Programmers have a hard job, they need to push out enormous amounts of code under circumstances far from ideal. The ideal situation would be to be totally isolated from any distraction whatsoever after you have a clear goal in mind. Sadly this situation is only available for a lucky few of us with home offices.
So what do you do to create an semi-ideal situation at work? I personally put on my headphones and listen to a variety of music; Iron Maiden (most of the old stuff), Metallica (The old stuff as well, Master of Puppets in particular), The Prodigy (The fat of the land), The Crystal Method (pertty much any album will do) and The Streets (Original pirate material). This is quite a variety of music styles, most of the time it relates to my state of mind. Some other favorites in the office:
- Bennie: Trance music; not too much melody and repetitiveness in a song works best
- JJK: Kruder&Dorfmeister - the K&D sessions, Gotan Project - Lunatico, Chicks on Speed - 99 cents, Air - Talkie Walkie, Chet Baker - anything, The strokes - is this it, Clap Your Hands Say Yeah, Chemical Brothers - Push the Button and Leftfield - Leftism
- Garbrand: Plaid, or Black Dog. Amazing music with multiple layers, tickles the brain…
- Niels: soma.fm
When you finally enter ‘The Zone’ you actually don’t hear the music anymore and you are as focused as can be and do amazing amounts of work, provided you are not interrupted anywhere during the process.
So what do you do to get into ‘The Zone’?
Marco: KoRn, Dragon Force, In Flames, Nonpoint, NIN.
All this would actually mean a crap if i would actually do sum coding … which i don’t
ebuddy is a fookin life saver!!
Programmer is a honorific job who set up byte-high buildings and large mansions in our daily life.. eBuddy is an useful tool to me, thank you your excellent team for that… Dennis from China
Hey Arjen!
I told Paulo yesterday that most of your music tastes relate to me, I also listen to most of those you specified, in order to program.
And found it really funny your post: I also have that loads of time, getting into the Zone
Cool post. Keep on sharing thoughts. You’ll get a drink on next eBuddy’s borrel
Dragonforce, Slayer, Morbid Angel, or anything cappucino machine related
Thanks for all your replies!
Dennis: thank you for your kind words or according to Elvin; Xie Xie.
Vitor: you’re on!
Does anybody ever tried to listen to jazz while programming?
[…] of the more interesting posts I have come up with so far is called The Zone, I am curious how people reading this blog feel about it, so jump over and leave a […]
Hi Elvin, I do jazz while programming… Anything from Sun-Ra to Miles to Wesseltoft. I need something that is a little repetitive, and triggers my brain on multiple levels. Things like Autechre also work well.
I’ve notice that the least lyrics the music has, the better helps to get into the Zone. Either that or when the lyrics are repetitive in some way.
That’s why electronic music helps a lot. What I haven’t figured out is why rock also helps getting into it! (at least it does for me…)
Does Jamiroquai count as jazz? I haven’t yet found my perfect musical recipe to get into the zone. Psychedelic stuff like Shpongle or ambient music definitely make me ‘zone out’ on certain levels but sometimes I get the feeling it slows down brain activity in general
Recently I’ve been experimenting with latin salsa radio. The upbeat music keeps me in a good mood and the fact that I don’t speak a word of Spanish prevents me from being distracted by the lyrics.
Coincidences are a cosmic wonder. This post was posted march 12th, however I had written it initially on february 22nd in an internal posting to hear what the thoughts of people in the eBuddy team were.
Today I found this article on reddit that deals with the subject more in-depth. Also a great read.
Nice work
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I found your site on technorati and read a few of your other posts. Keep up the good work. I just added your RSS feed to my Google News Reader. Looking forward to reading more from you.