Ah, when we lose focus for a second and then we don't even known what our code was supposed to do - eviltoast
  • Aceticon@lemmy.world
    2·
    1 year ago

    Actually there’s also the breaking of the psychological state of Flow, which is the mental state of total focus and maximum productivity, which takes about 15 minutes to get to.

    Years ago when I had to work as a programmer from the Trading Floor of a major Investment Bank (think Fishmongers’ Market but with Financial Assets) I bought some noise reduction earphones and have used those kind of things ever since as they really cut down on distractions and it mainly works.

    It even cuts down on the “can you help me for a second” thing because other people actually have to get up and move to were you are to get your attention (as you can’t hear them unless they shout), so the zero-effort choice of just calling you from their seat to help them isn’t there anymore and one thingI learned pretty early in my career is that in the absence of a zero-effort help path through you for their problems, your colleagues will actually try to first solve their problems themselves and only come to you if they’re really stuck, whilst if you’re the least effort path to having their problems solve most will just default to breaking your focus and using your time to have their problem solved.

  • barrage4u@lemmy.world
    1·
    1 year ago

    This is why I write down the questions I’m trying to answer in a text doc, e.g:

    Where is this network call comming from? …/some-api-call.js Why do you think it’s causing a 403?

    • I am authenticating correctly
    • the object seems to exist in s3
    • the bucket name is wrong

    Etc. So if I lose my thought (all the time), I know exactly what and why I was doing it. Also stops you from re-investigating things you forget

    • oddityoverseer@lemmy.world
      1·
      1 year ago

      I often take notes in the form of “TODO” comments, as I work through a problem. Then I have my editor set up to highlight them, and my git asks me if I’m sure I want to commit them. Works pretty well with keeping my thought process straight

    • SeriousBug@infosec.pub
      1·
      1 year ago

      It’s also an amazing way of duck-debugging. By the time you write down what the problem is, you’ll figure out where’s the issue or at least what you should try next.

      “X is giving me an error, I checked X’s logs. X communicates with Y… Oh, I need to check Y next!”

      And if you can’t figure it out, you have the problem and everything you tried documented so you can ask for help and get answers effectively.

    • madeindjs@lemmy.ml
      1·
      1 year ago

      It’s a very valid advice.

      I also try to do it for complicated bug and it helps me to keep a track of what I tried to do and my hypothesis.

  • totallynotarobot@lemmy.world
    1·
    1 year ago

    Aw I wish they had used “they” instead of “he” so I could put this up at work. But… accurate

    Edit: the kind reactions here have changed this comic from one that would remind me of nasty to one that will remind me of nice when I see it. It’s going up.

    We’re not on Reddit any more, see below for proof.