3 ms·

Its not an unreasonable metric, if a round trip through Stack Overflow is in your thought loop then you will be significantly more limited than someone who does

Its not an unreasonable metric, if a round trip through Stack Overflow is in your thought loop then you will be significantly more limited than someone who doesn't need that. If you are doing something very obscure then its reasonable, but most programmers don't do obscure things on a daily basis. Its similar to being unable to do math in your head. You can get away with always using the calculator but you'll be outperformed by someone who can do it without dropping their pencil.

auggierose 8y ago
Both will be outperformed by someone with a computer.
- slededit 8y ago
  I hope the programmers are given computers by default :)
wilsonnb3 8y ago
This is somewhat similar to the reasoning that leads people to use tiling window managers. It's more efficient than a traditional window manager so they think it makes them more productive. They're not wrong about the first part. Tiling window managers are very efficient. They are wrong about that making them more productive, though. It certainly makes them feel more productive, but this kind of micro-optimization is solving something that wasn't actually a huge productivity problem to begin with. You can add up all the time I spend switching windows in a slightly suboptimal manner on Gnome or Windows and all of that time will be lost by an extra 5 minute coffee break or the mental deficit from sleeping less than 8ish hours a night. Similarly, a person who doesn't have to look at Stack Overflow may seem more productive, but the tiny amount of time it takes to look something up instead of remembering it is a very, very small part of the developers day. Even if they have to do it 100 times a day it's unlikely to make any meaningful difference in the big picture. Not needing documentation would be helpful in a world where a programmer sat down and didn't stop typing for 8 hours, but that's not the world that we live in.
- slededit 8y ago
  How long would you estimate it takes to search your question, find the result and read the answer? I think it's optimistic to think it can be done in a minute if you actually time it. 100*1 minute is an hour and 40 minutes. That is not a trivial portion of the work day. Even if it were 30 seconds that's still almost an hour. If that is truly a micro optimization then I shudder to think of the waste elsewhere.

auggierose 8y ago

Both will be outperformed by someone with a computer.

slededit 8y ago
I hope the programmers are given computers by default :)

wilsonnb3 8y ago

This is somewhat similar to the reasoning that leads people to use tiling window managers. It's more efficient than a traditional window manager so they think it makes them more productive. They're not wrong about the first part. Tiling window managers are very efficient. They are wrong about that making them more productive, though. It certainly makes them feel more productive, but this kind of micro-optimization is solving something that wasn't actually a huge productivity problem to begin with. You can add up all the time I spend switching windows in a slightly suboptimal manner on Gnome or Windows and all of that time will be lost by an extra 5 minute coffee break or the mental deficit from sleeping less than 8ish hours a night. Similarly, a person who doesn't have to look at Stack Overflow may seem more productive, but the tiny amount of time it takes to look something up instead of remembering it is a very, very small part of the developers day. Even if they have to do it 100 times a day it's unlikely to make any meaningful difference in the big picture. Not needing documentation would be helpful in a world where a programmer sat down and didn't stop typing for 8 hours, but that's not the world that we live in.

slededit 8y ago
How long would you estimate it takes to search your question, find the result and read the answer? I think it's optimistic to think it can be done in a minute if you actually time it. 100*1 minute is an hour and 40 minutes. That is not a trivial portion of the work day. Even if it were 30 seconds that's still almost an hour. If that is truly a micro optimization then I shudder to think of the waste elsewhere.