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Comment by lucisferre | Hacker News Reader

I recall a post, I think it was here, that floated by me that said something like the most productive people only actually do about 3.5 hours of solid focused work a day. Now I wish I could find it.

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I think this might be the one you're talking about: http://calnewport.com/blog/2011/11/11/if-youre-busy-youre-do...

HN discussion from a few days ago here: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3222725

I can see this, think of it sort of like a football game where you have breaks in between each play, you may spend 10 solid minutes intently coding but then usually you would then divert attention for at least a minute or two, sometimes longer. However, the fact is, that with software development, anytime you are thinking about anything related to a task it is basically working, all work isn't done while intently starting into an IDE.

I think it was a story that studied gifted young violinists in Austria or Germany- the study said that while average students "worked" all day from 9-5, the gifted ones split work and play- they worked in spurts of a few intense hours, followed by personal time.

I seem to recall that what was more important than the amount of time spent studying, was that the students were engaging in deliberate practice; they were putting in focused work intended to extend the boundaries of their skills. I think the analogy here would be that three hours of focused work (door closed, phone turned off, no checking email, no interruptions unless the building is on fire or someone is dying) would produce more, better quality results than 8 (or more) hours of work broken up by dozens of interruptions.

I still get distractions and end up doing filler non technical work during those first 3 high-speed hours, but I try to go at a pace as if the world is coming to an end and I need to give my work its full and qualified attention that it deserves...just like I use too when taking tests during my university days

We have a gym at work and i have felt an amazing refresh when I go gor a midday workout, but sadly it looks bad to leave work to workout during normal office hours, and the gym is too packed during lunch for my taste

I remember seeing a similar number. I think it was in a blog post. I know it was different from the study regarding violinists' practice habits; this was someone discussing (their?) work habits in an office.

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