Productivity Tips for Programmers

While it was well written, and with best intentions, I don't think there is any real significant "tips" to increase "productivity". All things aside these are just some best practices sprinkled with some examples. This is similar to when your parents tell you to brush your teeth and floss daily.

I haven't been programming a lot but here are some ideas that I've found, in similar vein to the parent article.

1. Watch Bram Moolenaar's talk or read his notes - http://www.moolenaar.net/habits.html . Essentially learn how to use your text editor, as that's the thing you're going to be spending a good deal of your time in. In three steps, his suggestion is - Find what you're doing repeatedly, automate it and bind it to a key, make it a habit.

2. use a good version control system. Use a DVCS like git/mercurial/bzr and make lightweight branches for even the tiniest little features. That'll allow you to multitask like crazy! If you start properly using branching, you can write more code quickly and safely and switch between contexts.

3. Make sure your build system is optimal. If you spend too long waiting for builds to take place, maybe you can explore options to make it better.

4. The most important productivity secret imo - ACTUALLY WRITE CODE. Don't think about writing code, don't read blogs about writing code, don't follow twitterers who write code. Most importantly, don't get distracted and idle away when you're trying to write code.

I have some amount of mastery over my text editor, my language, my OS, etc. But none of that compares to the mastery and discipline of sitting down, concentrating and not letting your mind wander too much - something that I am trying to attain, but it's harder than I would like it to be.

Re: Productivity Tips for Programmers

#6

Post by sp2hari » Tue, Oct 12, 2010, 10:51 AM UTC

antileet wrote: post #5

While it was well written, and with best intentions, I don't think there is any real significant "tips" to increase "productivity". All things aside these are just some best practices sprinkled with some examples. This is similar to when your parents tell you to brush your teeth and floss daily. I haven't been programming a lot but here are some ideas that I've found, in similar vein to the parent article. 1. Watch B…

Hi, I agree with you that these points are basic, but at times we forget the very basic stuff and miss out things there..

Totally agree with your 4th point. Unless you actually write code, nothing will help you..

Re: Productivity Tips for Programmers

#7

Post by froo » Tue, Oct 12, 2010, 11:30 AM UTC

Productivity tips for programmers: stop bumming around on HN and go code something.

Re: Productivity Tips for Programmers

#8

Post by hjalle » Tue, Oct 12, 2010, 11:59 AM UTC

antileet wrote: post #5

While it was well written, and with best intentions, I don't think there is any real significant "tips" to increase "productivity". All things aside these are just some best practices sprinkled with some examples. This is similar to when your parents tell you to brush your teeth and floss daily. I haven't been programming a lot but here are some ideas that I've found, in similar vein to the parent article. 1. Watch B…

So basically, premature optimization sucks. Don't search for a solution of a problem that doesn't exist. If you spend lots of time writing the same code: optimize that. If you dont do that, dont optimize it. I think lots of people belive that its some kind of magic that made Sergey, Larry and all the other successful programmers successful.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZV-AFnCkRLY <-- There you got productivity by Notch (Minecraft creator for those who dont know). Its like three seconds of twitter, 30 minutes for food and some sleep, for a total of 48h. Actually that makes me take back the idea of the magical thing, since the magic seems to be complete dedication to the task you are supposed to do.

Re: Productivity Tips for Programmers

#9

Post by dirkgadsden » Tue, Oct 12, 2010, 12:52 PM UTC

antileet wrote: post #5

While it was well written, and with best intentions, I don't think there is any real significant "tips" to increase "productivity". All things aside these are just some best practices sprinkled with some examples. This is similar to when your parents tell you to brush your teeth and floss daily. I haven't been programming a lot but here are some ideas that I've found, in similar vein to the parent article. 1. Watch B…

One thing I'd add to the to the list is have someone to talk to. When building large systems it's always important to have the big picture in mind, and being able to get another person's input on what you're doing can often be invaluable. I've saved hours upon hours of time from stupid mistakes just by spending thirty seconds to get another perspective.

Re: Productivity Tips for Programmers

#10

Post by cdavid » Tue, Oct 12, 2010, 1:23 PM UTC

sp2hari wrote: post #6

antileet wrote: post #5

While it was well written, and with best intentions, I don't think there is any real significant "tips" to increase "productivity". All things aside these are just some best practices sprinkled with some examples. This is similar to when your parents tell you to brush your teeth and floss daily. I haven't been programming a lot but here are some ideas that I've found, in similar vein to the parent article. 1. Watch B…

Hi, I agree with you that these points are basic, but at times we forget the very basic stuff and miss out things there.. Totally agree with your 4th point. Unless you actually write code, nothing will help you..

You have to write code at some point, but you also have to think about what you are doing. Especially in time-constraints environments, there is a big risk doing a lot of code which ends up totally useless because it was not well thought, and did not do what was intended, etc...

More important than unit test and all that trivial stuff, what matters a lot in my experience is the ability to write for changes. That's really what's difficult about most programming tasks: how to deal with changing specs, change of deployment environments, etc...