Quotes About Efficiency

It's wise to learn how to cook,' Kessligh fumed, 'but a meal prepared over three weeks is inedible! There is wisdom in action! So stop talking, and act!

a pleasing geometric pattern maximising firegrid interceptions,

There is a law of exponential increase in efficiency that applies to all lifeforms that cluster, synthetic or organic. It is the reason your ancestors found it more productive to move to cities than live in small groups. Humanity found a mathematical law to benefit from, and they've been exploiting that law ever since,

The Joel Test 1. Do you use source control? 2. Can you make a build in one step? 3. Do you make daily builds? 4. Do you have a bug database? 5. Do you fix bugs before writing new code? 6. Do you have an up-to-date schedule? 7. Do you have a spec? 8. Do programmers have quiet working conditions? 9. Do you use the best tools money can buy? 10. Do you have testers? 11. Do new candidates write code during their interview? 12. Do you do hallway usability testing?

Many rookie software managers think that they can "motivate" their programmers to work faster by giving them nice, "tight" (unrealistically short) schedules. I think this kind of motivation is brain-dead. When I'm behind schedule, I feel doomed and depressed and unmotivated. When I'm working ahead of schedule, I'm cheerful and productive. The schedule is not the place to play psychological games.

I've grown to think that keeping your desk clean is actually probably a sign that you're not being effective.

Programmers and software engineers who dive into code without writing a spec tend to think they're cool gunslingers, shooting from the hip. They're not. They are terribly unproductive. They write bad code and produce shoddy software, and they threaten their projects by taking giant risks which are completely uncalled for.

Who reflects too much will accomplish little.

The average office worker now spends 40 percent of their work time wrongly believing they are "multitasking"--which means they are incurring all these costs for their attention and focus. In fact, uninterrupted time is becoming rare. One study found that most of us working in offices never get a whole hour uninterrupted in a normal day.

So if you spend your time switching a lot, then the evidence suggests you will be slower, you'll make more mistakes, you'll be less creative, and you'll remember less of what you do.

A different study by Gloria Mark, professor of informatics at the University of California, Irvine—who I interviewed—observed how long on average an adult working in an office stays on one task. It was three minutes.

The study found that "technological distraction"—just getting emails and calls—caused a drop in the workers' IQ by an average of ten points. To give you a sense of how big that is: in the short term, that's twice the knock to your IQ that you get when you smoke cannabis. So this suggests, in terms of being able to get your work done, you'd be better off getting stoned at your desk than checking your texts and Facebook messages

The study found that 'technological distraction' – just getting emails and calls – caused a drop in the workers' IQ by an average of ten points. To give you a sense of how big that is: in the short term, that's twice the knock to your IQ that you get when you smoke cannabis. So this suggests in terms of being able to get your work done, you'd be better off getting stoned at your desk than checking your texts and Facebook messages a lot.

brain moment to moment, task to task—[and] that comes with a cost.

More speed means less comprehension.

We always have time enough, if we will but use it aright.

Everything which is properly business we must keep carefully separate from life. Business requires earnestness and method; life must have a freed handling.

One always has time enough, if one will apply it well.

The less one has to do, the less time one finds to do it in.

Following straight lines shortens distances, and also life.

I'm working to improve my methods, and every hour I save is an hour added to my life.

In the ordinary business of life punctuality is . . . necessary.

Life is short (You need Python)

Of all escape mechanisms, death is the most efficient.