> What's the optimal amount for "computer people" to work each day, in your experience?

I think a lot of folks, once breaks and all are accounted for, probably work 6-7 hours in an 8 hour chunk, and that seems to work pretty well.

> What percent of "working time" do you think consists of actual "work"?

See above :)

> Do you have any opinions about optimal work spaces?

I like a clean desk. I like to stand more than I sit. I like to be in a spot where I can walk freely, and I go outside a good bit during the day, even in our lovely Portland rain, to think. I think the best work space is probably always the one you want, and over time what you want changes. It's iterative.

We have folks on our team that like working from home. I like working in the office. Some of our team sits on the couch at the office with their computer in their lap, and that seems crazy to me. So yeah, whatever you want.

Cool, thanks for the reply. Do you see the "6-7 actual / 8 attempted" thing to be "inevitable", like that's the maximum ratio people can reasonably sustain, or do you think that with better environment and habits, we could/should get up to 8/8? (I'm obviously not talking "eliminate lunch", though. More like "eliminate needless chichat/mindwandering/newsreading")

> Do you see the "6-7 actual / 8 attempted" thing to be "inevitable", like that's the maximum ratio people can reasonably sustain, or do you think that with better environment and habits, we could/should get up to 8/8?

I think a lot of managers on Earth spend a lot of time trying to get folks to 8/8 because that's their job, but that's not a job I'm all that interested in. There are way too many hypotheticals around it. Let's say you don't look at HN for a few and instead keep cranking. Is that extra crank time as productive?

If you were on my team I'd want you to be the most productive person you could be, but I'd bet (maybe I'm wrong) that how you communicate with others would be a lot bigger issue than your HN reading time, and we'd probably talk more about that. How you tested might be a bigger issue (I'm assuming you're a dev or designer here). Or how you shipped even though CI failed.

In my 15 years of software experience I've seen a lot of folks do a lot of weird stuff at work, but reading a website for 15 minutes has seldom been the main reason they weren't a top performer on the team.