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A bit over fifteen years ago, developer Joel Spolsky wrote:
It makes me think of those researchers who say that basically people can't control what they eat, so any attempt to diet is bound to be short term and they will always yoyo back to their natural weight. Maybe as a software developer I really can't control when I'm productive, and I just have to take the slow times with the fast times and hope that they average out to enough lines of code to make me employable.
What drives me crazy is that ever since my first job I've realized that as a developer, I usually average about two or three hours a day of productive coding. When I had a summer internship at Microsoft, a fellow intern told me he was actually only going into work from 12 to 5 every day. Five hours, minus lunch, and his team loved him because he still managed to get a lot more done than average. I've found the same thing to be true. I feel a little bit guilty when I see how hard everybody else seems to be working, and I get about two or three quality hours in a day, and still I've always been one of the most productive members of the team. That's probably why when Peopleware and XP insist on eliminating overtime and working strictly 40 hour weeks, they do so secure in the knowledge that this won't reduce a team's output.
But it's not the days when I "only" get two hours of work done that worry me. It's the days when I can't do anything.
The writer reckons the key to a productive day of writing software lies most in just getting started at the beginning of it. Do Soylentils have tried-and-true tricks to getting into the flow of writing code, or is it always catch-as-catch-can?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday July 27 2017, @10:05AM (3 children)
Awesome list. Worth pinning to the wall.
Find a quiet place? In an open plan office? No.
A colleague now has $400 noise cancelling earphones muff things. Overkill?
(Score: 4, Funny) by deimtee on Thursday July 27 2017, @02:43PM
The main way to increase productivity with those earphones is when someone walks up and starts talking, you don't take them off
If you cough while drinking cheap red wine it really cleans out your sinuses.
(Score: 2) by SecurityGuy on Thursday July 27 2017, @06:35PM (1 child)
Yes. Noise cancelling headphones actually don't work that well. Get a pair of in-ear headphones with triple flange inserts. They're basically earplugs with speakers in them. My cheap pair WITH the inserts set me back around $60, and there have been tons of times people walk in and start talking to me and I don't realize until I either see them or they tap me on the shoulder. My *good* pair was almost $400, but I'd be lying to you if I said they were good enough to be worth another $300. They sound better, sure, but $300 better? Nah.
(Score: 2) by Immerman on Thursday July 27 2017, @11:48PM
Clearly you're not enough of a hard-core audiophile. you should have been using them only with oxygen-free wires and white-gold plated jacks. :-D