4 ms·

Obligatory: https://xkcd.com/1205/ https://xkcd.com/1205/

by aargh_aargh 4y ago

klodolph 4y ago
I wonder if there's an admin tool someone can make that pattern-matches reposts of XKCD and deletes them.
- vntok 4y ago
  From the linked xkcd, that seems like a tremendous waste of time..
  - klodolph 4y ago
    I'm not so sure. Multiply the number of "obligatory XKCD" comments made on Hacker News by the average number of minutes wasted by unfortunate souls reading them, and I think you could probably save an FTE or two.
- mindcrime 4y ago
  That would be silly by https://xkcd.com/1053/ https://xkcd.com/1053/
atoav 4y ago
One thing not in the xkcd is "how much time it takes you to make the script". Let's say there is some weird service that you sometimes need to manually restart in a very specific order for maintenance. The hard (time intensive) task is figuring out the right incantations and the order to do it. It is however not time intesive at all to store those incantations in a shell script. So not saving that in a script risks you (or a co-worker) having to go through this again, potentially missing some important aspect and wasting time and energy.
- bluepnume 4y ago
  Isn't that exactly what the xkcd covers?
  - atoav 4y ago
    Sure in a sense, but my feeling is that this is often taken too literally. Sometimes the work is "making the script beautiful and universal" and then you should indeed consult that xkcd. Sometimes the work is spitting the commands you had to figure out anyways into a shell script in 5 seconds. Then it is a no brainer to do it, because it will safe you time even if you use it only once.
dceddia 4y ago
I like this XKCD and I think about it a lot, in a “is it really worth my time to do this?” kind of way. One thing the time-based framework doesn’t account for is the mental energy you could save. A small example: I sell a software product, and every now and then someone would ask for an invoice. So I’d have to look up the order, copy an ID and an email, make a PDF, and email it over. Was it hard? No, it took 2 minutes. But I loathed doing it. So I wrote a little invoice page that looks up their order and let’s them put in whatever info they need, and generates a PDF. It took a day or two. I’m 99% sure this will never ever pay off in terms of time savings, but it gives me great joy to know that I will never have to do that energy-sapping task again.
- agentwiggles 4y ago
  _Nothing_ takes 2 minutes, though! The context switching from whatever other thing you actually wanted to be focused on probably costs you at least 15-20 minutes. If it took you 16 hours of dev work to automate the process, it's only going to take you something like 50 invoices to recover your lost time when you account it that way. Seems like a great tradeoff to me. And reducing your own misery, is, of course, invaluable!

Obligatory: https://xkcd.com/1205/ https://xkcd.com/1205/

klodolph 4y ago

I wonder if there's an admin tool someone can make that pattern-matches reposts of XKCD and deletes them.

vntok 4y ago
From the linked xkcd, that seems like a tremendous waste of time..
- klodolph 4y ago
  I'm not so sure. Multiply the number of "obligatory XKCD" comments made on Hacker News by the average number of minutes wasted by unfortunate souls reading them, and I think you could probably save an FTE or two.
mindcrime 4y ago
That would be silly by https://xkcd.com/1053/ https://xkcd.com/1053/

atoav 4y ago

One thing not in the xkcd is "how much time it takes you to make the script". Let's say there is some weird service that you sometimes need to manually restart in a very specific order for maintenance. The hard (time intensive) task is figuring out the right incantations and the order to do it. It is however not time intesive at all to store those incantations in a shell script. So not saving that in a script risks you (or a co-worker) having to go through this again, potentially missing some important aspect and wasting time and energy.

bluepnume 4y ago
Isn't that exactly what the xkcd covers?
- atoav 4y ago
  Sure in a sense, but my feeling is that this is often taken too literally. Sometimes the work is "making the script beautiful and universal" and then you should indeed consult that xkcd. Sometimes the work is spitting the commands you had to figure out anyways into a shell script in 5 seconds. Then it is a no brainer to do it, because it will safe you time even if you use it only once.

dceddia 4y ago

I like this XKCD and I think about it a lot, in a “is it really worth my time to do this?” kind of way. One thing the time-based framework doesn’t account for is the mental energy you could save. A small example: I sell a software product, and every now and then someone would ask for an invoice. So I’d have to look up the order, copy an ID and an email, make a PDF, and email it over. Was it hard? No, it took 2 minutes. But I loathed doing it. So I wrote a little invoice page that looks up their order and let’s them put in whatever info they need, and generates a PDF. It took a day or two. I’m 99% sure this will never ever pay off in terms of time savings, but it gives me great joy to know that I will never have to do that energy-sapping task again.

agentwiggles 4y ago
_Nothing_ takes 2 minutes, though! The context switching from whatever other thing you actually wanted to be focused on probably costs you at least 15-20 minutes. If it took you 16 hours of dev work to automate the process, it's only going to take you something like 50 invoices to recover your lost time when you account it that way. Seems like a great tradeoff to me. And reducing your own misery, is, of course, invaluable!