You never get anything for nothing. Regular coffee drinking adds nothing to your productivity. I can tell you this from years and years of drinking it. Any increase in productivity will be compensated for by an exact opposite later.
Even worse, regular drinking makes you dependent on it, and, although I've been spared this one, stopping can lead to headaches.
I have noticed that some of the most successful programmers I know don't drink coffee at all. I think they also likely lead moderate lifestyles with the right amount of sleep.
Now, that said, the occasional use of coffee can be a great thing, in my opinion, for short term boosts. These moments might be for things like jet lag... that sort of thing. Also, it can be great for safe driving if you are tired. Used in this way, caffeine can be beneficial.
Any increase in productivity will be compensated for by an exact opposite later.
But mammals work that way, we have a sleep and wake cycle because in our average state we would be luggage. Similarly, many engineers have a few fruitful hours a day together with meetings and administrative things where sleepiness and passivity are better than awareness that could lead to aggressiveness and impatience.
My own experience is that colleagues that strategically drink lots of caffeine are good on new development projects. I would be more cautious on other roles as caffeine inhibits peripheral thinking. For example, on caffeine, you may too quickly discard causes in a core analysis or overlook a compatibility issue in a change. You may also make mistakes in new development but mistaken progress is on average better than over caution in new development.
Comments
You never get anything for nothing. Regular coffee drinking adds nothing to your productivity. I can tell you this from years and years of drinking it. Any increase in productivity will be compensated for by an exact opposite later.
Even worse, regular drinking makes you dependent on it, and, although I've been spared this one, stopping can lead to headaches.
I have noticed that some of the most successful programmers I know don't drink coffee at all. I think they also likely lead moderate lifestyles with the right amount of sleep.
Now, that said, the occasional use of coffee can be a great thing, in my opinion, for short term boosts. These moments might be for things like jet lag... that sort of thing. Also, it can be great for safe driving if you are tired. Used in this way, caffeine can be beneficial.
But mammals work that way, we have a sleep and wake cycle because in our average state we would be luggage. Similarly, many engineers have a few fruitful hours a day together with meetings and administrative things where sleepiness and passivity are better than awareness that could lead to aggressiveness and impatience.
My own experience is that colleagues that strategically drink lots of caffeine are good on new development projects. I would be more cautious on other roles as caffeine inhibits peripheral thinking. For example, on caffeine, you may too quickly discard causes in a core analysis or overlook a compatibility issue in a change. You may also make mistakes in new development but mistaken progress is on average better than over caution in new development.
"You never get anything for nothing." [citation needed]