▲ 7 points

Ask HN: How do you cope with routine in your daily programming job?

I am currently studying Computer Science and am wondering about how to deal with the daily routine of a programming job in the future. Though I really enjoy programming and contribute regularly to open source projects, the perspective of programming 8 hours a day, 5 days a week seems exhausting.

While learning new stuff is very interesting, I usually experience that the work becomes boring once you grasp the core concepts. For instance, consider building a web application: getting to know a new web framework and coming up with a sensible architecture is very fulfilling; however, after you figure it out, the rest of the work becomes pretty mechanical and repetitive.

This is the reason I am very curious to know: How do you cope with routine in your daily programming job? How do you approach your work in order to find gratification in what you do?

I don't. It was fun while I was learning how to do new things and discovering solutions to problems, but once I learn how to do something I no longer enjoy doing it. I have not found a solution to this problem, and so I simply don't enjoy my work and in fact resent it most of the time.

-Continously learning. -Switching jobs frequently. -Contributing to OSS.

Get rid of 8-hour stigma and that's it... I'm working part-time (and in charge of my time) for more than a decade.