3v1n0 / nightowls

Why programmers work at night - a book about programmers, by a programmer

Introduction - version 0.3

Hello, I am Book.

Now that we're not strangers anymore even your mother would agree you can talk to me!

Current reading time: 00:59:02

Why should you read this book?

Because Swizec, the guy writing Book, will be very happy if you do!

More importantly, it will let you in on the inner workings of programmers, those strange people making your modern life possible. The guys creating your internet, the lasses who make credit card systems, those people making sure opposing streets on a crossroads don't get green lights at the same time. Not to mention the heroes making sure airplanes don't fall out of the sky and your airbags deploy on time.

If there's a part of your life that programmers have yet to touch, I bet somebody in a research lab somewhere (probably Japan) is trying to change that as we speak. Think of toilets, toilets have a lot of computers attached in Japan.

Wouldn't it be marvelous to find out more about programmers?

Whom Book is for

Book is for programmers and the people who have to deal with programmers' strange habits all the time.

Wives, girlfriends, boyfriends, husbands, managers, sons, daughters ... if there's a programmer in your life, you should probably read Book, it will make your programmer like you even more than they already do.

If you're a programmer, the last part of Book is for you. Reading the other parts might make you nod your head in agreement, if it doesn't, you should write to Swizec.

What Book contains

There are four sections to Book.

First we'll explore whether programmers do in fact work at night or that's more of a myth than not.

Then we'll see some reasons about why they work at night to help everyone understand what's going on.

Lastly, there's going to be some practical guides aimed first at people who aren't programmers but have to deal with them. And some tips for programmers themselves to help them, perhaps, avoid working at night … or just get more out of the night. You could call them productivity tips.

What is not in Book

Book is not hard science. It's a collection of opinions weighed by conversations with other programmers online and off, reading some research about sleep and so on. If you want to look at hard science on the subject, you should talk to some of the wonderful people who research this stuff for a living.

How finished is Book

This Book is still a work in progress, if you are reading via the Github repository, that's wonderful! Make sure to give me your feedback, Github Issues exist for a reason.

If you're already reading via purchased pdf, that's awesome and you should feel good. Thanks for supporting this project :)

I am calling this version 0.3. The most interesting section right now is About flow, with Working with programmers coming in as a close second. Why programmers work at night contains some interesting science about intelligence, creativity and sleeping habits, plus a bit of cool trivia if you're too young to remember hacking history.

If you like data, you should definitely check out the Statistics part of Do programmers work at night?, it contains an analysis of some 500,000 github repositories.

Why listen to Swizec

Really, I'm just a guy who loves programming.

I have spent the past 16 years of my life either attached to a computer or talking to other programmers for most of my waking life. Not sure that makes me suitable to talk about programmers and their habits, but I'll be damned if I don't try.

Aside from programming, I also write a reasonably well read blog at swizec.com - there's a tiny chance you've seen it before. I keep being surprised by real life people mentioning they've read something on my blog. Don't think I will ever get used to that.

Some time ago I wrote an essay Why programmers work at night, which got an amazing response. Plenty of email too. This book is an expansion of that essay into a form that will hopefully be useful or at least interesting and entertaining.

You should write to me at [email protected] or ping me on twitter (@swizec) on the slightest whim!

License

Book cover courtesy of @ponywithhiccups

Why programmers work at night by Swizec Teller is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License.
Based on a work at http://leanpub.com/nightowls.