Re: 86 lines of code

As a former CIO I have to report that when I funded dual monitors on the desk (either with a docking station for a laptop or dual monitor for a thin client) we saw development productivity go up in very measurable ways. Quality improved, speed of development improved, Staff moral improved, and the only real problem we ran into was jealousy from the other departments about why did they not have dual monitors. I left before the entire project was complete but we budgeted for every developer and all of the media group to have this equipment. It was cheap by comparison to the gains from the development process improvements, especially for the folks doing user interface work.


Jim Oberholtzer
CEO/Chief Technical Architect
Agile Technology Architects -- LLC


On 3/16/2010 8:52 AM, Jon Paris wrote:

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On Mar 16, 2010, at 9:38 AM, wdsci-l-request@xxxxxxxxxxxx wrote:

Is this just the american way of doing things bigger than everyone
else? How does one convince one's employer that 2 19" monitors are
economically viable? Are most people developping this way or are
they using one screen only?

I don't think it is the "American way" per se - but the cost may be a
factor. I can buy a good quality 19+ inch monitor for around $200. At
that price I know a number of programmers who bought their own
additional monitor and took it to work when the company would not
supply one. Another factor is that all new monitors are LCD and
therefore don't require the desktop real estate that they once did.

I also find that a number of my customers are now giving their
programmers laptops as their primary machine and a large LCD monitor
on the desk. Most choose to run in dual monitor mode utilizing both
the laptop and the LCD screen.

Given the price I don't think it is too hard to convince them that
there is payback.

Jon Paris

www.Partner400.com
www.SystemiDeveloper.com