Emotional detachment. During the low moments, remember that it's just a job and, as long as I'm being paid, I shouldn't care too much about all the bad shit that's going on around me.
Ask HN: What are the 5 most important techniques you use at job?
21–25 of 25 posts
Re: Ask HN: What are the 5 most important techniques you use at job?
#22Earlier quoted context omitted.
Correctly promise and correctly deliver.
Time constraint. Features constraint. Quality constraint. Pick two.
Just to be fair. There is a way to have all 3. You need to do enough analysis to be completely sure of the time it will take to deliver the features to the quality required. To achieve such an estimate you need to analyse all of the details. The only way I know to do this, is to complete all of the features, and the answer is simply how much time you have spent, with remaining time zero.
Re: Ask HN: What are the 5 most important techniques you use at job?
#23For software developers:
1. If you have trouble getting started on a project, just do something really small like add comments to your code. After that, you'll find it easier to do more difficult tasks.
2. git checkout and git diff are two of the best ways to identify difficult bugs. Find the most recent version where the code where the software worked. Find the oldest version with the bug. Diff the two git SHAs.
3. People skills get more important the later you are in your career. At a minimum, try to maintain positive body language and a positive attitude everyday so your coworkers enjoy working with you.
4. Do some parts of your boss's job for him/her. That's a great way for your boss and your boss's boss to realize you're ready for a promotion.
5. Go to industry conferences so you can learn your industry. Not just the technical conferences, but also the business ones. The better you know the business side, the better decisions you can make. The better decisions you make, the more likely you are to be well compensated.
Re: Ask HN: What are the 5 most important techniques you use at job?
#241. Know and understand the problem you're trying to solve.
2. Communicate with your team. Whether it's an annoying problem with the standard library or debugging the impossible, you'll likely to spark new ideas or reconsider things previously overlooked just by talking to someone about it.
3. Document everything and anytime you can. Even if it's just unorganized notes. The longer you wait, the more likely the knowledge will fade. You can always clean it up later.
4. Earn your "Debugging Wizard" title by investing time in learning tools like gdb, strace, tcpdump, perf. Don't be afraid of getting your hands dirty. The more time you spend learning the stack, the more you can get out of it. Also frame this[1]
5. Know when to leave work at work.
[1]: http://www.brendangregg.com/Perf/linux_perf_tools_full.png
Re: Ask HN: What are the 5 most important techniques you use at job?
#25- Duck (https://blog.codinghorror.com/new-programming-jargon/)
- Divide et impera
- Convention over configuration
- Rubber Duck Debugging (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rubber_duck_debugging)
- Thinking about a problem while walking or playing some stupid repetitive game like candy crush or powermanga