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Ask HN: What do you do while code is compiling?
Compiling code takes an annoying amount of time. Not enough time to do something worthwhile yet too much time to just sit around and idly wait. If we add up all the time we sit around waiting for code to compile, it would be a depressing number.
So what do people currently do while waiting? Any good ideas on what to do?
- urorbit 15y agolooking from a window , you wll see a life
- sixtofour 15y agoToday I saw poetry on HN.
- whiterabbit 15y agoThis.
- merlins_hack 15y agoEcho.
- chosenone1907 15y agopray and wish it compiles without err
- Detrus 15y agotry out Golang
- cperciva 15y agoCompiling code takes an annoying amount of time. Really? Unless I'm doing a complete build, I never wait more than a few seconds for a build to complete. What build system are you using?
- pktm 15y agoUsually, read another post on HN.
- veyron 15y agoYou can be developing other tools. My builds oftentimes take a long time because there are a lot of cross-language stuff (libraries include some boost stuff, which always takes a long time to process) and cross-compiling (e.g. targeting tools for osx and for linux -- why they changed the syscall numbers is beyond me) You probably have a laundry list of scripts that should exist (e.g. launch scripts, cron jobs, etc) but are low-priority. It's easy to work a little bit on a script when building.
- damoncali 15y agoWrite some more ruby.
- fleitz 15y agoWhat language do you use? / What kind of project are you working on? embedded, kernel, iphone, web, etc? There are usually tricks to speed up your compile process, copy the code to a RAM drive before compiling, etc, also try using testing and create a small program that monitors your src dir and will recompile and test automatically. That way as soon as you save it's automatically recompiling and testing, then you just look over at the terminal window and see the results. Also, split your code into libraries so that only a single lib needs to be recompiled, etc. The drive to speed up iterations usually pays off in spades and you end up doing stuff you really should have been doing anyway, like writing tests, modularizing code, etc. If it absolutely can't be sped up, document your code while its compiling, Doxygen, etc.
- LarryA 15y agoThink of errors I had probably missed before I started compilation. Just about any long process I think of the stuff I forgot to check before I initiated it. :-D Other than that I get up, take a break, I deserve it.
- trafficlight 15y agoI usually sword fight in the hallway with coworkers while riding on office chairs.
- wladh 15y agoThe incremental builds are taking about 5 minutes, which is not really long enough for me to do any big work, but I usually look if there are any new issues in the queue, look at code reviews (not the ones I'm reviewing, but what others reviewed) or try to do code review for smaller chunks of code.
- OnesimusUnbound 15y agoresearch more on how to make the build process efficient :-)