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I kind of need to 
By need I mean that I really have the need for it, not because of any external "force".
And yeah I have a daily life without computers.
And yeah I sleep enough (6-7 h a day) and a lot more on weekends.
And no, I don't loose any important time commuting to/from work.
Working hours tend to be more of the same and usually after the projects initial fuss there's really nothing new to do.
Outside working hours what I do is exactly that... do stuff will all those shinny new toys that pop up in full bags every day.
In these side projects I do something I never do in a production serious client project, I use the latest most untested and shinny peace of technology I read on my daily news feeds 
What do I get from it?
I know they exists, I know how to use them and I know (this is really important) when NOT to use them.
What next?
Most of those shinny new things tend to disappear in smoke but for those who resist and prove themselves I might have a use for them in the future... The thing is that if I never tested them I would never now!!!
What's the alternative?
Google for solutions and apply them blindly or with few PoCs and real practical experience.
People tend to trust Google results a lot and that may come with a price... an expensive one.
We're in a ever evolving and changing business.
People tend to create things out of nothing or build some other out of the existing.
It's essential for any serious professional to know what runs behind the scenes otherwise we're merely assembly poorly designed Lego castles...
Cheers!
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Simon Lee Shugar wrote:
1. How often do you develop outside of work?
Never, I have other things to do.
Simon Lee Shugar wrote:
2. Are the projects you work on personal or intended for commercial use at some point?
See above.
Simon Lee Shugar wrote:
3. What do you like to work on outside of work? (other than the latest bottle of Gin)
I don't work outside of work, I only do things that pleases me. (not that I don't like paid work).
I'd rather be phishing!
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Simon Lee Shugar wrote: 1. How often do you develop outside of work?
I'd say that anywhere from 25% to 50% of my time, I'm developing stuff outside of work. For example, most of these[^] are things I've worked on to further my knowledge of Ruby on Rails, and that doesn't include my latest venture, arctiores.herokuapp.com (ugh, I just noticed the nbsp's!) which is still a work in progress, I'll eventually publish an article on the core stuff and the UI is really raw for prototyping and playing around.
Simon Lee Shugar wrote: 2. Are the projects you work on personal or intended for commercial use at some point?
Both. And the third category is, enhancing my "portfolio", aka resume.
Simon Lee Shugar wrote: 3. What do you like to work on outside of work?
I love metadata concepts and looking at new and different ways to work with technologies, data, databases, relationships between data, and just goofing around with different concepts. This is also the impetus for a lot of my articles.
Besides programming, I also am involved with some interesting community stuff, like generosity communities, needs & gifts, investment opportunity networks, spiritual studies (yes, I have strong spiritual convictions as well.) Sometimes there's a synergy between my non-programming activities and what I do programming wise. The needs & gifts site and the Arctiores site are examples.
And of course, I love writing, and CP is a great outlet for that.
Oh, and I'm learning to play the lyre. A lovely instrument!
Marc
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Marc Clifton wrote: A lovely instrument!
Lyre! Oh, and I think you mean this[^] link.
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Pete O'Hanlon wrote: Oh, and I think you mean this[^] link.
 I had to do the href tag manually because the URL didn't start with "http" and I was being hasty!
Marc
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Marc Clifton wrote: I love metadata concepts and looking at new and different ways to work with
technologies, data, databases, relationships between data
Multidimensional databases are cool stuff, just wish I had more time to build them rather than fix what others have broken.
Common sense is admitting there is cause and effect and that you can exert some control over what you understand.
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S Douglas wrote: just wish I had more time to build them rather than fix what others have broken.
Amen to that. I've been in "upgrade" and "debug" mode for the last year on a couple projects. I end up doing a lot of personal stuff because otherwise I would be starved--architecture and design is really what I love, and I only *really* like coding when it's on a new project, rather than working around the tragedies of others' code.
Marc
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1. Not as much as I used to...more family and home obligations these days. Luckily, I have a regular Saturday job that allows me at least 5-6 hours to delve into personal projects.
2. My side projects have historically been productivity tools either for work. Most of these were written many years ago, and have served me well.
3. Mrs. Wife and I have been in the new (actually 21 yrs) house a little over 2 months now, so I have my 'homework' planned out for the next several months. It seems that 20-25 years is the lifespan for many household gadgets/fixtures! To boot, we are getting the old house ready to rent! If I had time, I'd like to work on my golf game.
"Go forth into the source" - Neal Morse
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Simon Lee Shugar wrote: 1. How often do you develop outside of work?
About 25 hours a week.
Simon Lee Shugar wrote: 2. Are the projects you work on personal or intended for commercial use at some point?
They're freeware apps[^] that are in use by serveral thousand users worldwide and are actively supported by me.
Simon Lee Shugar wrote: 3. What do you like to work on outside of work? (other than the latest bottle of Gin)
Write code, play and record music.
/ravi
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Simon Lee Shugar wrote: 2. Are the projects you work on personal or intended for commercial use at some point?
It never starts of like a project; it often happens when you want to try some code and keep adding.
"I've never solved the travelling salesman problem"
"Geocoding? Never heard of it, time to Google"
"Now how do I get the distance between two points?"
"It'd be cool if I could show that path on a map"
"Can I run this when I boot into Ubuntu?"
"That's weird, it doesn't compile anymore - where did those 40 compile-errors come from?"
..and just as you want to get some sleep, you look at the time and wonder if the sun is up already.
Bastard Programmer from Hell 
If you can't read my code, try converting it here[^]
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I'm working on a web site for a local speed shop after hours (barter for labor on future planned work)
".45 ACP - because shooting twice is just silly" - JSOP, 2010
-----
You can never have too much ammo - unless you're swimming, or on fire. - JSOP, 2010
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When you pry the gun from my cold dead hands, be careful - the barrel will be very hot. - JSOP, 2013
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Simon Lee Shugar wrote: How often do you develop outside of work?
Not as often as I wish. Most of the time I have little to no available time (pun intended) to devote to any personal (or otherwise) pursuits outside of work an family.
Simon Lee Shugar wrote: Are the projects you work on personal or intended for commercial use at some point?
Generally personal. Though I have 2 projects I would like to promote commercially.
Simon Lee Shugar wrote: What do you like to work on outside of work? (other than the latest bottle of Gin)
Games. Browser based (HTML5/Canvas/javascript) and tabletop (board games). Then again, my latest project was a life-sized drawing of a Barbie I made on the door of my daughters' room to use as a ruler for measuring their height progress. It's a Barbie drawing with a ruler on the side, where I mark each one's height and date measured. They're 4 and 2 years old now.
Φευ! Εδόμεθα υπό ρηννοσχήμων λύκων!
(Alas! We're devoured by lamb-guised wolves!)
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1. How often do you develop outside of work?
Not as often as I would like. I would love to spend more time developing and experimenting outside of the office. Most of my time at home is enjoying my time with my 2 year old.
2. Are the projects you work on personal or intended for commercial use at some point?
Most of the projects that I have worked on are personal. There are many things that we think about needing at home for our own use that I mess around with. Most recently I have been throwing together plans for my father in laws business. He needs an inventory and I am in the processing of getting a proposal together to share with him. If he likes it, I can make the basics and then keep improving it for him.
I know there are inventory apps out there, but this would be tailored to his needs specifically and only have what he needs.
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1. How often do you develop outside of work?
Whenever the mood strikes me. I have other non-computer hobbies to keep me sane which I sometimes spend time on, so computers is sort of sporadic.
2. Are the projects you work on personal or intended for commercial use at some point
Since I'll pick up a project, work on it for a while, and then set it aside uncompleted, nothing I do has any commercial value.
3. What do you like to work on outside of work? (other than the latest bottle of Gin)
Whatever strikes my fancy. I'm sort of ADD with technologies [3D printers, ohhhh] and I finally learned [kindle hacking, ohhhh] to let myself be that way [plate tectonic simulations, ohhhh] in my free time [artificial life simulation, ohhhh] so I can stay focused at work [Halbach arrays, ohhhh]. Absinthe.
We can program with only 1's, but if all you've got are zeros, you've got nothing.
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Simon Lee Shugar wrote: 1. How often do you develop outside of work?
I'm always working on outside projects. I was put on Earth to write a certain number of programs, however at my current rate, I will never die.
Simon Lee Shugar wrote: 2. Are the projects you work on personal or intended for commercial use at some point?
A bit of both. I like to work on projects that require skills I think I may be able to re-apply at work. Projects at work must function within a certain amount of time. Home projects can go into dead ends without consequence. I wrote some routines to recreate images from numbers that was years ahead of everyone else and then it languished for decades until an art restorer came across my web page documenting it. here[^] And that led to me getting back into it and just in time to know how to write a graphical document handler for work. Saved the company a boatload of money and saved me the aggravation of interfacing some third party product they wanted to go out and buy. The art restorer put me in contact with a professor who had develped the mathematics to reverse engineer the components of substances from FTIR scanners. I rewrote his Excel program to C# and mated it with a database to automatically suggest compounds to combine. We're still working on revising it and may eventually commercialize it, but I took it on because it was interesting and I figured some of the coding tech I learned to create it would usable at work. Turned out, just as I started it, work required parts I had already started to research.
Simon Lee Shugar wrote: 3. What do you like to work on outside of work?
Anything and everything. I've got a game I've been puttering around with since high school (35+ years) that I released a graphical rewrite of here[^] that still requires rewriting. When I first wrote it people did not trust computers and accused it of cheating. Nowadays they complain that I didn't let them trust the computer not to cheat. Times change. But I've got a bazillion MP3s that I want to clean up and de-dupe some day. I use those carousels to store my CD/DVDs in that I want to write a better management program for. Too many other projects to mention.
When I was teaching programming to career changing immigrants, I told them to find personal projects to work on. They were the best way to learn new techniques. Work tends to pigeonhole you and most companies I've worked with frown on you working on anything they don't see an immediate return on. At one company I got yelled at because I had developed an interrupt driven printer routine because they didn't see the advantage of it. After that company went out of business due to its inability to adapt to changing market forces, I was able to get a job doing conveyor systems that were heavily interrupt driven.
Personal interest is always a great motivator for improving your skills.
Psychosis at 10
Film at 11
Those who do not remember the past, are doomed to repeat it.
Those who do not remember the past, cannot build upon it.
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As an aside to the main topic...You code and build things because...you like to build things. It's fun. And creative. Other people never build things. They just sit in front of the TV and completely vegetate. They are called "consumers" (coach potatoes).
I think it's much better to be a Builder. It's a good thing!
- Grant
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I work 9-5 weekdays, and may then work on ToDoList[^] an additional 0-3 hours a night.
I often also work 3-6 hours on Saturdays, in between painting, yoga, reading and walking, and then a couple hours on Sunday evenings.
How much time I spend tends to relate to where I am in the release cycle (Pre-Alpha, Alpha, Beta, Bug Fixes), my level of enthusiasm, and how good the weather is  .
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Out to dinner with some Italians tonight!
I'm not sure what the correct etiquette is though. Should I expect bunga bunga and ask or should I politely wait to see if it is offered?
speramus in juniperus
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Just drop your keys in the bowl on the way in...
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Can't do that! The driver has them.
speramus in juniperus
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Drop her keys in as well then...do you have no imagination? 
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No, Mrs Wife is not the driver tonight. We are being driven. There will be dr[i|u]nk.
speramus in juniperus
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You are not at the same freebie as me are you?
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They said it was 'north', but I took that to be North London. That said, I did once go out for evening drinks and got home three days later.
speramus in juniperus
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