How do you figure out your peak productivity hours?

Question

In working on side projects, I typically write code best around 7pm-8pm, with a good cup of coffee, and I find that I tend to be more productive than I do at work during this time.

What is the best way to find your peak productive hours?

Answer 1

I found my peak hours by the amount i got done compared to the amount of compile errors i had during that time.

I found it difficult to calcuilate on the amount of features i implemented, or bugs i fixed, because each one was of a different degree of difficulty.

i also guaged it by the amount of re-work/refactoring i didn't need to do.

Also, what was my mood at the time. was i really zoned in or was i wishy-washy?

edit

mine are from 6am to around the time people start arriving in the office.

Answer 2

I hate using a silly metric like lines/hour (or really anything involving lines) for more or less anything, but I think mine is when the code just flows out of my fingers. For me, it's usually 9:00 am til lunch time, which I guess nicely corresponds with the 8 hour day, haha. I do catch a small second wind around 2:00, but it's not as pronounced.

I think really the best way is just how do you "feel" as you're writing. Do you have to labor over every line, or can you just breathe C++ (or whatever), difficulty of assignment notwithstanding.

Answer 3

I'm not sure there is a straight forward measure and it very much depends on what you're trying to achieve. Ultimately I think you just know when you've been productive, though you tend to need to look back to understand whether you were really busy (doing but potentially unfocused) or productive (making good progress in a useful direction).

Certainly factors involved in any productive period for me would be:

1) Minimal interruptions - generally I find between 7am and 9am works best, though after 6pm can too, however that's not as good for...

2) Minimal distractions - the other reason early morning is good is that there's nothing on TV, pretty much no-one IM-ing you and once you've skimmed the news, your RSS reader and twitter, not much new being published (I'm in the UK and the evening is obviously US daytime so things are a lot livelier on-line then). Shutting down e-mail, your RSS client, your twitter client, your IM client, diverting your phone and everything else helps a bunch with this too.

3) I'm alert - as much as I'm not a morning person, once I've managed to get myself up and into the office, I find I'm more alert in the morning than I would be come 6pm when the day has pretty much fried me. Having weaned myself off caffeine a few years back I find I don't even need much perking up.

4) Clear priorities - Obviously this can be out of your hands but all other things being equal I often find that having slept on things has helped clarify what I really need to be working on and, with no-one else in to question those priorities, I can just crack on and get things done. The end of the day I find tends to succumb to whoever has been shouting loudest syndrome. On the subject of which...

5) The absence of my boss the day before and that day. He's pretty hands off and pretty good and really it's not him not being around, more about having been more likely to have managed to clear all the dross off my desk and knowing I've got a fair chance of having a decent run at something without the priorities changing.