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Bradly Lams
11/21/14
Paper 3 Final Revised Draft
Words Behind Programming
The first time I ever saw a code was actually my senior year of high school when I took
my first programming class. Being that my major is Computer Science, it was pretty bad that I
had a very small amount of experience with this new language heading into college. However,
ever since pre-k I have been taught new words and how to become a better writer. New
combinations of words that are used to complete a sentence that conveys a meaning. Each year
teachers taught me a different way to use these words and what to do with them or how to use
them now as I enter college. After finally deciding to major in Computer Science in college I
switched to a totally different type of writing life. Instead of writing fifteen hundred words each
week like most college students, I switched to a type of writing where writing code is what I do
instead. The amount of time I spent writing code outweighed the amount of time I spent writing
normally when I started my major. Now the question is, Why and How is it that I spend more
time writing a bunch of letters, numbers and symbols than writing normally like I am now?
Coding is not like one would think it is, just writing a bunch of stuff and make something pop up
on the screen. Look at coding as tools, tools one needs to solve a problem. Programming in
general is like problem solving with what you know and the coding are the tools one needs to
solve the problem. Programming in general is solving a problems with the tools you know. It is a
complex system with a wide field of possible ideas one can use to create something new. With
my research I will describe how greatly of a difference there is between my programming and
my writing as well as the length amount of both writing types. While In the article What Can

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Programmers and Writers Learn From One Another by Katrina Schwartz, she tries to convey
the concept that both coding and writing literature are not as different as people perceives them
to be, with my research I will describe how greatly of a difference there is between writing code
and writing words..
Foundations of Programming was the first programming class I took where I was first
introduced to coding. Learning the basics of programming was a new thing to me. Spending
about fifty minutes a day five days a week I coded simple stuff for beginners. Coding was still
not as important to me as it is now. Writing essays and research papers for my history and
English classes was still what I spent most of my time on. On my first semester of college I was
enrolled in Intro to Programming C where I again learned a different language. Here I was
introduced to coding in a different program with different rules. On the other hand, I was also
enrolled in Composition 1 where I had to write three fifteen hundred word essays and 3 short
response homeworks each week. At the beginning I did not realize how much time I would
spend writing code for my intro class, I had experience from a year before but most of the
material was still new to me. In my composition class I had to write responses to what we had to
read also talk about our opinions and thoughts. These short answers took me from about thirty to
forty-five minutes with no distractions.
Method
Using a log, I recorded the date, activity, time amount, and length of the activity for 6
days to see my performance. With this log I will determine the time and length difference
between the two different writing processes. On this log I only recorded the times I wrote code
using the Code:Blocks compiler and writing words using my laptop. Both ways were recorded
when I either did an assignment or wrote freely. I also used testimonial support by asking a

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colleague that had the same situation, Do you think you spend more time writing code than
writing words? Why or why not? and used her answers to support my conclusion about the
research. Using the article provided to me by Professor Guenzel, What Can Programmers and
Writers Learn From One Another by Katrina Schwartz I compared her theories with my results
that I have discovered with my recordings.
Results
Foundations of Programming was the first programming class I took where I was first
introduced to coding. Learning the basics of programming was a new thing to me. Spending
about fifty minutes a day five days a week I coded simple stuff for beginners. Coding was still
not as important to me as it is now. Writing essays and research papers for my history and
English classes was still what I spent most of my time on. On my first semester of college I was
enrolled in Intro to Programming C where I again learned a different language. Here I was
introduced to coding in a different program with different rules. On the other hand, I was also
enrolled in Composition 1 where I had to write three fifteen hundred word essays and 3 short
response homeworks each week. At the beginning I did not realize how much time I would
spend writing code for my intro class, I had experience from a year before but most of the
material was still new to me. In my composition class I had to write responses to what we had to
read also talk about our opinions and thoughts. These short answers took me from about thirty to
forty-five minutes with no distractions.
After creating seven different programs and programs done in class I was able to record a
log from Thursday 11/13/14 to Tuesday 11/18/14 of the amount of time spent writing code, as
well as writing my final exam and my short responses for my composition class, in the past
week. Due to the fact that I had a program that had to be finished and turned in on one of the

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days recorded I noticed that in the first two days I spent a total of 6 hours of writing about two
hundred lines of code, two hours of writing code in class, and four hours of writing personal
code, in compared to my normal writing which was recorded on the same two days of thirty
minutes responding to a homework assignment and ten minutes another day from personal
writing. On the next two days it was the weekend where I had no academic coding or writing
needed until Sunday night, on these days I was able to record a total of two hours of writing code
and about fifteen minutes of normal writing for my homework assignment due on Sunday night.
The last two days consisted of both my class on Programming and Composition on one day and
no class my last day. After my recordings I came with a result of only one hour of coding and
two hours of normal writing due to my rough draft which was fifteen hundred words. I came
with the conclusion that the amount of time spent writing code has over exceeded the amount
spent writing normally.
Writing Code
Writing Words

Date
11/13
11/14
11/15
11/16
11/17
11/18

Date
11/13
11/14
11/15
11/16
11/17
11/18

Activity
Activity
Homework
ProgramPersonal
Homework
Class
None
Personal
Homework
Personal Paper
None
Class

Time Amount
Time amount
30 minutes
4 hours
10 minutes
2 hours0 minutes
1 hour15 minutes
1 hour 2 hours
2 hours0 minutes

Length(words)
Length (lines of code)
100 hundreds
200 30 words
50
0 words
30
25 words
40 1500 words
O words
105

Personal

1 hour

35

The reason for the amount of time one spends writing code is due to the amount of time
one needs to organize the program. It takes a while for one to first see what the resulting goal for
the program is so one knows how to start it. Starting a code in the wrong way will cause the rest
of your code to fail. Once you have found that out one needs to write the code in a way that it

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connects with every other code that one wrote. You can see it as a puzzle that needs to be built
that can be made off of many different pieces. In this process you take time to find what to use
and see if it works and if it doesnt then one has to start over and find another way to do it.
However, writing code isnt just about techniques and strategies but also on the passion you have
with the material. You will reject spending excess time writing code if you dont enjoy it or hate
writing it that is another reason why I spend that much time with it. Even though after my
research the results show how I spend more time writing code than normal writing that does not
mean that I dont write normal at all. After asking my colleague that is also in the same
programming class and another composition class, of her intake with the amount of time spent
with both writing styles. Her response is that One just needs to spend more time on the code for
its quality than normal writing because we have mastered it already. She believes that the
quality of the code is what causes the time consumption when writing code. With this testimony
I realize that not only I have a different prospective in the view of writing styles. Others have
also been seen a difference with the time spent and the length of both writing types.
Other Factors that affected these findings are the assignments that were implied by both
classes. In my program that I had to write, which took me 6 hours, there is a difference with the
amount of time spent coding in class or personal coding. As well as the amount of time writing
my essay and the amount of time writing homework responses or blogs on my eportfolio. One
can make a correlation between the amount of time spent on an assignments with both types of
writing and the amount of time writing small codes or short responses. Also with the assignments
as a factor of time, they also affect the length of both the writing styles. It seems to me that
assignments require a longer length to complete them which causes the amount of time spent on

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the assignment to take longer than the amount of time it would take to write a personal code or a
personal blog.
Discussion
In my research I was able to explain my experience with the difference in the amount of
time spent writing code, or programming, and writing normally. I used my log that recorded my
findings in a 6 day period and compared both writing types. After my results I have determined
that according to my theory, I reject Schwartzs theory that both writing literature and coding are
similar. I have found that they are distinctively different due difference in time spent,
complexity, and rigorousness between the two. However, my findings could have been affected
by both my free time, self-motivation, interest, the number of assignments given to me from each
course, and the amount of time struggling with coding as novice. If I were to continue my
research into this topic, I would like to study if there is a correlation between amount of coding
written and amount of normal writing done with the amount of free time that I have. Writing
three times a week, three essays, and all the other personal writing I do still means I write a good
amount. Yet each year as I go deeper in my major my normal will decrease as my code writing
will increase.