Find other solo developers, have your daily status with them.
If you can sync time start coding while on video call together before everyone signs off.
Ask HN: Solo developer, what's your recipe to start working?
61–70 of 100 posts
Re: Ask HN: Solo developer, what's your recipe to start working?
#62"A warlord once stopped at a monastery on his way home from a successful military campaign. He came to visit the abbot who was an old teacher of his. As the abbot and the warlord sat in the courtyard pleasantly chatting and drinking tea, they were distracted by an argument between a novice and a senior monk. The novice was complaining that the meditation technique given him by the senior monk was ineffective and wort…
Hmm I guess I need some assasin archers. Motivational assassin archers as a service basically.
In a world with too many safe nets, deliver negative results as a service might actually be useful :)
Re: Ask HN: Solo developer, what's your recipe to start working?
#63After many decades of fighting procrastination the most important thing I have learned is that you cannot analyze yourself out of procrastination. You cannot read articles to solve your procrastination problem. The only thing that works is to start the work. I wish there were something else I could tell you, but that's it. Just open the book, open the editor, open the document, whatever. Now, that said, you may be bu…
> Do a bit, don't get down on yourself if you only do a bit. It's better than nothing.
This mindset is valuable, thanks :)
Re: Ask HN: Solo developer, what's your recipe to start working?
#64Write and Journal.
Whenever I feel unmotivated and cannot move forward, if I am not tired or burnt, then it is because I don't see a path forward. That is because my thoughts and information are disorganized and they pollute my sight.
Writing is a very good tool for organizing one's thoughts. For whatever reason thinking with one's short term memory, at least for me, is inferior to writing or even speaking(rubber ducky?) As Jon Haidt says, we are not a logic processing machine but a story processing one(or something like that).
If you have requirements for your work, sit down and write about it. If you don't know how to start then write about how you acquired those information; write about what they mean, what you want to do and anything that peaks your fancy. Over time you will develop your favorite style.
As an aside, journal your days too; looking back on your day you can put your personal story in order and then see if something went poorly, or well. If something doesn't make sense.
Again, over time, you can use your work or personal journal to derive other artifacts. Think of it as a data lake. Want some slides? documentation? forgot a command? forgot why you did something? open up your work journal and copy paste some lines, images or code snippets.
In summary I highly recommend writing. It is a valuable tool that for some reason is not emphasized enough.
One more thing, if you are expressing something, telling a story and such, you may type for speed. If you are thinking and exploring, its best to hand write, it will slow your brain down; plus, there is something about writing letters, a meandering doodling hand an rhythm that helps think.
Re: Ask HN: Solo developer, what's your recipe to start working?
#65Don’t build things for yourself. Don’t build things by yourself. Build for specific people, and feel responsible to those people. Tie your social status into it. Humans are incredibly social animals, take full advantage of that fact and make sure you’re sailing with the wind on the ocean, not tinkering with model boats in a poorly ventilated bedroom.
> Tie your social status into it.
Good advice, thanks :).
Re: Ask HN: Solo developer, what's your recipe to start working?
#66>> I know that once I start, I will be productive. But I don't have a recipe to start. If my mood changes, I work. If not, I dont' know what to do. “I write only when inspiration strikes. Fortunately it strikes every morning at nine o'clock sharp.” ― W. Somerset Maugham
Thanks, I am saving this quote to motivate myself :)
Re: Ask HN: Solo developer, what's your recipe to start working?
#67Unrelated, but eliminating resources is an effective productivity/focus "hack" for me: - Disconnect the laptop's charger and work on one charge. I used to have a laptop that had at most 2 hours and it forced me to really focus. The progress I made on some projects on a commute is amazing. - Disconnect from the internet and work only with what you have on your machine. This means no search, no tabs. No distractions. T…
I did my whole BSc degree in CS like this, without Internet. That was in the mid 2000s. It was exceptionally rare not to have a home connection by then in my city (a big one in the EU). When I told my classmates they thought I was kidding.
My dad, a uni professor, simply didn't want me to have one as he thought it was too distracting. And I kind of agree now, but I thought he was crazy. I remember my best friend asked his dad to take his Ethernet cable away during the exam period. Instead of rehearsing, he was playing online games. And he couldn't stop, thereby failing most courses. This was a pretty smart guy that had aced university entrance tests.
It kind of worked. I got the best GPA ever in my university, and I had the best GPA across all CS schools in the country.
I must say at the time having a connection didn't bring as much into the table as it does now, with e.g. quick answers on Stack Overflow. I bought dozens of textbooks, and I had things like MSDN installed locally to access e.g. C++ STL docs. It also forced me to be quite resourceful, as I had to solve everything on my own and offline. For example, I didn't login remotely to university servers to do DB assignments. Instead, I had my own local Oracle deployment and so on. Quite an experience.
Re: Ask HN: Solo developer, what's your recipe to start working?
#68Earlier quoted context omitted.
Hmm I guess I need some assasin archers. Motivational assassin archers as a service basically.
In a world with too many safe nets, deliver negative results as a service might actually be useful :)
This is, in fact, an existing product category: the one I'm most familiar with is https://www.beeminder.com/, but it's got a few competitors.
I've never found it particularly useful, but then I'm also too chicken to put up serious cash. I figure I put a high price on having to be disciplined :)
Re: Ask HN: Solo developer, what's your recipe to start working?
#69Try another job for a few months. Something in admin, something that is low on thinking or creativity. I bet you'll see your energy for coding come back.
Re: Ask HN: Solo developer, what's your recipe to start working?
#70After many decades of fighting procrastination the most important thing I have learned is that you cannot analyze yourself out of procrastination. You cannot read articles to solve your procrastination problem. The only thing that works is to start the work. I wish there were something else I could tell you, but that's it. Just open the book, open the editor, open the document, whatever. Now, that said, you may be bu…
This has been my experience too. No amount of self-help books, videos or workshops really help. They may actually end-up hurting if you go overboard with investing time, mindshare and money.
The only way I've been able to improve is:
> The only thing that works is to start the work. I wish there were something else I could tell you, but that's it. Just open the book, open the editor, open the document, whatever.
If you fail, try again.