DEV Community

Ben Halpern
Ben Halpern

Posted on

Which unproductive activities are typically mistaken for productivity?

Oldest comments (62)

Collapse
 
anortef profile image
Adrián Norte

Pull Requests

Collapse
 
jacobherrington profile image
Jacob Herrington (he/him)

Writing code.

Frequently adding more code to a project is exactly the wrong way to solve a problem.

No code solutions should be celebrated more often in my opinion.

Collapse
 
charlesdlandau profile image
Charles Landau

GitHub logo kelseyhightower / nocode

The best way to write secure and reliable applications. Write nothing; deploy nowhere.

No Code

No code is the best way to write secure and reliable applications. Write nothing; deploy nowhere.

Getting Started

Start by not writing any code.


This is just an example application, but imagine it doing anything you want. Adding new features is easy too:


The possibilities are endless.

Building the Application

Now that you have not done anything it's time to build your application:


Yep. That's it. You should see the following output:


Deploying

While you still have not done anything it's time to deploy your application. By running the following command you can deploy your application absolutely nowhere.


It's that simple. And when it comes time to scale the application, all you have to do is:


I know right?

Contributing

You don't.




Collapse
 
link2twenty profile image
Andrew Bone

That looks complicated, I don't have time to learn anooootttthhhheeeerrrr framework

Collapse
 
tttfifo profile image
Todor Todorov

BTW, Charles, I have seen an opinion for the most secured system:
Unplugged from electricity!
:)

Collapse
 
elmuerte profile image
Michiel Hendriks

"The sooner you start to code, the longer the program will take." - Roy Carlson

Collapse
 
simonhaisz profile image
simonhaisz

Weeks of coding can save hours of planning - Wise Developer

Collapse
 
combinatorylogic profile image
combinatorylogic

Exactly! I wish more people could understand it!

Collapse
 
andrewbrooks profile image
Andrew Brooks 👨‍💻 • Edited

Unpopular opinion is the pomodoro timer technique. It does more to distract me than anything. 🤷‍♂️

Collapse
 
unclescooter profile image
Justin Poiroux

This is interesting. I've found it to be so helpful. I think it depends on your work flow and how your concentration cycles go.

Collapse
 
rachelsoderberg profile image
Rachel Soderberg

It helps me too, but only at certain times. I definitely don't exclusively use it because sometimes I prefer a more free-form style of work time management.

Thread Thread
 
unclescooter profile image
Justin Poiroux

I dont use it religiously, definitely depends on how adhd I'm feeling that particular day.

Collapse
 
ryansmith profile image
Ryan Smith

I agree with this. I found that the short breaks in Pomodoro were interrupting focused work and it was too stressful to try to do anything during that short break because of the work timer coming up. I know you can adjust the times in Pomodoro, but there didn't seem to be an effective combination for me.

I found the better way is to have set intervals during the day to check email/Slack (as opposed to having them open at all times) and times take a break. Not frequent and not in cycles, but just 3-4 reminders on a calendar. There tend to be times of day where emails pile up or you aren't feeling development, so it feels more natural to set reminders for when those times typically arise and step back from focused work.

Collapse
 
jacobherrington profile image
Jacob Herrington (he/him)

I tend to be someone who can focus intensely for a few hours before getting exhausted, but I'll accidentally find another task to do if I take breaks every half hour.

An extended version of Pomodoro tends to work better for me.

Collapse
 
andrewbrooks profile image
Andrew Brooks 👨‍💻

This makes sense to me. I work in multiple hour bursts much better so maybe an extended version of pomodoro is a good idea for me to try. 🤔

Collapse
 
dannypule profile image
Danny Pule

For me, 25 minute chunks of time feel way too short. I prefer to do 45 minute bursts of focused work a then a short break.

Collapse
 
gayanhewa profile image
Gayan Hewa

Long meetings

Collapse
 
elmuerte profile image
Michiel Hendriks

Or meetings with more than 5 people.
Or meetings without clearly defined agendas or goals.

Collapse
 
adam_cyclones profile image
Adam Crockett 🌀

Agile...

Gotcha! :D

Collapse
 
daedtech profile image
Erik Dietrich

In a corporate context, I think dealing with/triaging one's inbox.

Collapse
 
rachelsoderberg profile image
Rachel Soderberg

Scrolling social media! It's so easy to lose track of time and think you've spent your day being productive, only to realize 2 hours was spent on looking at cats and 30mins was spent on a feature (but the brain tricks you to think the opposite!) Also the people who complain they're the busiest seem to be the most active on social media.

I'm guilty of this too and I'm considering taking a week or two long "social media vacation" soon.

Collapse
 
ben profile image
Ben Halpern

I read recently that if you stare at your phone while "on a break", it negates most of the restorative qualities of that break.

This makes perfect sense to me, but is hard to pull off. That little rectangle is addictive af. Social media can be really awful for our collective mental health.

Collapse
 
rachelsoderberg profile image
Rachel Soderberg

It totally can be - I've noticed I've found myself being more short with my partner lately and have been wondering if the root cause could be all the social media consumption. I've heard it can affect mood along with other mental health.

Collapse
 
danjconn profile image
Dan Conn

I've been using an app called Freedom on Android which blocks my phone from certain apps I choose for a given time period. If I try to go into an app during the time I set then it just kicks me out. If I want to stop the time period after it's started I have to phone their tech support so I don't break it "just this once".

I've found it to be pretty awesome so far.

Collapse
 
mxoliver profile image
Oliver

That is amazing, I tried a similar app before but you could easily go into settings and shut it off so it never panned out for me.

Thread Thread
 
danjconn profile image
Dan Conn

Take a look and see what you think. I was so impressed I took out a year subscription with it. freedom.to/

Thread Thread
 
rachelsoderberg profile image
Rachel Soderberg

I'll look into it, but I'm more a "cold turkey" kind of person so I may just end up logging out of all of my social media for a couple of weeks to make the "barrier to entry" a little higher. Thanks for the recommendation, Dan!

Thread Thread
 
danjconn profile image
Dan Conn • Edited

No worries! Whatever works for you 😃

Thread Thread
 
tkdmzq profile image
TKDMzq

I did it when changing phone. Still only logged to whatsapp and messanger. Thats one of best things.

Collapse
 
bertilmuth profile image
Bertil Muth

Traffic light (red,yellow,green) project status reporting.

Collapse
 
deciduously profile image
Ben Lovy

Tutorials (largely)

Collapse
 
chiangs profile image
Stephen Chiang

Writing tests that aren't meaningful or less meaningful than harder ones just to up the code coverage.

Collapse
 
lukegarrigan profile image
Luke Garrigan

Dev.to 😂😂 sorry

Collapse
 
ben profile image
Ben Halpern

Anybody who spends too much time here is being less productive than they could be. I agree 😄

Everything in moderation.

Collapse
 
mxoliver profile image
Oliver

dev.to is my lunch break activity haha

Collapse
 
danjconn profile image
Dan Conn

😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂

It has certainly used up a lot of free time recently. But I am also learning things so I guess it is productive still!

Collapse
 
maeganwilson_ profile image
Maegan Wilson

Reading about “how to be more productive”

Collapse
 
ben profile image
Ben Halpern

That's a good one

Collapse
 
j_mplourde profile image
Jean-Michel Plourde

The biggest/most frequent might be: checking emails and other notifications (slack precisely)

Collapse
 
ryansmith profile image
Ryan Smith • Edited

Meetings without a clear purpose or end goal. I think that these are "feel good" meetings that sometimes have a place, but should not be 100% of all meetings. These are the meetings that stray off the path of being productive into venting about the current state of something or exploring "it would be great if..." scenarios that are unreasonable to do. Everyone feels good because they get to talk about these things, then nothing happens from that discussion. If the topic is too broad, that is all that really can be done.

I think the way to avoid it is:

  • If you are calling a meeting, create an agenda with a clear purpose and product (could be a key decision or follow up tasks/assignees) that you want to leave the meeting with and send it out ahead of time.
    • If you aren't sure, you can also survey the people who will be in the meeting to see what they would like to get out of it and create the agenda based on that.
  • Review the agenda at the meeting.
  • Ensure that product is met and create any follow-up action items.
Collapse
 
jeikabu profile image
jeikabu

Meeting agenda ftw.
And someone with the power/authority/cohones to enforce it. Whether it's a "producer"-type or tech lead that plays the "bad cop" here, once the agenda is finalized at least one person in the room needs to be able to keep it. Follow up meetings are a sane way to truncate tangents, convoluted discussion, etc.

Some comments may only be visible to logged-in visitors. Sign in to view all comments.