Coding with Music

[Wags]

We used to have 2/4 man offices in our original building (ho hum) - but I only ever played music through speakers after hours. The head of department never seemed to mind. (It was normally just me and him left in the building and he had the office 2 doors down.) Our last building (our first open plan) housed ~100 people per wing but was divided into sections by tall cabinets. One night (it *is* sometime the only time to get things done when the phone's ringing all day) I was alone and blasting out Cypress Hill. 2h into my session a bloke from another team walked by on his way home. I hadn't noticed him working down the end of the wing. He's a quiet type who was due for retirement, had worked for the company since uni and *had* been used to his private office for the last 40 years. Oops! :doh: I like to think that perhaps he was getting down with Cypress Hill. :-D

"...there's what people want to hear, there's what people want to believe, there's everything else, THEN there's the truth!" - New York D.A., The International

[Gary Wheeler]

Talk radio would be too distracting for me, as I would be paying attention to the discussion in my ears rather than the argument/debate/domestic-violence-incident on the screen. I do listen to music, however.

Software Zen: delete this;

[Gary Wheeler]

I think the interesting part of the responses here is why people listen to music while coding. After reading the posts thus far, I found the following: - Those that don't listen don't like the distraction of the music. - If you don't listen, you obviously don't mind normal background noise, or don't have enough where you work to bother you. - Some of those that do listen do it to drown out background noise. - Some listen to enhance their mental process. Me, I listen to moderate my emotional state. I generally code best when I'm relaxed and unstressed. I tend to listen to jazz, new age, and classical. After lunch, when the carbohydrate crash hits, I'll dig out old-school 70's funk or 80's pop to wake me back up. If I've got a migraine pending, it's usually new age or some of those nature sounds + classical things that my wife likes :-O.

Software Zen: delete this;

[User 3401432]

I work in a rat maze of cubes, conference calls, curses, sneezes, snorts, coughs, and laughs. :^) There's 2,500 of us in our building. :~ The only way to escape from the cacophony is to listen to something -- anything -- with a beat. It isn't heavy (usually). It's usually lyric-free. It's probably jazz-techno-drums-synth stuff. It creates some order amongst the chaos. ... And there, in that semi-orderly world, I code. :cool:

[kustera]

I like programming with music. Sometimes I need good rhythm and then I prefer metal like Slipknot or something like Nirvana or Green Day, but normally I listen to classics. It doesn’t seem to affect my productivity.

[mattcj1122]

I usually listen to music, but more to drown out the surrounding office noise... so in that sense, I'm more productive when listening to music than the office noise. It actually started in college. Being unable to study in a library (which I find way too distracting with people walking around and all), I found myself studying in my room with music blasting in order to drown out some other person's crappy music. :laugh:

[Hooga Booga]

I listen rarely. But strangely enough, when I really need to get into the groove, I'll turn on some music and it works quite well.

[MACLima]

I'm a musician and I code with music for some reasons: - To avoid a too quiet place, which makes me sleepy; - To avoid been interrupted by general office talk. People often gives up telling me their last thoughts about anything non-work related because I'm on my ear buds; - To time up my "coding breaks". Sometimes you make that "10-minute relaxing from coding" last 30 minutes and from break to break, there goes the day. While listening to music, I can stop coding, listen a good one and get back to work. Buuuuut... I often turn off music to rest my ears and to be available to people around me, otherwise, I wouldn't be in a team.

:doh: do you know what to do with the power you have?

[englebart]

I can write boring, repetitive code if I listen to music. If I am tackling a difficult problem, the music seems to sap my creativity. I usually end up finding a better solution a few days later. If the cubicle area I work in is too rowdy, sometimes I listen to a noise loop with the volume just loud enough to "hiss" out the background noise.

[BunnyFaber]

My answer is... it depends. My office is extremely quiet so I don't feel the need to drown anything out. I usually don't like the distraction of music in the headphones, but ambient music is nice. But when I'm testing in the lab I am fully plugged into my iPod. Nothing helps you through a 600 step test better than the Ramones Anthology!!!!

[Lieutenant Frost]

Nah, it's considered "unprofessional" here...because we work in a cube farm, we might disrupt the angry finance people if we play music too loud. On top of that, management is afraid we won't answer the phone when it starts ringing if we have headphones on. I find this slightly ironic, because I don't answer my phone anyway - I prefer to let the calls go to voice mail if it's important. This saves me a lot of time on phone support. :cool:

“Acer, Gateway, and eMachines are the same company now. Great! Now we just need a really big toilet, and we can get rid of all three at once.”

[TheFez6255]

I switch between podcasts and music through out the day. It's pretty much the only way that I'll stay on task, otherwise I get bored and surf CNN or something else. Also I can't listen to instrumentals, there actually needs to be lyrics (or in the case of podcasts, someone talking obviously). As soon as there is silence I stop typing for whatever reason.

[P0110X]

yeah man, I do that too, symphonic and goth metal really improve creativity xD

_class MySignature _{ __public override void toString() __{ ____return "hi ;)"; __} _}

[Terence Wallace]

About 10% of the time and it works to keep me motivated, focused and productive. Listening to http://www.pandora.com[^] Should listen more often.

"If you think it's expensive to hire a professional to do the job, wait until you hire an amateur." - Red Adair

[Battlehammer]

I agree with you, and of course I am a musician as well. Rock and Heavy Metal most of the time, it sure sounds better then the chit chat of people discussing "Reality" TV shows.

[User 4158608]

AmazingMo wrote:

Rodrigo/Concerto de Aranjuez

Good taste my friend. :-)

[T800G]

My recommendations: Above & Beyond presents OceanLab - Sirens Of The Sea or Arch Enemy - Tyrants of the Rising Sun Live in Japan depending on your taste ;)

[kungFuCrab]

I find coding with music puts me into my zone. I find that I'm less distracted by noises coming from the office. Who says that you can't be productive while listening to heavy metal. :cool:

[fboule]

'°' \o/

In case you wonder what that means...[^]

[SweeTToxic]

i doo listen yup it's