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Coders: How do you stay sharp in the everyday?

category: offtopic [glöplog]
blimey.
added on the 2012-11-25 11:53:24 by reed reed
@FeN: Daily, a glass of water for each 7Kg of weight. You don't need more unless you live in the desert. :)

I also strongly recommend the daily practice of the "Iberian yoga", also known as siesta.
added on the 2012-11-25 12:02:21 by ham ham
Don't stress about it too much then?
added on the 2012-11-25 12:37:00 by ringofyre ringofyre
ringo: I won't, for all I know it's solved.
I drink coffee another time.
added on the 2012-11-25 18:09:45 by Bartoshe Bartoshe
What about some booze while coding?
added on the 2012-11-25 19:33:42 by msqrt msqrt
Less weed.
added on the 2012-11-26 11:20:32 by raer raer
boozing while coding upgrade the effect of deadline and it gives farts.
added on the 2012-11-26 12:43:22 by Bartoshe Bartoshe
In the following some bad tips you can use in case you have too much shit to do and no time (don't try if you don't have to):
- caffeine pills (50 pieces package ~ 10 euros) - half a pill will keep you "online"
- NO COFFEE, drinking a lot of coffee will completely kill you. Instead I use some tee - my favorite is a mate & guarana tee (also keeping you online - the fuck)
- be aware of the effects massive amounts of short time enhancers will have - taking massive amounts of caffeine will make you suffer from extreme caffeinism (depression, horrible headache and other not so cool things) if you stop taking it and you will sleep quite bad in (one of the "bad" side effects - well it's not that bad if you don't have time for that anyways)
- be sure not to eat caffeine pills like smarties - they are definitely not.
- while reaching the deadline (which is in my case tomorrow) depending how you react to massive amounts of stress you might also notice a high adrenaline level - see it as a feature and use it.
- take breaks, talk with other people about random things - do not completely eliminate you from the real world.
- long hot showers.
- if you are in a completely screwed up state due to the lack of sleep - use sleeping breaks of 30 minutes - take a short shower and get your ass back to the chair.

Hopefully I will not be dead by tomorrow morning - I might post on further side effects later. But first I will finish this thing. Over and out.
added on the 2012-11-29 14:21:41 by las las
this is madness!
added on the 2012-11-29 18:18:25 by wysiwtf wysiwtf
Good onya las for being our guinea pig.
Also
BB Image
added on the 2012-11-29 22:43:50 by ringofyre ringofyre
sugar works wonders for me for a short period of time i.e. a few days of coffee/carbs/sugar-fuelled madness is good. I guess coke would be more effective.
added on the 2012-11-29 22:49:01 by nic0 nic0
There are many interesting hints here and most of them are somewhat true.
However, don't forget that people are very different. Physically and mentally.

Some people need a lot of sleep. some can't eat much without getting fat soon. Some people never have a headache and some are sad all day long when a colleague says something cheeky about one's haircut.

I personally think that psychosomatic effects are considered too seldomly. The placebo-effect, so to speak, can be very strong. Give me a decafeinated coffee in the afternoon low and I'll accelerate again, *tell* me it's decafeinated and I'll fall asleep.

Of course, what works for me too is drinking a sufficient amount of water (6-8 glasses), getting enough sleep and doing some excercise. You might find that funny, but when I manage to go to bed at 11pm, I get up at 5.15am and excercise with EA Sports active on the Wii until 6. It's basically like a fitness video with performance tracking, you use your own body wheight and a bunch of these flex-tapes and you also have some device to measure your pulse. By that, I get my heart rate up in the morning for half an hour, strengthen my muscles a bit and, best part, I don't get the forementioned low during the day - even though I have slept one hour less. And I feel like someone who has already done something. I never understood why people go to the fitness clubs after work in order to, like they say in German-English, "power out" after a stressful day. I need my remaining power to do interesting stuff in the evening!

That leads to another point, that's really important for one's mental health in my opinion: Staying somewhat independent in general. That is, if you work for a company, still see yourself as an individual and try to keep up with stuff that interests you but is not excactly important for your current work, especially things that are *close* to what you are doing for a living. Having a portfolio always helps relaxing.

Good for one's mental health in my opinion is also reflecting a lot about yourself, the world and why the hell people behave like they do. If you understand (or at least try to imagine) the possible reasons for why your boss, your mom or the president is stressing you, this helps to put yourself out of the situation and reduces your anger. Which can in turn also have a positive effect on your health.
added on the 2012-11-29 22:57:21 by novel novel
Just to reinforce what novel said about people being different: I hate exercise early in the morning :) Maybe because I run, running is hard, and early I'm dehydrated after sleep and more dehydrated after drinking coffee, which is necessary to get out of bed. But a run just before lunch is great. Or a run in the evening, if I'm going to work late.

Also, a warning on coffee. I love coffee and drink it daily (usually a big strong coffee to get me up and an espresso in the afternoon), but I can't drink to much of it - a couple of times I have done, and my heart starts going too fast and I feel like I'm going to have a heart attack. This is not good, and I wouldn't recommend it before a deadline ;)

From a bit of research, I think this is actually quite common. I had a friend before who had something similar too, but he had much more serious effects - the doctor told him he would have to give up either strong beer or coffee, so he went to decaffeinated.

Anyway, back to crunch mode for me, i have a deadline tomorrow and I'm working crazy hours to get shit done. This time I'm not stressed though - there's plenty of pressure, but little stress. Reason? I'm enjoying the work, so good code is flying out of my fingers at good speed :)
added on the 2012-11-29 23:28:16 by psonice psonice
Go to bed on time.
added on the 2012-11-29 23:45:23 by trc_wm trc_wm
Hookers and booze does the trick for me.
added on the 2012-11-29 23:47:12 by kusma kusma
Quote:
the doctor told him he would have to give up either strong beer or coffee, so he went to decaffeinated.

lulz.
added on the 2012-11-29 23:53:16 by ringofyre ringofyre
^ +Insightful

To keep oneself razor sharp:

try {
(a) void ing to understand("too widely known neuron stimulating additives ", short int objectHandlers + (Integer) Long WorldMethodHelper );
} catch (ex) {
// might upset us brothers and trow different types of disloyal class cast exceptions
}
added on the 2012-11-30 00:11:15 by jhae jhae
knl: not trolling.

Release "ready" for printing at 8:30.
added on the 2012-11-30 03:54:21 by las las
Printed and released.
Now I will have to suffer horribly :).
Currently slight "the day after revision" feeling - without the good parts of it.
added on the 2012-11-30 10:17:50 by las las
diplomarbeit?
added on the 2012-11-30 12:01:21 by arm1n arm1n
Masterarbeit - same shit - different name.
Goosebumps, slight "spider web" hallucinations, no headache yet, no horrible headache yet. But that's all up next - for sure ;) - been there.
added on the 2012-11-30 12:20:04 by las las
Of course problems to concentrate... replace 1xheadache with depressions.
added on the 2012-11-30 12:31:13 by las las

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