Chess instructors use to say to their students that they are playing with their brains, not with their hands. Therefore, there is no need to move quickly, at least when you don’t have a chess clock pressing you for the next move. The same can be said about coding. The most important part is to think deeply about an efficient solution and go straight forward after that. However, learning to code faster can be a great ally in certain situations. If you are using VS Code, you can benefit from the next features to increase your speed.
Why improving your speed at code is important?
Coding is mainly an intellectual job, but typing is a physical one. In timed job interviews, coding quickly is essential. Interviewers will see you in action. If you know shortcuts or you use extensions that help you to code faster you will be able to impress them and it will be more likely that they offer you a job.
Your code editor your instrument: the more you practice with it and the more advanced techniques you learn, the more likely you will be to dazzle your audience with your talent in your performance.
For that reason, the first step to code faster is to learn to type. Obviously. Why do you keep using just two fingers when typing? Let your other eight fingers give you a hand!
Once you learn to type, practice a lot! Try this game for that.
Summit the power of Keyboard shortcuts
Type faster is just the first step for coding faster. You also need to learn to type less. For achieving this goal, keyboard shortcuts are your best ally in becoming a fast coder.
In VS Code, if you create a file with a .html extension, you can type an Emmet abbreviation like html:5 and then hit the tab key to get an entire skeleton of a webpage built for you, complete with a DOCTYPE, <html> tag, <head> tag, <body> tag, etc without having to remember how to lay all that out yourself.
Trust in Autocomplete
Text predictor is another key ally in your coding. Take advantage of autocomplete, often referred to as IntelliSense. Don’t feel scared of the tab key. For example, when coding JavaScript, if you want to use document.querySelector to find an element on the page, in most code editors, all you will likely need to do is type doc, press the tab key to autocomplete it to document, then type .queryS, and press the tab key to autocomplete it to querySelector. While it may not seem like saving yourself from typing ten or so keys would improve speed much, those seconds can add up to minutes quickly in an hour-long coding session, which can buy you precious time in an interview situation where minutes can make the difference between possibly solving the exercise or not solving it in time.
Editor extensions
Editor extensions can help you to boost the features previously mentioned. Most code editors have extension systems that let you add useful features to your editor to speed things up in various ways. Extensions can be used to add more keyboard shortcuts, more autocomplete features, or other conveniences. You should take some time to look at lists of popular extensions, such as Top 10 VS Code extensions for 2021, and install anything that looks like it might speed up your workflow.