Ok, so in many ways I like the idea of programming so much more than the actual coding itself.
One of the major problems I've found I have is one of feedback. It doesn't even necessarily mean feedback from others, but merely feed back that something is happening other than typing characters on a screen.
Last week, I was modifying a tool I had made at work. The tool basically tests our I/O boards that we use on our game. The board controls the inputs we use: buttons, lights, trackball. So, I wrote a GTK app that will show when you press buttons.
The first pass just had reflection of the state of the buttons and a button to reset the states...kinda like the old keyboard tests. But, it had a few flaws. First, you had to restart the app every time you plugged in a new board to test. Second, there was no way to know looking at the app if the system could talk to the board (you have to power the board on with a button sequence to put it in this test mode).
So, I was adding those features. It was pleasurable for me because I had feedback. I added a text box for status, and there it was on screen. I changed the color of the status text, and it worked. I added a button to reset the board, and I was able to have the app remain running. There's still a shortcoming due to the fact that the app doesn't know when you've removed a board, but that's besides the point.
The point was that while I was coding it...I was in the zone. Time was losing meaning. I love being in that state, because it's when I'm the most productive. I forget that there's a browser, I forget that there's a meal I need to eat, I forget that I need to stretch. I'm focused.
I don't get to that state much anymore, and I've been trying to figure out why. I think it's because much of the coding I do doesn't bear fruit. At work now, I do a lot of behind the scenes work, and much of it requires a lot of function coding before I can actually run anything. I also twiddle our system a lot, and I don't get the satisfaction of creating, it's merely, "Yup, the network works."
So, my latest theory is that I need more feedback to keep me going. I just have to figure out how to get it without sidetracking a goal.
Posted by flynn at May 25, 2007 6:43 PM