Why Geeks should write

Given the technical nature of CS, most people think that words do not have much use in the field. However, communication skills are not to be underestimated for us self proclaimed geeks. As Joel Spolsky says on his blog 'Joel on Software', "The difference between a tolerable programmer and a great programmer is not how many programming languages they know, and it's not whether they prefer Python or Java. It's whether they can communicate their ideas." It matters not how well you can write in the language of programmers if you cannot write in the language of Humans.

One of the ways in which writing comes in handy to a programmer is in keeping track of what you do and how you do it. Despite what some people(like myself) may believe, you cannot possibly keep track of every single thing you did in every single line of your 100 line program. Having written up code for any assignment, there will come a point where you will hit an error and then you shall be left wondering where you went wrong. So when you go about debugging you code and maybe trying to find out where you messed up, writing out your process would definitely help. Furthermore, the whole point of making apps, advancing technology, all what we do in CS, is to make things that we want people to use all the time. How can anyone possibly use something if they don't understand what it is or what it does? A good programmer should be able to write and communicate to their peers as well as their customers what their code does. Without that, no matter how brilliant the code, nobody will understand its value.

So do yourself a favour, and pick up those writing skills you left behind in High School English.