Ask HN: What to do while compiling?

I tend to get distracted and check hn, reddit when compiling. This disrupts my thought line & I sometimes stay on these sites after the compiling is over.

What can I do to stay focused when compiling? What do you do to solve this problem?

This.

Technically I spend time waiting for tests to run rather than for compilation, but same problem.

It's a good time for a trip to the restroom or to refresh your beverage, but you can't do that every 5 min.

I'll often deal with email (our issue tracker sends email for comments, so there's usually something to deal with there) or catch up on slack.

There's always something that needs code review.

I'll check some monitoring dashboards for servers I'm responsible for.

And I have project management responsibilities along with the code-related ones, so I can take care of some of that.

Of course, all of those other than the first require significant context switching, but so does reading HN.

Make a coffee for yourself. This allows you to get out of your desk and moving and has the added benefit of keeping you away from your computer.

Figure out why compilation takes so long and if there's any way to improve it.

Get compile times down to more reasonable levels. Use the shorter breaks for checking on things in your issue tracker to start on whatever is next in your queue.