An open office is essential if you're pair programming.
If not, I agree it makes no sense. I guess it can cut down on frivolous browsing.
If not, I agree it makes no sense. I guess it can cut down on frivolous browsing.
I guess it sounds weird if you've never done it, but it works really well.
Now and then, someone will ask "Hey, does anyone know X?" or something else, and issues will be resolved quickly. One counter intuitive thing that makes this possible is that since you're already engaged in a conversation with your pair, this turns out to not be disruptive.
Concentrating deeply means you're keeping too much state in your head. Write more tests instead. If it's still a problem, bring a co-worker over, or better yet, pair program. It's not the 1980s anymore, this industry is not for solitary special-snowflake hackers. You're a part of a team -- like a node in a cluster -- and the team's productivity is what matters.
Wound not have guessed that!
Now I think that if you need to focus very hard to program, you code and/or design is way to complicated.