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The ADHD body double: A unique tool for getting things done

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Re: The ADHD body double: A unique tool for getting things done

#91

Post by CuriousSkeptic »

onemoresoop wrote: post #32

I may have ADHD, I never went for a diagnosis and found body doubling useful at times, especially when I was in school some decades ago, back then I had no name for it. However, I find white noise very helpful with staying on the task and with increased focus. My company moved, about a year ago, into a very cramped office that is also extremely noisy. This exasperated me, I would get drained of energy in a couple of…

> my ears hurt a bit after a few hours of white noise

Seems like something that could lead to permanent hearing damage

Re: The ADHD body double: A unique tool for getting things done

#92

Post by whstl »

lurkshark wrote: post #28
rpgwaiter wrote: post #21

I’m sure this works for some people. Personally I loathe social interaction of any kind, and mixing that with engineering gets me to my mental/emotional limits much faster. On my own I can work about 2 hours on and 10 mins off, sometimes for 10+ hours total. If I have a 2 hour collab coding call, that’s about all I’ll do that’s productive that day. I’l literally have to spend the rest of that day mentally recovering…

Whenever I read about pair programming as a standard technique (like XP) it sounds so great in theory but in practice I find it extremely draining whenever I’ve dabbled.

Probably the most stressful portion of my career was when I was doing mandatory pair programming in a shop where the manager came from Thoughtworks.

Funny enough, the two guys who pushed for it never did any pairing.

The CEO put the kibosh on it when he noticed the staff was not only unproductive but also massively unhappy.

Re: The ADHD body double: A unique tool for getting things done

#93

Post by pxoe »

ravetcofx wrote: post #18
lemming wrote: post #6

An online application of this principle is Focusmate, where you schedule calls with essentially random strangers and just work together. There's very little chit chat and it's not some weird front for a hookup scheme. I've been amazed at how well it works for me. I can't really explain why, after all the other person can't see my screen so I could just be doom scrolling YouTube the whole time, but for some reason I d…

There are free discord groups for this too

also perhaps coworking streams on twitch https://www.twitch.tv/directory/all/tags/CoWorking

Re: The ADHD body double: A unique tool for getting things done

#94

Post by phito »

pydry wrote: post #66
phito wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’ve never really understood the hype around pair programming. In practice, it’s usually just sitting with a coworker who wants to chat and crack jokes while working. That’s fine socially, but I don’t see any productivity gains. What I find actually useful is a short, focused meeting with the relevant people before coding. That way, we align on what’s being built, resolve confusion, and then I can just go write the c…

The productivity gains come from: * You get unstuck faster. * When the passenger does background research/slacking stakeholders meaning that the driver doesnt have to context switch. Sometimes they even just know the answer to something you would have to spend 30 minutes researching. * When the passenger spots something you didnt (antipattern, bug, problem) and they spot it quickly before you dug yourself a hole with…

I already get those benefits from focused pre-coding discussions and pull request reviews. They allow for high-quality decisions, involve more perspectives, and are asynchronous.

Pair programming might help when training juniors, since they need that level of hand-holding. But for experienced devs, constant back-and-forth while typing mostly just adds friction.

Re: The ADHD body double: A unique tool for getting things done

#95

Post by jamesbfb »

In my 40s and I’ve recently been diagnosed with inattentive adhd. TFA makes a lot of sense to me given I’m one of the rare people at my company who commutes to the office every day even though we are an in-person optional workplace. Whenever I’ve had to WFH, I’ve struggled massively to gain an initial focus. Although medication has helped tremendously, I still feel much more productive in an office setting.

Re: The ADHD body double: A unique tool for getting things done

#96

Post by pydry »

phito wrote: post #94
pydry wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The productivity gains come from: * You get unstuck faster. * When the passenger does background research/slacking stakeholders meaning that the driver doesnt have to context switch. Sometimes they even just know the answer to something you would have to spend 30 minutes researching. * When the passenger spots something you didnt (antipattern, bug, problem) and they spot it quickly before you dug yourself a hole with…

I already get those benefits from focused pre-coding discussions and pull request reviews. They allow for high-quality decisions, involve more perspectives, and are asynchronous. Pair programming might help when training juniors, since they need that level of hand-holding. But for experienced devs, constant back-and-forth while typing mostly just adds friction.

No. You dont. The feedback cadence is then wildly stretched out.

Instead of getting notification that you made a mistake within a few seconds of making it you are told at, say, 4pm, 45 minutes after you raised the PR, 4 hours after you made the mistake and in time for you to maybe fix it tomorrow. Also, if it was a rabbit hole mistake thats a whole lot of wasted work.

With PRs I find reviewers tend to miss more stuff (especially forest-not-trees stuff) because there are usually a lot of changes all going on at the same time and because the mental tax of trying to grasp all of the necessary context is higher.

The pre-coding discussions also do NOT provide the same value because many problems only become apparent after you've started coding. Only correctly anticipated problems are caught at that stage.

Code reviews and pre coding discussions are still good practices and add value of their own (especially because for some issues you do benefit from > 2 sets of eyes), but not as substitutes for pairing.

Pairing is also effective at training juniors and onboarding, but not only.

Re: The ADHD body double: A unique tool for getting things done

#98

Post by whatnow37373 »

Tabular-Iceberg wrote: post #59

This is where remote work goes off the rails, but then it’s wild how intentionally isolating the implementation of RTO that many large corporations are doing now. They line people up in rows, put headphones on their heads and wire them up to Teams and Jira to spend the whole day in isolation. Because taking a walk to another floor of building to talk to someone like a normal human being is too wasteful, but somehow f…

The commute isn’t paid, so who cares. Let them drive 4 hours a day. But don’t you dare stealing a few minutes in idle talk, because yes, not being valuable every second you are on company premises is stealing. You should feel bad. Now put on your headphones and work through your task list, you miserable ant.

Re: The ADHD body double: A unique tool for getting things done

#99

Post by TeMPOraL »

suzzer99 wrote: post #76
Tabular-Iceberg wrote: post #59

This is where remote work goes off the rails, but then it’s wild how intentionally isolating the implementation of RTO that many large corporations are doing now. They line people up in rows, put headphones on their heads and wire them up to Teams and Jira to spend the whole day in isolation. Because taking a walk to another floor of building to talk to someone like a normal human being is too wasteful, but somehow f…

Working in an open office on cool stuff with legitimate friends was the best work experience I've ever had by far. Most days it didn't even feel like work. Now I wfh full time with people who are just coworkers and I'm miserable.

That's the core aspect of my open-office experience too. Working together on cool stuff with legitimate friends? Best thing ever. Take away even one of {together, cool stuff, legitimate friends} - just a single thing - and open-office instantly becomes psychological torture for me, because for some reason, my mind parses this as feeling under threat, and gives me large amount of anxiety to deal with.

Re: The ADHD body double: A unique tool for getting things done

#100

Post by swader999 »

Tabular-Iceberg wrote: post #59

This is where remote work goes off the rails, but then it’s wild how intentionally isolating the implementation of RTO that many large corporations are doing now. They line people up in rows, put headphones on their heads and wire them up to Teams and Jira to spend the whole day in isolation. Because taking a walk to another floor of building to talk to someone like a normal human being is too wasteful, but somehow f…

Meh, we haven't seen anything yet. Just wait till the AI managers take over. Keystroke, app usage, bugs, velocity, eye tracking, stool samples... All logged and dash boarded in real time.
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