I've always thought that a dual screen setup is sufficient for application development. One screen for the code and one for documentation/testing. In some cases I could see another pc with one screen to be useful for testing in a different environment. Then I saw this. I'm not sure what to do with so many screens but I'm still a bit env...
I'm wanting to hear from some people who have actually done extreme programming. Does it work? Well? Is it sustainable over the long term? Thanks! ...
We know there is a maximum number of hours that a programmer can really be 'effective' in a day. Human mind has a limited capacity to work at a stretch, more so when the work is creative in nature. There is certainly variation per programmer but not much. There have been studies which evaluated how and when were most of the bugs were int...
I usually take hours to get into the zone. But I kept getting knocked out of the zone (usually by coworkers asking for help) and switching between programming tasks is tiring. How do you get back into the zone after losing it? ...
Lots of people have things that their systems do for them or for their teams. Source control post-commit hooks are a standard example: have an automated build system that checks out the latest source, compiles, tests, and packages it is a back-office hack that most of us probably use. What other cool things have you done? ...
I've learned that I work better with less stuff around me, so I got rid of a lot of toys, pictures, printouts, spare parts, little-used computers, etc. If you're going to set up an office but keep it minimalist, what items do you still bring along? Assume you have the budget you want. For example, you could just work on a laptop, le...
Anybody have any suggestions for a quiet or silent mouse? My wife is not so keen on me coding while watching television because of all the mouse clicks. A follow up for someone who knows hardware... are the clicks in a mouse really necessary? Or are they supposed to be auditory feedback? ...
What you do before starting to code/program everyday? Play a flash game? Surfing? ...
I am a software developer for a decent sized software company who's major revenue comes from on-site consulting and web design. I am one of very few in-house developers, whose job is maintaining a .NET 1.0 application (pretty much legacy at this point). This project has been neglected for years (due to the main revenue coming elsewhere...
Any suggestions for concentrating on the relevant topics? ...
I know that I do my best coding late at night with Groove Salad playing in the background, but I was wondering how other people feel they do their best coding. So my question is this - where and when do you do your best coding? Is there anything that you absolutely need to code? ...
What items go into a software shop's development environment, how do you document it, and what processes do you follow to make changes? I thinking about this from the standpoint where I want to make it easier to bring new hires up to speed quickly by having all this on a checklist we follow when setting them up, and then while I'm at it...
Programmers as a group have a not exactly ill-deserved reputation for thinking little of others work/opinions and thinking a great deal of our own. I know that, I see it in myself all the time, and I consciously let such things slide on that basis when I see them. But... I'm in the unfortunate position where I'm working in an environme...
I've graduated from college last May with a CS degree and have been working for a state-government agency ever since. This place, however, isn't like how I imagined the "real world" would be: I've been put into a small conference room (my bedroom is bigger) with 3 other programmers. The four of us just sit together, all day long, on th...
Hi all, My team is working on a conversion project to convert one product (but with many facets) from VB6 to .Net (we have over ~300k LOC). Before I got on board, the decision was made that regardless of the location of the assembly, or folder structure, all classes / structs will be in one namespace: . They even go as far as changing...
I know someone who has a one-man company developing applications in Delphi and Pascal. He is running into problems in handling the workload. Thus, he needs to find an employee. Having trouble finding people, he said his company is not attractive for graduated students. One of the reasons was that he uses a platform that is not that popu...
Expanding upon http://stackoverflow.com/questions/395557/are-framework-dependencies-a-problem, my uncle runs a one-man software company that was once the software departement of an general IT company. He writes applications using Delphi and Delphi for PHP. His strength is that he has alot of domain specific knowledge in regards to the a...
The company I work for has had about 10 of us in a conference room pushing for a deadline. Maybe it's just me, but I just can't get any work done in that sort of environment. It seems as though I'm not the only one who has issues with this kind of work space (citing that Australian study at http://www.news.com.au/business/story/0,27753,...
I've been suffering from a lot of elbow and forearm pain lately, and apparently it's caused by my arms and elbows constantly pressing against the desk. My doctor says I'm damaging the nerves on my elbow, and if I don't use elbow pads (or spend less time with the computer), it will get worse, and I will be risking permanent damage to the...
I currently am an 'intern' with a managed services company (much more IT/hosting than development, to my woe) that pays the bills and puts experience on my résumé. The issue I am having is really with what defines the "core" of an internship - learning. I personally have always thought that an internship is an opportunity to receive a k...