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I program on the subway

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Re: I program on the subway

#171

Post by fastasucan »

systems wrote: post #75
ziofill wrote: post #11

When I was living in Paris I had a 20 min ride from home to work each day. I picked up the habit to read during those 40 total minutes and I was going through books like I had never been able to, because while 40 min is not a lot, it’s about 150h per year. One easily underestimates the power of consistency.

how can you read in 20 minutes, for me 20 minutes is only good enough to stare out the windows and ... zip zip 20 minutes are gone i need a couple of hours to do any technical reading 20 minutes, maybe, maybe .. good enough if i am reading fiction or something

Just do as you do when you are doing technical reading for a couple of hours, but stop after 20 minutes.

Re: I program on the subway

#172

Post by saagarjha »

throwaway2037 wrote: post #138
saagarjha wrote: post #14

I used to do work on Caltrain, which used to be like 3 hours of my commute and didn't have any internet, so I would carefully plan what I could do beforehand. My code deploys to a machine that's very different from my laptop, but I had a Docker container set up to cross compile things and loaded up the docs beforehand, so as long as I planned out what I wanted to do. These days Caltrain is faster and has occasionally…

3 hours of Caltrain!? I assume that is 90 mins each way. San Jose to SF on a non-express train? That sounds painful!

I take the non-express in the morning and express in the evening, which used to be 105 and 60 minutes respectively prior to electrification. Nowadays it's 75 and 60 which is a little more reasonable. I could in theory take the last express in the morning but I think trying to squeeze in on a packed train that I have to wake up early for isn't really worth it over being able to leave the house at 10 and being guaranteed a table.

Re: I program on the subway

#174

Post by sedatk »

What I miss about my long commutes on public transportation in early 2000’s was the serenity of doing absolutely nothing.

It was essentially forced meditation, and it helped me a lot in reorganizing my thoughts.

I had moved next to the office later, and noticed that I’d really missed those meditative hours. I saved maybe 1.5 hours of commute every day but my net productivity had declined.

I don’t think it would be as easy to achieve the same effect today as it was back then. We now have phones and interactive ads, and that dopamine driven economy.

I miss that about those times.

Re: I program on the subway

#175

Post by decafninja »

Proponents of public transportation often say how they love to be able to use it as peaceful downtime to read, work, meditate, etc.

All my experience with public transportation is having to roll the dice and more often than not losing - having to stand while packed liked sardines into a bus or subway.

Re: I program on the subway

#176

Post by MrOrelliOReilly »

decafninja wrote: post #175

Proponents of public transportation often say how they love to be able to use it as peaceful downtime to read, work, meditate, etc. All my experience with public transportation is having to roll the dice and more often than not losing - having to stand while packed liked sardines into a bus or subway.

Try a commuter train in Switzerland. I work two hours on the train every single day with no issue!

Re: I program on the subway

#177

Post by hexfish »

druskacik wrote: post #86
bbkane wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Until the book gets really good and you have to keep reading past your bedtime to learn what happens (or maybe that's just me)

It's not just you, I hear this often, but I am always suprised people can read for so long in bed. No matter how interesting a book is, I can rarely read more than 20-30 minutes before the urge to fall asleep becomes too strong. But I can sometimes code until like 4AM. Weird.

Well you are sitting in front of a relatively bright lamp when coding.

Re: I program on the subway

#178

Post by d4nyll »

Working on the metro makes a boring commute fly by - blink and you are at your destination already. 30 minutes each way is 1 hour a day. Over the entire year it's 250+ hours or 9 whole 16-hour days.

That's why whenever I move to a new city, I typically look to live somewhere that's at the end of the metro line. It meant in the morning commute I can _always_ get a seat.

That was one of the reasons I liked living in Hammersmith when I worked in Shoreditch/Old Street - it's at the end of the Hammersmith and City Line and I don't have to change lines. There's also the add bonus that the line is above ground until Paddington which meant I have more than enough time to load up any tabs I need to use before the Internet blackout.

In Hong Kong I worked at Central and lived in Tsuen Wan. Literally from one end of the line to the other. This had the added bonus that I was also guaranteed a seat on the way home as well.

Re: I program on the subway

#179

Post by Forgeties79 »

mid-kid wrote: post #157
Forgeties79 wrote: post #134

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’ve recently learned to downvote/flag and not respond to green names. The number of new accounts coming in hot with inflammatory takes lately has seemed higher to me, but admittedly this is purely a “vibe,” I have no numbers to back it up. Anyway, I just flag/downvote and move on.

TIL that the green color means the account is new. I always thought it was a special marker somehow, like the equivalent of a blue checkmark.

Yeah I used to think it was the thread OP or an admin or something myself.

Re: I program on the subway

#180

Post by WorldPeas »

stasge wrote: post #142
burningChrome wrote: post #140

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A buddy of mine had the same thing. He started taking the light rail into downtown and purposefully parked at one of the early stops instead of taking the bus in. He said he would sit and code on his side projects for around the same amount of time. In the span of a year, he knocked out several small mobile apps and several social media plugins. He said the benefit was being able to spend more time with his family at…

My commute to work is quite long but there is no "sitting" in Tokyo's trains in mornings/evenings so I program on a smartphone. Yes, it's not impossible but it takes time to get used to it.

have you ever considered a nanote from donki? I've been using one as a paired terminal and with the right os (debian, no GUI) it stays cool enough and gets good battery, same with the gpd handhelds
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