(others) YMMV but I usually don't. It's the complexity of the problems which I need to tackle and for which I have no playbook to follow and it will mostly invo

(others) YMMV but I usually don't. It's the complexity of the problems which I need to tackle and for which I have no playbook to follow and it will mostly involve deep understanding of HW, operating systems and algorithmic design. There're also compilers and programming languages which do require a non-trivial amount of time to understand but also keeping the pace with it because they're constantly evolving. Pick any of those to study and I guarantee that you can spend your lifetime doing so without having a single second to spare. However, to provide an actual business value to your company, you obviously cannot keep running through this rabbit hole on and on but by the end of the day you have to learn how to pick the right balance. In the end, I'd say that the problem space is simply too huge and I personally haven't found myself idling in my 10+ year career other than in the moments when I became too frustrated with the problem at hand. That's also one of the reasons I am reconsidering what I want to do in next 5-10 years :)