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There is often pressure inside Software development for Software developers to code outside of work hours. Coding is considered a passion for some, but others don’t think this way. They are more than happy to not code in their spare time. This is OK.
Meetup groups, side-projects, coding quizzes, side-hustles, developing websites for friends and family. Improving your coding skills takes time, effort, discipline and sacrifice. But is it really necessary? That is for you to decide.
There is no doubt that there is importance to setting goals. It helps to see where you are going and to have something you are working towards. Being the best coder isn’t everyone’s goal.
People often feel peer pressure to code outside of hours, to stay competitive and to be the best. If someone is making you feel this way, you can remind yourself that it is perfectly OK to only code at work. Some people might even argue that doing too much can have diminishing returns…
[...] In short, it is perfectly OK to have a life outside of work. Many people hack their schedules according to their own goals and interests, which may or may not include coding. If you think this post could help someone out there, please share it around!
(Score: 3, Insightful) by AthanasiusKircher on Sunday May 05 2019, @03:31AM (4 children)
Some folks like hobbies related to their jobs. Some like to have very disparate hobbies and find pleasure in doing stuff completely unrelated to the way they think at work and the types of tasks they do there. Some are in the middle.
What is healthy is continuing to learn about your work. Sometimes you get that done as part of your work. Sometimes you need to add some exploratory activities outside of work hours to expand your knowledge. It may depend on your job and its tasks (and flexibilty in time/projects), or it may depend on your personality and when and where you can concentrate and learn best.
What isn't healthy usually is when work begins to take over your life so you don't have anything else. If something were ever to happen to your work situation, how would you define yourself outside of it? Even worse is giving up on other life goals (health, family, other relationships, other opportunities..) just to chase a work-related goal that won't give you happiness.
Often people tend to tell themselves that work is paramount, money is important, you need to be financially settled, secure, etc., and you obsess about getting ahead in work.
But sometimes you need to just take an hour and throw a ball around with your 8-year-old son, or go to your 12-year-old daughter's ballet recital, or be there for your significant otther more often... Or call your parents or make friends or go hiking and eat better and...
Everyone has to find their own balance. So I give no general advice. Just make sure if you're devoting extra time to work that it's fulfilling for you and that it's helping achieve BALANCED goals in various parts of the life you want.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Sunday May 05 2019, @03:39AM (2 children)
I did a fair amount of research work for a while, and it was remarkable how much of my "hobby time" activities found serious practical application in the research. If you don't have any of those outside experiences, you can't bring them into the office for practical use.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 2) by krishnoid on Monday May 06 2019, @09:43PM (1 child)
Can you describe a few of these? I've found a couple hobby-time activities that extended/integrated two technologies/tools/techniques to produce something very specific and impractical, the skills from which helped in other areas. Just the exercise of integrating tools pays off when you're on the spot at work to pull something together that solves a product development problem, regardless of how purposeless the result of your original integration project was.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by JoeMerchant on Monday May 06 2019, @09:56PM
The big one that sticks in my mind was this, Problem statement: secure a supine adult to a platform comfortably such that the platform may accelerate their skeletal frame head-to-foot at up to +/- 0.6g at a rate of approximately 2Hz, whilst leaving the soft tissues free to move.
Solution: secure the feet to a solid footboard using snowboard boots and bindings.
That one got refined away from the snowboard boots later when the accelerations required moved down from 0.6 to about 0.2, but snowboard boots, and bindings, were readily available off the shelf at a cost less than the engineering hours required to even begin to talk about how to accomplish the goal from scratch.
Minor plumbing stuff from automotive hot-rod hobby work came in handy periodically, of course Ham radio is a virtual requirement in some RF work, I believe SCUBA came into play more than once - including neoprene material from wetsuits.
Then we can get into woodworking / cabinetry making... and later days 3D printing, with obvious implications for prototype fabrication of all kinds.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 3, Funny) by krishnoid on Sunday May 05 2019, @07:22AM
Right -- the furry conventions. Don't forget those.