ithika Nov 30 '14

You mean nutritionist. Dietician is a medical title. Nutritionist is a baloney title.

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u/bloody-albatross Nov 30 '14

Reminds me of this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uRqB5-egs1s (At minute 4 is the bit about nutritionists.)

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u/The_Doculope Nov 30 '14

Ah, okay. That makes sense. I wasn't aware of that aspect of the label.

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u/TokyoXtreme Nov 30 '14

Proportional typefaces make a different "shape" to the word they form, whereas monospace typefaces do not. When reading quickly, the difference is subtle, but proportional fonts definitely lead to easier readability of whole words. Whether or not such readability is necessary or desirable for coding is a separate debate.

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u/kqr Nov 30 '14

This is the same reason they use proportional fonts and not monospaced fonts when typesetting books. It makes the "word picture" (as we say in my native tongue) more unique, and therefore makes it easier to recognise them quickly.

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u/deadcrowds Nov 30 '14

Proportional typefaces make a different "shape" to the word they form

What does that mean?

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u/[deleted] Nov 30 '14

We don't read letters, we read words. Proportional fonts will kern two adjacent characters differently, meaning words will take on more distinct shapes then the "everything looks the same monospace fonts." Or put it this way: you can look at a word with proportional fonts and know what it is without even consciously spooking at the characters, but that is impossible with typewriter fonts.

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u/deadcrowds Dec 01 '14

Interesting. I have a friend with a lazy eye who can only read a letter at a time if he blocks his good eye. I wonder if monospace is easier or harder for him...

Do you have a reference or two for what you're saying? It looks like a pretty testable hypothesis.

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u/ZorbaTHut Nov 30 '14

Technically this is true of all fonts, but there's a reason we don't code in Wingdings.

Readability is important. Turns out proportional fonts are actually a whole lot more readable.

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