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My personal guess is that most people need "warm up" time to make progress on their projects, the time needed to build up the mental model of the whole domain.
by sbjs 8y ago
My personal guess is that most people need "warm up" time to make progress on their projects, the time needed to build up the mental model of the whole domain. This can go from hours to days to weeks depending on the person and the type of mental model. But some people have certain domains where they can just instantly build up that model in their head and immediately begin making serious progress. You sound like you're one of the rare ones that can do this for a large number of domains (3d algorithms, project architecture, database structure, feature interaction). I'm only like that with a few very specific domains and I suspect most other devs are like me in that sense, so we stand in awe when someone has that natural in-built capability. (I think this not only goes for making progress but also learning new concepts, as I have seen other graduate students who can blaze through certain things like Haskell where I struggle as through molasses.) If this theory is true, then you probably aren't spending more than 3-5 hours on projects like this per week, but you're making the same progress most of us would need 2-5 weeks for. Btw I'm the guy who posted your project and emailed you, thanks for coming here to answer our questions and thanks for making such a cool project and making it freely available for all of us to learn from!
- Nition 8y agoI think that's a good guess. I'd add to that, sometimes people could get going faster if they really tried, but they're just a bit lazy or burnt out and need a rest. So they say OK, I've finally got an hour of free time, but I'll just check Hacker News first, check my email, read this article... and now they only have 20 minutes of work time left. Whereas a few people either don't need so much time to recharge, or they just push themselves into getting started anyway, and usually once you actually start working it's not so hard to continue. Getting enough sleep helps a lot with motivation to work. Although then you have less time! So I'll just stay up late this one time and get this thing done...
- feiss 8y agoYeah I can relate to all this.. I need warm up time, and that includes updating social media and HN (like now), which I regret later. I'm one of those that have a daughter and feel they aren't productive at all and lack of free time to do cool, deep projects. It also depends on what standards of productivity you aim for, and who you compare with. Many people say I do lots of stuff when comparing to themselves, and I feel unproductive 'cause I'm comparing to myself 5 years ago, working 14 hours/day. I should try to get into The Flow faster (maybe leaving notes of what to do next when finishing a task? --and removing twitter and similar..) Anyway, finding a good balance between family and work time is extremely difficult for me, one of my biggest endeavors, even after 3 years of parenthood.