Re: forward masking (was: Re: Hugos)

From: James Wetterau (jwjr@panix.com)
Date: Mon Dec 18 2000 - 22:22:20 MST


...
> Typing certainly doesn't require consciousness. I recall one occasion
> when I turned around to talk to someone - my brother, in fact - and found,
> when I turned back, that some keywords had been typed on the screen. At
> the very least, the word-to-finger connection is direct and does not
> require conscious attention. That being the case, it seems quite possible
> that a slip of the fingers could occur independently of a slip of the
> mind's tongue. ...

Last I heard it's fairly well possible to have two distinct channels
you communicate meaningfully on. One should be audio and one visual.
If you can type by sight (not pronouncing the words in your head by
visualizing how the typed conversation will look) you can probably
speak simultaneously. If you use the speech channel for both you
probably can't do them simultaneously. I've known at least one
accomplished hacker and one dilettante English maven who can carry on
100+ wpm typing conversations while talking fluidly. People who use
the same channel for both lines can learn to buffer, though, and use
alternating bursty message forming sessions which can then be each
indepently slowly dumped for reasonably steady output on both lines.
This is how I manage to talk and do email at the same time. Drives
some people bananas though, as they insist I can't really be listening
to them while typing to someone else.

Regards,
James



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