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Discussion on: The Complete Guide To Using One Monitor As A Programmer.

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sinewalker profile image
Mike Lockhart

This is highly personal of course, and it also depends upon your work. A developer may indeed gain from only having one screen to look at, and focus on one task. A support engineer (hi) has a highly interrupt-driven workflow. "Flow" is a rare thing as well. I often need to context switch, and will have multiple different window arrangements across my main external monitor depending on if I am working and testing a ticket, researching a topic, updating documentation.
At all times I usually need to keep my chat session visible, and it helps to have this on it's own screen so that I'm not always juggling windows or swapping virtual desktops / workspaces to view it.
Also, a lot of web sites are optimized for a portrait screen, and I use my older (and lower resolution) monitor in portrait to read these rather than arrange for the window to occupy 1/3 of my 32" UHD.
Finally, I can direct Zoom to only share my laptop's built-in screen so that other people who are trying to read what I share don't have to view a 32 " UHD display scaled down to their 16/13" laptop screen

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wiseai profile image
Mahmoud Harmouch

I totally understand your position and here goes another real-life example: