5 ms·

Indeed. There's no way I can work at 18°C. Four layers of shirts plus wrist warmers won't be enough to keep my fingers flexible on the keyboard if I sit still a

Indeed. There's no way I can work at 18°C. Four layers of shirts plus wrist warmers won't be enough to keep my fingers flexible on the keyboard if I sit still and code. Edit: and I know this because I start the workday at 17°C in winter months. I live in an old building with poor-ish window insulation so I turn off heating in most rooms for the night, and in the bedroom for the day to conserve energy.

genewitch 5y ago
Code on a laptop and mine verium on it too (or whatever, 'compile') + an incandescent bulb aimed at your head is a decent amount of mitigation for it being 17-18C. During the cold snap where it was below -15C during the night in the southern US last year I did exactly what i specified, and i didn't bother using my central heat. I haven't used central heat at all for 2 years. I do have mini split air systems, but at -15C they spend more time defrosting than heating, so the mitigation was to use lots of blankets in the bedrooms and turn the minisplits to heat at about 6AM to take the chill out for the morning routines, but shut them off at 10PM. There's no sense in wasting heat defrosting on "less efficient" heat pumps. for perspective it's about 19C(66.2F) and i'm wearing shorts and a short sleeve shirt, indoors. One other thing that may not be true everywhere is i run de-humidifiers nearly year round, so that does dump about 800-1000W in the air when they're actively removing moisture, so your mileage may vary.
- lucb1e 5y ago
  > During the cold snap where it was below -15C during the night [...] and i didn't bother using my central heat. I haven't used central heat at all for 2 years. [...] i'm wearing shorts and a short sleeve shirt, indoors Yeah something doesn't add up here. Unless that lamp has a crazy wattage and you look down at this "mining" laptop on your lap for 8 hours a day (no desk, all heat going to legs, wrists, and hands), I don't really see this being realistic.
  - genewitch 5y ago
    75W halogen, but my laptop can dissipate 170W. As long as you don't have fans blowing air around/over you, it's fine. your basal metabolic rate can be captured with clothing and especially caps, like a thin fabric cap and then a wool beanie/cap over that. Plus ~200ish watts of heat where you need it, head and hands. I do have to use more heating if the temperature stays below 4C or so for more than 24 hours. That is, my indoor ambient temp was 11-12C on the night it was -15C outside - had it remained that cold for longer than a night i would have had to raise the indoor temp with electric heat, as mentioned, the split-air was woefully inadequate. I was just trying to avoid the central electric heat since it smells bad the first few times you use it in a season and it always wakes everyone up. all this being said, people are different and my wife and son would have been miserable in the exact same situation. I was speaking directly to "fingers get too cold to type" with the laptop thing.
    - emteycz 5y ago
      Lol, we use 3W LEDs for lighting... And not gonna change that with the electricity prices of today. And my M1 never gets hot and has no fans...
      - genewitch 5y ago
        That's fine, however, if you're using heat at all in your home, having a "mining laptop" and a few incandescent lights around to take the chill off is not going to increase your electricity bill, unless you're using gas for heat. I forget the ranking of efficiency, heat pumps are more efficient than resistive heating (to a point well below -15 for more expensive units); however i forget where gas fits in that spectrum. having a couple hundred watts of heat per person will lower your overall heating bill, all else being equal.
        emteycz 5y ago
        Of course I use gas for heat, most people do here. Electricity is way too expensive to heat with it, even for a programmer.
- distances 5y ago
  Thanks for the tips, but not very applicable in my situation. I never use the laptop keyboard, but rather an external ergonomic keyboard. Building is from 1910s with central heating that I can control for my apartment, so doesn't affect my electric bill directly. Any form of electric heating would likely be more expensive. Finally, I start wearing shorts and t-shirts at around 25°C, and my favourite indoor temp in summer is 27°C so I guess you're just better adapted for cooler weather.
lucb1e 5y ago
I had never heard of the term wrist warmer! Just image-searched it, that looks great. I've tried fingerless gloves before (some family members have those for sailing) but those make it hard to type and I dropped that attempt. Will be seeing if I can buy some of those, or maybe repurpose some old gloves. Thanks for that :) > I start the workday at 17°C in winter months. I live in an old building with poor-ish window insulation That might also be your problem rather than the temperature. If there is any amount of air movement, like even just air being refreshed so to say, that takes away any lingering heat and replaces it with new, cold air. Of course, everyone's internal thermostat also works differently so I'm not saying this must be it but... something to consider.
- distances 5y ago
  > That might also be your problem rather than the temperature. Yes, very possible. The windows have basic insulation but there is a small draft for sure. I'm renting so I'm not going to do any window renovations though.

genewitch 5y ago

Code on a laptop and mine verium on it too (or whatever, 'compile') + an incandescent bulb aimed at your head is a decent amount of mitigation for it being 17-18C. During the cold snap where it was below -15C during the night in the southern US last year I did exactly what i specified, and i didn't bother using my central heat. I haven't used central heat at all for 2 years. I do have mini split air systems, but at -15C they spend more time defrosting than heating, so the mitigation was to use lots of blankets in the bedrooms and turn the minisplits to heat at about 6AM to take the chill out for the morning routines, but shut them off at 10PM. There's no sense in wasting heat defrosting on "less efficient" heat pumps. for perspective it's about 19C(66.2F) and i'm wearing shorts and a short sleeve shirt, indoors. One other thing that may not be true everywhere is i run de-humidifiers nearly year round, so that does dump about 800-1000W in the air when they're actively removing moisture, so your mileage may vary.

lucb1e 5y ago
> During the cold snap where it was below -15C during the night [...] and i didn't bother using my central heat. I haven't used central heat at all for 2 years. [...] i'm wearing shorts and a short sleeve shirt, indoors Yeah something doesn't add up here. Unless that lamp has a crazy wattage and you look down at this "mining" laptop on your lap for 8 hours a day (no desk, all heat going to legs, wrists, and hands), I don't really see this being realistic.
- genewitch 5y ago
  75W halogen, but my laptop can dissipate 170W. As long as you don't have fans blowing air around/over you, it's fine. your basal metabolic rate can be captured with clothing and especially caps, like a thin fabric cap and then a wool beanie/cap over that. Plus ~200ish watts of heat where you need it, head and hands. I do have to use more heating if the temperature stays below 4C or so for more than 24 hours. That is, my indoor ambient temp was 11-12C on the night it was -15C outside - had it remained that cold for longer than a night i would have had to raise the indoor temp with electric heat, as mentioned, the split-air was woefully inadequate. I was just trying to avoid the central electric heat since it smells bad the first few times you use it in a season and it always wakes everyone up. all this being said, people are different and my wife and son would have been miserable in the exact same situation. I was speaking directly to "fingers get too cold to type" with the laptop thing.
  - emteycz 5y ago
    Lol, we use 3W LEDs for lighting... And not gonna change that with the electricity prices of today. And my M1 never gets hot and has no fans...
    - genewitch 5y ago
      That's fine, however, if you're using heat at all in your home, having a "mining laptop" and a few incandescent lights around to take the chill off is not going to increase your electricity bill, unless you're using gas for heat. I forget the ranking of efficiency, heat pumps are more efficient than resistive heating (to a point well below -15 for more expensive units); however i forget where gas fits in that spectrum. having a couple hundred watts of heat per person will lower your overall heating bill, all else being equal.
      - emteycz 5y ago
        Of course I use gas for heat, most people do here. Electricity is way too expensive to heat with it, even for a programmer.
distances 5y ago
Thanks for the tips, but not very applicable in my situation. I never use the laptop keyboard, but rather an external ergonomic keyboard. Building is from 1910s with central heating that I can control for my apartment, so doesn't affect my electric bill directly. Any form of electric heating would likely be more expensive. Finally, I start wearing shorts and t-shirts at around 25°C, and my favourite indoor temp in summer is 27°C so I guess you're just better adapted for cooler weather.

lucb1e 5y ago

I had never heard of the term wrist warmer! Just image-searched it, that looks great. I've tried fingerless gloves before (some family members have those for sailing) but those make it hard to type and I dropped that attempt. Will be seeing if I can buy some of those, or maybe repurpose some old gloves. Thanks for that :) > I start the workday at 17°C in winter months. I live in an old building with poor-ish window insulation That might also be your problem rather than the temperature. If there is any amount of air movement, like even just air being refreshed so to say, that takes away any lingering heat and replaces it with new, cold air. Of course, everyone's internal thermostat also works differently so I'm not saying this must be it but... something to consider.

distances 5y ago
> That might also be your problem rather than the temperature. Yes, very possible. The windows have basic insulation but there is a small draft for sure. I'm renting so I'm not going to do any window renovations though.