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Submitted via IRC for TheMightyBuzzard
A new major release of open source text editor GNU nano is here. GNU nano 3.0 reads files 70% faster and brings several other features.
GNU nano is one of the most popular terminal based text editors. Those who keep forgetting how to exit Vim, seek refuge with GNU nano. It's a godsend for beginners who have to deal with editing in the command line while the experienced nano fans just swear by it.
I wouldn't normally consider a new version of a text editor really newsworthy but a 70% read speed increase is interesting to investigate even if only for an example of how not to do things from the prior versions.
Source: https://itsfoss.com/nano-3-release/
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Nano 3.0 Released! Reads Files 70% Faster
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(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday September 16 2018, @07:37PM
Not really.
Choose two.
The trouble with "intuitive" interfaces for complex functionality is that no matter how often you use them, they remain slow. Not as slow as having to browse a manual for the right key combination, but much slower than hitting a key combination you know. An expert can be faster with a non-intuitive interface.
The obvious counter is that even "experts" using a powerful piece of software frequently tend to only regularly use, and thus truly be expert with, a certain subset of its capabilities. So an intuitive interface saves even experts a little time whenever they need to do something they don't often do -- but by definition, they don't do that often, so it's wrong to say it saves them a lot of time; in fact, it will almost certainly cost them more time on the routine than it saves them on the unusual.
The standard solution, these days, is to combine two interfaces. Usually (including modern vim and emacs) a menu and/or toolbar system (intuitive and powerful) with a keyboard shortcut system (fast and powerful), with the idea that you'll learn the keyboard shortcuts for anything you use regularly. But it's important to realize that that's two distinct interfaces superimposed, and while the combination does prevent experts from being weighed down by the intuitive interface during the routine, it still only saves them a little time.