OT: keeping track of time when programming

[Dave]

<frustrated>

Sorry, this mostly doesn't belong here, but I just became very
frustrated when I looked at the clock and noticed yet again that hours
had passed in what seemed like minutes!

Is it an accurate assumption that this is a common tendency among
programmers when writing or debugging code? If so, what strategies have
you found effective for dealing with it?

Hmmm... Perhaps a Perl-based alarm clock is in order. That might make
this thread on topic.

 

[Iain Chalmers]

<frustrated>

Sorry, this mostly doesn't belong here, but I just became very
frustrated when I looked at the clock and noticed yet again that hours
had passed in what seemed like minutes!

Its known around here as "hacker trance".

I'm usually at my most productive when I can get into that state...

big

 

[Joe Smith]

Hmmm... Perhaps a Perl-based alarm clock is in order. That might make
this thread on topic.

It would be handy to have a Perl-Tk application that pops up a
dialog box every 30 minutes, asking "Whatcha doin?". The one-line
answer, appended to a log file with timestamp, would be very useful
creating the end-of-the-week summary of work.
-Joe