laminate installation direction

I also would like to know which direction to lay out my flooring. We have a large kitchen/living room and a front entryway that are separated by about 4' of carpet in our 7 year old home. There is a sliding glass door and four large windows along the back of the kitchen/living room (along the long axis of the room) where the sun comes in most of the day. [FYI, We are replacing carpet and vinyl flooring over concrete and have ordered the appropriate materials (water barrier, etc.).] All of my neighbors with wood or laminate flooring have the planks with the smaller sections of wood kind of like butcher block (I do not know the correct term). They have all installed their smaller planks along the short axis of the kitchen/living room so that in the front entry, the planks are long in the direction that you enter the house. We are putting in large planks of light beech and I think that we should take our neighbors' lead on the direction, but my husband thinks that would make for more cutting on installation. I thinnk that it would be worth it, however, I would like to know if this is just a personal preference issue, or if there is something else we need to know. Do we need to order more if we install it a different direction (is there waste in cutting)?
Any help would be greatly appreciated. Does anybody know if there is a design ideas web site or something that I could browse through?
The flooring arrives in about two weeks.
Thank you !!!

 

Seems you plan to install a laminate floor and are concerned about the orientation of the planks. It is recommended that the planks are installed so that the short side faces the primary light source. The joints are less discernable this way and that is the only reason.