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up vote 8 down vote favorite

I know this might sound like a silly question, but here on Programmers (as well as on SO and Meta), I've seen quite a few indications that coffee is popular among programmers. Even the logo of this site features a coffee mug.

I've haven't ever drunk much coffee, but when I have, I never really noticed any profound effects on my productivity. Am I missing something? If I started to drink more coffee, would it make me a better programmer?

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15  
Coffee increases your programming effectiveness by 197%, reduces bug counts, implements unit testing on its own, and solves political gridlock. If your company doesn't have an embedded Starbucks, leave now. – user414076 Sep 9 '11 at 15:38
4  
@Anthony Pegram - I'm not a fan of embedded Starbucks, I find that a discrete Starbucks on PCI-express (Prime Caffeine Intake) has higher performance. – MadKeithV Sep 9 '11 at 15:42
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"Programmer - an organism that turns coffee into software." ~Author Unknown – Amy Anuszewski Sep 9 '11 at 15:43
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"Code monkey like Tab and Mountain Dew" – Jim Sep 9 '11 at 15:45
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@Amy: actually that quote is from Paul Erdös, only he talked about mathematicians and theorems rather than programmers and software. – Michael Borgwardt Sep 9 '11 at 15:51
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closed as not constructive by Rob Z, Mark Trapp Sep 9 '11 at 15:43

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2 Answers

up vote 5 down vote

I think programming is one of the few fields in which, developers really get energy from seen their work generating something. In other words, when you start coding at 10 PM, and you code till 2 AM, then you see that something is taking shape, you really don't like to go to bed and wait till tomorrow to finish it.

I think developers are like God, trying to create something, and when they build it, they lay back, while praising themselves and enjoy the created software.

However, sleep is an interruption here. Thus why not using coffee?

Another reason (which is of course not related to developers only) is that, coffee is delicious. :)

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up vote 4 down vote

The thing about coffee is that when it's good, it's really good, but on the whole companies tend to have the "Nescafé Cat Vomit" variety. Hence I drink tea most of the time.

Does it do anything for your programming? Apart from the caffeine, not really. It's dark and bitter though, and that suits a lot of programmers I know ;-)

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2  
Once you go black... – Nick Sep 10 '11 at 6:01

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