Zombie Mode

A little while ago I posted about the 90 hours / week challenge. I ended up not posting any updates about it because circumstances were such that I ended up working at least as much and I didn't have the energy or motivation to keep the blog updated. Aaaanyway, as I mentioned before, I'm still working on a Chromebook instead of my regular MacBook  It's definitely a struggle and I oscillate between being happy and angry with the machine, often at the same time.

A side effect of being forced out of my usual work environment is that I get a lot less distractions. I don't have everything handed out to me and I have to think about what and how I have to do it. This way I can filter out unimportant things and focus on what's really important. I've been able to get a decent amount of work done, but not anything related to programming. That would be just too painful.

Now... about this week. Starting this week, I'm easing on into Zombie Mode. The end of the year is coming and I have to finish strong. That means, work, classes and then more work. With my MacBook out of the picture (the new one won't be here until at least next Friday), all I have is the Chromebook, my tablet and my phone. And since I'm away from all my music, shows, games, side-projects, I'm finding myself using the computer only when I have an actual need for it. It's going to be an interesting zombie session, more disconnected, but probably also more productive than what I experienced before. With 5-6 hours of sleep every night, the recovery is going to be tough, but the adrenaline rush is definitely worth it.

In 2 weeks, my sophomore year will be over, and I'm definitely looking forward to it. Over the summer I'll be operating on a 9-5 schedule, which will be a nice change of pace. I'll use the time to nourish my brain and come back with fresh vital force in my junior year, which will probably be more lax than this one. I realized I would be able to get my BS in computer science next year. I'm probably going to stay in school for the full 4 years though, and most likely get another major (not sure in what yet, suggestions maybe?).

Technologically Impaired

For the past 4 years I've been using a 13" MacBook Pro. It was an amazing experience. I didn't expect such a compact machine to pack so much power. I never had to reinstall it once, and times I had to break it open was to squeeze in some more power. It's been a fun ride. I took my first steps in learning how to develop for iOS on it and served me well for homework purposes too. It even packed enough power to run Bioshock at a decent frame rate (and I'm really happy it could, it's a great game). Nevertheless, the time for us to part has come. In about a week I will be the proud owner of a 15" Retina.

In the meantime, however, I'm exclusively using a Chromebook and after one day of using it I can only say that it's an interesting experience. It's not quite a tablet, it's definitely not a notebook, but it's not a netbook either. It's something of its own, and it offers a completely different experience.

First thing I noticed was the storage. Everything is off-loaded on Google's servers. While their goal is to make this change as transparent as possible, you will immediately notice it. Especially if you're a tech savvy person, a little voice in the back of your head will tell you something is different. It feels like you're transported into the future where everything is connected to the mother ship.

However, that feeling passes quickly as you realize that it feels like the future for a reason. We're not there yet. Not by a long shot. While cloud computing is a good idea, in today's implementations it lacks the versatility a heavy computer user needs (I know the Chromebook is not aimed at heavy users, the statement is made in a general sense). Sometimes apps crash for no apparent reason. Although it's a very lightweight OS which should have a small memory footprint, opening more than 3-4 tabs in Chrome will cause every one of them to refresh as you're switching from one to another. It feels like you are constantly running out of RAM. Even when you're not forced to refresh, sometimes apps will crash for no apparent reason.

Google Drive is kind of a blowfish. It's awesome, and its integration with Docs is an amazing idea, but, again, it fails in practice. Files will sometimes fail to synchronize altogether and you will have an incredibly hard time making anything available offline.

Luckily I'm on a college campus so connectivity is not an issue. I'm having fun using it, though, and being away from all of my files has allowed me to focus on my current tasks(and god knows I have a LOT of them) and be more productive. The only challenge I'm going to have is finding a way to code on this machine.

90 Hours per Week

Although I feel like I'm accomplishing a lot during a week, I'm still wasting a lot of time messing around, re-watching TV Shows, just because I'm in an energy slump. Sure, it's fun at the time, but then I realize I could have done so much more with my time. Besides college I have personal projects I'm working on and internships to apply to. Therefore I've decided to try something for the next couple of weeks. I'm going to try and work 90 hours / week.

Not counting Sunday, I'd have to average 15 hours / day. This would still give me 3 hours for personal affairs and 7 hours of sleep, which should be enough to regain my energy. To keep track of the hours, I just created a simple spreadsheet where I can input the start and end time of each work session. Based on that, it calculates the total at the end of each day and the weekly total.

I'll count everything school related as work, as well as the projects I'm working on and internship applications. At the end of each day I'll try to post as summary and analysis of the day here, mostly for motivation (and maybe to help someone else that's trying the same thing).