9 ms·

What it feels like to be in the zone as a programmer

285 points by dopeboy 9y ago

Uptrenda 9y ago
Good luck ever getting in the zone if you do anything with modern blockchains (especially Ethereum.) All of the documentation is terrible and you waste hours trying to find a bug only to realise it was a problem with the library all along... Assuming of course: that you don't give up after seeing the "developer tools." What little tools you have for solving problems feels like you're trying to carve a delicate ice statue with a giant hammer while wearing clown gloves. How do you deal with the related stress of having to struggle against needlessly difficult tools, libraries, documentation, and bugs caused by other people?
- TimJRobinson 9y ago
  Most of the time I've found no one intended for the tooling to be difficult to use, it's just that they didn't know any better or haven't had time to fix it. Those are still early alpha projects so the creators are probably more focused on the core product than the tooling around it. Follow the boy scouts rule: leave documentation and code in a better state than you found it. If enough of us do that it'll naturally get better over time.
fnayr 9y ago
This is almost disturbingly accurate to how I feel in the "zone" as well. A consequence of this is it's hard to have a healthy life as a self-employed programmer. If I want the app I'm working on finished faster (and I do or I'll run out of money), I must stay in the zone as long as possible. Which means I must ignore people as long as possible and put off eating/exercising as long as possible as well.
- maxxxxx 9y ago
  Putting off exercising and eating may work short term but I don't think it's a good idea to do long term. In the long run you need to find a sustainable rhythm.
  - fnayr 9y ago
    I agree. And the excuse I tell myself it's only temporary. But it's been 3 years now...sigh.
- ambicapter 9y ago
  Why not get your exercising out of the way early in the day?
d33 9y ago
How does "being in the zone" compare to being in the state of "flow" [0]? Are those synonymous? [0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flow_(psychology) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flow_(psychology)
- db48x 9y ago
  Yep.
- emddudley 9y ago
  Different words for the same thing.
- depressedpanda 9y ago
  The first sentence in the article reads: "In positive psychology, flow, also known as the zone, is the mental state of operation in which a person performing an activity is fully immersed in a feeling of energized focus, full involvement, and enjoyment in the process of the activity." Also: "Achieving flow is often colloquially referred to as being in the zone." So, yes, they are synonymous. :-)
sktrdie 9y ago
I get this too, but it's very draining - similar to doing an intensive workout, or given a talk at a conference. The negatives are obvious; less sociable, more easily irritated, wanting to be by yourself. After you've spent a day in the zone, you're not really "party material". The positive (apart from being very productive) is that I use it to get my negative feelings out of the way - anything that is bothering in my life is somehow gone when I am in "the zone" - it is truly a zen feeling as the author explains. It's also important to mention that you can't force yourself to be in the zone. It comes and goes, with very little control on your behalf. People that try to force themselves in the zone by working harder, are not truly in the zone. It happens seamlessly without you even knowing or wanting it. For instance, I'm hardly in the zone. It happens probably once every two weeks, if not less - it also depends on what I'm working on; if it's something new and exciting I'm more predisposed to get in the zone. Being in the zone is like getting an adrenaline rush - you can force yourself to do it more often (go skydiving for instance), but if you do it too often you'll quickly drain out and not enjoy it as you used to.
- synthmeat 9y ago
  > It comes and goes, with very little control on your behalf. As anecdata makes the data, here's mine - you have a lot of control of it. If you can control your environment (audio, light, temperature, food, exercise, communication, interaction, ...), you can get in the zone too just by virtue of almost exclusively focusing on some type of work you get in the zone for in the first place. Live by code, die by code.
  - falcolas 9y ago
    No amount of control of my environment will put me in the zone when I'm working on boring code. Crud framework? I'll be reading HN while going through the motions. Code review? Time for some stimulating music (though not too stimulating, I do need to pay attention to the code review). But give me something interesting - a real challenge - and I'm able to get into the zone, the hours flying by like they were minutes. My brain has to be able to fully engage with the problem to hit that zone. Of course, I'm a technical lead in my group, so the ability to control my environment is limited. So I get up absurdly early just to get work done before I have to be available to be interrupted.
chrisfinne 9y ago
Well articulated and very concise. This could have been laboriously drawn out into a 10 page article. "Half as long" writing lesson from "A River Runs Through It" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7vRhOdf-6co https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7vRhOdf-6co
gggdvnkhmbgjvbn 9y ago
Used to get this feeling from video games, now i get paid for it as a programmer. As a result I've found it hard to go back.
amelius 9y ago
I notice that I can be in the zone while programming, but then when I need to research something (do real thinking rather than work by reflexes), I pop out of it.
robotmay 9y ago
I find that isolating myself from my surroundings can actually help encourage me get into the zone. I work from home, usually by myself, but if I want to get into the zone I'll chuck on a pair of headphones; something about that helps focus me, prevents distractions, and pulls me into the zone more easily. I suggested this to a friend recently whilst he was writing his dissertation, and he found that it worked well for him too and really helped him get through it. However I can't have folk music, as I stumble across a great tune too often and get up to play it instead :) It is much easier to stay in the zone when there's a physical barrier between you and other people. Even so much as being asked if you want a cup of tea is enough to pull you out of it. I recently asked my boss to stop other people from phoning me if they want me to be productive, and that really helped. I don't think most people understand what it's like; that amazing feeling you get when you're in the zone when programming, and it can be difficult getting them to understand why it's so frustrating being pulled out of it when a simple message would have sufficed.
amiga-workbench 9y ago
I haven't been getting this much for the last few months, but I think that's due to my scattered workload. I'm about to start a new project build and am looking forward to falling back into the flow. Its a wonderful feeling, its like the fog in my mind has been lifted.
djhworld 9y ago
I sometimes find myself in this situation too. I often find that I feel most productive when I reach this state. But it's quite rare, a lot of my day is interrupted by colleagues, meetings, noisy office etc It's cool, but you can see the downsides. A few weeks ago I basically disappeared for a few days writing some code. Great fun for me, but not exactly boosting growth opportunities for the team.
NicoJuicy 9y ago
This happens a lot to me. Although i always go out friday and saturday evenings. It's just hard sometimes switching it off and takes a reasonable effort... Sometimes i'm more quiet the entire evening and sometimes it's easier. In my mind, i'm constantly thinking about code then and it's hard to be social then. All arround, i'm a very social guy. Just when i leave the zone, i'm not.
xaedes 9y ago
“The Dexterous Butcher” Cook Ting was cutting up an ox for Lord Wen-hui. As every touch of his hand, every heave of his shoulder, every move of his feet, every thrust of his knee — zip! zoop! He slithered the knife along with a zing, and all was in perfect rhythm, as though he were performing the dance of the Mulberry Grove or keeping time to the Ching-shou music. “Ah, this is marvelous!” said Lord Wen-hui. “Imagine skill reaching such heights!” Cook Ting laid down his knife and replied, “What I care about is the Way, which goes beyond skill. When I first began cutting up oxen, all I could see was the ox itself. After three years I no longer saw the whole ox. And now — now I go at it by spirit and don’t look with my eyes. Perception and understanding have come to a stop and spirit moves where it wants. I go along with the natural makeup, strike in the big hollows, guide the knife through the big openings, and following things as they are. So I never touch the smallest ligament or tendon, much less a main joint. “A good cook changes his knife once a year — because he cuts. A mediocre cook changes his knife once a month — because he hacks. I’ve had this knife of mine for nineteen years and I’ve cut up thousands of oxen with it, and yet the blade is as good as though it had just come from the grindstone. There are spaces between the joints, and the blade of the knife has really no thickness. If you insert what has no thickness into such spaces, then there’s plenty of room — more than enough for the blade to play about it. That’s why after nineteen years the blade of my knife is still as good as when it first came from the grindstone. “However, whenever I come to a complicated place, I size up the difficulties, tell myself to watch out and be careful, keep my eyes on what I’m doing, work very slowly, and move the knife with the greatest subtlety, until — flop! the whole thing comes apart like a clod of earth crumbling to the ground. I stand there holding the knife and look all around me, completely satisfied and reluctant to move on, and then I wipe off the knife and put it away.” “Excellent!” said Lord Wen-hui. “I have heard the words of Cook Ting and learned how to care for life!” Translated by Burton Watson (Chuang Tzu: The Basic Writings, 1964) http://www.bopsecrets.org/gateway/passages/chuang-tzu.htm http://www.bopsecrets.org/gateway/passages/chuang-tzu.htm
- xaedes 9y ago
  Also: The Tao of Programming [1] 4.4 Prince Wang's programmer was coding software. His fingers danced upon the keyboard. The program compiled without and error message, and the program ran like a gentle wind. "Excellent!" the Prince exclaimed. "Your technique is faultless!" "Technique?" said the programmer, turning from his terminal, "What I follow is Tao -- beyond all techniques! When I first began to program, I would see before me the whole problem in one mass. After three years, I no longer saw this mass. Instead, I used subroutines. But now I see nothing. My whole being exists in a formless void. My senses are idle. My spirit, free to work without a plan, follows its own instinct. In short, my program writes itself. True, sometimes there are difficult problems. I see them coming, I slow down, I watch silently. Then I change a single line of code and the difficulties vanish like puffs of idle smoke. I then compile the program. I sit still and let the joy of the work fill my being. I close my eyes for a moment and then log off." Prince Wang said, "Would that all of my programmers were as wise!" [1] The Tao of Programming http://www.mit.edu/~xela/tao.html http://www.mit.edu/~xela/tao.html
cpayne624 9y ago
I'm a Fed engineer and spent a 4 mo. assignment on an integrated team with Pivotal pairing exclusively. It was a long 4 months for me. There was no "zone." I'm not built for pairing.
- calafrax 9y ago
  pair programming is an anti-process. its only purpose is to control employees, limit individual productivity, and drive down wages.
  - majewsky 9y ago
    > drive down wages Yeah, because everyone knows that you have to pay less wages when you have two people do the job of one.
    - calafrax 9y ago
      Sure you do. Two mediocre programmers working as a pair might get 100k each. One elite programmer can clear 7 figures easily. The elite programmer will also have much more control over the IP they create and be able to negotiate much more stringent terms for how it is used. If you think pair programming is a good idea you are just at the bottom of the industry.
      - bussierem 9y ago
        > One elite programmer can clear 7 figures easily Can I come live in this fantasy world you found yourself in please? You're gonna need to provide some SERIOUS proof for a claim like that...
- kornork 9y ago
  I think pairing can be different for different people. I've often heard people saying that "the zone" comes more easily when pairing. Personally, any zone I'm feeling pairing has a different character from one achieved alone. It's easier to focus on the task at hand (because there's peer pressure).
tastyface 9y ago
Speaking of The Zone: I often see programmers on HN talk about building mental castles of their programs, but I feel like I don't really code the same way. Instead, my thinking seems more "functional". For a given problem, I can often make out the faint outline of an optimal solution, but there's a lot of cruft and misplaced bits in the way. Most of my work involves mentally simulating the consequences of different options and then bending the architecture into such a shape that the whole thing just sort of assembles on its own. I'm only "in the zone" when I have to make that final leap. There's very little castle-building along the way. As a result, I feel like I'm somewhat incapable of working on massive, multi-part architectures, since I just can't see the running state in my head. Once I zoom in to work on a single component, the rest fade from memory and I lose the big picture. On the other hand, I have no problem working in open-office environments: I don't mentally deal with a lot of program state, so I'm able to just dive right back in. This also influences my code to be more functional, as I know I can rely on e.g. idempotent methods to keep doing what they're supposed to regardless of any finicky global state. I wish I could get better at building those "mental castles" since it's a huge barrier to designing complex architectures (like games). I don't want to be stuck forever working on the leaves of the tree. Might be related to OCD: I've had the disorder for a long time and I've sort of conditioned myself to avoid keeping running thoughts in memory before the "OCD daemon" distorts them into something horrible. As a result, much of my thinking is necessarily spontaneous and intuitive, or at the very least wordless. Can anyone else relate?
- synthmeat 9y ago
  I relate. > I wish I could get better at building those "mental castles" since it's a huge barrier to working on complex architectures like as games. If you truly wish to do so - go make technically challenging systems like games. From start to end. Solo.
  - tastyface 9y ago
    Yeah — trying to do that right now! Hope it gets easier over time.
  - freehunter 9y ago
deleted 9y ago
[deleted]
rhizome31 9y ago
I don't think I've ever experienced anything like this. As I practice TDD, my usual workflow is think -> test -> code, code usually being the easiest part. Things like "problems break down instantly", "everything becomes effortless" sound strange and exciting. I wonder how that relates to the concepts of maintainability, cowboy programming and 10x engineer. I've met a few programmers in my career who were able to write a huge amount of code doing wonderful things without testing at all. One guy I think of would spend days coding without even trying to compile his code and apparently, except for minor typos he could quickly fix, his code was working when he decided to compile and test it. He impressed bosses and colleagues with amazing features developed in a very short time but, on the other hand, nobody on the team was able to maintain his code. This was explicitly stated and accepted by team members, we knew we couldn't maintain his code but we were ready to accept it given the productivity of the guy. It was a trade-off. This way of working is completely alien to me. I can't think things in my head out of nothing and write working code. I need to start building something and get feedback from the computer to go to the next step. That's why when I was introduced to TDD it immediately made a lot of sense to me. It matched the way I was already operating. If I didn't have this workflow I think I would be unable to write even mildly complex code. It's interesting how people can operate differently. In a way I'm a bit jealous of those "zone" programmers who can produce amazing things very quickly. But, on the other hand, I can see that I'm also useful because companies hire me and want to keep me. I've seen many times people taking over my code, maintain it and develop it further. I've even been explicitly told a few times that my code was very easy to understand and maintain. Seeing people taking over my code and develop it further is one of the most satisfying things in my work.
- rnabel 9y ago
  Interesting point re the zone-programming and being a cowboy programmer. I don't think that 'in the zone'-programming has to produce bad code, though (if that's what you are saying). I'd argue that it depends on what gives you a reward. If you take pride in your code then you will find it rewarding to write tests and decent comments etc., and more importantly make a habit of doing so. A lot of people who write bad code think that they can get away with it because they are 'smart'. These same people then spend a ton of time trying to find bugs. It sounds like your colleague is 'finishing' features by accumulating tech debt. While this may impress non-technical management, from my experience, it wouldn't make it into a high-quality production code base. From people I've worked with, it seems like most people go through phases of extreme productivity ('being in the zone'). The code quality may suffer somewhat during those times, but they don't throw all good practice out of the window (not compiling for days, no tests?!?).
dghughes 9y ago
I'm trying my hand at programming and I'm surprised at my progress so far. But as a person who is very unfocused and poor at math programming has got to be the worst thing on earth for me. But I like it, and math. As with anything learning to focus takes effort it's different for each person. But a clean desk, calm environment, goals, lots of sleep, eat well and I find post exercise all helps. Not just learning to program but any task.
atom-morgan 9y ago
What it feels like to be in the zone as a programmer is what it feels like to be in the zone doing any task that can put you into flow state.
EliRivers 9y ago
Oh yeah, here comes the zone, here comes the zone, it's taken an hour of intense study of all this code but now I can see all the pieces at once inside my head and I can feel exactly how to thread this code right through the middle of all of it and - COLLEAGUE LEANS OVER FROM NEARBY DESK IN OPEN OFFICE: "Hey buddy, what's the password for the - oh no, wait I remember." Wait, what was I doing? What's all this code on my monitors? Why was I looking at any of this?
- jackcosgrove 9y ago
  I don't feel much while in the zone but I sure get irritable when someone disrupts it.
- gprasanth 9y ago
  http://heeris.id.au/2013/this-is-why-you-shouldnt-interrupt-a-programmer/ http://heeris.id.au/2013/this-is-why-you-shouldnt-interrupt-...
astrod 9y ago
I started using guarana tablets to help stay 'super' focused, but only when required. I find it helps me a lot with productivity, often 3+ hours of optimum output. No side effects, only other supplements I take regularly are fish oil and I dont drink coffee or energy drinks.
bcrisman 9y ago
I get there as well, but it takes a bit. Generally, the zone hits me when I'm in crunch time and I know that I won't have any meetings for a while. My ideas all work together and if I get stuck on something, it's not long before I can figure it out. I can generally get a ton of work accomplished. But then, someone knocks on my cube to say, "do you know where the elevators are at?"
EdgarVerona 9y ago
Getting in the zone is something exhilarating for me - I experience euphoria, though I don't really notice the feeling until after it's over or if I get broken out of it. It was actually something that as of late has started to disturb me: I notice that I live for moments like that, when I get in the zone and the whole world melts away. I feel like a junkie seeking a high, and thinking back on my youth and how destructive I was to my body and my interpersonal relationships in pursuit of "code all the time," I wonder whether that analogy is even more accurate than I'd like to believe. I look back on my life and wonder if I've actually been a lifelong addict who is lucky enough to have a productive output of his addiction rather than a functioning member of society. I don't know if others feel or have felt this way, or if it's just a phase that I'm going through. But these are my thoughts at the moment.
- DutchKevv 9y ago
  Same here.. I made a comment somewhere saying the same as you, but I feel like I'm in the middle of the thing your looking back at. I really do feel like a junky, that has found a pile of whatever it needs and the world encourages me to get better in 'using' and keeps paying me more to get higher and higher.. it's such a strange 'unethical' feeling.. I'm programming for about 8 years now in full throttle, and it keeps feeling stranger.. I'm somehow glad others experience it also...
- sherkaner 9y ago
  I'm completely opposite. I was playing chess from the childhood, and started programming only in the university. As a result, I'm addicted to chess, but not to programming. It is ridiculously hard for me to get in a zone while working, while I can play chess non-stop for hours and hours without noticing the time flying by. I'd love to reverse chess and programming....
Tepix 9y ago
Recommended related reading: Zenclavier - Extreme Keyboarding by Tom Christiansen http://archive.oreilly.com/pub/a/oreilly/news/zenclavier_1299.html http://archive.oreilly.com/pub/a/oreilly/news/zenclavier_129...
tekromancr 9y ago
I haven't been in the zone for months. It's mostly general dissatisfaction with my job, but it's gotten worse of late. On an average day, there will be 4 hours of calls spread an hour or less apart for the first half of the day, with the potential for surprise calls for the rest of the day. The irony is that a lot of these calls are about why things aren't getting done. The surprise calls are the worst. Even if I might have 2 hours of uninterupted time at the end of a day (when I am most tired and frustrated) it is impossible to get focused when there is always a looming threat of interruption. It's gotten so bad that I only get anything done late at night or over weekends, but then I am tired during weekdays and resentful that I had to throw away my freetime in order to move a project forward.
- ratherbefuddled 9y ago
  Might not help if you're stuck in an authoritarian micro managing matrix but some tactics I've found useful before. 1) Block out 3 hours in the morning and 3 in the afternoon in your calendar as busy, marked private, at slightly different times each day. If asked you can be honest, many times people will not ask and simply avoid booking. 2) Leave your least productive time of day open for 90 minutes of meetings - for me this was post lunch. 3) Always reply and ask for an agenda so you can be sure you're necessary (it's a constructive way of making the requester think twice about whether they really need a meeting). 4) Often suggest a new time that is only 30 minutes long rather than the default hour. 5) Decline politely if you are not specifically necessary (Thanks for the invite Peter, appreciate being kept informed but I don't think you need me for this and I have a conflict - no need to reschedule for me). But mainly just look for a way to leave. That company is heading down the tubes.
  - zild3d 9y ago
    Simple and easy to apply. I will start using some of these, thanks
- devrandomguy 9y ago
  I have been in a situation like that, when I worked for a company that had me managing 12 to 30 clients directly. There is a standard solution to this problem: a ticket / issue system. If clients won't use that, and you need to keep them, then hire someone to transcribe their issues into the system, and increase your prices to cover it. The clients might find that they prefer interacting with a more business/people oriented person, rather than a stressed out INTP. That person could also help you schedule and estimate work, without needing to have programming skills themselves; another source of stress mitigated. In theory, recovering your full productivity would lead to a net increase in the value of your services, despite the expense of this new person on staff.
macca321 9y ago
Then the next day you realise how to achieve the same thing in a tenth of the code...
kolari 9y ago
I guess when a programmer is in the zone, he/she is much more effective communicating/instructing the machines (in the language defined between humans and machines), than communicating with other humans (programmers or not).
depressedpanda 9y ago
What a great article; it concisely and succinctly describes what's going on, and does so much better than I could. I shared it with my significant other, in order for her to better understand the grumpy responses she sometimes gets when asking seemingly innocuous questions like "would you like some tea?"
twodave 9y ago
I disagree with the premise of this article (though I haven't always). I generally find that I'm always in the zone for _something_, and after more than a decade writing code I've found that often when I'm feeling less productive at it, it's because there is some deficiency in my life, be it social interaction, nutrition, fitness, over-exertion, etc. Over the years I've come to know myself better, which allows me to take better care of myself holistically in order to be not just more productive at work, but more content with life in general. Keep everything in it's proper place and all that.
tiku 9y ago
I've done a minor in Flow, the theory about getting in the zone. Very interesting. It manifests itself mostly when the challenge is hard enough and your knowledge is also good on the subject. Boring tasks won't trigger flow etc.
stevewillows 9y ago
Years ago I went through some neurotherapy with a local doctor [1]. One part of the process had clips on my ears and a sensor on my head to read biofeedback (or something along those lines). The game was simple: there's a silo on the screen with a hot air balloon on the left side. When I get into 'the zone', the balloon goes up and around the silo. This will loop for as long as I can hold it. It took about two sessions with minor success, then suddenly it clicked. Now I can easily enter that state on demand. This might sound odd, but the neurotherapy helped eliminate a lot of the negative parts of ADHD without losing the edge that a lot of medications take away. I still have a lot of energy, but I can always sit and focus on the task at hand when I need to. [1] http://www.swingleclinic.com/about/how-does-neurotherapy-work/ http://www.swingleclinic.com/about/how-does-neurotherapy-wor...
orthoganol 9y ago
Prerequisites for 'the zone' (why not call it flow? isn't it the same thing?): a) You have to be interested and eager to get started. If you're not happy with the project, if anything else going on in your life is taking your attention, you will not experience it. b) When you experience it, you feel like you're a 'real' engineer, like that is your true identity now, your imposter syndrome disappears. So ultimately, if you don't identify as a programmer, as opposed to identifying as someone who programs because it pays well or view it as just a temporary phase of your career until you do management or become a startup CEO or something, you may never experience it. c) After you experience it, your brain goes "whoaaa" and needs to recover. You won't be able to experience it for at least another 2-3 days, in my experience.
Excluse 9y ago
Contrary to what a lot of people here have said about boring tasks, I find that's the easiest way for me to get into the zone. While it may not be my most economically productive part of the day (aka I'm not working on the hard, important problems) there's no doubt that for the 10-15 minutes one of those menial tasks requires, I'm in that special state. An environmental trigger for me is to play familiar music. It doesn't have to be a special playlist; any album I've listened to >50 times will suffice. Remaining in the zone requires incremental progress (momentum) which I think is easy to find in a boring, repetitive task that's squarely in your wheelhouse. The real productivity sweet spot is when you're able to get that momentum going on a valuable project.
luckydude 9y ago
Back when I worked at Sun, and got in the zone all the time, I worked on a ~32 hour daily clock. Because some of the work I was doing would take me about 8 hours to get back to the state of mind where I was yesterday. So instead of working 8 hours I would work for about 16, so I actually made 8 hours of forward progress. The 32 hour "day" was so I could have the rest of a normal day to eat, sleep, etc. This got to be common enough that someone made a clock, where you could move the hands, it said "Larry will be in here" and stuck it on my door. I think it was sort of a joke but I think some people actually used it. I couldn't come close to doing anything like that now. And at 55 years old, I can tell you that the days where you get in the zone, for me at least, are few and far between. I used to be able to just go there, now it sort of happens to me and I have to drop everything else and ride it before it fades away.
subwayclub 9y ago
I try to not stay in flow state. It means that the problem I'm working on is too familiar and I should automate the programming of it so that I'm grinding on something hard again. Edit: but it's okay if it's a prototype
engnr567 9y ago
When I was single, for most of my big projects I used to get 70-80% of the work done in 4-5 days of being in the zone. And then spend months on changing the bells and whistles. Now I have to be home at a reasonable hour and hopefully in a good mood. So I have become hesitant to even get into the zone, because getting out of this state of high efficiency would make me extremely irritable. How do married people or those with kids balance such bursts of creativity with personal commitments to their family ?
- SimonPStevens 9y ago
  I usually don't start work on side projects until the kid(s) are asleep. Only works while they are young I guess. My wife has always been understanding of my personal projects, provided I don't let them dominate every waking hour. When they are older I plan to teach them useful complimentary skills. Graphics design. Testing. Copywriting. Marketing. Sales. :-)
  - fencepost 9y ago
    > When they are older I plan to teach them useful complimentary skills. Graphics design. Testing. Copywriting. Marketing. Sales. :-) That's not what most people mean when they say "growing a company."
QuercusMax 9y ago
I find that doing TDD makes it much easier to get in the zone; more importantly, it helps to get back into the zone if I get off track. I typically stub out a bunch of tests (just empty methods named based on what I plan to test), then go one by one and fill in the tests and write the implementations. In the codebase I work in, we use a lot of mocks / fakes, so I typically write my tests "in reverse" - first the verification of results, then the mock / fake expectations for what methods should have been called. Then I'll write the actual implementation, and then fill in the mock inputs. This way, if I get interrupted, it's very easy to transition back into what I was working on, as I make sure to always leave a breadcrumb trail for the next piece (when I run my test, the failure will give me a hint as to the next step to take). And since I have a bunch of stubbed out test methods, once one bit is finished, I can move onto the next one and repeat the process.
- askafriend 9y ago
  The style of work you described sounds like torture to me. I don't know why the idea of TDD sounds so terrible to me but it does.
  - dozzie 9y ago
    Because it sounds like "start with tests, design and plan never". Too often tests-first is a substitute for a thought-out architecture and data flow.
    - QuercusMax 9y ago
      That's certainly true; but when you've done your homework, it can be a really great experience. For example: the past 3 weeks I've been pounding out tons of code in a TDD fashion. But prior to that: * I spent a week writing up a detailed design document and getting feedback from teammates and stakeholders. * Another week refactoring (TRULY refactoring; no changes to functionality) the existing implementation so I can reuse the existing work in my new implementation.
klarrimore 9y ago
You mean when you sit down at your keyboard 45 minutes after you popped those Adderall?
deleted 9y ago
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285 points by dopeboy 9y ago

Good luck ever getting in the zone if you do anything with modern blockchains (especially Ethereum.) All of the documentation is terrible and you waste hours trying to find a bug only to realise it was a problem with the library all along... Assuming of course: that you don't give up after seeing the "developer tools." What little tools you have for solving problems feels like you're trying to carve a delicate ice statue with a giant hammer while wearing clown gloves. How do you deal with the related stress of having to struggle against needlessly difficult tools, libraries, documentation, and bugs caused by other people?

TimJRobinson 9y ago
Most of the time I've found no one intended for the tooling to be difficult to use, it's just that they didn't know any better or haven't had time to fix it. Those are still early alpha projects so the creators are probably more focused on the core product than the tooling around it. Follow the boy scouts rule: leave documentation and code in a better state than you found it. If enough of us do that it'll naturally get better over time.

fnayr 9y ago

This is almost disturbingly accurate to how I feel in the "zone" as well. A consequence of this is it's hard to have a healthy life as a self-employed programmer. If I want the app I'm working on finished faster (and I do or I'll run out of money), I must stay in the zone as long as possible. Which means I must ignore people as long as possible and put off eating/exercising as long as possible as well.

maxxxxx 9y ago
Putting off exercising and eating may work short term but I don't think it's a good idea to do long term. In the long run you need to find a sustainable rhythm.
- fnayr 9y ago
  I agree. And the excuse I tell myself it's only temporary. But it's been 3 years now...sigh.
ambicapter 9y ago
Why not get your exercising out of the way early in the day?

d33 9y ago

How does "being in the zone" compare to being in the state of "flow" [0]? Are those synonymous? [0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flow_(psychology) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flow_(psychology)

db48x 9y ago
Yep.
emddudley 9y ago
Different words for the same thing.
depressedpanda 9y ago
The first sentence in the article reads: "In positive psychology, flow, also known as the zone, is the mental state of operation in which a person performing an activity is fully immersed in a feeling of energized focus, full involvement, and enjoyment in the process of the activity." Also: "Achieving flow is often colloquially referred to as being in the zone." So, yes, they are synonymous. :-)

sktrdie 9y ago

I get this too, but it's very draining - similar to doing an intensive workout, or given a talk at a conference. The negatives are obvious; less sociable, more easily irritated, wanting to be by yourself. After you've spent a day in the zone, you're not really "party material". The positive (apart from being very productive) is that I use it to get my negative feelings out of the way - anything that is bothering in my life is somehow gone when I am in "the zone" - it is truly a zen feeling as the author explains. It's also important to mention that you can't force yourself to be in the zone. It comes and goes, with very little control on your behalf. People that try to force themselves in the zone by working harder, are not truly in the zone. It happens seamlessly without you even knowing or wanting it. For instance, I'm hardly in the zone. It happens probably once every two weeks, if not less - it also depends on what I'm working on; if it's something new and exciting I'm more predisposed to get in the zone. Being in the zone is like getting an adrenaline rush - you can force yourself to do it more often (go skydiving for instance), but if you do it too often you'll quickly drain out and not enjoy it as you used to.

synthmeat 9y ago
> It comes and goes, with very little control on your behalf. As anecdata makes the data, here's mine - you have a lot of control of it. If you can control your environment (audio, light, temperature, food, exercise, communication, interaction, ...), you can get in the zone too just by virtue of almost exclusively focusing on some type of work you get in the zone for in the first place. Live by code, die by code.
- falcolas 9y ago
  No amount of control of my environment will put me in the zone when I'm working on boring code. Crud framework? I'll be reading HN while going through the motions. Code review? Time for some stimulating music (though not too stimulating, I do need to pay attention to the code review). But give me something interesting - a real challenge - and I'm able to get into the zone, the hours flying by like they were minutes. My brain has to be able to fully engage with the problem to hit that zone. Of course, I'm a technical lead in my group, so the ability to control my environment is limited. So I get up absurdly early just to get work done before I have to be available to be interrupted.

chrisfinne 9y ago

Well articulated and very concise. This could have been laboriously drawn out into a 10 page article. "Half as long" writing lesson from "A River Runs Through It" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7vRhOdf-6co https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7vRhOdf-6co

gggdvnkhmbgjvbn 9y ago

Used to get this feeling from video games, now i get paid for it as a programmer. As a result I've found it hard to go back.

amelius 9y ago

I notice that I can be in the zone while programming, but then when I need to research something (do real thinking rather than work by reflexes), I pop out of it.

robotmay 9y ago

I find that isolating myself from my surroundings can actually help encourage me get into the zone. I work from home, usually by myself, but if I want to get into the zone I'll chuck on a pair of headphones; something about that helps focus me, prevents distractions, and pulls me into the zone more easily. I suggested this to a friend recently whilst he was writing his dissertation, and he found that it worked well for him too and really helped him get through it. However I can't have folk music, as I stumble across a great tune too often and get up to play it instead :) It is much easier to stay in the zone when there's a physical barrier between you and other people. Even so much as being asked if you want a cup of tea is enough to pull you out of it. I recently asked my boss to stop other people from phoning me if they want me to be productive, and that really helped. I don't think most people understand what it's like; that amazing feeling you get when you're in the zone when programming, and it can be difficult getting them to understand why it's so frustrating being pulled out of it when a simple message would have sufficed.

amiga-workbench 9y ago

I haven't been getting this much for the last few months, but I think that's due to my scattered workload. I'm about to start a new project build and am looking forward to falling back into the flow. Its a wonderful feeling, its like the fog in my mind has been lifted.

djhworld 9y ago

I sometimes find myself in this situation too. I often find that I feel most productive when I reach this state. But it's quite rare, a lot of my day is interrupted by colleagues, meetings, noisy office etc It's cool, but you can see the downsides. A few weeks ago I basically disappeared for a few days writing some code. Great fun for me, but not exactly boosting growth opportunities for the team.

NicoJuicy 9y ago

This happens a lot to me. Although i always go out friday and saturday evenings. It's just hard sometimes switching it off and takes a reasonable effort... Sometimes i'm more quiet the entire evening and sometimes it's easier. In my mind, i'm constantly thinking about code then and it's hard to be social then. All arround, i'm a very social guy. Just when i leave the zone, i'm not.

xaedes 9y ago

“The Dexterous Butcher” Cook Ting was cutting up an ox for Lord Wen-hui. As every touch of his hand, every heave of his shoulder, every move of his feet, every thrust of his knee — zip! zoop! He slithered the knife along with a zing, and all was in perfect rhythm, as though he were performing the dance of the Mulberry Grove or keeping time to the Ching-shou music. “Ah, this is marvelous!” said Lord Wen-hui. “Imagine skill reaching such heights!” Cook Ting laid down his knife and replied, “What I care about is the Way, which goes beyond skill. When I first began cutting up oxen, all I could see was the ox itself. After three years I no longer saw the whole ox. And now — now I go at it by spirit and don’t look with my eyes. Perception and understanding have come to a stop and spirit moves where it wants. I go along with the natural makeup, strike in the big hollows, guide the knife through the big openings, and following things as they are. So I never touch the smallest ligament or tendon, much less a main joint. “A good cook changes his knife once a year — because he cuts. A mediocre cook changes his knife once a month — because he hacks. I’ve had this knife of mine for nineteen years and I’ve cut up thousands of oxen with it, and yet the blade is as good as though it had just come from the grindstone. There are spaces between the joints, and the blade of the knife has really no thickness. If you insert what has no thickness into such spaces, then there’s plenty of room — more than enough for the blade to play about it. That’s why after nineteen years the blade of my knife is still as good as when it first came from the grindstone. “However, whenever I come to a complicated place, I size up the difficulties, tell myself to watch out and be careful, keep my eyes on what I’m doing, work very slowly, and move the knife with the greatest subtlety, until — flop! the whole thing comes apart like a clod of earth crumbling to the ground. I stand there holding the knife and look all around me, completely satisfied and reluctant to move on, and then I wipe off the knife and put it away.” “Excellent!” said Lord Wen-hui. “I have heard the words of Cook Ting and learned how to care for life!” Translated by Burton Watson (Chuang Tzu: The Basic Writings, 1964) http://www.bopsecrets.org/gateway/passages/chuang-tzu.htm http://www.bopsecrets.org/gateway/passages/chuang-tzu.htm

xaedes 9y ago
Also: The Tao of Programming [1] 4.4 Prince Wang's programmer was coding software. His fingers danced upon the keyboard. The program compiled without and error message, and the program ran like a gentle wind. "Excellent!" the Prince exclaimed. "Your technique is faultless!" "Technique?" said the programmer, turning from his terminal, "What I follow is Tao -- beyond all techniques! When I first began to program, I would see before me the whole problem in one mass. After three years, I no longer saw this mass. Instead, I used subroutines. But now I see nothing. My whole being exists in a formless void. My senses are idle. My spirit, free to work without a plan, follows its own instinct. In short, my program writes itself. True, sometimes there are difficult problems. I see them coming, I slow down, I watch silently. Then I change a single line of code and the difficulties vanish like puffs of idle smoke. I then compile the program. I sit still and let the joy of the work fill my being. I close my eyes for a moment and then log off." Prince Wang said, "Would that all of my programmers were as wise!" [1] The Tao of Programming http://www.mit.edu/~xela/tao.html http://www.mit.edu/~xela/tao.html

cpayne624 9y ago

I'm a Fed engineer and spent a 4 mo. assignment on an integrated team with Pivotal pairing exclusively. It was a long 4 months for me. There was no "zone." I'm not built for pairing.

calafrax 9y ago
pair programming is an anti-process. its only purpose is to control employees, limit individual productivity, and drive down wages.
- majewsky 9y ago
  > drive down wages Yeah, because everyone knows that you have to pay less wages when you have two people do the job of one.
  - calafrax 9y ago
    Sure you do. Two mediocre programmers working as a pair might get 100k each. One elite programmer can clear 7 figures easily. The elite programmer will also have much more control over the IP they create and be able to negotiate much more stringent terms for how it is used. If you think pair programming is a good idea you are just at the bottom of the industry.
    - bussierem 9y ago
      > One elite programmer can clear 7 figures easily Can I come live in this fantasy world you found yourself in please? You're gonna need to provide some SERIOUS proof for a claim like that...
kornork 9y ago
I think pairing can be different for different people. I've often heard people saying that "the zone" comes more easily when pairing. Personally, any zone I'm feeling pairing has a different character from one achieved alone. It's easier to focus on the task at hand (because there's peer pressure).

tastyface 9y ago

Speaking of The Zone: I often see programmers on HN talk about building mental castles of their programs, but I feel like I don't really code the same way. Instead, my thinking seems more "functional". For a given problem, I can often make out the faint outline of an optimal solution, but there's a lot of cruft and misplaced bits in the way. Most of my work involves mentally simulating the consequences of different options and then bending the architecture into such a shape that the whole thing just sort of assembles on its own. I'm only "in the zone" when I have to make that final leap. There's very little castle-building along the way. As a result, I feel like I'm somewhat incapable of working on massive, multi-part architectures, since I just can't see the running state in my head. Once I zoom in to work on a single component, the rest fade from memory and I lose the big picture. On the other hand, I have no problem working in open-office environments: I don't mentally deal with a lot of program state, so I'm able to just dive right back in. This also influences my code to be more functional, as I know I can rely on e.g. idempotent methods to keep doing what they're supposed to regardless of any finicky global state. I wish I could get better at building those "mental castles" since it's a huge barrier to designing complex architectures (like games). I don't want to be stuck forever working on the leaves of the tree. Might be related to OCD: I've had the disorder for a long time and I've sort of conditioned myself to avoid keeping running thoughts in memory before the "OCD daemon" distorts them into something horrible. As a result, much of my thinking is necessarily spontaneous and intuitive, or at the very least wordless. Can anyone else relate?

synthmeat 9y ago
I relate. > I wish I could get better at building those "mental castles" since it's a huge barrier to working on complex architectures like as games. If you truly wish to do so - go make technically challenging systems like games. From start to end. Solo.
- tastyface 9y ago
  Yeah — trying to do that right now! Hope it gets easier over time.
- freehunter 9y ago

deleted 9y ago

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rhizome31 9y ago

I don't think I've ever experienced anything like this. As I practice TDD, my usual workflow is think -> test -> code, code usually being the easiest part. Things like "problems break down instantly", "everything becomes effortless" sound strange and exciting. I wonder how that relates to the concepts of maintainability, cowboy programming and 10x engineer. I've met a few programmers in my career who were able to write a huge amount of code doing wonderful things without testing at all. One guy I think of would spend days coding without even trying to compile his code and apparently, except for minor typos he could quickly fix, his code was working when he decided to compile and test it. He impressed bosses and colleagues with amazing features developed in a very short time but, on the other hand, nobody on the team was able to maintain his code. This was explicitly stated and accepted by team members, we knew we couldn't maintain his code but we were ready to accept it given the productivity of the guy. It was a trade-off. This way of working is completely alien to me. I can't think things in my head out of nothing and write working code. I need to start building something and get feedback from the computer to go to the next step. That's why when I was introduced to TDD it immediately made a lot of sense to me. It matched the way I was already operating. If I didn't have this workflow I think I would be unable to write even mildly complex code. It's interesting how people can operate differently. In a way I'm a bit jealous of those "zone" programmers who can produce amazing things very quickly. But, on the other hand, I can see that I'm also useful because companies hire me and want to keep me. I've seen many times people taking over my code, maintain it and develop it further. I've even been explicitly told a few times that my code was very easy to understand and maintain. Seeing people taking over my code and develop it further is one of the most satisfying things in my work.

rnabel 9y ago
Interesting point re the zone-programming and being a cowboy programmer. I don't think that 'in the zone'-programming has to produce bad code, though (if that's what you are saying). I'd argue that it depends on what gives you a reward. If you take pride in your code then you will find it rewarding to write tests and decent comments etc., and more importantly make a habit of doing so. A lot of people who write bad code think that they can get away with it because they are 'smart'. These same people then spend a ton of time trying to find bugs. It sounds like your colleague is 'finishing' features by accumulating tech debt. While this may impress non-technical management, from my experience, it wouldn't make it into a high-quality production code base. From people I've worked with, it seems like most people go through phases of extreme productivity ('being in the zone'). The code quality may suffer somewhat during those times, but they don't throw all good practice out of the window (not compiling for days, no tests?!?).

dghughes 9y ago

I'm trying my hand at programming and I'm surprised at my progress so far. But as a person who is very unfocused and poor at math programming has got to be the worst thing on earth for me. But I like it, and math. As with anything learning to focus takes effort it's different for each person. But a clean desk, calm environment, goals, lots of sleep, eat well and I find post exercise all helps. Not just learning to program but any task.

atom-morgan 9y ago

What it feels like to be in the zone as a programmer is what it feels like to be in the zone doing any task that can put you into flow state.

EliRivers 9y ago

Oh yeah, here comes the zone, here comes the zone, it's taken an hour of intense study of all this code but now I can see all the pieces at once inside my head and I can feel exactly how to thread this code right through the middle of all of it and - COLLEAGUE LEANS OVER FROM NEARBY DESK IN OPEN OFFICE: "Hey buddy, what's the password for the - oh no, wait I remember." Wait, what was I doing? What's all this code on my monitors? Why was I looking at any of this?

jackcosgrove 9y ago
I don't feel much while in the zone but I sure get irritable when someone disrupts it.
gprasanth 9y ago
http://heeris.id.au/2013/this-is-why-you-shouldnt-interrupt-a-programmer/ http://heeris.id.au/2013/this-is-why-you-shouldnt-interrupt-...

astrod 9y ago

I started using guarana tablets to help stay 'super' focused, but only when required. I find it helps me a lot with productivity, often 3+ hours of optimum output. No side effects, only other supplements I take regularly are fish oil and I dont drink coffee or energy drinks.

bcrisman 9y ago

I get there as well, but it takes a bit. Generally, the zone hits me when I'm in crunch time and I know that I won't have any meetings for a while. My ideas all work together and if I get stuck on something, it's not long before I can figure it out. I can generally get a ton of work accomplished. But then, someone knocks on my cube to say, "do you know where the elevators are at?"

EdgarVerona 9y ago

Getting in the zone is something exhilarating for me - I experience euphoria, though I don't really notice the feeling until after it's over or if I get broken out of it. It was actually something that as of late has started to disturb me: I notice that I live for moments like that, when I get in the zone and the whole world melts away. I feel like a junkie seeking a high, and thinking back on my youth and how destructive I was to my body and my interpersonal relationships in pursuit of "code all the time," I wonder whether that analogy is even more accurate than I'd like to believe. I look back on my life and wonder if I've actually been a lifelong addict who is lucky enough to have a productive output of his addiction rather than a functioning member of society. I don't know if others feel or have felt this way, or if it's just a phase that I'm going through. But these are my thoughts at the moment.

DutchKevv 9y ago
Same here.. I made a comment somewhere saying the same as you, but I feel like I'm in the middle of the thing your looking back at. I really do feel like a junky, that has found a pile of whatever it needs and the world encourages me to get better in 'using' and keeps paying me more to get higher and higher.. it's such a strange 'unethical' feeling.. I'm programming for about 8 years now in full throttle, and it keeps feeling stranger.. I'm somehow glad others experience it also...
sherkaner 9y ago
I'm completely opposite. I was playing chess from the childhood, and started programming only in the university. As a result, I'm addicted to chess, but not to programming. It is ridiculously hard for me to get in a zone while working, while I can play chess non-stop for hours and hours without noticing the time flying by. I'd love to reverse chess and programming....

Tepix 9y ago

Recommended related reading: Zenclavier - Extreme Keyboarding by Tom Christiansen http://archive.oreilly.com/pub/a/oreilly/news/zenclavier_1299.html http://archive.oreilly.com/pub/a/oreilly/news/zenclavier_129...

tekromancr 9y ago

I haven't been in the zone for months. It's mostly general dissatisfaction with my job, but it's gotten worse of late. On an average day, there will be 4 hours of calls spread an hour or less apart for the first half of the day, with the potential for surprise calls for the rest of the day. The irony is that a lot of these calls are about why things aren't getting done. The surprise calls are the worst. Even if I might have 2 hours of uninterupted time at the end of a day (when I am most tired and frustrated) it is impossible to get focused when there is always a looming threat of interruption. It's gotten so bad that I only get anything done late at night or over weekends, but then I am tired during weekdays and resentful that I had to throw away my freetime in order to move a project forward.

ratherbefuddled 9y ago
Might not help if you're stuck in an authoritarian micro managing matrix but some tactics I've found useful before. 1) Block out 3 hours in the morning and 3 in the afternoon in your calendar as busy, marked private, at slightly different times each day. If asked you can be honest, many times people will not ask and simply avoid booking. 2) Leave your least productive time of day open for 90 minutes of meetings - for me this was post lunch. 3) Always reply and ask for an agenda so you can be sure you're necessary (it's a constructive way of making the requester think twice about whether they really need a meeting). 4) Often suggest a new time that is only 30 minutes long rather than the default hour. 5) Decline politely if you are not specifically necessary (Thanks for the invite Peter, appreciate being kept informed but I don't think you need me for this and I have a conflict - no need to reschedule for me). But mainly just look for a way to leave. That company is heading down the tubes.
- zild3d 9y ago
  Simple and easy to apply. I will start using some of these, thanks
devrandomguy 9y ago
I have been in a situation like that, when I worked for a company that had me managing 12 to 30 clients directly. There is a standard solution to this problem: a ticket / issue system. If clients won't use that, and you need to keep them, then hire someone to transcribe their issues into the system, and increase your prices to cover it. The clients might find that they prefer interacting with a more business/people oriented person, rather than a stressed out INTP. That person could also help you schedule and estimate work, without needing to have programming skills themselves; another source of stress mitigated. In theory, recovering your full productivity would lead to a net increase in the value of your services, despite the expense of this new person on staff.

macca321 9y ago

Then the next day you realise how to achieve the same thing in a tenth of the code...

kolari 9y ago

I guess when a programmer is in the zone, he/she is much more effective communicating/instructing the machines (in the language defined between humans and machines), than communicating with other humans (programmers or not).

depressedpanda 9y ago

What a great article; it concisely and succinctly describes what's going on, and does so much better than I could. I shared it with my significant other, in order for her to better understand the grumpy responses she sometimes gets when asking seemingly innocuous questions like "would you like some tea?"

twodave 9y ago

I disagree with the premise of this article (though I haven't always). I generally find that I'm always in the zone for _something_, and after more than a decade writing code I've found that often when I'm feeling less productive at it, it's because there is some deficiency in my life, be it social interaction, nutrition, fitness, over-exertion, etc. Over the years I've come to know myself better, which allows me to take better care of myself holistically in order to be not just more productive at work, but more content with life in general. Keep everything in it's proper place and all that.

tiku 9y ago

I've done a minor in Flow, the theory about getting in the zone. Very interesting. It manifests itself mostly when the challenge is hard enough and your knowledge is also good on the subject. Boring tasks won't trigger flow etc.

stevewillows 9y ago

Years ago I went through some neurotherapy with a local doctor [1]. One part of the process had clips on my ears and a sensor on my head to read biofeedback (or something along those lines). The game was simple: there's a silo on the screen with a hot air balloon on the left side. When I get into 'the zone', the balloon goes up and around the silo. This will loop for as long as I can hold it. It took about two sessions with minor success, then suddenly it clicked. Now I can easily enter that state on demand. This might sound odd, but the neurotherapy helped eliminate a lot of the negative parts of ADHD without losing the edge that a lot of medications take away. I still have a lot of energy, but I can always sit and focus on the task at hand when I need to. [1] http://www.swingleclinic.com/about/how-does-neurotherapy-work/ http://www.swingleclinic.com/about/how-does-neurotherapy-wor...

orthoganol 9y ago

Prerequisites for 'the zone' (why not call it flow? isn't it the same thing?): a) You have to be interested and eager to get started. If you're not happy with the project, if anything else going on in your life is taking your attention, you will not experience it. b) When you experience it, you feel like you're a 'real' engineer, like that is your true identity now, your imposter syndrome disappears. So ultimately, if you don't identify as a programmer, as opposed to identifying as someone who programs because it pays well or view it as just a temporary phase of your career until you do management or become a startup CEO or something, you may never experience it. c) After you experience it, your brain goes "whoaaa" and needs to recover. You won't be able to experience it for at least another 2-3 days, in my experience.

Excluse 9y ago

Contrary to what a lot of people here have said about boring tasks, I find that's the easiest way for me to get into the zone. While it may not be my most economically productive part of the day (aka I'm not working on the hard, important problems) there's no doubt that for the 10-15 minutes one of those menial tasks requires, I'm in that special state. An environmental trigger for me is to play familiar music. It doesn't have to be a special playlist; any album I've listened to >50 times will suffice. Remaining in the zone requires incremental progress (momentum) which I think is easy to find in a boring, repetitive task that's squarely in your wheelhouse. The real productivity sweet spot is when you're able to get that momentum going on a valuable project.

luckydude 9y ago

Back when I worked at Sun, and got in the zone all the time, I worked on a ~32 hour daily clock. Because some of the work I was doing would take me about 8 hours to get back to the state of mind where I was yesterday. So instead of working 8 hours I would work for about 16, so I actually made 8 hours of forward progress. The 32 hour "day" was so I could have the rest of a normal day to eat, sleep, etc. This got to be common enough that someone made a clock, where you could move the hands, it said "Larry will be in here" and stuck it on my door. I think it was sort of a joke but I think some people actually used it. I couldn't come close to doing anything like that now. And at 55 years old, I can tell you that the days where you get in the zone, for me at least, are few and far between. I used to be able to just go there, now it sort of happens to me and I have to drop everything else and ride it before it fades away.

subwayclub 9y ago

I try to not stay in flow state. It means that the problem I'm working on is too familiar and I should automate the programming of it so that I'm grinding on something hard again. Edit: but it's okay if it's a prototype

engnr567 9y ago

When I was single, for most of my big projects I used to get 70-80% of the work done in 4-5 days of being in the zone. And then spend months on changing the bells and whistles. Now I have to be home at a reasonable hour and hopefully in a good mood. So I have become hesitant to even get into the zone, because getting out of this state of high efficiency would make me extremely irritable. How do married people or those with kids balance such bursts of creativity with personal commitments to their family ?

SimonPStevens 9y ago
I usually don't start work on side projects until the kid(s) are asleep. Only works while they are young I guess. My wife has always been understanding of my personal projects, provided I don't let them dominate every waking hour. When they are older I plan to teach them useful complimentary skills. Graphics design. Testing. Copywriting. Marketing. Sales. :-)
- fencepost 9y ago
  > When they are older I plan to teach them useful complimentary skills. Graphics design. Testing. Copywriting. Marketing. Sales. :-) That's not what most people mean when they say "growing a company."

QuercusMax 9y ago

I find that doing TDD makes it much easier to get in the zone; more importantly, it helps to get back into the zone if I get off track. I typically stub out a bunch of tests (just empty methods named based on what I plan to test), then go one by one and fill in the tests and write the implementations. In the codebase I work in, we use a lot of mocks / fakes, so I typically write my tests "in reverse" - first the verification of results, then the mock / fake expectations for what methods should have been called. Then I'll write the actual implementation, and then fill in the mock inputs. This way, if I get interrupted, it's very easy to transition back into what I was working on, as I make sure to always leave a breadcrumb trail for the next piece (when I run my test, the failure will give me a hint as to the next step to take). And since I have a bunch of stubbed out test methods, once one bit is finished, I can move onto the next one and repeat the process.

askafriend 9y ago
The style of work you described sounds like torture to me. I don't know why the idea of TDD sounds so terrible to me but it does.
- dozzie 9y ago
  Because it sounds like "start with tests, design and plan never". Too often tests-first is a substitute for a thought-out architecture and data flow.
  - QuercusMax 9y ago
    That's certainly true; but when you've done your homework, it can be a really great experience. For example: the past 3 weeks I've been pounding out tons of code in a TDD fashion. But prior to that: * I spent a week writing up a detailed design document and getting feedback from teammates and stakeholders. * Another week refactoring (TRULY refactoring; no changes to functionality) the existing implementation so I can reuse the existing work in my new implementation.

klarrimore 9y ago

You mean when you sit down at your keyboard 45 minutes after you popped those Adderall?

deleted 9y ago

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