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Improving my focus by giving up my big monitor

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Re: Improving my focus by giving up my big monitor

#111

Post by PhilipRoman »

kartoffelsaft wrote: post #28
antonvs wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Managing windows with OS idiosyncrasies becomes a task in itself. Tiling window managers are a good solution.

Tiling merely changes the idiosyncrasies, and I say this as someone who primarily uses them. (hyprland in my case) If you created a window right now, where will it go? Which window will it take its space from? Does it use your focused window? Your mouse position? If your WM supports mixed floating & tiling, how does it go when you flip a window between them? etc. That's all cognitive load when you aren't familiar and…

I'm using Hyprland right now for its wayland support, but IMO so far the best mental model for window management I've seen is that of herbstluftwm with static layouts (you can still use dynamic tiling and tabs with it of course)

Re: Improving my focus by giving up my big monitor

#112

Post by petters »

> On a 34" ultrawide monitor, it was too easy to put YouTube running on the left side, and whatever else on the right.

Yes, if you were doing that, almost any change to your environment that stops that will be good. I don't think you'd have to give up your monitor.

Re: Improving my focus by giving up my big monitor

#113

Post by smallstepforman »

pdpi wrote: post #100

I'm on the other side of this one. Two 27" 4k displays (at 2x scaling, so logical 1080p), always with editor on one screen, and documentation on the other. This is true for programming (where editor = IDE and documentation = API docs for some thing or other), 3d modelling (where editor = CAD software, and documentation = reference drawings, diagrams, etc), and even gaming (where "editor" = Blue Prince, and "documenta…

At 27”, 2560x1440 withouth scaling is your better option vs UHD and x2 scaling. You need a pair of screens for true bliss.

Re: Improving my focus by giving up my big monitor

#114

Post by stingraycharles »

cookiengineer wrote: post #90
JSR_FDED wrote: post #89

I spent decades completely happy with Cmd+Tab. Now I’m helping someone develop a trading system and I need to see several log files simultaneously, a broker GUI, and neovim. Once I realized that in order to answer a single question I needed to Cmd+Tab at least four times, often more, I added two monitors and it’s dramatically lowered my stress level. FYI, on older MacBooks you can’t add more than one extra screen, bu…

The reason I love my old cheap 1080p monitors so much is because they need less organizational overhead compared to a large 4k monitor where you constantly have to fix UI scaling bugs and zoom in/out, force different fonts for shitty web pages etc. I am never gonna sway away from i3 [1], a notification free tiled window desktop system is just way too convenient. When I have to bootup a Windows VM for work (I am a mal…

“compared to a large 4k monitor where you constantly have to fix UI scaling bugs and zoom in/out, force different fonts for shitty web pages etc.”

counterpoint: this doesn’t appear the case with Apple, as they have defaulted their OS entirely to retina-level density now, removed subpixel rendering, and anything non-5K may look off (and you need to go through hoops to make it look well).

As such, I’m typing this in a MacBook with 3x5K displays connected.

Re: Improving my focus by giving up my big monitor

#115

Post by microtonal »

asdff wrote: post #57
kartoffelsaft wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Tiling merely changes the idiosyncrasies, and I say this as someone who primarily uses them. (hyprland in my case) If you created a window right now, where will it go? Which window will it take its space from? Does it use your focused window? Your mouse position? If your WM supports mixed floating & tiling, how does it go when you flip a window between them? etc. That's all cognitive load when you aren't familiar and…

This is why I use no window management. Windows are arbitrary sizes of what I happened to drag out last time. Windows piled on top of eachother. Some stuff in the back of the pile dates back weeks. A couple other piles of various windows in other desktop spaces. I like to think it is like a messy desk. Maybe closer to how we think in real life. Like you the tiling was a lot of faff. What goes where, how big shoudl th…

After having tried many tiling window managers over the years, I have also come to the conclusion that the ‘pile of windows’ model (sometimes spread across desktops) works best for me.

The most important thing is to have a way to search through the pile. (Raycast window search is pretty good.)

Re: Improving my focus by giving up my big monitor

#118

Post by gchamonlive »

I think it's like for me moving to using Instagram in the browser instead of launching the app. Doesn't fight my addiction to doom scrolling directly, but it makes it awkward enough so that the small imposed friction reduces the urge with time.

If it works for you as it worked for me it's fine, but don't feel frustrated if you end up recreating bad habits in these kinds of setup. They can work but they don't really treat the root cause of the addiction.

Re: Improving my focus by giving up my big monitor

#120

Post by krater23 »

Working without 3 monitors or maybe a good tiled ultrawide feels just like digging a hole with a spoon. But I'm the type of developer that needs videos or music on the side that the work is not just boring enough to stop it. Has nothing todo with the work itself that I do. When it gets difficult I can press the pause button.
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