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Comment by yummypaint | Hacker News Reader

Get enough sleep every night that you wake up naturally before your alarm goes off. Drink enough water that your pee is clear. Merely not being chronically sleep deprived or dehydrated greatly improves every aspect of productivity, learning capacity, and subjective experience.

Most workflows can benefit from multiple monitors. it's a silly thing to be bottlenecked by screen area on a fancy computer when used 1080p monitors are nearly free in 2020.

Take regular walks and use that time to think. There is something about a steady walk that seems to improve problem solving, especially for more abstract/creative things.

When working, put the cell phone out of view and out of reach. It's too easy to subconsciously pick it up and start scrolling a feed before realizing focus had been broken.

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> Most workflows can benefit from multiple monitors.

Maybe some people benefit from this but I’ve always found it distracting and in some cases a bit annoying. I’ve always preferred simply having multiple desktops and switching between them instantly with a keystroke which is great in most Linux DEs/WMs but a terrible experience in Windows. It’s gotten to a point where even though I have 2 displays, I just turn one off 99% of the time.

I can toggle between virtual desktops with a keystroke in Windows, too! I have mine set to CTRL-WINDOWS-arrow. Let me know what you're having trouble with and I can help you get Windows 10 set up the way you want.

This either works out of the box or it is something that PowerToys added (which I have installed, so I do not know for sure).

Also very useful: the windows-key shortcut overview that the PowerToys added (keep the windows-keypressed for a second or two to bring it up).

Could you give me some pointers how to setup virtual desktops and tiled windows that are completely keyboard controllable?

I only use W10 as a secondary OS and never used windows as main since XP/2000. So far never got to dig deeper into this. It seems to me that out of the box a lot of the functionality is there, but there are also a lot of related third party (often paid) tools.

What are some good combination of tools (third party, paid or not) and settings for a more keyboard centric i guess you could call it, setup of Windows? At the moment to me it feels a bit like, that I could do everything with just keyboard but I'm not meant to.

WINDOWS+arrow will tile the current window and give the opportunity to tile other windows next to it

Without weird third party stuff, it annoys me that I can’t map desktops to Ctrl-1/2/3/4 which is how I have it set up in Linux. Hopefully they eventually make all this more flexible.

The easiest way to do stuff like this is with a keyboard that supports macros.

Doesn't that interfere with app shortcuts?

I think that depends on the apps you're using. I like his chances on the desktop switching being more handy than in app combinations.

You need to be able to switch directly from workspace #1 to #8 (eg.), not hitting ctrl-windows-arrow 7 times. I use AutoHotKey for this purpose.

I agree with the grandparent poster that the Windows situation is very bad compared to something like i3.

For those on macOS this can be set in system preferences -> keyboard -> shortcuts -> mission control.

I highly recommend using multiple desktops with dedicated hotkeys over alt+tab to switch between applications. Much much faster to press fn+cmd+<h, j , k, l> and immediately bring up the application you want than to tab until you find the application you are looking for.

Same for me. Multiple desktops with tiled windows on a single screen has been a much better experience than the two screen setup I had in every job before.

Example for my desktops setup for web application development over the last couple of years:

1. Browser with the product I'm currently working on, nothing else

2. Shells for all sorts of small tasks like tailing a log to REPLs for quick experimentations

3. Application IDE(s)

4. SQL IDE

5. Music player

6. Communication (Mail, slack, etc.) and secondary browser for miscellaneous things

The greatest thing for me is, that what I'm currently doing is in full focus and everything else basically doesn't exist. No notifications dinging in peripheral vision or other distractions. Also it is nice, that when I switch to laptop only, the workflows are exactly the same just with more limited screen space = less tiles I can use.

If for a given tasks it is beneficial to have things side by side, it is just a couple of key strokes to re-arrange windows and or create an ad-hoc desktop until the task is finished.

Of course I could use multiple desktops and tiled windows on multiple screens, but from my experiments it added more complexity that benefits.

I would rather go for a bigger, higher quality screen than adding another.

Agreed. My major workflows involve a 28" 4K screen with a tiling window manager. The second monitor is often empty or has chat window or music player in it.

Ye that is how I use multiple monitors too. 2nd monitor has something I use like 5 minutes to the hour, like Spotify etc.

what does a 4k screen do for productivity? i get the image is clearer than 1080p but is it worth the higher spend?

It lets you fit more stuff on the screen, legibly.

Depends on how you run it. A screen is more than just "4k", or 4000 pixels wide. The amount of pixels in total spread out over the physical dimension, depending on the aspect ratio and the distance between you and the screen as well as the rendered density by the computer together make the result.

So, you could use a 27 inch 4k display at 16:9 aspect ratio (which is 3840 by 2160 pixels) in a way that gets you the native resolution which results in much more usable space but the displayed quality isn't all that great. You can run them at 2560x1440 rendering which sacrifices some pace for much improved quality. Works well when you don't sit super close to your screen. Or, if you like more space but still have a little better quality than the jagged mess that is the native resolution, you could run it at 3008x1692. Close to fully usable space but still way better in terms of quality.

The scale of your computer rendered interface and text versus the actual pixel size and density on your display gives you a balance to choose from for space vs. quality. Which one works best is a combination between physical distance to the screen and personal preference (which mostly forms based on cognitive load).

My experience, after buying a monitor for home for the first time in like a decade and getting a very nice 27" HP z27 4K: it's... fine. I think I'd need like 5 more diagonal inches before I could really fit more on it than I can on a lower-pixel-count 16:10 monitor the same size. Because of the way scaling works, what I want is everything scaled to about 1.5x, but that's computationally expensive and/or looks bad, so in practice I run at 2x anyway, so the benefits in stuff-on-screen aren't really that high. I can keep fonts set a little smaller I guess.

I kinda regret not getting 2x 1440p monitors with similar picture quality for less money.

Meanwhile it makes using Linux a giant pain in the ass, unless you go all-in on a major desktop on a major distro, and then also get lucky. Possibly I'd have a better opinion of it if I were using it with macOS rather than Win10 and Linux.

[EDIT] and OMG lacking auto-temp-control based on surrounding light has me really wishing I'd just put the monitor cash toward an iMac. Way more eye strain.

install redshift or something similar. it's basically flux

Assigning programs/roles to certain screens helped me there. For example the left monitor is the browser, the center the editor and the right for consoles.

Though when a task only needs one screen for more than a couple of minutes to stay focused shutting off the other screens does help.

I found myself having productivity issues while having two displays because I always have to decide which display the window should belong to.

Then I upgraded to 3 displays, it's much better. Because I have an explicit main display.

So a viable way is, even with two displays, don't try to utilize them. Put the main one in the center, and pretend the other doesn't exist. Once you really want to use the other display, instead of for the sake of utilizing them only, you'll know it.

> So a viable way is, even with two displays, don't try to utilize them.

I did that before switching to single display after having multiples from the first day of my career onwards. But I didn't even had to try. By the end, because of how my work and setup has evolved, the second display was switched off 99% of the time.

So when I have the choice I put the entire budget into an ever better single monitor, rather than splitting it.

I would recommend the same. I usually only put things like Slack or documentations in the off screens - it's pretty 'read only'. I also use ultrawide screens occasionally in my hometown's house. I found the problem with 3 displays is I cannot put one application span across displays or there would be a 'bar' in the center of the application. I have to put them far left or right instead of placing them in more comfort zones.

With that being said, I ended up with 3 monitors in my apartment because I bought them incrementally across 3 years(though they're the same model). And also I play video games from time to time, for most of the games, it's better to have 3 monitors instead of an ultrawide one.

About four or five years ago, I was finally able to swing my ultimate monitor setup. 27” 5K iMac in the center and a 27” Thunderbolt Display (2560 x 1440) on both sides. All three wall mounted so I keep all my desk space free. The side displays are angled inward by about 20 degrees. Unlike windows and Linux, which both perpetually don’t seem to care about hi-dpi displays and low-dpi displays in the same desktop, macOS seamlessly handles dragging windows across the entire workspace.

Main task in the main display, docs and other references on the left display and email/messages on the right. Works wonderfully.

I’m so used to this setup that when I go to my real job and am constrained to a single monitor I feel like I’m looking through a periscope at my work.

Touche. Me too work with 3 27" monitors mounted with arms, while in my company I work with single 24" monitor... It's painful.

Rectangle solved that problem for me, by making it very easy to move windows around.

https://rectangleapp.com/

One situation where I've found it invaluable recently is Zoom standups. I like to see everyone at the same time rather than let Zoom decide who I want to look at, and our kanban board has 7 (!) columns. Of course I could just switch between these things, but you don't really notice the cognitive load that causes until it's gone (and I do use a nice tiling WM setup)

I’m saddened that so many morning standups have transitioned to video instead of quietly dying off.

Are you saying you don’t like the format, don’t find the meetings valuable, or both?

Not GP, but my impression is a bit, that the better things are going, the more farcical stand ups can become. The status update aspect of it could be automatized from the task management tooling, people reach out for help/input as needed and don't wait for the next stand up, socialize outside of these allocated slots, etc.

With every recurring meeting no matter the frequency you have to be quite careful in my opinion and constantly re-evaluate and tweak to keep it useful most of the time, instead it being a dogmatic ritual that has to be done a specific way because somebody learned it as such from an "Agile" book, certificate, course, video.

> The status update aspect of it could be automatized from the task management tooling, people reach out for help/input as needed and don't wait for the next stand up, socialize outside of these allocated slots, etc.

People rarely understand the point of agile and, specifically, standups. Using it as a daily check in, especially as status updates, is contrary to agile's intentions. The real purpose is to make sure that people on the team frequently expose problems. If people are already doing that consistently, then standup as a practice is fairly moot.

For me standup meetings are not a part of agile. The latter is more of a minset, how you go on about things. Everything else, standups, scrum boards, epics, story points, squads, retros etc. are just tools that might or might not be useful for a team. You can be agile without them, and you can not be agile with the entire array of buzzwords.

I think there is an useful status update component to standups. Not to your boss, to have a shared view among the team what the state of the product is. But this has to be aligned with how fast to product is meaningfully changing. Some times this might indeed be daily, but otherwise it quickly becomes just noise.

Of course some managers think the product has to or can meaningfully change every day.

I agree, that if you do them you should make them about exposing problems.

Ya the only value I don’t totally discount in them is the forced socialization. It’s sorta like eating dinner together as a family. As a kid you might not want to participate but at the end of the day there is value in that cohesion. And if it’s not scheduled it’ll not happen much, or it’ll happen among cliques.

We switched to asynchronous standups that just involve writing a short post stating what we did yesterday, what we are doing today and any questions/blockers we have.

Everyone seems to prefer it. They don't have to stop what they are doing at exactly 10am, and they can re-read things that are relevant and skip things that are not easily. There is also a bit more personal accountability because everyone can see what was said in previous days.

Time to dust up the deep fake and some gt-3 standard answers for the standup.

hmmm... can gpt-3 code too?

Where it’s feasible for a given task, I find nothing more productive than just switching to a Linux virtual console and running Emacs in text mode there. The complete absence of doodads gives a huge boost to my focus.

I use a tiling window manager and often have up to 6 editor panels open at a time, spread across 3 monitors. I honestly don't know how people are productive with a single editor window.

I was the same way and ultrawide is the happy medium for me. 1.5x width lets me have 3 columns of windows instead of 2 and then I virtual desktop for more expansion.

IMO the WMs on windows and OSX sucks.

sloppy focus is way more helpful than multiple monitors. You can have your editor largely obscured by documentation (or the other way around) and still type. This is especially nice with modern UIs which seem to think wasting screen real estate with white space and ribbons is an important recent innovation.

I personally find multiple monitors to be very distracting, in fact I get headaches and dizziness when sitting with someone with 2 or more monitors. I'm so used to a single monitor that the fact the mouse cursor doesn't stop at the edge of the screen and goes on to the other one is extremely disorienting. Now, I'm sure I could get used to 2 monitors, and I'm just stuck in my ways, but for my current workflow I don't see the benefit. I'm distracted enough as it is by emails/chats.

For web stuff, I find having three monitors invaluable.

One monitor for code, one for the browser (and devtools window) and a third for everything else (an API document, or a spec, a control for the music I'm streaming or a chat window etc.)

I've found the same setup works really well for any workflow that involves making a small change and immediately seeing the result.

I do this as well but I can get easily disoriented by the abrupt changes in the layout. Does that happen to you at all?

Task View and Windows Virtual Desktops are actually quite good in Windows 10. Most people never try them.

>Most workflows can benefit from multiple monitors.

I used to believe this but not anymore. Way back in 2007, I spent $2500 for 2 Samsung 30" 2560x1600 monitors ($1250 each). I envisioned a massive productivity increase with scenarios such as:

- email inbox one screen with main "task" window on another screen

- video tutorial (e.g. Photoshop training) on one screen while following along on Photoshop on the main screen

- debugger on one window with the code output on another screen

Eliminating all the Alt-Tab window switching would be supposedly be gone. That was the theory. The problem is that I didn't realize that my eyes hated having these giant lightbulbs in my peripheral vision. It was uncomfortable enough that I often powered off 1 monitor which negated the point of multiple monitors. The other thing I didn't like was the extra heat 2 monitors would add to the room.

I went back to 1 monitor and Alt-Tab is minimized if the single monitor is big enough (at least 27") to have multiple windows of reasonable size. For me to go back to multiple monitors, I'd need the "wing" screens to be color e-ink panels[0] so that they don't act as bright flashlights in my peripheral vision.

I recognize the productivity benefits of multiple monitors -- especially for "dashboard" and monitoring[1] such as stock trading, devops IT corporate/cloud systems monitoring, SpaceX rocket launch monitoring, etc. Having your peripheral vision notice an abnormal activity is useful in those scenarios.

[0] https://www.google.com/search?q=e-ink+panel+&tbm=isch

[1] https://www.google.com/search?q=multiple+monitors+trading&tb...

I too don't like lots of bright windows/monitors in my peripheral vision.

On macOS, a utility called HazeOver makes working with three monitors much nicer.

https://hazeover.com/

What if you routinely want to look at multiple windows? Can you easily choose which windows are not dimmed of the many on your desktop?

You can set it up so the one active window on each monitor is not dimmed, so if you have two or three monitors you can have two or three non-dimmed windows. You can't do anything more fine-grained than that, as far as I know. You can also toggle the dimming on or off with a global hotkey.

Not exactly the same thing, but I have 3 physical monitors in Windows and when I need to go into focus-mode I sometimes use an application called MultiScreenBlank[1] to dim or blank out the screens I do not want to bother me.

[1]: http://multiscreenblank.nookkin.com/

Similar here. Also, my workstation is now a laptop with a big screen, so I can go work wherever is comfortable at the moment, without being crippled without my multiple monitor setup.

I use tiling window managers to help make this work. (Currently, xmonad on personal laptop, and trying out i3 on my work laptop to see if I can get is as productive for me as xmonad.)

When docked, the laptop's screen usually displays my first virtual desktop, which is for email, chat, misc monitoring. All the other desktops are for Web and tasks.

There are two many tools, setups, and conventions to get into here, but I'd just like to say I'm currently a fan of the approach that all I need is my laptop and Internet to do all my work.

(Well, sometimes I need other specialized hardware. But I don't need to be at my desk for the big monitors.)

Agreed but you got very large monitors. If you have regular sized monitors (~23-24") then you can arrange them in more creative ways than horizontally.

I'm using 3 monitors - the two main are right in front of me, the one on top of the other, and the 3rd is on the side, rotated vertically. I tried several arrangements and I found this one working great for me.

I like the additional monitor on its side. Terminal window plus Telegram open in that, or a code editor with web browser on the horizontal screen. Even two 24" monitors side-by-side horizontal seems like a long way to go from one side to the other, the arrangement I have now seems very natural. Multiple workspaces on my Linux desktop really help as well.

I agree with the other points, but for this:

> The other thing I didn't like was the extra heat 2 monitors would add to the room.

This has probably changed with modern monitors. I don't think I've ever felt that a non-CRT monitor was hot, but even it might have been true a long time ago, it definitely hasn't been the case since at least 2015.

I agree on the multiple displays point.

However, keep in mind that the 16:9 aspect ratio is better suited for movie watching and somehow the whole industry (except for Apple, and Dell also seems to have picked that up in its latest XPS line) uses that, even in professional settings. 16:10 is way better. 1920x1200 displays do exist and I recommend that. Used ones are a bit more expensive than used 1920x1080.

I'll forever miss the 1400x1050 display that I had on my ThinkPad T42. It was awesome for displaying content vertically (think code and/or documents).

Yeah, i miss the days of 4:3 displays on laptops. This reminds me one of my favorite things to do with 2x 1080p monitors is orient one of them vertically. It works great for documents and code.

4:3 is underrated. I was watching Star Trek the other day and realized it is easier to focus on a square screen. I wonder if the widescreen era was driven by some technical detail in ease of manufacturing.

AFAIK the "widescreen era" of computer monitors has been driven by TV screens & TV screen marketing (non-tech and non-screen-nerd people just knew "HD" and maybe "1080p" meant "good screen"), which were driven by the desire to watch movies at close to full-frame, which I'd guess were driven by the need/desire to have a wide viewing area for seating-layout reasons. Early cinema, though, often used aspect ratios much closer to 4:3 than later films (they're actually really nice to watch on iPads), so the later, wider format must have evolved for some reason.

I guess it is easier to build cinemas with wide rather then tall screens, since the roof is just so high.

Maybe it is becouse widescreens have more inches diagonaly for the same area as 4:3 that there was a push for consumer TVs with widescreen?

Add to that list 3:2 displays. Surface devices have been using this ratio since Surface 3. [1] Now it's the only device that appeals to me because the ratio feels just right.

I wish there were more options for ratios in the stand-alone display market. Rumor has it, Microsoft will be creating a line of Surface displays. [2]

In my opinion 16:9 is unappealing for productive work.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_Surface#Model_compar...

[2] https://www.theverge.com/2018/11/29/18117584/microsoft-surfa...

Yes indeed. I forgot about those.

Help fight my ignorance: what makes 16:10 so much better? If you sat me down in front of two different monitors I doubt I could tell the difference.

I'm not so sure, I recently calculated the following:

16:9

16:10

16:10.66 (almost 3:2)

16:12 (4:3)

I'm sure you can tell the difference between 16:12 (old TV) and 16:9 (widescreen).

Vertical screen real estate.

Think about it: when you're writing code or working in a shell or reviewing a configuration file or working on a word document you'll probably use vertical space more than horizontal space.

Consider rotating your monitor to vertical instead. On the desktop, I always have one or both of my monitors vertical.

Can't do that on the laptop!

It's a bigger difference than it sounds, because the space taken by the taskbar and window chrome are fixed. So the extra pixels go directly to your vertical scroll area.

I also like hiding the dock and the menu bar on macos.

On linux I like using a 4k display at 100%. I don't really care about window chrome, icons, etc. I care about text and mainly use a text editor, terminal and browser. They all allow me to set the text size. This way I get the best of both worlds: unobtrusive window chrome and legible text. This works great on a 24" display.

I visited a factory (kind of) a few days ago. I saw an old HP laptop (6xxx model) running Windows XP and controlling some machines. It's as wide as my laptop, the bezel not much larger and the display area definitely bigger because it was almost square. Too bad for the low screen resolution. I'd love that form factor again.

Works great when you spend a lot of time in a code editor with a file navigation pane on the left fourth of the screen. Keeps the code in the center so you don't have to look to the left all day.

You should revisit your clear pee theory. Clear all the time means you've consumed way too much water and you're probably low on electrolytes.

If you're eating food then you're fine. The US military tells everyone to drink water until your piss is clear. "Hydration charts"

The military has like an hour of exercise a day, no? If you are walking 10 feet to a car and driving to site in a cube all day, I don’t think you have the same hydration needs as someone physically exerting themselves.

I think the point was that if you exercise a lot, eat enough, and drink yourself to clear pee, you still get enough electrolytes. So a less strenuous plan with enough food presumably also means one gets enough electrolytes.

You'll still be low on Magnesium if you sweat and perform for 60min+ — which leads to stuff like restless legs and rather bad sleep.

The U.S. military does not have any uniform guidance on this. The Navy and Marine Corps official guidance is that urine should be lightly straw-colored. Hyponatremia is warned against just as strongly as dehydration.

The average sedentary individual is way more likely to be dehydrated. Physical exertion is going to deplete both hydration and salts, via sweat.

I am a runner and a weight lifter and a former Sergeant in the army. Dehydration is overwhelmingly more frequent than electrolyte depletion. Even when there's no physical exertion involved.

> Drink enough water that your pee is clear.

A lot of doctors and health professionals will say that this is bad advice and that it encourages people to obsessively flush electrolytes and minerals out of their bodies.

> A lot of doctors

Which doctors, specifically?

Doctors I've spoken with. Do you want their names and phone numbers or something? What are you expecting me to say here?

Some reference material would be good. Article? Research?

https://duckduckgo.com/?q=too+much+water+electrolytes

These results seem to indicate one has to drink a lot - not just enough for clear pee

I don't know what their references are or what articles they've read.

But it's not hard to find warnings:

https://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/hyponatremia/...

> Drinking water is vital for your health, so make sure you drink enough fluids. But don't overdo it. Thirst and the color of your urine are usually the best indications of how much water you need. If you're not thirsty and your urine is pale yellow, you are likely getting enough water.

You see it all the time - young people drinking eight litres of water over an hour or something stupid like that during arduous physical activity because they think they should 'drink until their pee is clear', then wondering they their legs don't work anymore.

It's a meme from the HBO Trump interview.

Clear is not necessary. Here's a reference for you: a professor of urology in the NHS who says "If it’s yellow it’s quite concentrated, if it’s white or just white or pale then it’s fine." So, pale is fine, yellow is not. https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b036v9hq

Read the books, read the manuals.

You have to drink a LOT of water to reach that state or over flushing out electrolytes. Whereas, a dramatically large popular doesn’t drink enough water. So, in general, the above advice is still very valid.

I've known the "real" color is supposed to be pale straw yellow for years but I still feel best when it is clear.

2-3 ltrs per day of water is good. Especially in the early morning to detox. Hydration is very much mandatory for focus.

> detox

What does that even mean? If your body contained toxins that you needed to « detox », you’d be having a pretty bad day and kidney failure.

Detox is meaningless. It’s not like your body is « polluted » and and you can only clean it by « detoxing ».

Increasing flow and decreasing concentration through most filtration assemblies generally increase their effectiveness. There are some exceptions in certain active transport systems that I can think of and the kidneys certainly do some of that, but even then the system has to be operating above a certain optimal flow.

Healthy skepticism that this makes a difference in day to day human health may be warranted, but skepticism that the claim is even meaningful in the first place is not. Your body does routinely contain a lot of toxins, and it has mechanisms to clean them out. “Polluted” is not a binary yes/no attribute anywhere else in the world and it hits not binary in your body either; it gets more or less polluted as it excretes less or more waste.

Sure, if you’re dehydrated, your liver and kidneys will probably have a hard time doing their job. But drinking more water than you need, drinking magic teas or vitamins, etc does nothing more than what your liver and kidney normally do in a healthy body.

See https://duckduckgo.com/?q=detox+fallacy for more in depth explanations.

Metabolic byproducts are literally toxic, and your liver and kidneys remove them constantly. "Detox" is probably overused but your comment is wrong too.

> Get enough sleep every...

All good advice. You missed one though: get your ass into shape. You need to be doing strenuous exercise. The difference this will make in life can not be explained, it can only be experienced... just like The Matrix if you will.

YMMV. It does nothing for me (in terms of how I feel during the day or the quality of my sleep), although I do it because I enjoy sports and having better cardio and being stronger helps (and I look better).

Does nothing compared to when? Were you previously obese?

Compared to when I was out of shape (much weaker and no cardio to speak of). But I was never obese, I was rather too thin.

In my experience, one set of exercise is akin to 2 cups of coffee in terms of wakefulness/alertness. I'm sensitive to caffeine. So by that I mean 2 cups of coffee as someone who's sensitive to caffeine.

Also, with 1 set of exercise you won't really start to sweat and you can do it every day.

What counts as "1 set of exercise"? I've never thought about exercising that way.

a "set" is a series of repetitions of a given exercise that is performed continuously. for example "three sets of five reps" of a given exercise would mean performing the exercise five times, resting for a moment, then performing the exercise five times, then resting, and finally performing the exercise five more times. a single set would just be doing the exercise for a given number of repetitions.

Yeah, I know of that one, of course, but it didn't seem to make sense in the context of mettamage's comment.

I'm building up my motivation for exerccise. Currently, I'm motivated enough to do one to two sets. the motivation stems from what I said above. I typically do 8 reps.

The issue with three sets is muscle soreness. I want a fully functioning body every day.

You might find (as I have) that when your body gets used to certain movement it will no longer get sore from it, even if sets are very hard and even if there are many of them. It does take some time though, good luck!

Ohh, I didn’t know that was a thing!

> The issue with three sets is muscle soreness

I appreciate the fact that we all can't be athletes: having said that; there was a time in my life when I would open my eyes Every Morning to blinding pain from my workouts. But now, 30 years later, the benefit (I believe partly from having been in such awesome shape and I do still workout strenuously, but not to that level) is that even at 60 years of age I still have stunning reaction times, I can still do things most 35 year olds can not and my driving is still freaking crisp!

PS: I can still do over 60 consecutive pushups and planck for 4:30 minutes. Sure somedays I'm sore as hell but fuck that old age shit... ;)

Haha, that’s an amazing external motivator!

Currently I am on a quest to like exercise for its own sake, and I am coming from a place where I strongly disliked it. I am surprised that I have found a way to like it at all.

I’ll be blogging about it in a month from now as I would be on month 3 then :)

> Haha, that’s an amazing external motivator

Cheers!

Great advice! Addendum: if you feel shitty don't always presume it to be lifestyle related. Get blood tests and confirm.

Good addendum! I didn’t think anything of being tired all the time. Even though it’s silly, the jokes about adult life being tiring and all the “but first, coffee” things really made me feel like being tired was just a normal byproduct of being grown up. Nope! I was just anemic to the point the doctor was recommending blood transfusions to me, so I could get back to normal. Oh my gosh! I don’t basically army crawl from the door to the couch when I get home because I am so tired anymore.

Yep. Also simple vitamin deficiencies can cause massive energy/mood issues.

Spot on. I experienced elevated stress and only when felt lightheaded, Dr suspected B12 deficiency.

did you feel better after you fixed it?

Much much better! I have a lot more energy. There were times that I was so tired at work, I would go in the bathroom and lay my head on the toilet paper dispenser for a moment. I was just so desperate. I felt like I took Benadryl. Looking back, it’s obvious that isn’t normal behavior. But yes, now I can stay awake for a normal amount of time. Such an easy fix, but what a difference.

so what was the fix?

Iron supplements. “Flora fix liquid iron” was the best I tried. I tried pills, but they made me feel so sick. Slow release iron pills were fine though. I also try to be mindful and try to get iron from my food. Meat, spinach, dried apricots.

I had sort of a similar revelation. I went from a normal American diets (eat whatever I want) to a low carb diet and my energy rebounded quite a bit. No more super grogginess in the morning or occassional heartburn. Decent energy all day long without the spikes from caffeine and carb loaded meals. The weight loss was a nice secondary benefit, but I wasn't so concerned about that.

Watch challenging clips or lectures. I had feedback on my thesis on nonparametric Bayesian methods and started two days ago watching lectures on topology and convergence. It somehow unlocked concepts that made it much easier to grog the feedback, even though it was not directly related.

Any lectures you would suggest?

The topology one I mentioned is from Jack Nathan.

I also liked the lectures on convex optimization by Stephen Boyd a lot.

Steve Brunton on Fourier analysis.

It's all very subjective of course. Andrew Ng would be mentioned by most and I've watch the series as well, but I find that suddenly I'm intrigued by a mathematical field via some connection I didn't make before.

For example, I experiment with auto-encoders, then I read some papers on using the Wasserstein distance as a metric. Subsequently, I'm watching clips and lectures on optimal transport.

The nice thing about math is that it's so self-motivating to me. The more I learn, the more I want to know. I don't know, maybe it's a type of addiction.

Regular walks is such a big one for me. When I realised how often the solution to a problem I was trying to solve would come to me even if I just went for a ten minute walk round the block and thought about something else for a minute, I couldn’t believe I hadn’t done it before!

It’s now my default thing to do if I am struggling with a problem or just feeling slightly unfocused, even if it’s raining - I’m fortunate that my office pre-lockdown was on the ground floor, and my apartment has a large enough balcony that now I tend to pace up and down there rather than mess around locking up and going downstairs etc. I can see how having a lift to wait for etc. might make me less keen to do this all the time, but seriously, try it! (It’s good for you too :))

I think multiple monitors is not a universal thing. I can't concentrate with more than one monitor. Tiling wm works better for me. At every moment I am only focused on one thing.

I'm the same. A company I worked for tried to buy me multiple large monitors of my choice, and couldn't understand how I can do front-end comfortably on a 13" MacBook Pro screen.

Yeah, I would rather have software perform the task of switching my focus between windows than my neck.

I used two 24" monitors at work for years, and thought it was fantastic. But at home, I only have one 27" iMac, and it's more than enough... tried two for a while, and it just didn't help.

I think the 27" is in a sweet spot. Big enough to be able to display several things (2 editor columns + docs + console for example) but not too big so that it's not visible all at once.

Now if it would be possible to get a 27" 5k screen like the new imacs, that would be absolutely great. Same "actual resolution" as the older 27" but with much sharper text.

I use a 48" monitor that lets me have 4 to 8 zones pretty easily, usually the bottom two get the most attention but the top comes in handy when monitoring something or keeping up on stonks.

I like multiple monitors when you have two of the same size and vertical resolution next to each other at the same height. Having the mouse cursor jump I find to be distracting. On a laptop I usually stick to the one "monitor".

There are definitely (at least) two schools of thought on this.

Personally, I'm in the preferring-two-monitors camp. If I can't have two, I'll have three, please. And large ones. Particularly when I'm doing web work, the convenience of having an editor with ample space to open many source files at once on a main screen, an auto-reloading browser with accompanying dev tools on one side monitor, and multiple pages of documentation on the other side is a huge win.

I know other people who are also in this camp, and others still who for similar reasons to others commenting here aren't a fan of lots of monitors. They typically have very consistent patterns in how they set up their working environments and often multiple desktops that they switch between frequently.

I suppose the conclusion is not so much "have multiple monitors" but rather "invest a bit of time and if necessary money in customising your work environment to work well for you".

> Take regular walks and use that time to think. There is something about a steady walk that seems to improve problem solving, especially for more abstract/creative things.

When I’m thinking really hard about something, I _have_ to pace back and forth.

I’m not sure that walking will make me think harder, but I’m sure it can’t hurt.

> When working, put the cell phone out of view and out of reach. It's too easy to subconsciously pick it up and start scrolling a feed before realizing focus had been broken.

Do people not use social networks on their computers? It's as easy for me (easier actually) to subconsciously open HN on a computer, unless it's blocked somehow.

I only social on my phone. So. Placing it by the door of my office, out of reach is effective for me.

That struck me as odd too. I never pick up my phone when I have my computer in front of me. Everything my phone does, my computer can do better, including taking and making calls and texts via google voice.

I'd hazard to guess that most people have notifications turned on on their phones and typically not on their computer.

Take Facebook as an example. Your phone will ding on FB updates or incoming messages on Messenger, even when the phone isn't actively being used. On a computer you need to have a browser open and have Facebook opened in a tab for it to give you any notifications.

So it's easier to avoid on your desktop than on your phone.

Most of my computer time is spent on my work-issued laptop. I try to avoid anything social/personal on work machines.

this is why I ssh tunnel/VNC to my home PC. I suppose they could be key logging or screen capturing, but if they're doing that on my work laptop I don't want to be there anyway so I don't worry about it, but there is no browser history there at all.

I wish that I could. Unfortunately, it is my MFA for half a dozen services.

> Most workflows can benefit from multiple monitors. it's a silly thing to be bottlenecked by screen area on a fancy computer when used 1080p monitors are nearly free in 2020.

If this is your cup of tea, I recommend checking out VR Desktop style workflows (arguably a good way to experience "working in The Future™", with infinite screens, customizable environments, etc). Here is one for Linux that we've been working on for a few years: https://github.com/SimulaVR/Simula

Diet is another big factor. Try to eat more vegetables, less carbs and less meat. Especially mid-day. If you don't like vegetables, figure out how to cook them better.

How exactly does that help? You’re saying a low calorie, low protein, low carb diet makes you feel better? Where are you getting your energy from then?

You get more than enough energy from eating sensible, healthy food. Protein doesn't just have to come from large serves of meat!

Here is how my partner and I ate for the last five months of working from home:

* Eat more veggies and salad, more beans and legumes, some fruit.

* Eat much less bread and pasta. Cut out most sugar and fruit juice.

* Make 1/3 of your dinners vegetarian, and split the other 2/3 between chicken/turkey and fish. Eat little red meat. * Have dessert as a treat twice a week.

* Evaluate portion sizes. You probably will be perfectly happy only eating 2/3 as much for your evening meal.

* Realize that most snacking between meals is because you really want a small break from work, not because you are actually hungry.

In combination with regular running, I have never felt fitter or been in better shape.

I’d call this a “rational” diet; unfortunately, most of the diet plans I find on reputable sources are for “constrained” people (vegans, vegetarians, or people that are allergic to something). Being unconstrained, I’d assume I’d have an easier time finding a sensible diet that has all the nutrients and energy I need while being reasonably eco-friendly and wouldn’t break the bank, but that’s not my experience. Would you recommend any sources that I could use to build such a diet plan?

Why do I ask for some reputable sources? My attempt to build a plan according to my “common sense” (similar to your advice actually: dropping most of red meat, eating more legumes etc) lead to me developing hypotension and iron-deficiency; of course I can adjust the diet now I know this, but I’d rather do it the proper way this time.

"Most workflows can benefit from multiple monitors. it's a silly thing to be bottlenecked by screen area on a fancy computer when used 1080p monitors are nearly free in 2020."

No. My productivity is much better with just one monitor.

Same, at least thus far. It always ends with annoyance caused by fighting over window management and task switching which hampers productivity.

I never understood why people struggle with window management, but then again, my primary setup is to use a tiling window manager where I either keep a single full screen window in a workspace or a very simple side by side split, or 1x2 split or 2x2 split as appropriate. Possibly one hovering window that I call up/hide on demand. And then I just keyboard shortcut between workspaces. For multi monitor, I dedicate some workspaces to each monitor (and occasionally move windows between then if needed, but it’s not so often). It’s easy to switch between workspaces because I dedicate them to specific tasks, eg 0 is messaging applications, 6 is my IDE, 7 is browser I use for development (dev tools open tiled beside the browser), 8 is terminals etc

More monitors just mean some workspaces are switched between by moving my head instead of switching what’s on screen. For some tasks it’s easier for others it’s not.

I do find a larger higher resolution monitor more useful than having two or three small ones, especially for my IDE where I have splits and such. I use a 34” 1440p currently but would love to go larger/higher resolution (but 4K at those sizes is out of my budget right now)

Since moving to Mac OS because of work I desperately miss XMonad, where workspaces and screens are separate concepts, and you can ask any screen to show any workspace and it’ll just resize appropriately.

There are tiling managers for OSX. None of them work as well as the ones for Linux but they're better than fumbling with a bunch of mousing around. Maybe try Divvy or Tiles.

Tiling window manager like i3 in multiple monitors environment is not that convenient as I thought. Most of the time I just use one monitor. Switching workspace between multiple monitors confuses me.

I still like having multiple monitors even with i3, but a single large monitor is definitely more useful to me than multiple small ones, so given the choice I would choose a larger primary monitor before choosing a second or third monitor.

> I either keep a single full screen window

Pretty much what I do with my single screen. Probably down to being a contractor for a long time and never knowing from one day to the next if I even had a desk to sit at, never mind a monitor or two.

That's exactly the problem I solve with multiple monitors.

I'd rather flick my eyes over to the browser window documenting function signatures, error cases, etc. than alt+tab through potentially several windows to find said docs window, then alt+tab ing back to my coding window to use said information.

But apparently some people prefer to do that, than to spam a few win+arrow key combinations, to spread their windows out for initial setup.

I suspect it has to do with number of windows required for your work. If it's a couple, I guess switching desktops/screens/windows via shortcut is equally or more efficient than separate screens.

However, if I have ~10-12 windows I regularly need to switch between (2-3 related projects in the code editor, 2 browser windows - 1 browsing/docs, 1 the actual app I'm working on, terminal, db mgmt tool, Figma, Slack, email, Calc for some of the data, file manager), a tiling manager or multiple desktop on just one physical screen make things significantly harder for me...I might be missing something obvious in how it's supposed to be used.

I use workspaces with one monitor. It's sort of best of both worlds.

Then you’re not in the “most”. GP did not say “All workflows”

GP probably shouldn't have included it. It's hard to argue that even "most" do. Maybe "some" workflows.

same and how can so many people not be in "most"

Sort of agree, though I'd say more important the number of monitors is resolution. I find anything less 2560x1440 results in increased cognitive load for window management.

-Most- implies for some people it won't be so. I don't think he meant it was true for everyone. Most of the engineers I know personally, and that's a lot, prefer two or more screens to work on.

Getting better now but for me I am lucky if I get 2hrs sleep before a workday. I can lay in bed trying to sleep for 12 hours and it's just horrible, brain won't turn off. Pills do help,but either the dosage is too weak or strong enough to make you grogy or moody when you get up,defeating the whole purpose.

Have you tried mindfulness?

Or vigorous excercise - for me I have enough energy that if my body is not tired, I don't sleep.

Probably not the problem in your case, but in my case taking a single Magnesium/Zinc pill about an hour before bed became the 75% solution.

+1, Everyone should try ZMA first if they can't sleep. Then tryptophane or GABA or 5-HTP or melatonin.

Have you tried diphenhydramine? It helps me a lot work occasional insomnia and I never feel groggy the next day.

I also started taking 1mg melatonin an hour before I want to sleep. That works wonders for me.

https://slatestarcodex.com/2018/07/10/melatonin-much-more-th...

... and, umm, mindfulness, I guess.

For those people who feel groggy or nauseous/headachy in the morning after Melatonin, try taking 0.3mg. You might find it has the same effect with less pronounced side effects.

(I am not a doctor)

I have tested different doses quite a bit. 5mg makes me feel groggy the next day. <0.5mg seems to do morning. ~1mg seems like the sweet spot for me.

I'd recommend against regularly taking anticholinergic drugs like diphenhydramine because they've been fairly clearly linked to cognitive decline in the elderly when taken regularly: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diphenhydramine#Adverse_effect...

It's worth noting that many allergy meds (like diphenhydramine) are anticholinergic, but only ones which pass the blood-brain barrier are linked to cognitive decline. So newer allergy meds like cetirizine and loratadine are better.

Your link says anticholinergic use later in life has been linked to cognitive decline, not that use by young people results in cognitive decline later in life.

I linked to Wikipedia, but I originally read the abstract of a different study, which might have examined diphenhydramine specifically rather than many anticholinergic drugs. The abstract of the article cited on Wikipedia makes it clear that it's a cumulative effect, and that they studied outcomes in older adults. So I think Wikipedia describes the research incorrectly.

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/25879993/

I have bad insomnia for many years, since childhood, with symptoms similar to what you report. I would stay away from pills. They lead to dependency, possible mood changes and shallow sleep. I have been able to get better at sleeping over the years after trying many different things. Here are a few of the things that helped me the most:

- Temperature control. I sleep with the AC set at 65, a fan and a BedJet device.

- Blue light control. I wear blue light blocking glasses at night time

- Wind down routine. I am careful not to exercise, watch exciting shows or do anything that raises my hearth rate at least an hour before bed.

- No alarm clock. I have found that when using an alarm clock I invariably get anxious about it going off.

Hope some of that helps.

I've done most of these and they all help.

What really helps is silicon earplugs (they warm up to body temperature and mold to fit, so comfortable I've forgotten to take them out until I'm half way to work) - a lot of my issues are I require silence to sleep and stay asleep and the modern world just isn't conducive to that at all.

Ah, yes, I forgot about that, I use those as well and they do help. Sometimes I also use a mask.

> Temperature control. I sleep with the AC set at 65, a fan and a BedJet device.

Do you have a thick blanket then? Or are you just covered with a thin bed sheet while the air around you is 65 degrees F (18 degrees C)? That sounds like it would be freezing.

I have 3 not so tick blankets so that I regulate the temperature further yes. For some reason I am extremely sensitive to temperature.

I'm wondering why you find it better to have a cold room but then heat the body with blankets vs. just using fewer (or no) blankets and having a higher room temperature. It's pretty interesting in any case, thanks for the answer!

1) any part of you out from under the blankets (face, perhaps) feels the coolness.

2) I can't sleep with few or no blankets anyway. I mean I could probably adjust to it over time, or if I'd hiked 20 miles that day I bet I could, but I certainly can't right now under ordinary circumstances.

I don't start to think a room's too cold for comfortable sleeping until it's under like 60F. My sleep gets worse if it's over about 68.

Some ideas after a LONG list of trys:

- Exercise, even if just 10min daily

- Sleep in a colder room

- Maybe is a lot of noise around you, and night is the time for your brain to work cleanly. Reduce it (I find this recently)

- Stop being worry about not get sleep. The more you worry, the less you get.

- If can, sleep when you feel it, get up when not. Not force to get sleep if you know you can't. I think this help to reset the clock. After a while things start to settle.

- Substances amplify what is wrong, maybe. I think is better to fix the macro stuff, the routine, and then maybe use something.

Thanks, I've tried a few those as well. I can't stop from worry about not being asleep once it's been a few hours of trying. I am looking into diet and any new behaviors as well. I use to br able to sleep at will.

I was in a big bad batch, but eventually it get better. Hopefully you get better too!

Exercise has consistently been the key for me. About 6 months after I stop exercising, my sleep schedule is a total wreck. Walking briskly for 1 mile a day is enough.

Listening to a podcast that is not too exciting helps me switch my brain off. It needs to be one without a flashy ending which might wake you up. That or you can set a timer to kill it before it ends.

Have you tried changing your diet? Keto, Mediterranean, Vegan. I've known people who have all benefited by finding a diet that works for them. I personally never eat past 6:30 or before 6:30 the next morning and eat keto and my energy has rebounded a lot in the past few months. Regular sleep schedule also helps, I'm always in bed by midnight unless it's an emergency (a real one) of some sort.

Knowing I have to get up, that I'm likely to be disturbed early, or that I'm needed at a particular time in the morning makes falling asleep really hard. That and I find it a lot easier if I'm on my own with no-one in my space or interrupting me or chatting or asking for stuff or anything as I'm winding down and relaxing in the ~1hr before sleep. And that's before you throw in any extra actual life stress on top of fairly-normal things like having to be up at a certain time or having a partner.

... so yeah, as a married guy with kids and a job, falling asleep is hell basically every night.

It gets old quickly.

If you are following a coding tutorial; you need to alt-tab back and forth from browser, terminal, and editor. If you an have an issue you may do it ten times before finding an issue which breaks flow.

Much better use of your time to stay focus and just glance at the second monitor. Same with research and an office suite.

drinking water till pee is clear is total nonsense. drink when thirsty.

There are known benefits to drinking at least 2L a day, which is hard for most people who don't make any effort to drink even when not thirsty

Not sure about best pee color but I know for a fact that I am less hydrated because I don’t get thirsty often. I have to impose on myself to drink water otherwise I drink a glass of water a day.

It is too late to drink when you feel thirsty.

The problem is that it's very easy to get distracted or engrossed in work and not register in your consciousness the signal of thirst.

yeah that's me, I have workrave going in the background at at my hourly reminders to get up and move, I'll grab some water and stretch my legs. Colleagues always offering coffee in the breakroom :)

I can get quite dehydrated before I get thirsty. So now when I get a headache I drink a lot of water and it usually helps.

caveat - multiple monitors are NOT ergonomic.

You really want one monitor, properly positioned forward of you. You should have a keyboard at the appropriate height with a wrist rest to support and angle your wrists (also make it warm - not cold plastic or metal). Your seating should allow you to sit up or slightly reclined. Your head should be balanced on top of your neck, you shouldn't be hunched or twisted.

laptops - well, let's just say NO laptop is osha approved.

This is assuming you're sitting in the exact same position all day long. With a laptop you don't have to assume that.

> With a laptop you don't have to assume that.

bed, right?

If you are coding in bed, well... I just don't know the ergonomics of that situation. I don't know if this requires further study or a prompt curtailment of that line of thought.

It's great. The key is to get one of those bendy-leg laptop stands. That solves all the ergonomic angle problems, keeps it from getting hot on the bed, and lets you use it a little table.

The walking bit resonates a lot. Feels therapeutic to go for a walk and let my mind wander after a day of work.

or get big widescreen monitors they are great

> Drink enough water that your pee is clear

This would give my GCSE Chemistry teacher apoplexy.

Clear is not a colour.

"is" has nothing to do with colors, e.g. pee is hot.

"clear" == "transparent" == "colorless"

If your urine stream has much color, you are dehydrated or perhaps sick:

https://media.healthdirect.org.au/images/inline/original/uri...

Clarity is to do with opacity, not colour. See also how diamonds are graded by colour and clarity.

May I ask what you hoped to accomplish here? a) the parent comment didn't ever mention colour, and b) is there any possible ambiguity - even a fleeting moment of confusion - that any reader of the parent might have experienced?

> "clear" == "transparent" == "colorless"

Pretty clearly talks about colour.

Yes, there's plenty of confusion, given "clear" is not a colour. Your urine can be perfectly clear while still being yellow.

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