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Credits go to Arthur Kalliokoski, bamccaig, Bob Keane, Dizzy Egg, Edgar Reynaldo, Johan Halmén, Michael Faerber, Onewing, Paul whoknows, pkrcel, Polybios, and Thomas Fjellstrom for helping out!
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productivity enhancement hints
Dennis
Member #1,090
July 2003
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Let's make a collection of productivity enhancement hints.

1. close IRC

Thomas Fjellstrom
Member #476
June 2000
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Block twitter, Facebook, reddit and other social media.

--
Thomas Fjellstrom - [website] - [email] - [Allegro Wiki] - [Allegro TODO]
"If you can't think of a better solution, don't try to make a better solution." -- weapon_S
"The less evidence we have for what we believe is certain, the more violently we defend beliefs against those who don't agree" -- https://twitter.com/neiltyson/status/592870205409353730

Polybios
Member #12,293
October 2010

sleep, exercise, caffeine

Edgar Reynaldo
Major Reynaldo
May 2007
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pkrcel
Member #14,001
February 2012

Polybios said:

sleep

^ this, oh so much of this.

It is unlikely that Google shares your distaste for capitalism. - Derezo
If one had the eternity of time, one would do things later. - Johan Halmén

Thomas Fjellstrom
Member #476
June 2000
avatar

Oh, also forgot youtube and twitch.

--
Thomas Fjellstrom - [website] - [email] - [Allegro Wiki] - [Allegro TODO]
"If you can't think of a better solution, don't try to make a better solution." -- weapon_S
"The less evidence we have for what we believe is certain, the more violently we defend beliefs against those who don't agree" -- https://twitter.com/neiltyson/status/592870205409353730

Dennis
Member #1,090
July 2003
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Mmmmh... sleep.

Do a.cc and other forums count as social media?

Got another one: settle for "good enough" now and then instead of always aiming for perfection.

bamccaig
Member #7,536
July 2006
avatar

Back away from the metal and use tools that make your life easy until it has to be hard (i.e., don't use C or C++ unless you really need to). And do yourself a favor and learn some dynamic languages (e.g., JavaScript, Perl, Common Lisp, ... Ruby, Python [1]). They are so much nicer to code in. The possibilities are just so much more elegant. These do tend to be slower than native code, but computers are very fast today and most of the time you don't actually need every clock cycle. Your time is usually more valuable than the CPU's. And dynamic languages are every bit as "real" as static languages.

If you do need to use C or C++, try to reuse existing code rather than rolling your own. You don't have time to do better than somebody else has, and you'll waste a lot of time trying. For example, Bstrlib.

Real programmers have better things to do with their lives than reinvent the square memory management. I believe it's very useful for you to learn how to manage memory, what it means, and why its necessary, but once you understand how to do it you should understand why you don't want to do it unless you really have to.

References

  1. I don't care for Python, but it suits other people. To each his own.
Arthur Kalliokoski
Second in Command
February 2005
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Delete all the games...

They all watch too much MSNBC... they get ideas.

Thomas Fjellstrom
Member #476
June 2000
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One thing that isn't just removing things... Is just do something you actually like to do.

--
Thomas Fjellstrom - [website] - [email] - [Allegro Wiki] - [Allegro TODO]
"If you can't think of a better solution, don't try to make a better solution." -- weapon_S
"The less evidence we have for what we believe is certain, the more violently we defend beliefs against those who don't agree" -- https://twitter.com/neiltyson/status/592870205409353730

Paul whoknows
Member #5,081
September 2004
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Choose your tools carefully and wisely.

Since I switched from a game library to a game engine I have increased my productivity enormously.

____

"The unlimited potential has been replaced by the concrete reality of what I programmed today." - Jordan Mechner.

Thomas Fjellstrom
Member #476
June 2000
avatar

It depends on how you measure "productivity", If your goal is to actually write the low level bits, then using a prebuilt engine is actually bad :D

But if your goal is to just whip out a game as fast as possible, yeah, grab unity or something.

I'm actually using GL and Allegro directly for my current game related projects because I want to learn GL and some of the concepts behind what engines do. So yeah.

--
Thomas Fjellstrom - [website] - [email] - [Allegro Wiki] - [Allegro TODO]
"If you can't think of a better solution, don't try to make a better solution." -- weapon_S
"The less evidence we have for what we believe is certain, the more violently we defend beliefs against those who don't agree" -- https://twitter.com/neiltyson/status/592870205409353730

Onewing
Member #6,152
August 2005
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Notes + Trello + timer/exercise.

I often bog myself down with thinking about too many things. I get new ideas (that immediately appear better) and drift into day dreams naturally.

What I started to do, since side project work for me is extremely limited (sometimes, only a single hour), I take a few minutes to brain dump every one-word thing I can think of that sums up what I'm working on. This is mindless and easy. Afterwards, I review the words and expand upon them to something actionable, which creates tasks. I then put those tasks into a trello board and get working. It's motivating to see the cards move across the flow and trello is good for minimal effort to move them along. This also gives me a place to pickup from if I need to stop for a while.

If I hit a wall or get curious about whether or not I'm doing something right/wrong, it immediately goes into a backlog on the notes and will be considered for the next round, not the current round.

Lastly, I turn on some music, either hard rock or cinematic type music and start a timer for 1 hour. Once the timer goes off, I get up and do a quick 10 push ups, reminding myself that time is passing and I too need to be moving along effectively.

------------
Solo-Games.org | My Tech Blog: The Digital Helm

bamccaig
Member #7,536
July 2006
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It's all about understanding what it is that you're trying to do and picking the shortest paths to it. If you're trying to learn GL programming or engine design then that's what you should be doing. Of course, if this is the case then you should get the same satisfaction from meager displays of GL manipulation or engine machinery that somebody actually trying to make a game would get from testing a new part of their game. If you're learning GL and engine mechanics, but ultimately want to be playing your game, then your productivity will be very poor and your motivation will not last. Along with choosing appropriate tools is defining realistic goals. You may be setting off on an ambitious project, but to have any chance at all you need to break it up into smaller, attainable goals that will keep you motivated and move you towards achieving the over all goal.

Johan Halmén
Member #1,550
September 2001

Open a thread on a.cc about religion or... rats, I suck at this.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Years of thorough research have revealed that the red "x" that closes a window, really isn't red, but white on red background.

Years of thorough research have revealed that what people find beautiful about the Mandelbrot set is not the set itself, but all the rest.

Michael Faerber
Member #4,800
July 2004
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Just read this --- perhaps the solution is not to increase your productivity, but to decrease it? :)

Oh, and yes, sleep FTW.

--
"The basic of informatics is Microsoft Office." - An informatics teacher in our school
"Do you know Linux?" "Linux? Isn't that something for visually impaired people?"

bamccaig
Member #7,536
July 2006
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Just read this --- perhaps the solution is not to increase your productivity, but to decrease it? :)

Michael wins the thread! Thanks for sharing!

Bob Keane
Member #7,342
June 2006

Remove people whose inactions (incompetence?) hinder your progress. <rant> I share workspace with another group on a different schedule. I came in tonight and one of our monitors was missing. We have a cabinet with spare equipment including monitors. The procedure for broken equipment is to replace the equipment and call tech support to restock. The cabinet has two monitors, both broken. The only other time I replaced a monitor, I had to call tech support because we had no working spares.</rant> Also rid your computer of Internet Explorer. Congrats Michael.

By reading this sig, I, the reader, agree to render my soul to Bob Keane. I, the reader, understand this is a legally binding contract and freely render my soul.
"Love thy neighbor as much as you love yourself means be nice to the people next door. Everyone else can go to hell. Missy Cooper.
The advantage to learning something on your own is that there is no one there to tell you something can't be done.

Dennis
Member #1,090
July 2003
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Just read this --- perhaps the solution is not to increase your productivity, but to decrease it?

I very much agree with that article.

Not trying to go into a "work-yourself-to-death" mode here and certainly not expecting anyone else to do that. Just collecting obvious and not-so-obvious hints for the times when you'd like to get this or that done.

Getting things done beyond the bare necessities is entirely optional and should not be something to obsess about but being idle all the time can get boring too.

So on a wide angle view... it is all about finding balance again. Society has lost balance a long time ago (or maybe never was balanced to begin with) but for some reason is not making an effort to find it again.

Dizzy Egg
Member #10,824
March 2009
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Get stoned.

----------------------------------------------------
Please check out my songs:
https://soundcloud.com/dont-rob-the-machina

Arthur Kalliokoski
Second in Command
February 2005
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Quote:

I do not know what I may appear to the world, but to myself I seem to have been only like a boy playing on the seashore, and diverting myself in now and then finding a smoother pebble or a prettier shell than ordinary, whilst the great ocean of truth lay all undiscovered before me. -- Isaac Newton

I kind of feel the same way about programming, we've only scratched the surface. You don't have to be a genius, because there are so many things possible that haven't been touched yet. Think about that awhile.

They all watch too much MSNBC... they get ideas.

Dennis
Member #1,090
July 2003
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You don't have to be a genius, because there are so many things possible that haven't been touched yet.

And there are so many interesting topics to explore, it's depressing one is not granted an eternity of time to dabble in all of them.

Johan Halmén
Member #1,550
September 2001

If one had the eternity of time, one would do things later.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Years of thorough research have revealed that the red "x" that closes a window, really isn't red, but white on red background.

Years of thorough research have revealed that what people find beautiful about the Mandelbrot set is not the set itself, but all the rest.

Paul whoknows
Member #5,081
September 2004
avatar

Thranduil said:

A hundred years is a mere blink in a life of an Elf. I'm patient. I can wait.

Unlike elves, we mortal men cannot wait for our time in this world is finite.

Too much Tolkien again, sorry :P

____

"The unlimited potential has been replaced by the concrete reality of what I programmed today." - Jordan Mechner.

Dennis
Member #1,090
July 2003
avatar

Tolkien was a wise man.

Alright, cookie time.

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