In case people aren't yet sick of me plugging the ambient noise generator I built, here are some sites that block out background noise as a supplement to a good pair of headphones for distraction-free work:

http://coffitivity.com

http://noisli.com

http://asoftmurmur.com

I like working with music on, but I find it very hard to find music that allows me to truly focus, and when I do I quickly get tired of listening to the same tracks over and over. I like ambient noise because it blocks out the world without stealing focus.

I also like this Buddhist chant: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iG_lNuNUVd4

I'm a fan of ambient noise and the likes of Brian Eno. I'm somewhat fearful of using the same tones for _very_ long periods of time. The inner ear doesn't tolerate these well (especially white noise), nor does the brain. In moderation however, bring it on. Thanks for the links.

That's interesting. Do you know where I can read more about this please?

I had a much harder time finding info about the mechanism I reported than I would have thought. I think perhaps I was wrong and I appreciate the prompt to research further.

Even at low levels, anything droning I _theorize_ (for the moment) must _habituate_ the listener (e.g. cricket song). I thought I understood that physiologically, such droning caused the tiny hairs of the inner ear to either die or become less sensitive. The brain filters "noise" I understood. Again, I cannot seem to find evidence of this at low sound pressure levels(~volumes), so my reasoning may be a byproduct of some pseudoscience.

I understand that tinnitus suffers sometimes use white noise to habituate themselves to the ringing they perceive, and that this reportedly improves their symptoms. However, this conclusion seems incomplete to me. I think there is habituation happening, but I suspect it's: (1) a desensitization to nearly all frequencies (white noise = broad spectrum) and (2) frequency masking. (1) would be sacrificing the ability to perceive across the spectrum in order to minimize the effects of "the ringing" which is only sometimes physically present. (2) (masking) fools the brain/ear into not hearing something that "really" (psycho-acoustically, in this context) is there. Enough of my theorizing though.

Most of what I find suggests that "noise" by definition is loud and only sometimes unwanted. I take issue with both over-simplifications. lol.

I first learned about the concept while studying to become an Audio Mastering Engineer. I gave up before making it to that level, though.

The concept of "central gain" is pretty interesting as a topic of research in this field.

Here are some links:

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18274918

http://www.cnn.com/2014/03/03/health/noise-machines-study/ (contradicts me)

To be honest, I'm happy to learn there is little evidence of droning causing damage at low SPLs; I used to sit on a data center room floor with a direct line of sight to hundreds of computer racks. :-)

Edit: Another link: http://www.jneurosci.org/content/33/6/2356.full.pdf

Thanks!

We've known for a long time that for instance road noise causes health issues.

I don't see road noise being all that different from white noise. Outside of the dump truck at 5AM, it's not so loud as to cause damage

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noise_health_effects

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roadway_noise

Playnoise.com is an HTML5 noise generator that supports Brown noise (as well as pink and white). I find it much less harsh than white noise for any period of time.

I've been using, and highly recommend, SimplyRain: https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/simplyrain/id635166382

I use this when it's noisy outside: http://www.rainymood.com/

You know what stuck with me? The Star Trek TNG Ambient Engine Noise.

See for yourself: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cqCoUvz_nwI

This is surprisingly comforting. Really great ambiance. I don't know if this is because I love TNG so much or because it sounds very womb like.

Tried http://musicforprogramming.net yet? I've found it to be a great source of background music that doesn't interfere with the foreground thoughts I need to have in order to do my job ..

I also like working with music but can become unfocused. What seems to work for me is to listen to music in a foreign language because that way I can focus on my work and not the lyrics.

Your brain is still going to try to pattern-match on the human voice.

I felt the same way about working with music on, until I found http://musicforprogramming.net/

Notwithstanding the fact that I'm diverted right now... thanks, these are great. I've been using a local copy of the SimplyNoise SWF since I am offline a lot (which is itself very helpful).

> I allow myself 15 minutes of Reddit per day.

He's definitely not the only one. We noticed this trend very early on -- a lot of users have a fixed amount of time.

If we made an improvement to page loading times, time on site stayed fixed, but the number of pages each user viewed went up. In other words, they were reading more in the same amount of time.

We found that fascinating.

Is "work from home on a team" different than "work from home bootstrapping by yourself"? The article mentions "While working from the office, it’s hard to get quality work done every day. Doing it from home is even harder" and at least for me, it's much easier to get quality work done at home. Maybe I'm lucky and have built a distraction free home (no kids, wife, or goats).

The other tips don't seem to be "work from home" specific.

As a side note, I think it's really funny how much importance people put on their coffee ritual. I'm a tea drinker, which must mean I'm just a plebeian ;-)

Working from home on a team feels different. My work hours are more constrained, to align with the office-bound team. I'm on video calls with the team several times a day, and need to be available for that.

I think the morning ritual is to an extent wfh specific. It's obvious that you get yourself together when you're heading into the office, but at home it's so easy just to open up the laptop and stay in bed. It's so easy to blur the line between work time and home time this way, and lose your balance one way or the other.

I have the vpn token on a lanyard; I find this helps as a mental signal that I'm on company time. I also try to do my morning session in a cafe - this forces me to be up and out with the world, and introduces a cutoff point when 'home' ends.

I want to like working in Cafes. I focus easier, the energy is invigorating, less loneliness.. but invariably every coffee shop visit is accompanied by flaky connection issues. I usually lose 30 min of productivity messing with it and then give up and go home to good internet.

Well, with me its a coin toss, I've had many days where the home internet was unusable, and the cafe's ok for my needs (mostly just ssh) - except when a bunch of teens come in and open up youtube simultaneously. It's too noisy for hangouts though, so I only use it at a point in the day when calls are unlikely.

I found this to be true as well. You should really look into a mifi. At ~50 bucks a month it is well worth the investment, especially if you have a bus commute or like working in coffee shops, etc as you mentioned.

I tether to my phone but my favorite coffee shop doesn't get good cell reception for me either :/

If I really enjoy the task working from home improves my output, but when it's boring I do almost nothing.

I'm a tea drinker as well, but I think it's other way around.

Since the advent of third-wave coffee houses, I think coffee has reclaimed the high-brow market. But this may just because I'm a coffee drinker and I want to feel superior to you in this moment we share over the internet :P

I've worked from home for 2 and a half years after working in only office environments in cubicles.

I find one of the hardest to define and most important was work signalling. When I worked in an office there were many signals that got me mentally and physically prepared to do work. These included:

Getting dressed - I have never worked in my underwear from home but I now make a point to put on some nice pants and shoes and fix my hair/wash my face etc.

Driving - Not commuting is a huge time and energy saver but it still gave me some quiet time to prepare for the day. I now either go for a walk in the morning or "get to work" 15 minutes early and read something interesting and tech oriented.

Greeting Coworkers - I still haven't found a good replacement for this. It's hard to catch up on water cooler talk remotely especially since half my team doesn't even use IM. I try to check in with questions from the previous day or a quick status update via email within the first hour of work.

The office - I've moved my office a couple of times and find it's best if the office is a dedicated room, not a nook or a corner of the living room but something with it's own decor and sense of place. I painted my office spring green to be cheery and have some plants and a bookshelf with tech books on it. I put a glass whiteboard up that I use to brainstorm and will point my webcam at it if I'm working with a remote coworker on something that requires it.

When I first started working form home I thought that distractions were my biggest problem but I've since realized that it's not so much getting rid of distractions, but getting INTO work.

I've been working from home for close to ten years, and one thing to note is that the challenges are exponentially increased when children enter the picture. When those children become teens, the challenges can be epic. Nothing like a flame-out between two daughters in the kitchen next to your office during a conference call! Throw in a couple of pets, just in case the stress level isn't crippling yet. Fortunately I'm a night-owl, and don't have to attend too many meetings. In terms of producing what I need to produce I can often shift work into the quieter evening and early morning hours. In the end I would still much rather work this way. All of the interruptions of family life still prove somehow less disruptive than the endless "networking" and powerpoint-strewn meetings I used to be dragged into when I worked in an office.

I am in similar situation. Routine can help in some cases. When you have a routine your wife and kids know when you will leave the room and when you will go back in (or the cave as my wife calls it :D). Sometimes it can be hard to take breaks at the same time everyday, especially when you are trying to figure out a problem you believe you are very close to solving. However, sometimes that break is all you need to fix that pesky bug! Headphones are also helpful, though like you I am a night owl as well. The only problem with that is that it can lead to irregular sleep, a subject a would like to read more about from a programmer who works at home with a family.

I'd also suggest* using tools such Tomatoes[1] that help you stay focused and manage your working time.

Another suggestion is to try to not work from home at all, find a nice coworking space or a shared office.

[1] http://tomato.es

* I'm the author a proud user of this tool

I've used tomato.es for a while now and its a great tool, so thank you. I'd highly recommend it to others.

I use the login with github and my one peeve with it is that if I forget to login and start and finish an interval, it tells me to login in order to keep track of things. But if I then proceed to log in, that one interval is lost.

When I raised my first round I worked from home most of the time and time boxing was the key. Writing down one or some goals and trying to achieve them in a given period of time.

For me 19 minutes works the best. It doesn't feel like too much ('19 minutes won't kill me') and still you can move mountains in 19 minutes. I don't do breaks inbetween them, I just make like 3-6 in a row and the some break.

Because none of the tools were really perfect I wrote my own, very lean and a not configurable tool:

- 19 minutes fixed

- a crisp & clear ticking sound (WebKit only)

- browser-based, just enter url and the thing starts without the need to press any further button; the page title shows the running time

=> http://revs.co

This is a really interesting idea. I work a lot with desktop tools and am thinking of making a little timer which does something similar and makes tracks which I am doing which could "Yell" at me if I am doing thing on a "ban" list. I like the simplicity of the browser page.

Is procrastination as common in other fields like engineering, accounting, marketing etc when compared to programming?

What I have learnt is that as long as the work involves non-deterministic processes, it will cause mental drain. So, there is more chance of procrastination.

Along with this, if the task is large, there is a higher risk of procrastination.

As someone who worked in business strategy / analytics, I can say that procrastination does occur, but it's probably a bit harder to get away with.

You generally have to give frequent updates, with a predefined deliverable. It's often a series of sprints, vs deliver this in 2 weeks. If you don't deliver something - which happens all the time for unforseen reasons - you generally make everyone aware of the delay and what caused it. So, you can only procrastinate so much before you run out of excuses.

I really like his focus script. However, I think he's treating the symptoms and not the problem. Usually, when I can't focus it just means there's something else that's wrong: 1) I didn't get a good night's sleep, 2) my diet wasn't quite right that day (too much sugar perhaps?) or the previous day, or 3) I've been working too long.

Lack of focus is a signal that something is wrong. In terms of being at home versus at the office, I can have the same lack of focus at the office.

I worked from home for about three years. At one point I had an entirely separate desk and computer for work, adjacent to my personal computer and desk. This is legally required for tax purposes, but it's also the best work/life balance I could find and still maintain focus. If I'm in the work chair on the work computer, I'm working.

That's another thing -- having a chair makes a huge difference. I'd been sitting on a water jug at my desk for the last few months and recently got a chair -- what a difference! (I wish I was joking/trolling)

These are all good points. Except for the goat.

When I was working at home and the kids were still young, I had a door to the office that was closed when I was "at work". Family could knock if they needed something.

Nice, succinct advice, especially the bit about multi-tasking.

I've always said that multi-tasking is like fixing a flat tire. It's a valuable skill to have, but you should avoid putting yourself in situations that require it.

Great article. I have been working from home with one remote colleague for two years now. I also use head phones to immerse myself 'in the zone'. I find my mind often wanders when I have to wait for something. Already a 6 sec build often makes me briefly check HN, Facebook or my mail. Another big distraction is my girlfriend. It's not always easy to get her to understand that I'm busy despite being at home. Overall, I'm quite satisfied with My focus though, especially when compared with an office environment. YMMV

The company I'm with operates on 3 remotes day per week. It's a terrific balance for me. The on-site days are spent pair programming, sprint demos, meetings, and being social. The remote days are distraction free work.

I think I may need to commit to headphones when working at home, to reduce distraction and signal to my family that I'm working.

I wonder if the dogs will figure it out? And if they do, I wonder if they'll care?

If you train them sure, why not?

The dogs at our house know EXACTLY what certain articles mean. (Leash, jacket, car keys)

Only marginally related to the post, but has anyone here lived with a pet goat before? Can they live with you in your home, or do they need to stay outside most of the time?

Does anyone have a script that is close to his, except for linux?

do you really have a pet goat?!

author here. sadly, I don't, but I always wanted one.

Headphones block noise. Headphones are a social signal: "don't interrupt me". Headphones are 'in-the-zone' muscle memory. Headphones are amazing!

When your company's culture respect that!

Really, headphones are amazing :)