In my case it's to have a single immutable desktop whenever I'm working at home or at a customer site. A 15" laptop screen is enough for me.
Why I Stopped Using Multiple Monitors
41–50 of 137 posts
Re: Why I Stopped Using Multiple Monitors
#42> Virtual Desktops For the Win There's a few things about virtual desktops on OS X (the OS I use at work) that just absolutely kill them for me: 1. OS X will re-order keyboard inputs when the inputs contain virtual desktop commands. That is, if you have two terminals open, one in one desktop, and one in another, and you type ^→¹ "hi", where "hi" ends up depends on how quickly you type the command . If you know the de…
FWIW, you can disable the "Automatically rearrange Spaces based on most recent use" option in the Mission Control Preferences panel.
Re: Why I Stopped Using Multiple Monitors
#43I prefer multiple monitors because they allow a more physical distribution of documents compared to virtual desktops. Having the document I'm going to refer to already in peripheral vision makes it much easier to switch to it than a switch to another virtual desktop and re-orient.
The article notes the problem of having your mail open on the second monitor. There is an easy solution to that: close it. Sure if you then can't find anything useful to put there, you don't need a second monitor.
Re: Why I Stopped Using Multiple Monitors
#44>> to display multiple things simultaneously? If my email or social media feeds are available at a glance, then I’ll check them constantly Just had no desire to read further, I started with the impression that there will be some strong arguments against multi monitor setup. May be for the author's needs a single monitor suffices, he earlier had a multi monitor setup, so he ended up using the excess which made him unp…
That top comment is the one that really invalidated most of the article. Multiple monitors is to give you enough screen real estate for all components of task. It is not to stream twitch and watch Twitter scroll as you try to write in a text editor.
Putting distractions in a separate 'workspace' and making conscious decisions to switch contexts is a good idea, but it isn't related to having a second monitor, IMO.
Re: Why I Stopped Using Multiple Monitors
#45Earlier quoted context omitted.
Multiple monitors are your friend
Best of all, multiple monitors play very nicely with both tiling window managers and virtual desktops. :)
Some tiling WMs on x11 allow to share virtual desktops between monitors, so you can move a whole virtual desktop from a monitor to another.
Spectrwm for sure, maybe xmonad inspired it.
Re: Why I Stopped Using Multiple Monitors
#46Next, he should cut down his desk so that he can only fit one piece of paper on it. After all, it's better to focus on one thing at a time.
Also there's too many drawers. How can you find anything when there are so many storage bins to choose from? One giant laundry basket, or a bathtub, if you have lots of stuff, should do just fine...
Re: Why I Stopped Using Multiple Monitors
#47On my Mac, I can 3 finger swipe to quickly switch between multiple virtual desktops. This takes less than a second and it doesn’t require me to turn my head and refocus my eyes on content in a different spot.
This reveals something odd about me, or about the author. Not sure which. It seems obvious to me that it's less context-switch overhead to glance at something that's already physically in my peripheral vision than it is to swap out what's physically in front of me for some different content. The latter means I have to take a moment to understand what I'm looking at, then find what I need. The former doesn't seem to have this "wait, what is this" part before looking where I need, which I suspect is because it was already in my field of vision and some part of my brain that would otherwise be keeping track of the patterns on the wall is keeping track of placement of things on that second monitor.
Re: Why I Stopped Using Multiple Monitors
#48As a data business analyst in large and small companies, I find myself working on very complex systems (people and apps), and a single monitor helps me focus. Occasionally I switch the second monitor on, but usually use it as an expensive document stand.
Of course all the marketing/finance/ops/pm people I support love to multitask and hack spreadsheets and email all day. I get the pros and cons for various flavors of developers, but EVERYONE with two monitors is total insanity.
Re: Why I Stopped Using Multiple Monitors
#49I disagree heavily - Having a secondary monitor with documentation / work plans on it is enormously useful as you can glance at it without having to do anything more special than turn your head. In fact, I would go so far as to say that three monitors is optimum since you can have your code on one, the output of your code (continuous tests/hot reload/etc) on another and documentation on the last allowing you to see a…
I have a wide screen and don't use it multi-tasking but more to stop switching so much. My web development setup. One third code and terminal, one third the app i'm developing open and one third design or requirement docs.
Yes its harder to manage windows but once its setup, I don't find that i'm fooling with windows all day, just a minute whenever I restart my computer which isn't that often.
Re: Why I Stopped Using Multiple Monitors
#50I use dual 32" 4K monitors. I love it. I do computer graphics though that demands attention to detail. I love a full screen 3D editor (Clara.io) with some documents/task lists open in the other screen.
Say what you will about this setup, but I'd never go back. I am very productive in this setup.