[rudenoise]

It's hard to respond to this piece. It makes some very clear observations that seem hard to counter.

I've collected two other posts that seem to overlap http://rudenoise.uk/low-tech-minimal-computing.html

Covering: Why the Office Needs a Typewriter Revolution http://www.lowtechmagazine.com/2016/11/why-the-office-needs-...

The Analog Spaces in Digital Companies http://www.newyorker.com/business/currency/the-analog-spaces...

For all the work that gets done in offices there's a corresponding lack of self-awareness related to the impact that it has. As an Information Worker it seems to me that there isn't nearly enough diversity in approach.

[Tharkun]

The Typewriter Revolution article is a real beauty. It covers a nice history lesson as well as making some good points.

One thing I take offense to is this statement:

> Opening multiple windows on a computer screen doesn't work for back-and-forth cross-referencing of other material during authoring work, both because of slow visual navigation and because of the limited space on the computer screen.

That's a problem that's easily solved with a half decent window manager.

[tonyarkles]

Yeah, I recently changed my main dev environment to be a 27" 2560x1440 monitor (Asus PB278, if anyone's curious) attached to a Mac Mini. There's enough space to happily keep a browser, evernote, and a terminal side-by-side (three vertical pillars); this has had very noticeable impacts on, if not my efficiency, at least my feeling of "not having to context switch". Everything's just right there and I just need to shift my eyes left and right.

[BugsBunnySan]

Focus-Follows-Mouse for the win :)

Which is even available on the crippled window manager that Windows has...

[crpatino]

Your average office worker does not get decent screens. Even if the Windows default settings for the desktop have been kind of acceptable for many years, it does you little good if you are looking at it through a 9"-by-5" rectangle.

Multiple monitors are beyond any discussion for most, even if we programmers have gotten used to those and find'em indispensable.

[douche]

Or with multiple monitors.

[Retric]

The energy use numbers are kind of silly.

Nuclear is ~20% of our electricity gen, so 1/4th of that is 1/20th or 5% of US electricity aka not really that big a deal. Energy wise getting to an office is generally far more expensive.

Further they talk about BTU for heating ignoring heat pumps generally being over 100% efficient and running on electricity.

[brokenmachine]

> heat pumps generally being over 100% efficient

Que? How can anything be over 100% efficient?

[sean_patel]

TL;DR anyone? Like seriously.

I ran this through the read-o-meter => http://niram.org/read/ and it says "Estimated reading time: 20 minutes, 38 seconds. Contains 4128 words".

How many of you here actually read the entire article? Just curious, not trolling.

[Roboprog]

Nope, got about 1/3 to 1/2 in, and it started to seem repetitive.

Good points, but needed editing.

[Retric]

200 words per minute is kind of average, but for this kind of content it's easy to beat. I would practice a little as hitting 350-400+ as a fairly comfortable pace. It should be easy for most people and it really does add up.

As to actual content I kind of skipped over 2/3rds of it as it's really repetitive.

[amitdeshwar]

I read it. It's good focus practice (and I enjoy it).

[omouse]

IBM did a study on work spaces and how they affect productivity. It would be nice if universities did the same as a joint project of the Architecture and Computer Science departments but everyone seems to be interested in coding to get a job rather than studying these issues that are faced daily by millions of devs.

[jwatte]

Why would you need to counter it? If it's right, it's right!

The fact that US offices are designed to maximize return on real estate investment, not knowledge worker productivity, is well known.

I wish our screens were better so there's not the continual battle between daylight and readability. E-ink for coding?