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Ask HN: What are your favorite developer-efficiency tips?

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Re: Ask HN: What are your favorite developer-efficiency tips?

#191

Post by lee »

Learn how to touch type.

I've worked with many programmers who don't know how to touch type. Anyone who uses a keyboard for more than an hour a day should learn to. It only takes about 2 weeks to learn all the keys, but it's a skill that'll save you thousands of hours throughout your entire career.

It completely baffles me that some developers haven't learned this basic skill. I've heard the argument that thinking is more important than typing. I counter that by saying if you learn to touch type, then it's easier to get into "flow" and your resistance to writing code drops pretty quickly.

Re: Ask HN: What are your favorite developer-efficiency tips?

#193

Post by kanyethegreat »

imwally wrote: post #101

Emacs key bindings work system-wide on macOS. Having the same keys to navigate no matter what app you’re in is a huge productivity booster.

This is really interesting. What key bindings do you use consistently? I wish the vim worked the same way. I'd love to use vim nav and modes for any text in any app.

Re: Ask HN: What are your favorite developer-efficiency tips?

#194

Post by 1f60c »

lostintangent wrote: post #188

Whenever I onboard to a new codebase, or try to learn more about an open-source project, I typically create personal notes that outline the structure and high-level “markers” that I want to remember and easily reference later. Unfortunately those notes are disconnected from the codebase itself, and therefore, not as immersive/rich as I wanted them to be. So I created a tool that allows me to annotate codebases with m…

I was about to ask how you got your own aka.ms link, then I saw you are a product manager at Microsoft, so that shouldn't have been too difficult :-)

Re: Ask HN: What are your favorite developer-efficiency tips?

#195

Post by XCSme »

kanyethegreat wrote: post #172
XCSme wrote: post #59

The REST Client VSCode extension[0] let's you send HTTP request from any file open in the editor. I use it to call the Cloudflare API to purge the cache of my site after I make changes. It's also really useful to test new APIs or quickly create a bunch of file/requests for the current project. I use PHP on my landing page[1] so I can make changes and publish them immediately without any build step. This way, whenever…

This is awesome. I usually just have a scratch file that uses an http library (eg. requests for python) and log the response. Do you prefer this over something like postman?

Yes, I only use this now. I used postman for a while, but I remember last time I tried it, it was way too complex, had to create projects or accounts (or something like that) to make a simple request.

I now only use this VSCode extension, I have some .http files saved in my project with requests I do often. If I am trying an API online, I just copy-paste their cURL examples and run them, it's useful because on Windows there is no cURL cmd preinstalled. It's also nice that you get code highlighting by default in VSCode for the .http files.

Re: Ask HN: What are your favorite developer-efficiency tips?

#196

Post by XCSme »

kanyethegreat wrote: post #172
XCSme wrote: post #59

The REST Client VSCode extension[0] let's you send HTTP request from any file open in the editor. I use it to call the Cloudflare API to purge the cache of my site after I make changes. It's also really useful to test new APIs or quickly create a bunch of file/requests for the current project. I use PHP on my landing page[1] so I can make changes and publish them immediately without any build step. This way, whenever…

This is awesome. I usually just have a scratch file that uses an http library (eg. requests for python) and log the response. Do you prefer this over something like postman?

Another big advantage is that you don't have to open a new console or application. You just do CTRL+N to open a new file and ALT+CTR+R to send the request. So you can do CTRL+N, write google.com, ALT+CTR+R and you can see the source-code of google.com in a VSCode file.

Having the request in a file means you can easily change it, save it or version it.

Re: Ask HN: What are your favorite developer-efficiency tips?

#198

Post by mceachen »

uryga wrote: post #134
lukifer wrote: post #121

I can't say enough good things about a multiple clipboard manager. Not only is it useful to copy/paste multiple items in sequence, but it's a game changer to be able to quickly retrieve a code snippet, or URL, or CLI command you used recently; and/or, to trivially stash one just in case you'll want it later. (Primary downside: using a computer without multiple clipboards feels broken. What do you mean it "forgot" the…

Windows 10's builtin clipboard history (Win+V) is one of the best things they've added tbh (it's opt-in, in case anyone's wondering...)

Also try Ditto. It has features I missed with the new built-in win10 tool which made be come back to it. Open source. https://ditto-cp.sourceforge.io/

Re: Ask HN: What are your favorite developer-efficiency tips?

#200

Post by jez »

ZeroClickOk wrote: post #155
jokab wrote: post #81

Obs studio. I record myself while coding anything. I pretend to be a bigshot coding streaming sensation (even if its just for me). Its fun as well as very helpful in so many ways. 1. It helps me stay focus on the task at hand. One recording for each task 2. It lets me practice how to articulate stuffs. Its like blogging but ephemeral (because i wont upload this) 3. It helps me get motivated. Cant let my "thousands" o…

I loved this idea. Can you share your Obs defaults/workflow for this? By example, I work 8hs per day, how much space all this audio/video recording will take? What video/resolution/etc? Thank you!

Honestly for me it was just the act of being able to see my picture and my screen moving inside OBS, not even the fact that it was recording. I tried streaming myself live coding on Twitch a couple times and it was a blast. I felt like I was thinking so much more clearly. I didn't save the recordings—just the act of it all was worthwhile.
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