The advantages of programming on a small netbook
ianso.blogspot.com
ianso.blogspot.com
But it was a happy switch from Eclipse. Netbeans took longer to do things, but it didn't require that I try doing them 3-4 times before anything would happen (e.g. start/restart tomcat).
=)
Even my humble netbook is a good couple hundred times more powerful than the my Apple II. I am quite sure it can accommodate NetBeans and Eclipse quite comfortably, apart from the screen real-estate limitations.
The point is that the constraints of his system forced him to code better rather than being lazy and relying on the hardware to carry him through the day.
(too bad the wikipedia page doesn't list Kaeon, his one man shooter than was revolutionary on PCs of the day).
edit here it is! https://www.mobygames.com/game/kaeon
Or you could just have a mobile phone sitting nearby, and keep hitting 'refresh' on it...
somewhat off topic but I feel like saying this story too. When the game hitman 2 was out I had a machine with only the minimum requirements. So I always had very high stealth points because I never went out in bang bang shoot outs because the machine got stuck when I alarm so many enemies.
Keyboard: I have small fingers, and I actually type faster on the netbook keyboard. The key distances are smaller, so I'm moving my fingers les.
Screen: I use a small font (Code Envy R at 10pt) and WMII, so I can fit a lot of code on the screen at once. I can also switch between windows extremely quickly, so it is relatively painless not to have all the code I'm working on, on screen at once.
Battery: I got the six cell battery, because I don't mind the extra weight (unless you have muscular dystrophy what difference does weight really make? It isn't like I have to hold this thing in the air while typing on it. ;) but I do love the seven and a half hour battery life. It also uses close to no power when on suspend (loses maybe 3% over two hours) so I just shut the lid whenever I'm not using it, and a charge lasts me the whole day.
Durability: I've dropped this thing off tables maybe seven times now. It doesn't care. It also spends most of its time in the small compartment of my backpack where it gets jostled all day.
If the drive was spinning when it fell it all depends on the angle and the strength of the shock, if it was not spinning chances of not having any damage are much better.
SSDs were made for netbooks. I am not sure why vendors even attempt to put hard drives in them. (Actually, I know why. Comparison charts, and money.)
I'm certainly less distracted when I'm in front of my netbook. And, I'm certainly less likely to start noodling around on the internet looking for videos, etc...
I also can run Win 7 Ultimate on the Netbook without any problems whatsover. And, by purchasing an extra 6 cell battery the my Aspire One, I have enough battery life to last me from Barcelona to San Francisco on a single charge. It's a beautiful thing.
I know the iPad is a beautiful piece of hardware, but when people mention having a computer that they can just have lying around and turn on to surf the web... I already have that. And, it cost me $250.
For example: I remember, back in the day, that in order to compile, I had to submit the compilation job to a batch queue running on a separate server. Usually, you got your "success" or "failure" message back within a half-hour.
(Similarly, print jobs printed to a device in a locked room, and an "operator" (remember those?) would deliver the printout to your desk, usually within a half-hour.)
Needless to say, one tended to be pretty damn certain that the code was clean and correct before attempting to compile.
As Samuel Johnson said, "Depend upon it, sir, when a man knows he is to be hanged in a fortnight, it concentrates his mind wonderfully."
Bars aren't for coding, put down the computer.
But then ... maybe you work at a bar? You didn't describe your office.
Where I live you don't go to a bar to drink although you usually drink something when you're in a bar.
My specs: Acer Aspire One D150 (1gb/160gb) with Ubuntu 9.10 Emacs 23 for editing Switched to Chrome (5.0.379.dev) from FF, coz the new dom inspector seems to hook right at the bottom of the window like firebug.
Using Balsamiq on the netbook is a pain for new mockups. Not to just view mocks tho.
It seems to be slow to run the Android emulator, but it runs fine raising some exceptions. Tip: click wait and not force quit in the emulator :) also skip eclipse and learn the commands. The only thing you'll probably miss is the auto pkg importer in eclipse (fixing statements by importing pkgs). But that's fine :)
Now, I'm not actually a coder, I just do a job-related script or two now and then; so YMMV.
If it's at night (I've done this too), the loud people act like a white noise generator and leave me alone in my thoughts.
I had horrific problems with the keyboard on my 1st gen EEE PC, so make sure you get a chance to demo the netbook of your choice before blowing $400 bucks. The right shift key is terribly placed (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:ASUS_Eee_PC_900_0010.JPG) - you reach for shift and you end up hitting the up arrow. Sure you can remap the keys, but this design decision is indicative of the overall quality of the keyboard. The _biggest_ problem was that various keys randomly ignored input. Hit the spacebar 10 times, you'd be lucky to get have it register 10 times. Try coding in vim with a keyboard that may or may not let you into insert mode. Maybe I just got a dud, but the EEE PC message boards suggests other users experienced similar issues.
I used that netbook exclusively for 6 months before giving up. Now it's my $400 Playstation 1 emulator :-/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/symmetricalism/3429329317/sizes...
luckily there was an international version of the same keyboard being used on other mini 9s, so i was able to order it from dell and install it on mine.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/symmetricalism/3465687431/in/se...
Do you happen to have the part # for the international keyboard? (I just poked around Dell's site for it unsuccessfully.)
the back of it is the top one here: http://www.flickr.com/photos/symmetricalism/3466501746/sizes...
It was annoying, but the hacking was fun.
Since I bought my netbook (3 months ago, LG x130), I have been using it heavily to browse the web, open and edit office documents, play games (and it runs well Age Of Methology), watch videos and chat with friends (it has a cam). The netbook has served me well, it’s fast and the battery life is fine (4 hours).
Later, I have decided to learn some jQuery and JavaScript in my spare time (so in my netbook). I installed Expression Studio (Web 3.0), Stylizer, FireFox, FireBug and Google Chrome. When working (debugging JavaScript or editing HTML) I always keep all of the windows open (Web 3, Firefox, Chrome, Stylizer and sometimes IE8 for testing); the speed is amazing, it never slowed me down. I also run Skype and Gtalk.
The only issue I have been facing is Flash and mainly with FaceBook videos which completely slow down, kill and then crash Google Chrome or any other browser which was positive since it increased my productivity. Another issue was with Adobe Reader, very slow at loading, opening and browsing PDF books or files.
edit: I might add also screen/tmux. Coding at home, and need to go? detach and grab a laptop, continue coding. Your battery dies? Session is at remote end and nothing is lost.
I have only one semi-functioning eye and code in 14pt font on a 24in monitor, though, so I'm maybe not the best to talk about eye strain on a netbook... after all, one must be able to at least see them first.
But it seems like line length would be a real issue.
* AMD Athlon Neo MV-40(1.60GHz)
* 12.1" WXGA
* 2GB Memory
* 250GB HDD
* ATI Radeon HD 3200
Not bad for $380 I think! Also Ubuntu 9.10 runs fine on it except the wifi driver which has to be manually installed but only involves an extra minute or two.
and, of course, you've written a script for that by now anyways (right?)
BTW, as I noted elsewhere, ubuntu netbook remix is outstanding for the netbooks. It provides maximum screen space utility and is worth a look.
Don't get me wrong, I love my 27" iMac, but there sometimes is too much going on on the screen. On a small screen you just see code and nothing else. No IM, no finder icons, no bouncing dock things. Makes a big difference if your brain is already going 150 MPH.
Maybe this is why Stallman is also still using a fullscreen emacs in tty mode.
Here's my experience:
Up: - It's fast. Honest! Faster than the proper dev machine I was using just 3 years ago.
- It's crazy portable. I can write code on a bus.
- Long battery life. 8 hours writing in Word, or 3 hours at full dev mode: SQL Server up, VS.NET and ReSharper churning away nonstop while 4 copies of the client-heavy end-product are running in the background.
Down:
- You can't fit much code on the screen. Means you need to keep more stuff in your head, which slows you down a bit.
The big downside is that nobody is making fast small machines anymore. The X60, which ended production 2 years ago, is the last notebook you can buy with a non-letterbox screen and a proper fast processor. Now it's all netbooks, with their boggy processors and wide-aspect, codeproof screens.
It's a shame. If somebody made a machine on the X60 form factor with the latest hardware I'd definitely buy one.
While it is somewhat larger (12" screen, 3.25lb), it's still rather mobile, and a bit bigger screen (1280x800) means I can fit most of what I need on the screen (I prefer my windows maximised, though, and my IDE of choice is vim+bash).
It's powerful enough machine, too - I usually have one (or, not so often, two or more) VM running for servers and/or different operating systems.
And this temptation is bad?
Fast machines make you lazy.
These days the stuff I write does not run on the machine it is written on at all so that's no longer a factor.
Makes it easier to spot performance issues if you are not using a desktop water cooled super computer that boots so fast it causes nosebleeds and nausea.
It is very different experience from coding with computer, and it results in better quality code, because I can't just run to "ensure" it works, I have to think it throught.
Also I tend to write less code, when each time I forget to add check before some line I have to rewrite whole function by hand.
In home I just check documentation for apis I didn't remembered, and type code into computer. Almost always it works after a few minutes of simple variable misspelings etc corrected.
Of course, this won't work so good with bloat oriented languages :)
My old Thinkpad T22 was fantastic for coding, and of course my desktop with HHK and 3-button Logitech (3 real buttons, no scrollwheel) is even better. The netbook, not so much.
The nice thing about a longish honest post like this is that the writer is likely to tell you what you need to know whether he meant to or not. This is a good example of condemning something while meaning to praise it. Trying out ideas is half the point of programming!
coding on a train? coding in your head while shopping for groceries? how is that related to notebook at all? same can be done with any laptop. no?
I recently coded a personal site (around 5,000 lines) almost entirely on an Acer Aspire One with a small display and a cramped keyboard, and I made sure I knew exactly what I wanted to write before sitting down (usually during lunchtime).
(Of course, the HHKB is as easy to carry around as the netbook, so I usually don't have to use the netbook keyboard. Once you get past the keyboard, a netbook is a full machine like any other. Except it weighs nearly nothing and it can live for 14 hours without a power outlet.)
The speed was also rarely an issue. Clojure starts a bit slow, but everything runs perfectly fine. Admittedly, I mainly use lightweight tools like vim (I did once fire up eclipse, but it was so painfully slow, I promptly (as promptly as it let me) uninstalled it again).
I actually bought the eee pc for development. I find it extremely useful to have a small and light laptop which i can throw into the bottom of a bag and bring with me wherever. I got it for the freedom of being able to work on the bus or in a cafe without the hassle of a heavy or bulky laptop.
I do use a decoration-free window manager though, so I don't have screen space wasted on window borders, title bars or taskbars.
I've mainly been using my dual monitor desktop machine since I "upgraded" my work room, because I now have a very spacious desk and it makes sense to me to have plenty of screen space too (and I've been doing more GUI development recently too), but I still ocasionally pick up the eee pc to hack something together, especially when I'm not near my desk.