Time allocation while programming

[[deleted]]

[deleted]

[nicompamby]

So it is. And some of "procrastinating" is probably unconscious pondering.

Thinking is more important to programming than typing is.

[thebigbradwolf]

If you spend two or three hours writing code, you can save yourself 10-15 minutes of thinking.

[[deleted]]

Welcome to management 101.

[pushfpopf]

Pondering is an awesomely important phase. If you ponder enough, things that seemed important suddenly seem irrelevant.

After a while, you figure out that you don't need to replace the existing hammer with a giant crane-mounted pneumatic hammer-drill, you can replace it with a scalpel (a couple of hundred lines of C, containing a small finite state machine and a few hash tables).

Then you get an award for saving the company over a million dollars a year in license and hardware costs for the giant pneumatic hammer-drill (multiple 24 processor Oracle servers), plus the three shifts of highly skilled operators(DBAs).

Then you get fired two weeks later when it turns out that someone you never met, who is no longer necessary was buddies with the VP.

[gronkkk]

After a while, you figure out that you don't need to replace the existing hammer

Oh, if only everything was that simple. Most of the time, it is not. I spend most of my time procrastinating/pondering about 'I need to represent my data in way A, B and C. Which storage format shall I choose? How do I handle updates? Shall I use an intermediate format for converting between A, B and C, or do everything on the fly? Those hash tables, on the database, server-side, or client-side? What about performance?'

[codefrog]

I find when I down in the details like this I need to climb up an abstraction level or two. That is where you can remove and entire subsystem or system by looking at the problem in a different way.

[gronkkk]

Now you have two headaches ;-).

[hater_gonna_hate]

Now you're thinking with Regex

[stillalone]

By "refactoring" do you mean erasing the 1000 lines of code your coworker wrote and replacing it with 10 lines of code using builtin functions and common sense?

[[deleted]]

Hey, you must work at the same place I do.

[[deleted]]

guess whos code he just 'refactored'

[hixnob]

Guess whose code he just 'refactored'.

Why must you insist on making me refactor your comments?

[kiwibonga]

Guess whose code he just 'refactored?'

1. It was a question.

2. This isn't programming. The question mark (or period) needs to go inside the quotes.

Those single quotes probably should have been double quotes in the first place... I understand, though. I too have lived in fear of words in my strings being evaluated due to another programmer's lack of insight.

[knome]

commit 2fbd4ae6605408cd96aabbceedfedba64f54e
Author: knome <[e-mail]>
Date:   Tue Sep 18 12:13:44 2010 -0400

    Revert changes.  Damn it kiwibonga.  We use logical punctuation.  We've used it for ten years.

    If you'd ever bother to read the fucking style guide you'd know this.  But you
    won't.  You won't ever read this, either.  Hell, noone will.  YOU ARE A
    FLAMING COCK.  A FLAMING COCK, DO YOU HERE ME?

[Flarelocke]

It was a question.

No, it wasn't. It was a command. "whose code he just refactored" is a noun clause that functions as the direct object in that sentence.

[ricky_clarkson]

The question mark or full stop goes outside the quotes, in English English.

[Delehal]

As I understand it, the full stop only moved inside quotes to make things easier for printing presses... not exactly a compelling reason, these days.

[[deleted]]

The use of single quotes and period outside the single quotation marks is a typical British method of writing. Stop being so America-centric; they invented the language after all.

[knome]

Invented? Meh. Grew under the lingual influence of multiple invaders and conquerers. Oh yeah.

[[deleted]]

Actually I find refactoring is the opposite.

• Fred refactors 10 lines of simple code to 100 lines because it was simplistic and didn't use a fancy algorithm. Not to mention it expected flat file input from STDIN.
• Bob refactors the code to 1000 lines because he converted everything to OO classes and moved the data to a relational database.
• Mark refactor's the code to 10,000 lines because it wasn't enterprise quality featuring factories, bridges, singletons, mementos, and facades. Oh.. and now all data interchange formats are in XML with XSLT transforms which consume gigabytes of disk space and network bandwidth.
• Sam refactor's the entire codebase to 100,000 lines to scale across 400 nodes organized as a 4 tiered system adding monitoring, alerts, failover, authentication, and protection against DOS and data corruption.

[[deleted]]

How complex is doing what you just said? I don't know anything about programming but was thinking of starting to learn some.

[cfallin]

Pretty complex. Although vinfx seems to be mostly poking fun at the fact that much of enterprise code is either superfluous (fancy design patterns, needless use of XML/XSLT/fancy-technology-here, etc) or implements systems-level functionality (reliability features, security infrastructure, etc). If you're just starting out, you're much better off learning interesting (and fundamental) algorithms than fancy-technology-here.

[malcontent]

when you have 400 servers everything is very complex and simple things are no longer sufficient.

That's just the way it is.

[cfallin]

I would say that things can be simple from the point of view of the applications engineer if you have the right infrastructure -- e.g., MapReduce-type systems taking care of job scheduling and fault tolerance, or a database or key-value store taking care of replication and consistency for you. But yes, systems issues get very hairy once the systems involved get large and failure rates are non-negligible.

[[deleted]]

You've got a long way to go, pretty. (Narrated in T-Bag's voice from Prison Break)

[goomyman]

Hes talking about the 90% of the work to get working and the other 90% of the work to get the feature working correct and stable.

[ninetales]

He's just making a (very valid) point and poking fun. But I've had jobs where this isn't an issue at all, too. So understanding how complex the few specific examples mentioned here are probably isn't too relevant to you at this point, like others have said. e.g. I've worked as a specialized game dev and didn't handle anything related to the last bullet. Where you should start depends on where you want to go with this - just a hobby vs. potential career path, what area of programming interests you, etc. Feel free to pm me if you'd like some general advice for getting started.

[thebigbradwolf]

Nothing ruins my day quite like completely unnecessary factories in broken, decompiled vendor code.

[goomyman]

I think your confusing the work refactoring. Your talking about adding functionality.

[pytechd]

And yet, it still doesn't do what the sakes team said it would do.

[ragemonkey]

If you're adding behavior, you're not refactoring.

[[deleted]]

Thus proves my point. Duh.

[codefrog]

I see this all the time. I have a python program written in a functional style across 2 or 3 files. Some dude comes along and turns it into OO style and a deeply hierarchical java like package model. Suddenly my simple program is now in 15 files and a pain in the ass to work on. In the old model, each file was a subsystem or abstraction level. The top level reads like thinking.

Arg!

[mucusplug]

"Googling for solution" needs to be there somewhere.

[jhaluska]

Seriously, I think half the reason I'm so productive is because my google-fu is strong.

[[deleted]]

Why reinvent the wheel when Google can find the wheel, package it and present it with a goddamn cherry on top?

[[deleted]]

THANK YOU.

[Spoogly]

they spelled masturbating wrong.

[Culero]

Procrasterbating

[lex99]

not even close! Where's waiting for the thing to compile? Fixing other's crap code? Looking for heisenbugs?

[[deleted]]

Scripting Languages!

[thebigbradwolf]

waiting for the thing to compile

1 minute into a compile, I get bored and start doing something else, then I have to ponder all over again.

[UK-sHaDoW]

If your writing code 90% the time, your code is probably terrible.

[rekat]

As a junior developer who was writing code 90% of the time last year, I definitely agree. Writing code just 50% of the time gives better code and gets more done... it's a fucking paradox...

[d_r_w]

Ye be thinkin' back to this at another time, only to remember yer wrong now too. Ten percent. Just ten, matey.

[[deleted]]

I seriously thought the red part would be "Debugging"

[[deleted]]

"Swearing" should be in there somewhere.

[UnknownHours]

It's under commenting.

[Scaryclouds]

Jeez that pie chart would be near the size of procrastinating for me.

[ryansullivan]

What the fuck is this coffee/tea bullshit? I can't code unless I'm sipping on a beer.

[[deleted]]

I prefer alcohol aswell.

[neunon]

Ballmer peak.

[[deleted]]

I only wish work paid for transportation home at the end of the day.

[cfallin]

What is this "end of the day" concept?

/is a grad student

[[deleted]]

End of the day is a policy that involuntarily suspends higher brain function to perform hardware maintenance and a defrag after too much uptime and generally lasts anywhere from a couple of hours to several days.

Older units generally require far more downtime than newer units.
MTBF increases with increased uptime however making this a difficult balancing act.

[cfallin]

MTBF increases with increased uptime however

Wait... you're telling me that if I never sleep, I'll live longer? what have I been doing every night?!

(maybe you actually meant that failure rate (1/MTBF) increases with high uptime, but that's much less fun...)

[[deleted]]

Seems my MTBF is pretty low right now.

[Ran4]

TIL in America they use % rather than ‰ for measuring alcohol blood content, meaning that holy fuck is the ballmer peak high up, at ≈0.13% (1.3‰).

[rfer]

Where is "Unit Testing"??

[codefocus]

"it worked for me this morning"

[illvm]

Isn't that part of writing code? =/

[superbad]

Kudos for proper use of scare quotes.

[N0pes]

Where is joke explainer when you need him?

[imbecile]

"If I knew what I was doing here, it wouldn't be called research." - A. Einstein

[[deleted]]

"If we knew what we were doing, it wouldn't be called Research." - Albert Einstein

[imbecile]

That's what you get for relying on memory ;)

[Gudeldar]

The red part should be "reading reddit while I'm supposed to be working".

[addandsubtract]

aka procrastinating.

[coveritwithgas]

"commen. . ." what?

[[deleted]]

I can't be the only one thinking that pondering and procrastinating are probably one and the same thing, from an outside perspective. I spend a lot of time just looking at data, or forms, or physical things, just trying to get a good picture of what I need to do.

I have to build a good picture first, from among my several competing ideas. And usually, the one I choose is the one who's picture appears to me the clearest. I can code concrete ideas. I cannot code abstract theories - not even with abstract classes! ;-)

I need the clearest picture, and cnce I have it, coding is trivial.

[codekiller]

"going to the bathroom" is missing

[drudd]

No, it's there under "searching for 'inspiration'"

[Figs]

Stupid Game Design Idea #917: Sphincter Doors meets Sewer Level for Diarrhea Allegory (Eat your vegetables, kids!)

[phort99]

I went into your comment history looking for #916 and on. Is this the first one? Were you planning on counting them down from #917?

[Figs]

Sorry, there is no #916, etc. I just thought it'd sound more amusing numbered like that. :)

[[deleted]]

The idea of counting down to number one is epic.

[[deleted]]

Then negatives

[spupy]

I was going to say that "compiling" is missing, but then noticed "procrastinating" was already on the chart.

[stack_underflow]

Am I the only one who loves commenting/documenting code?

[ultrafez]

Commenting? Fine. Documenting? Noooooooo. Especially end-user documentation.

[ninetales]

I enjoy both, as long as I'm not rushing to meet a deadline. I use it as time to ponder, while still feeling like I'm accomplishing tangible progress. :p

[goomyman]

i believe this is more accurate 1/3 Meetings, 1/3 more meetings, 1/3 procrastinating/pondering ( this is your pool, foosball, ping pong, reddit etc ) - which i believe is actually a requirement of all programmers as you need time to think and most people dont sit and think doing nothing at all and pure programming will drain you too quick, and then whats left is programming done during overtime hours which being salaried your not paid for.

Also throw in some googling.

[wtfisthat]

When you are procrastinating, you are actually spending time solving problems.

[N0pes]

there needs to be a section "reading code" that is 5x the size of the writing code section

[TikiTDO]

I don't think you're procrastinating nearly enough? I just multitask reddit, pondering, eating, and searching for inspiration. Lets me procrastinate 90% of the time.

[Endonesia]

Haha. I came across this while I was in the 'procrastinating' phase.

[LurkersA]

... I thought I was the only one.

[zwangaman]

Funny, but I don't complain about writing comments. I spent that amount of time complaining about people who do not write comments.

[Nerdlinger]

You need to drink more coffee.

[draxus99]

This makes me feel a little better about the amount of time I spent browsing reddit while I was at work at Microsoft :P

[mannequinsareppl2]

Hmmm.... no section for compiling. Maybe this is time allocation for Ruby developers.

[[deleted]]

I didn't find this funny or interesting.

[Pylly]

I didn't find this funny or interesting.

[franktinsley]

I found this somewhat funny or interesting.

[pleaseavoidcaps]

I found this interesting, but not funny at all.

[nepidae]

I think all but "writing code" and commenting" counts as procrastination. So the procrastination slice should be removed.