Poll: number of monitors attached to your development machine | Hacker News Reader

Poll: number of monitors attached to your development machine

11 pointsjacquesm29 comments

How many monitors do you have attached to your main development machine ?

One. I prefer deep focus into one thing: my code. I alt-tab to get to my app. That little gesture is just enough to require me to think about what I'm doing. It's just too easy to change my glance from one screen to another; focus is ruined.

I have tried two or three screens before, but just got irritated by the noise.

I check email and hn on breaks. They don't have dedicated screens during work periods.

If you are on a mac you can check out a program called think. It blacks out the background and all other apps that are not being used but still gives you the ability to move toolbars and menus over to the second screen.

I don't know if there is a similar program for the win/lin world.

I think compiz has a plugin that does this. Haven't used it though.

Three. (Sort of.) I have Windows and Mac systems side-by-side running Synergy, so it feels like one machine. Each machine is running on a 25.5" Samsung so that I can get a broad view of what I am doing. However, the downside of the big monitors (and limited budget) is that they are both TN panels, which is a no-go for design. So when I am pretending to be an artist, or doing color picking for websites I work on, I use a 19" Dell monitor (S-PVA) which actually produces colors accurately. The rest of the time it is hanging out in the corner on an Ergotron arm.

Synergy is a great app, I recommend anyone who has more than one machine check it out.

synergy is one of those apps I can't live without

Synergy sounds like xdmx ?

I use one monitor -- the one built in to my laptop -- but 8 desktops in X.

tip: webdevs with 2+ monitors should check http://xrefresh.binaryage.com

Interesting. If you are on a Mac you can get a similar effect from CSSEdit, which (I believe) actually swaps the CSS styles out as you type and feels really smooth.

The downside is, changes to the underlying layout require a manual refresh.

Yes it does. There are also plugins on both IE and Firefox with a similar name which does that.

thanks for that! I only use one screen (because I found more unproductive) but it's still a handy app (if it doesn't bring the browser in to the foreground)

tip: emacs webdevs should check http://people.internetconnection.net/2009/02/interactive-htm...

This works even with several computers, over a network.

not an emacs dev, but this is incredibly cool.

nice job!

btw. xrefresh also works over network and does "soft css refresh". Some disadvantage of that emacs system is that it bypasses whole server-side stack (imagine PHP or HAML/SASS)

Linux devs can just use Epiphany, which has this built in :)

this is great. better than forcing a refresh every x seconds (which gets irritating VERY quicky).

Question: do you use horizontal or vertical monitors? I've gotten so used to vertical for code and for web pages I'm developing with Firebug that I can't imagine preferring horizontal for writing code. But I've seen few others running that way. Am I crazy?

I use 4 monitors. The 4th one is great for not having to manage IM window positions or look at them when I'm working, since it's outside my normal visual focus, while letting people still contact me asynchronously for things they need from me.

Both. I have two horizontal and two vertical (from left to right: V, V, H, H). The last horizontal I use mostly for IM windows, comparing versions of a page in the browser, etc. Sort of like my monitor "scratch paper" -- I could do without this one if need be.

The two vertical make it easy to compare code and work on two files side by side. The first horizontal is great for checking UI work in the browser.

I had one of the 30" ones at google, and I preferred it horizontal because I could get about four 80-column terminals across it with decent fonts. Maybe two vertical 24" monitors would be nice, but I can't imagine trying to tilt my head that far to see both ends of my code. In either case, if you need to look at more than 30 lines of code at a time, you're probably already in trouble.

I work on a laptop hooked up to a docking station with an extra video card in the docking station. I keep email and IM on the laptop screen, IDE on one monitor and my web browser and documentation on the third monitor. I've been using this setup in the office for about 5 years now and I really like it.

Call me a masochist, but I have a single 13" monitor where I write all my code (that's my macbook screen).

A few years ago I thought about moving back to the east coast, and stayed with my brother outside of D.C. Since most everything went into storage, my development machine was a Toshiba Portege 3440 with a 12" 1920x1200 WUXGA screen. (Great machine, BTW)

I worked this way for about 2 or 3 months, and loved it. I got accustomed to switching desktops and console sessions and toggling about.

Now I use a Dell Lattitude with a 15" 1920x1200 screen, and a 24" 1920x1200 monitor attached. And I have my Windows and Mac boxen sharing a keyboard (Endurapro 104 "clacky" keyboard with built-in clit mouse) and 24" 1920x1200 monitor as well.

The second monitor has its advantages (I can keep a nice busy set of IRC channels always in view) but I still tend to work via desktop toggling. Increasing familiarity with screen (and now tmux) is playing a role as well.

The second monitor is useful indeed, I tried it for a couple of months, but to switch is too much work for my eyes. I guess what I should really try is to use a very big monitor, so that I can have for instance the xterms in one side, IRC in another place of the screen, and so on, all visible, with a goal: instead of a notification I can see what is happening in the other windows, and chances are I don't need to take any action at all.

Btw using an external monitor I lost the "portability" benefits of the macbook, and I'm used to work on the balcony when it's sunny :)

This poses another problem btw, the contrast is too low with the macbook display.

I get surprising (to me) amount of stuff done on my 10" netbook (a $200 dell mini 10v) with vim and git, while the kids are asleep, though my "main" dev setup is a 18.4" laptop + a 24".

2, but I really only use one. The other is for email, IM, music or TV or something.

2 on the Windows box, 1 on the Solaris box (with an X server on Windows too)

Three: one widescreen 24" in the center (for code), two 19" square screens to the left and right (left used for web, right used for communication - IRC, IM, etc.). The center screen is great, because I can crank my font size up to 16pt (I have bad eyestrain problems). When I'm really working, I typically pop out Firebug and cover the right window with it.

I also have an old laptop set up to the left of the left monitor that shows the key metrics for my startup (user count, etc.) Sometimes it's bad to have this right in your face, but usually I find it motivating. :)

Someone else mentioned Synergy; Windows-only devs can also check out InputDirector: http://www.inputdirector.com/

0, you unsensitive clod, it's a laptop!

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