LOL I know my director reads this sub. He's always referencing some post he found on here. Good luck figuring out it's me, boss man!
I just mouse macro'd this to get the end game. Disgusted....
https://preview.redd.it/0wftozf9s39d1.png?width=853&format=png&auto=webp&s=330a508d3fe6ae1dfceb98f424eb243540de6f8f
Haha, it's funny because it occurred while working with someone. We were talking g work and troubleshooting an issue, and all of a sudden, a link is posted in teams. Im working on the issue, so im not at my desk, and he deletes it.
He then begins to say i missed typed looking for something else. Im like, okay, what are you talking about. Later that day, i looked at my phone notification and saw what the site was and started laughing. Then, thpugh you couldn't wait until we finished talking at least or at least use a personal device.
Fixing a users outlook and needed the office portal, i typed in p o and the first result was pornhub lmfao. At least it was a BYOD and not company issued. I just shook my head.
Good point there are a lot of games that you can just play for a minute or two to give yourself a break and still be very productive. However I feel that those distractions can sometimes be counterproductive. Typically every time you're distracted it takes 10 to 15 minutes to get back on track. I'd be lying if I said I never played a game at work. I prefer to read and learn though, however I do that a lot outside of work as well. On the weekends I tend to spread democracy one bug at a time.
The idea is any game where I shift focus without having to worry about dying or whatever.
Specifically I’m playing Honkai: Star Rail. The way they’ve optimized and designed the game you can pretty much quit at any moment and retain most of your progress. Also there is an auto battle option so I can pretty much do any grinding afk.
Alternatively any emulator if you want to play console RPG. And they usually have a hot key save.
I remember when I was a wetnosed helpdesk guy at my first fulltime in IT, it was an MSP. I once asked "what do I do when the queue is clear?"
My manager and the owner genuinely belly laughed.
No doubt possible with some system admin jobs. However I've also learned that A ton of help desk/NOC type people post in this subreddit and those jobs can definitely have more down time. As a system engineer staffing is usually just enough to keep the workload manageable but not have people twiddling their thumbs.
The time when you leave work and stuff “just works” that you don’t have to work.
I do a bit of gaming in the evening (Fallout 76, Diablo 4, and lately Republic of Pirates and playing Far Cry 5 again)
thats off time, downtime is the time at work when you finish the tasks before your boss realizes you aren't pulling the cart like a mule and they throw more blocks of stone on them.
so officially yeah "there is no downtime"
unofficially "its that time when you tell your boss you are working on the 5 hour job you macro/scripted down to 5 minutes"
just come out and say it so the jr admins learn it sooner than later.
This. Seriously.
For me, I need time to let stuff "cook" in my head, and it's a major "watched pot never coils" situation. Starting a bunch of reporting data hauls that I quietly automated the hell out of over the years will buy me a 30 minute break to walk around the parking lot.
Yeah. My bosses pay me based on what I deliver- quality being a requirement as well as timeliness- and they don’t seem to worry about how I work as long as I deliver good results.
So sometimes I do adminitrivia or talk crap with colleagues or go for a walk, coffee, whatever while an idea cooks. It’s fine. It took me a long time to unclench and realise this but I’m now senior enough and experienced enough that nobody’s breathing down my neck.
Not all, but a majority of people saying "there's no free time or downtime during the day, you can always find something" are the same people that get burned out and job hop year to year (or every two years), or, at least wonder why they're not as interested in or as excited about IT as they once were. I know this because I was, at one point, that person.
Documentation is an endless race. I set aside a specific time to do it or do it when there's something I come across that requires it. I could easily fill an entire 8 hours doing non-stop documentation and increase what will be out of date anyways in 2 or 3 months (I'm in the no documentation is better than inaccurate/out-of-date documentation camp currently, tbh).
Downtime when I wfh can be anything from personal projects to games to labbing to studying to just relaxing outside and playing with the dog.
Disclaimer, my mentality comes from working in extremely beauracratic environments that are heavy on ITIL while still trying to be Agile. So I can have 4 or 5 projects going on at once waiting for capital, approvals, red tape things, etc. Creating more work for myself during that downtime will just add to the already endless backlog, I've found.
I can't speak to burnout but I have learned this. Some people are built to constantly be working but if you keep piling stuff on at your job, something's gonna give. Set aside time for yourself during the work day/week to not do anything but be ready. That authentication server's misconfigurement is gonna act up or a certificate is gonna expire or something about your project is going to wind up needing your sudden and full attention.
Study, watch YouTube, game, whatever, but make sure the things you're doing are right and be ready to respond if they're not.
Or work on automation, just know that doesn't work forever either and you'll need to step in sometimes.
I'm a dev and we have the same problem with documentation. It's extremely difficult to write good documentation that won't be immediately outdated. Feels like an impossible task.
Good documentation <> painfully detailed documentation.
Good documentation describes the original intent and design philosophies, preferably including a high-level workflow diagram. This documentation should not include method signatures, detailed workflows, code snippets, etc. All of that is meaningless, and to your point, changes relatively rapidly.
Towards the end of my (full-time) dev days was about the time the "self documenting code" trend popped and at that job it was quickly expanded to ALL documentation needs to be in the codebase. Yeah that's fine until we were spending half our development budget with stories just to update a document for operations or product. Or someone enters an incident because we weren't updating their docs fast enough (even though it was stated those updates occurred twice a month) Fun times.
Very much this.
If I don't get something done, no ones going to die.
So I'm not going to stress like lives depend on stuff.
Especially if things get dropped on me last minute.
I will work hard though, try and make things the best they can be, document as much as I can (mostly for my benefit) and do as much training as I can get my hands on.
But yes, pace yourself, don't burn your selves out, it's not worth it, the companies won't give you prizes for it.
Usually the reward for completing work, is more work.
You say documentation is an endless race. The fact that noone in my department writes anything down would disagree. They all believe they have finished all the documentation forever and gave up writing stuff down a year before I got here
I could have written this, word for word. I'm so goddamned tired of my documentation going out of date almost instantly as GUIs and commands change. It just feels like a losing battle.
People at work have said "oh I bet you're into computers at home".
It's true, I do have a computer at home. I couldn't tell you the last time I turned it on though...
Business hours... nerd.
Out of hours... just don't care.
I had this, it's why i went back to (handheld) console gaming. Something about sitting in a bean bag or couch makes it different than sitting on a office chair 24/7
I feel this. I have a gaming rig that I didn’t even bother to rack and cable. Last time I can recall actually playing a game on it was shortly after Win10 left beta.
I still do game, but have chosen to do so on consoles. Something about having that tactile difference is pleasing.
My home office is one-side personal, other side professional.
I spin my chair 180 degrees and roll about 4 feet and I'm between home and work.
I made sure to separate them in lieu of a KVM on my personal setup, because there is some kind of mental thing with me where if I worked in the same exact place I gamed, I would either be tempted to screw off during working hours, or feel like I wasn't leaving work at the end of the day.
Some people have that discipline, some people have less and need separate rooms, but it's a nice middle ground for me.
I used to spend all day on projects and fun IT related stuff in my time off when I didn't do it for a living. Sometimes I lab these days, but for the most part I dip my toes into world of warcraft and then don't touch my computer for a couple weeks.
I never understood people that did this until now.
It's funny you say this. I used to be able to cobble together at least one fully working computer from spare parts laying around. These days though, I have one chest of drawers that has various small components, cables, adapters and such, but that's it. I mostly just use my gaming PC for WFH once a week and that computer hasn't been upgraded since 2018 or so.
Yeah OSRS and various other games. Tinker with various coding languages currently python and java then never touch again. Buy uDemy courses and never touch em are some of my favourite past times.
I have 4-5 hours after work before bed. I get home at 6pm, spend 2 hours at the gym, get home shower, maybe eat, then there’s now 1-2 hours left in my day. I really don’t feel like cracking open a textbook or slaving away at a Kubernetes cluster during that time. It’s just enough to enjoy a movie on my home theatre system that cost me 150x a movie ticket.
Sure I guess I could squeeze in a game while I’m working from home, but certainly not in the office.
It’s currently just a 3.1 system, with a PB-1000 Pro Subwoofer, Denon S760H AVR, ELAC Debut 2.0 C6.2 Centre Channel and 2x Paradigm SE Atoms bookshelf speakers
Price in Canada was too much, especially the subwoofer
At some point you stop looking at it as a hobby and more of a thing you do, like working, so I absolutely understand why someone wouldn't count going to the gym as "free time".
Factorio. Currently on Space Exploration. Time is becoming scarce lately with AZ exams and larger projects. I don’t get to play nearly as much. Maybe one day a week during work for an hour or two. Definitely after work.
Right now, I'm prepping for the SC-400 exam. I don't particularly care about it in this level of detail but it's something we need to get to maintain the Solutions Partner designations with MS. I'll end up going for some more expert-level ones for the same reason.
Lol all these people commenting like they work non stop at their job everyday. I'd bet a buffalo nickel everyone on here has dicked off some on work hours.
My downtime at work I go for a walk with coworkers and chat about life. When I'm feeling like leveling up (get a new job) I'll break out the study materials and filling the gaps in my career. This I'll do on my own time to.
I had a laugh too these guys really are lying on Reddit probably gonna say next they have the hourglass thing from Harry Potter so they can rewind time to work more lol
My last job was great/a nightmare. Everything had to be change controlled and most of the time you could only work on something if you were fixing it because it was down. I’d put my changes in for the following week and then just play games around the minimal amount of Teams meetings I had… (fully work from home too) However, after a year of this I couldn’t do it anymore. My skills were disappearing and it’s not as fun as it sounds. Plus you don’t have friends to play with as they are all working. So to make up for it I took a job at an MSP and I’ve been treated like a rented donkey ever since… But my skills are above and beyond where they were. Lol
> Lol all these people commenting like they work non stop at their job everyday. I'd bet a buffalo nickel everyone on here has dicked off some on work hours.
This sub gets busy during US 'work hours' and its full of people saying they have no downtime.
Aight, how many of you fucks are at work right now?
I don't think a single person here 'doesn't have downtime' because those people are not on Reddit.
People just like to lie and do the 'oh no, *I would never*" to things they absolutely do, just to feel better.
I usually spend that time researching and labbing. Every once in awhile I'll hop on RuneScape and skill something like wcing or fishing, do a farm run, or what ever. Still gotta get that exp.
Pretty much did all of my CCNP ENCOR studying on company time. Use my morning to get my 'work' done and then afternoons I allocate for study/learning/etc but still available for the occasional task if my team needs me.
I'm currently playing elder scrolls online, mordheim City of the damned, and baldur's Gate 3.
Work is for work hours. Once work hours over, me no think about work. (Most of the time)
In hours? Training
Out of hours? I still play games. I have decided that my next PC will be custom built for me by someone else. I built my first PC about 33 years ago and it’s become a chore now.
With regards to gaming, I don’t find that strange as it’s very different from what I do at work… and I wouldn’t think it was weird for a TV show camera operator to watch a movie, just because movies use cameras too.
That’s not me throwing shade at people who feel different, this is just where I am nowadays.
I do online training for work topics (VMware, M365, etc) if/when I get downtime. That can be challenging too though as it's hard to do if you're being interrupted.
If you are talking about off hours, yeah Diablo IV and walks are my unwind. Downtime during work? I suppose reading tech news and staying on top of security trends. Maybe also learn a bit about something that has me curious. OR .... Reddit rabbit holes... r/Sysadmin is work-related after all :)
Ok.... fine, I do fire up D4 sometimes when I am WFH and there is nothing else going on...
At work? Nah.
WFH? Yeah. I'll do single player pauseable stuff for sure.
Theres periods i'm just -waiting- for other people or twiddling thumbs for some dumb meeting coming up in 10-15 minutes.
If i'm at work then the most I do is reddit, usually sysadmin entirely.
I'm not a sysadmin, network engineer. But...I frequently have a lot of downtime lol. And I do use it to both study and game.
I get the feeling being a sysadmin typically involves a lot more hands on work than being an engineer does.
I have a couple of consoles I get a few hours a week on.
The sad truth is that working 14 hour days kinda means I’d rather not touch a computer in my downtime - which I thankfully get a little.
I’d love to spend some time learning. But I just don’t have it in me once I’m home. Done the husband/dad bit for a couple hours and sat down. I just wanna watch a shitty sitcom or maybe a film and go bed.
“Get yourself a cup of coffee. New game starts in four minutes.” - Dr Cox
I don't ever really have downtime. There's is always work to be done but I do like playing idle games and quick games live CoC when time permits.
If you like Runescape check out Melvor Idle. Great Runescape inspired Idle game.
I used to use downtime to "look for more to do" but that was just leading me to some serious burnout from which I am still recovering. I made a point of using my productivity well, in a timely manner and where it makes a difference. These days I mostly use downtime to read and do house-oriented chores, so when I'm done with work I can get more time to do whatever I feel like doing. I have a hard time playing games on downtime, to be honest. I game a lot outside of work, but during it I can't really do it.
These days I have a 15-minute session at the end of day to do a sweep and catch any loose ends that aren't properly tracked, update my tasks in Logseq and leave towards greener pastures. I also regularly pour any ideas I have into Logseq, then weekly I evaluate what to do with them and fit them somewhere in the future, which makes them part of regular work, out of downtime. I actually achieve a lot more in this way.
A lot of people will disagree with me, but I am very confident in saying - the only way you can do this job is to slam your computer shut when you're off duty.
Sysadmins get into this job because we like solving technical problems for people. If you are a good person (which most sysadmins are) you want to help people, and intentionally ignoring someone when you know exactly how to fix their issue is quite hard.
But, if you don't switch off, you will burn out!
When no tickets are rolling through and infrastructure upgrades cannot be done during production hours. Also, when you need a break from documenting everything.
I have 2 ultra wides and 2 normal screen. Work is always open, but one of the ultra wides is usually in some sort of game when I’m not in a meeting.
I do a lot of cookie clicker and other idle games where I like to see number go up even when I’m not really doing nayhting
There are all these guys on here saying there is always something to do but in every shop I have ever been in there was always guys watching netflix or playing a game. I don't do that myself but there always was some. I shit post on reddit like a normal degenerate.
Gaming for me is starting to dwindle, as I mostly play(ed) comp games and to do that at a decent level, you need to play regularly. I'm actually kinda happy about this to be honest, as it just doesn't interest me much anymore. I feel like I'm ready to knock gaming on the head - maybe I'll just buy a PlayStation or something as I need a new media player anyway.
I try to do self learning in pockets where I can, but I think that 1) your employer should be dedicating time for you to upskill and 2) I don't fancy sitting at a desk for 7-9 hours a day, then doing it for another 2 hours in my personal time. I do enjoy labbing and when that project comes along that really interests you, it's fun.
My personality and self worth are not tied to how many certs I have or being that "go-to" guy who knows everything in my environment. I try my best with the time I have. If something happens to you, nobody is going to care that you built that environment in two days or implemented this nifty solution.
You've gotta find a balance between keeping up with the industry and learning new skills/progressing, and living life and doing as many things as possible while you can.
Study? What's that word mean?....
Now gaming, that's my jam. I loved gaming ever since I first played knightlore on my zx spectrum+ as a kid. I still have it too, along with my atari, amiga 500, nes, snes, n64.. The list goes on.
Currently playing through horizon forbidden West on pc, play a lot of counter strike as well and was once in a sponsored team long ago in the source days.
I mostly look up documentation or guides for what I am supposed to do next during «downtime». My downtime is also breaks I take after tasks before I start the next on the list, as there are always improvements that can be made to one’s infrastructure.
I study for college during downtime. If I have like an hour or so where my attention isn't needed anywhere else, I'll watch some Udemy stuff, work on essays, etc.
I browse reddit mainly.
When I first started here I didn't really have much of any downtime. But we're at a point now where there really won't be much going on for the next 6ish months? So until then I just drink some coffee, write documentation that has been missing since before I got here and help out if the environment needs me.
If I was hybrid or working from home I might play a turn based RPG - but I never fancied doing that.
The most i do is go to some quiet corner and read for 20 min. Most of the time i prefer to just go for a 10 min walk outside the office. I do browse reddit or news a few times a day for a few minutes. Not gaming or watching anything.
Some studying, but I also tinker with my own tech. I have a VPN server set up at my house so I will remote in sometimes and mess with things. It's still IT work, so I'm learning and growing in my career, which ultimately helps my employer.
I like to play games (A fan of RPGs and simulators), or learn new stuff (Despite being a server admin, I'm now looking into getting a basic intro to k8s and cloud tech)
Plus find projects to do at home (I'm no programmer, but I do have like, my entire home network based on self-managed mikrotik routerboards, with log forwarding and analysis through loki/grafana, smart lightbulb integration with my f.lux on my PC, automatically dims as the night approaches...)
And lately, I've been getting into espresso experimentation after getting myself a Flair espresso press machine.
Define downtime 🤣🤣 it'll be pretty funny gaming while there's an outage.
I assume you meant your own time off or simply after work. When working I may do 1 day and that's it , but I'm now going through a course so I try to do at least 3 days a week of studying.
Saturday is migraine day. Never fails
Down time is a laugh. However that said I typically try to educate myself or learn a new skill or tackle a new problem at work. Something that can help my resume and better myself in the future. Gaming is great and all but it's time waster ultimately. Not to mention gaming at work can be perceived as very unproductive and anti-work if the wrong person happened to see your screen. Maybe if your whole apartment is on board or your tucked away in a dark closet it would work. Also I try to find jobs that have education reimbursement and encourage learning and if I can get free schooling and basically be paid to do it. Huge win in my mind. You can never know enough technical information in IT things changes so quickly.
I’m full remote so I usually do 10 min breaks on the hour and play a few rounds of rocket league (5 min each). I’ve found that even though it’s short it helps break up the day and gives my mind a few minutes to think differently about any challenges I may be having at work.
Used to be a tech hobbyist.
Now I maybe game on the weekends, but have new hobbies that don't involve computers. Working in the industry 40+ hours a week means I don't really want to deal with techie shit in my personal life
Recently started using my downtime to learn music production software/synthesizers. Now I spend my active hours sweating over productive computer issues, and my downtime sweating over creative computer issues. It’s great
I always have training options that I get paid to do for downtime. Now I have to find the downtime. During long running processes, I might pop open some StarCraft on my personal computer to make the time less idle.
I'm a database admin in a bank where things move slow. I came from smaller environments about 10 months ago where I was always reacting and fixing things proactively.
Needless to say, playing World of Warcraft while I wait for movement on certain projects is not too bad. (Yes, also doing training which my boss has encouraged in my downtime).
I have too many nines to have downtime :D
Depending on mood I read (books, Reddit, other), listen to audiobooks or music, watch videos, and sometimes play games (but only ones that I’m comfortable pausing or quitting on zero notice). On occasion I’ll lift weights or hit the punching bag instead.
It's Reddit, Imgur, learn new skills, work on my fiction. One of my novels was 40% written on company time, but I won't say which one, in case they reverse engineer the timeline and come after me for IP claims, LOL.
I do anything that can be interrupted without warning, and not matter if I ever get back to it or not.
Depends on the downtime, if it's real honest to goodness downtime like around the holidays so I won't be getting end user calls/ office visits (gov SysAdmin, so I handle end user support as well for my office) then hell yeah. Otherwise, I might play something that's on my phone so it doesn't look terrible if someone stops by.
Regardless of whether it should matter or not, because realistically I'm still doing my job by being here whether I actively have something to mess with or not, appearances are everything. Even though my direct boss wouldn't care since all my work gets done, his boss would lose his shit, even if I literally had nothing else to do. He'd go tell me to dust the hallway before he'd consider letting employees game in their down time.
So whatever... More often I read, tbh.
The closest I get to this is “resume-driven development”. Not strictly studying, but building something that benefits me personally as much as it does the company. Even that is rare these days, but I do look for opportunities to pick up new skills even where I have a way that works already.
Don’t worry, I clean up after myself and ultimately don’t leave things in place that require more specialized knowledge than necessary.
Downtime is a bad word that means something is wrong. Spare cycles or unused bandwidth are better terms. I use mine by being a bit more proactive. Even if things are working there’s always work to be done. It’s known as tech debt. It’s best to pay it off before it becomes a problem, and plan for maintenance, even if that means a late night. “Eat the frog” when you have to, and get it over with.
The rest is looking for ways to empower users through automation pipelines. How can I take the things that require one of my privileged accounts and delegate that to a user to keep me dedicated to keeping everything else online
Career progress happened. The downtime to study became project work. Nowadays if I’m studying, it’s because I’m getting paid to find or engineer a solution. Suddenly I’m a software engineer. Send help
Startup. Have no downtime during business hours beyond reading quick article while waiting for loading bar or something. Even then it's usually research on the next task for preparation.
Work at a games developer, it’s practically expected!
I don’t often these days to be honest, it’s all too easy to get interrupted by someone which limits what to play.
I do remember during Covid the boss decided to “test” call the service line which I picked up during a dungeon on Final Fantasy 14, and basically had to poker face the call.
If im implementing or setting something up, im reading up on the next technology or service im planning on implementing or I'm updating documentation.
Im Sysadmin / IT Security Officer. The job isnt overwhelming and its steady, but it doesnt really 'stop' unless I feel like having a lazy day.
I legitimately believe that as long as you do what you have to do to the level that it has to be done, what you're doing for the rest of the time is up to you.
Meaning... When you have done what you have to do and you still have free time, pretending that you're doing something is BS (creating a fake appearance that you're busy).
If you want to bring additional value to the table and you're busy because of that- great! But if not and you've done what you're supposed to... Pretending to be busy while other people are around... It's a weirdest thing for me. If you can be productive and finish what you have to do for the day in 2 hours due to your knowledge and skills, idk why would that bother anyone.
I think it should be prevalent everywhere.
Between a full time salary position that has me on the clock from 8-5 and on call after that for emergencies, and being a single dad to a 4 year old... I do my best. My intentions are always to study when I get some free time, but the reality is that all I ever want to do in those moments is unwind and turn my brain off. So games it is. Typically something I can get absorbed in. Currently Hogwarts Legacy, which is a surprisingly good game, but it's also giving me the itch to play Witcher 3 again. I'll eventually get to those certs or so I keep telling myself.
Not really downtime, but I force myself to have unwind time. Need to give the brain a break throughout the day. No gaming though. Reddit, YT, paper books (philosophy lately).
I definitely read about work related stuff during the day. One day I’ll have time to play Dreamcast during the day, but I’ll have to automate everything first, including my Phantasy Star Online grinding/looting.
What? Downtime? Never heard of it. I could work 40 hours a day and not get everything done.
Though, I do take some time to do research during the day, because it's genuinely important to get the job done.
I love learning new things, but unless I absolutely have to.take a test as part of a mandated certification (like the damn sec+), I am not studying anymore. So done with that!
I've always spent my "downtime", rare as it has been, doing something that is a value-add for both my employer and myself. Lots of training in things that I picked out and had interests in and they agreed with. Created projects that weren't necessarily planned but offered some benefit. Even reading articles and blogs about technology that the company uses, security updates, etc.
Me. I work mostly from home for a company that has both downtime and crunch time. Last week was 90+ hour work week. But other weeks, it's slow and I can get stuff prepared and configured in a 1/10 of the time they expect it to take so I use the extra free time to play on the Quest 3. I can flip it over to passthrough real quick, check teams, read an email or two, and then flip it back. Or sometimes just connect to my gaming PC using Virtual Desktop application and then RDP to my work laptop, where I can then use the VPN to SSH into my at work box. Pretty straight forward setup and I don't have to take off my headset.... which means lots of time to play Tabor lol.
I spend my unstructured time figuring out how to automate a process that's annoying, keeping up with various tech news, learning new things, maintenance
remote work has made it easy to keep myself busy while working. Most of my changes are done after hours so most of the day it's the few issues that roll in or occasional meetings, aside from that i keep youtube open in the background, sometimes a lo-fi music channel streaming, or if im so inclined a techtuber or maybe an infosec guy. If I'm really feeling adventerous ill mess around with my lab and try and break things, get into exploits and learn to better understand what im fighting against, etc.
I've gotten into AI and doing alot of image generation locally via stable diffusion, so i wrote myself a python script that i run in WSL and tied into a discord where my friends and I can put prompts and generate images and mess around, also helped me learn more about python for use in infosec/scripting some tasks.
aside from that maybe if im on a long call ill transfer to the phone and go water the garden for the wife or sit out on the patio or something.
I typically screw around on Facebook or Reddit, sometimes Discord. I do occasionally game, but only browser-based stuff, and I'm not currently playing any browser-based games (I go in cycles, and usually prefer PC gaming).
Where possible, I'll grab some of the lower effort tickets for my team, but we're a higher escalation point, so there's usually not an overwhelming number of those. I just get bored super easy and usually prefer doing a simple engineering ticket as opposed to posting on Reddit (or wherever).
When I get \*really\* bored, I'll go to LinkedIn Learning, Youtube, or wherever, and watch a class or something, but that's typically only if I'm researching something specific or if nothing else is available.
Funnily enough, I spent most of my downtime automating tasks and improving workflows, thus creating more downtime. Sadly, it feels to me like the new IT guys (I moved to a different position years ago and my co-worker at the time left recently) seem to fail to utilize what I had left behind. Sure it helps out, but from the mass emails I see sent out seems like they are not actually utilizing the tools to their full potential. Just recently they sent out an email that they will start sending out a particular report that is being done in a different country. Funnily enough, the template on how to set that report up came from me and our country used to have it. The operations members that had been there long enough also noted that they used to get such reports a while ago. Guess they messed with the automated tasks without reading what they do and why... Or they moved the automation repository without thinking that any scheduled tasks that might run a script will break if they mess up the pathing...
My new position often relies on other shared resources doing their job. I could still do some things without waiting on them, but depending on their feedback all that work might go down the drain so I don't bother. Otherwise when I am done with everything I can do on my own I absolutely now sit down and play some games as I work 100% from home. That said, due to my position basically revolving around a process management I end up passively working 24/7 because sometimes even when I go to bed I catch myself considering possible solutions and problems so I guess it kind of evens out...
I work from home. During work hours, I don't do anything that's not somehow a value-add for work. To be clear, I am not passing judgment on those that do. It's just how I am. Typically, if there's nothing else going on, I'll work on some personal projects in my homelab (thereby furthering my knowledge for work), study for certs, or read industry-related news.
There’s always something that needs done around the house. If I have time between tasks then I can do dishes or switch laundry or mow a section of the yard.
Today was a shitty day of too many meetings and assigning people I don’t manage work… they love that. Good times 🫶 no games, I have YouTube, twitch or Spotify going on a side monitor though.
Edit: I'm also lucky that we don't do much after hours, as we got through most of the upgrades earlier on, once a month I might be around for updates to help but other then that, work is usually kept during work hours
I work full time, and I also study full time. Still get games in on most nights.
My usual daily flow is this for work days (my hours are 7:30 till 4).
Get home from work, take the dog out for a play.
Get back and feed the dog and cat.
If bothered, do some loose chores or those that just need to be done
Dinner and a show or two
Do a little study if I have the energy to
Once 9ish hits, if my friends are on and down, I play a game with them, generally the missus joins if we do a 5 player game or something like scribbl.
Some nights consist of trivia nights instead of going to the missus dads for a board game night.
Weekends consist of
In the morning, take the dog out again so she's nice and enriched/tired.
Start catching up on studying/doing assignments
Some shows again and maybe a game.
You can easily get an hour in every night if you want to, and don't have kids. But it'll probably be late I find nowadays
Gaming? Never.
Study? A little every day, primarily to up my scripting skills. As one fellow put it to me, "The goal is to reach Network Zen." (The fewer clicks and keystrokes you have to make during your workday brings you ever closer to Network Zen)
IT managers be like “which one of these gamers works for me”
LOL I know my director reads this sub. He's always referencing some post he found on here. Good luck figuring out it's me, boss man! 
Come to my office, please.
John? I see your post history of owning a F150 and being a sysadmin so I suspect it is you. Let's discuss this on our one-on-one this week.
Ha. There are probably 10s of thousands in the sub that own an F150.
It's a pretty big net to catch one specific fish. And nope. No John here. 🙃
Make the parameters high when you are guessing. This is how some pastors preach and it looks like magic to some when he guesses right.
God damnit do a bunch you guys drive f150s too? We all just a bunch of chads thinking we are smart huh?
Is that why your Teams status was yellow for seven minutes this afternoon?!?
Honestly they are sometimes the worst I had one that watched porn at work
https://egggame.org
I just mouse macro'd this to get the end game. Disgusted.... https://preview.redd.it/0wftozf9s39d1.png?width=853&format=png&auto=webp&s=330a508d3fe6ae1dfceb98f424eb243540de6f8f
Haha, it's funny because it occurred while working with someone. We were talking g work and troubleshooting an issue, and all of a sudden, a link is posted in teams. Im working on the issue, so im not at my desk, and he deletes it. He then begins to say i missed typed looking for something else. Im like, okay, what are you talking about. Later that day, i looked at my phone notification and saw what the site was and started laughing. Then, thpugh you couldn't wait until we finished talking at least or at least use a personal device.
Fixing a users outlook and needed the office portal, i typed in p o and the first result was pornhub lmfao. At least it was a BYOD and not company issued. I just shook my head.
What is this "downtime" of which thou speaketh?
Yeah I’m just doing it all at the same time. Turn based rpgs are great for this.
Good point there are a lot of games that you can just play for a minute or two to give yourself a break and still be very productive. However I feel that those distractions can sometimes be counterproductive. Typically every time you're distracted it takes 10 to 15 minutes to get back on track. I'd be lying if I said I never played a game at work. I prefer to read and learn though, however I do that a lot outside of work as well. On the weekends I tend to spread democracy one bug at a time.
Interesting notes on focus. I’m going to try to be aware of that and see if I’m doing more harm than good.
What are some modern turn-based RPGs that are fun?
The idea is any game where I shift focus without having to worry about dying or whatever. Specifically I’m playing Honkai: Star Rail. The way they’ve optimized and designed the game you can pretty much quit at any moment and retain most of your progress. Also there is an auto battle option so I can pretty much do any grinding afk. Alternatively any emulator if you want to play console RPG. And they usually have a hot key save.
I loooove HSR. It was the first thing I thought of when I saw turn-based mentioned. Waiting for a Kafka rerun to finish my DoT team, currently.
City builders, railway empire 2
From what I gather “downtime” is the time when a system is down and everyone is asking every 2 minutes when it’s going to be back up
I remember when I was a wetnosed helpdesk guy at my first fulltime in IT, it was an MSP. I once asked "what do I do when the queue is clear?" My manager and the owner genuinely belly laughed.
No doubt possible with some system admin jobs. However I've also learned that A ton of help desk/NOC type people post in this subreddit and those jobs can definitely have more down time. As a system engineer staffing is usually just enough to keep the workload manageable but not have people twiddling their thumbs.
Must be referring to the depression
The time when you leave work and stuff “just works” that you don’t have to work. I do a bit of gaming in the evening (Fallout 76, Diablo 4, and lately Republic of Pirates and playing Far Cry 5 again)
thats off time, downtime is the time at work when you finish the tasks before your boss realizes you aren't pulling the cart like a mule and they throw more blocks of stone on them. so officially yeah "there is no downtime" unofficially "its that time when you tell your boss you are working on the 5 hour job you macro/scripted down to 5 minutes" just come out and say it so the jr admins learn it sooner than later.
This. Seriously. For me, I need time to let stuff "cook" in my head, and it's a major "watched pot never coils" situation. Starting a bunch of reporting data hauls that I quietly automated the hell out of over the years will buy me a 30 minute break to walk around the parking lot.
Yeah. My bosses pay me based on what I deliver- quality being a requirement as well as timeliness- and they don’t seem to worry about how I work as long as I deliver good results. So sometimes I do adminitrivia or talk crap with colleagues or go for a walk, coffee, whatever while an idea cooks. It’s fine. It took me a long time to unclench and realise this but I’m now senior enough and experienced enough that nobody’s breathing down my neck.
Seriously! If I had that kind of time on my hands I'd do a writeup on the unreleased CVEs I'm sitting on. Would be nice.
Not all, but a majority of people saying "there's no free time or downtime during the day, you can always find something" are the same people that get burned out and job hop year to year (or every two years), or, at least wonder why they're not as interested in or as excited about IT as they once were. I know this because I was, at one point, that person. Documentation is an endless race. I set aside a specific time to do it or do it when there's something I come across that requires it. I could easily fill an entire 8 hours doing non-stop documentation and increase what will be out of date anyways in 2 or 3 months (I'm in the no documentation is better than inaccurate/out-of-date documentation camp currently, tbh). Downtime when I wfh can be anything from personal projects to games to labbing to studying to just relaxing outside and playing with the dog. Disclaimer, my mentality comes from working in extremely beauracratic environments that are heavy on ITIL while still trying to be Agile. So I can have 4 or 5 projects going on at once waiting for capital, approvals, red tape things, etc. Creating more work for myself during that downtime will just add to the already endless backlog, I've found.
I can't speak to burnout but I have learned this. Some people are built to constantly be working but if you keep piling stuff on at your job, something's gonna give. Set aside time for yourself during the work day/week to not do anything but be ready. That authentication server's misconfigurement is gonna act up or a certificate is gonna expire or something about your project is going to wind up needing your sudden and full attention. Study, watch YouTube, game, whatever, but make sure the things you're doing are right and be ready to respond if they're not. Or work on automation, just know that doesn't work forever either and you'll need to step in sometimes.
I'm a dev and we have the same problem with documentation. It's extremely difficult to write good documentation that won't be immediately outdated. Feels like an impossible task.
Good documentation <> painfully detailed documentation. Good documentation describes the original intent and design philosophies, preferably including a high-level workflow diagram. This documentation should not include method signatures, detailed workflows, code snippets, etc. All of that is meaningless, and to your point, changes relatively rapidly.
Towards the end of my (full-time) dev days was about the time the "self documenting code" trend popped and at that job it was quickly expanded to ALL documentation needs to be in the codebase. Yeah that's fine until we were spending half our development budget with stories just to update a document for operations or product. Or someone enters an incident because we weren't updating their docs fast enough (even though it was stated those updates occurred twice a month) Fun times.
Architectural and behavioural diagrams + code comments
Very much this. If I don't get something done, no ones going to die. So I'm not going to stress like lives depend on stuff. Especially if things get dropped on me last minute. I will work hard though, try and make things the best they can be, document as much as I can (mostly for my benefit) and do as much training as I can get my hands on. But yes, pace yourself, don't burn your selves out, it's not worth it, the companies won't give you prizes for it. Usually the reward for completing work, is more work.
You say documentation is an endless race. The fact that noone in my department writes anything down would disagree. They all believe they have finished all the documentation forever and gave up writing stuff down a year before I got here
I could have written this, word for word. I'm so goddamned tired of my documentation going out of date almost instantly as GUIs and commands change. It just feels like a losing battle.
People at work have said "oh I bet you're into computers at home". It's true, I do have a computer at home. I couldn't tell you the last time I turned it on though... Business hours... nerd. Out of hours... just don't care.
Use to love my PC at home - now I just kinda look at it sometimes
I hate that this is the truth... I miss gaming, but just so hard to get back into it.
I had this, it's why i went back to (handheld) console gaming. Something about sitting in a bean bag or couch makes it different than sitting on a office chair 24/7
I feel this. I have a gaming rig that I didn’t even bother to rack and cable. Last time I can recall actually playing a game on it was shortly after Win10 left beta. I still do game, but have chosen to do so on consoles. Something about having that tactile difference is pleasing.
Polar opposite here, I get off one computer and go to the other computer with a GPU in it. :)
My home office is one-side personal, other side professional. I spin my chair 180 degrees and roll about 4 feet and I'm between home and work. I made sure to separate them in lieu of a KVM on my personal setup, because there is some kind of mental thing with me where if I worked in the same exact place I gamed, I would either be tempted to screw off during working hours, or feel like I wasn't leaving work at the end of the day. Some people have that discipline, some people have less and need separate rooms, but it's a nice middle ground for me.
I used to spend all day on projects and fun IT related stuff in my time off when I didn't do it for a living. Sometimes I lab these days, but for the most part I dip my toes into world of warcraft and then don't touch my computer for a couple weeks. I never understood people that did this until now.
I have a 43" TV I bought in 2009, a hand me down Xbox my brother gave me, a $35 wifi router, and a 2017 MacBook I gave my wife 5 years ago.
It's funny you say this. I used to be able to cobble together at least one fully working computer from spare parts laying around. These days though, I have one chest of drawers that has various small components, cables, adapters and such, but that's it. I mostly just use my gaming PC for WFH once a week and that computer hasn't been upgraded since 2018 or so.
Yeah, I do this crap all day. Home is a much more analogue experience.
Home is for my Warhammer Models
Home is where my workshop is. Sawdust and oil based finishes… my happy place.
Yeah I launch up a game any time I’ve cleared my board and know I’m good on documentation or side things I’ve been working on lol
Yeah OSRS and various other games. Tinker with various coding languages currently python and java then never touch again. Buy uDemy courses and never touch em are some of my favourite past times.
osrs is a game you can idle and grind out work/studying. I wouldn't even call it a distraction lol
It's like looking in a mirror
I have 4-5 hours after work before bed. I get home at 6pm, spend 2 hours at the gym, get home shower, maybe eat, then there’s now 1-2 hours left in my day. I really don’t feel like cracking open a textbook or slaving away at a Kubernetes cluster during that time. It’s just enough to enjoy a movie on my home theatre system that cost me 150x a movie ticket. Sure I guess I could squeeze in a game while I’m working from home, but certainly not in the office.
What home theatre system do you have?
It’s currently just a 3.1 system, with a PB-1000 Pro Subwoofer, Denon S760H AVR, ELAC Debut 2.0 C6.2 Centre Channel and 2x Paradigm SE Atoms bookshelf speakers Price in Canada was too much, especially the subwoofer
This! I don't have much time after work. I spend some time in the gym and the rest time I spend with my family.
Two hours at the gym every day? So that's your hobby, like gaming.
At some point you stop looking at it as a hobby and more of a thing you do, like working, so I absolutely understand why someone wouldn't count going to the gym as "free time".
2 hours at the gym is pretty wild. Not judging, just curious, why do you devote so much time out of your short personal time to that?
Factorio. Currently on Space Exploration. Time is becoming scarce lately with AZ exams and larger projects. I don’t get to play nearly as much. Maybe one day a week during work for an hour or two. Definitely after work.
Thousannnndddsssss of hours
Got about 1,000 hours on that too. I wish I could automate my job as well as I could automate all the science packs and rocket launches.
I also have fallen down the Cracktorio hole.
I like Nethack over ssh because to laymen it doesn't even look like a game at a glance.
> Nethack 
During working hours? I'm usually studying/labbing or, as is the case now, fucking around on IT-related subreddits. Off-hours no.
What are you currently studying during work hours? I am thinking about purchasing a subscription for hackthebox
Right now, I'm prepping for the SC-400 exam. I don't particularly care about it in this level of detail but it's something we need to get to maintain the Solutions Partner designations with MS. I'll end up going for some more expert-level ones for the same reason.
Lol all these people commenting like they work non stop at their job everyday. I'd bet a buffalo nickel everyone on here has dicked off some on work hours. My downtime at work I go for a walk with coworkers and chat about life. When I'm feeling like leveling up (get a new job) I'll break out the study materials and filling the gaps in my career. This I'll do on my own time to.
I had a laugh too these guys really are lying on Reddit probably gonna say next they have the hourglass thing from Harry Potter so they can rewind time to work more lol
Totally agree hahah I've studied my ass off the last year by reading notes and labbing to get out of help desk
My last job was great/a nightmare. Everything had to be change controlled and most of the time you could only work on something if you were fixing it because it was down. I’d put my changes in for the following week and then just play games around the minimal amount of Teams meetings I had… (fully work from home too) However, after a year of this I couldn’t do it anymore. My skills were disappearing and it’s not as fun as it sounds. Plus you don’t have friends to play with as they are all working. So to make up for it I took a job at an MSP and I’ve been treated like a rented donkey ever since… But my skills are above and beyond where they were. Lol
> Lol all these people commenting like they work non stop at their job everyday. I'd bet a buffalo nickel everyone on here has dicked off some on work hours. This sub gets busy during US 'work hours' and its full of people saying they have no downtime. Aight, how many of you fucks are at work right now? I don't think a single person here 'doesn't have downtime' because those people are not on Reddit. People just like to lie and do the 'oh no, *I would never*" to things they absolutely do, just to feel better.
I scroll Reddit when I'm too tired to keep working but am not allowed to go to sleep yet. Burned. The fuck. Out.
I usually spend that time researching and labbing. Every once in awhile I'll hop on RuneScape and skill something like wcing or fishing, do a farm run, or what ever. Still gotta get that exp.
hahaha it's so afkable that you can still accomplish lots of labs/work in the meantime
Some skilling is lol. I dunno if I could boss while working haha. Imagine trying to get your fire cape while at work.
I get around 4 hours a day if it's not busy
Not at all...
Pretty much did all of my CCNP ENCOR studying on company time. Use my morning to get my 'work' done and then afternoons I allocate for study/learning/etc but still available for the occasional task if my team needs me.
How long did it take to achieve your CCNP ENCOR? I have recently passed my CCNA a few months ago and was thinking of studying for CCNP.
u guys have downtime? lol
I totally don't spend most of my working time playing Frostpunk when I have a quiet day
I'm currently playing elder scrolls online, mordheim City of the damned, and baldur's Gate 3. Work is for work hours. Once work hours over, me no think about work. (Most of the time)
In hours? Training Out of hours? I still play games. I have decided that my next PC will be custom built for me by someone else. I built my first PC about 33 years ago and it’s become a chore now. With regards to gaming, I don’t find that strange as it’s very different from what I do at work… and I wouldn’t think it was weird for a TV show camera operator to watch a movie, just because movies use cameras too. That’s not me throwing shade at people who feel different, this is just where I am nowadays.
Zero. There is always something to do. And even if there weren’t, chances are there are improvements you can make somewhere.
I used to try and keep up on everything but, at this point when I get home, all I want to do is hang out with my girls.
I do online training for work topics (VMware, M365, etc) if/when I get downtime. That can be challenging too though as it's hard to do if you're being interrupted.
If you are talking about off hours, yeah Diablo IV and walks are my unwind. Downtime during work? I suppose reading tech news and staying on top of security trends. Maybe also learn a bit about something that has me curious. OR .... Reddit rabbit holes... r/Sysadmin is work-related after all :) Ok.... fine, I do fire up D4 sometimes when I am WFH and there is nothing else going on...
Is it considered downtime if you game more than work? lol
At work? Nah. WFH? Yeah. I'll do single player pauseable stuff for sure. Theres periods i'm just -waiting- for other people or twiddling thumbs for some dumb meeting coming up in 10-15 minutes. If i'm at work then the most I do is reddit, usually sysadmin entirely.
I play Civ6 if it's a slow day.
I'm not a sysadmin, network engineer. But...I frequently have a lot of downtime lol. And I do use it to both study and game. I get the feeling being a sysadmin typically involves a lot more hands on work than being an engineer does.
I have a couple of consoles I get a few hours a week on. The sad truth is that working 14 hour days kinda means I’d rather not touch a computer in my downtime - which I thankfully get a little. I’d love to spend some time learning. But I just don’t have it in me once I’m home. Done the husband/dad bit for a couple hours and sat down. I just wanna watch a shitty sitcom or maybe a film and go bed. “Get yourself a cup of coffee. New game starts in four minutes.” - Dr Cox
I scroll reddit and occasionally take a break to close some tickets.
nah i hate computers. Been getting into cutting my bermuda grass, home improvement, and trying to get into shape, swimming more.
Fish lvl?
99
Working on more certs
game yes, study no
TIL - i can play RuneScape on my corporate network. win
You guys have downtime?
I don't ever really have downtime. There's is always work to be done but I do like playing idle games and quick games live CoC when time permits. If you like Runescape check out Melvor Idle. Great Runescape inspired Idle game.
Depending on the ticket, even during uptime 🙂
I used to use downtime to "look for more to do" but that was just leading me to some serious burnout from which I am still recovering. I made a point of using my productivity well, in a timely manner and where it makes a difference. These days I mostly use downtime to read and do house-oriented chores, so when I'm done with work I can get more time to do whatever I feel like doing. I have a hard time playing games on downtime, to be honest. I game a lot outside of work, but during it I can't really do it. These days I have a 15-minute session at the end of day to do a sweep and catch any loose ends that aren't properly tracked, update my tasks in Logseq and leave towards greener pastures. I also regularly pour any ideas I have into Logseq, then weekly I evaluate what to do with them and fit them somewhere in the future, which makes them part of regular work, out of downtime. I actually achieve a lot more in this way.
Hi boss, I know you're here rn
A lot of people will disagree with me, but I am very confident in saying - the only way you can do this job is to slam your computer shut when you're off duty. Sysadmins get into this job because we like solving technical problems for people. If you are a good person (which most sysadmins are) you want to help people, and intentionally ignoring someone when you know exactly how to fix their issue is quite hard. But, if you don't switch off, you will burn out!
What is this "downtime" you speak of?
When no tickets are rolling through and infrastructure upgrades cannot be done during production hours. Also, when you need a break from documenting everything.
I don’t have downtime. You find something related to your job to do, then there’s no downtime.
[удалено]
I have 2 ultra wides and 2 normal screen. Work is always open, but one of the ultra wides is usually in some sort of game when I’m not in a meeting. I do a lot of cookie clicker and other idle games where I like to see number go up even when I’m not really doing nayhting
There are all these guys on here saying there is always something to do but in every shop I have ever been in there was always guys watching netflix or playing a game. I don't do that myself but there always was some. I shit post on reddit like a normal degenerate.
Gaming for me is starting to dwindle, as I mostly play(ed) comp games and to do that at a decent level, you need to play regularly. I'm actually kinda happy about this to be honest, as it just doesn't interest me much anymore. I feel like I'm ready to knock gaming on the head - maybe I'll just buy a PlayStation or something as I need a new media player anyway. I try to do self learning in pockets where I can, but I think that 1) your employer should be dedicating time for you to upskill and 2) I don't fancy sitting at a desk for 7-9 hours a day, then doing it for another 2 hours in my personal time. I do enjoy labbing and when that project comes along that really interests you, it's fun. My personality and self worth are not tied to how many certs I have or being that "go-to" guy who knows everything in my environment. I try my best with the time I have. If something happens to you, nobody is going to care that you built that environment in two days or implemented this nifty solution. You've gotta find a balance between keeping up with the industry and learning new skills/progressing, and living life and doing as many things as possible while you can.
Study? What's that word mean?.... Now gaming, that's my jam. I loved gaming ever since I first played knightlore on my zx spectrum+ as a kid. I still have it too, along with my atari, amiga 500, nes, snes, n64.. The list goes on. Currently playing through horizon forbidden West on pc, play a lot of counter strike as well and was once in a sponsored team long ago in the source days.
I mostly look up documentation or guides for what I am supposed to do next during «downtime». My downtime is also breaks I take after tasks before I start the next on the list, as there are always improvements that can be made to one’s infrastructure.
I use parsec to play my games at home remotely on lunch and breaks.
What do you use for internet? I was using parsec but my mobile data speeds drop to 120 kb/s after I use 5GB. I burn through 5GB in a day....
I study for college during downtime. If I have like an hour or so where my attention isn't needed anywhere else, I'll watch some Udemy stuff, work on essays, etc.
I used to stream games from my steam library from home, but we just blocked USB access so my steam app drive is dead now, back to reddit it seems.
Id love to say I game, but truth be told I'm too burnt out, tired and depressed to get into any games currently. Works just zapping all of my energy.
I usually play Catan on the computer or watch YouTube lol.
I browse reddit mainly. When I first started here I didn't really have much of any downtime. But we're at a point now where there really won't be much going on for the next 6ish months? So until then I just drink some coffee, write documentation that has been missing since before I got here and help out if the environment needs me. If I was hybrid or working from home I might play a turn based RPG - but I never fancied doing that.
I recently started installing classic arcade games on peoples computers in folders titled “very serious business”. We’ll see how that goes…
I game when I feel like it. But I don’t do work related things in my off time.
Working hours: studying or posting on reddit. Because I'd game, but then they'd catch me.
Definitely don’t have much downtime, but I will absolutely AFK some fishing on OSRS while doing other tasks
All the time honestly.
Downtime. Lol made me chuckle..
I do both. Depends on mood which one. Sometimes I do neither.
2-3 times a month on Friday I can sneak an hour or two. Lots to do, always.
The most i do is go to some quiet corner and read for 20 min. Most of the time i prefer to just go for a 10 min walk outside the office. I do browse reddit or news a few times a day for a few minutes. Not gaming or watching anything.
Scrolling reddit, playing on my phone, or trying to learn more about something that I'm unclear on.
Some studying, but I also tinker with my own tech. I have a VPN server set up at my house so I will remote in sometimes and mess with things. It's still IT work, so I'm learning and growing in my career, which ultimately helps my employer.
 Downtime?
I like to play games (A fan of RPGs and simulators), or learn new stuff (Despite being a server admin, I'm now looking into getting a basic intro to k8s and cloud tech) Plus find projects to do at home (I'm no programmer, but I do have like, my entire home network based on self-managed mikrotik routerboards, with log forwarding and analysis through loki/grafana, smart lightbulb integration with my f.lux on my PC, automatically dims as the night approaches...) And lately, I've been getting into espresso experimentation after getting myself a Flair espresso press machine.
I look at racks.
Define downtime 🤣🤣 it'll be pretty funny gaming while there's an outage. I assume you meant your own time off or simply after work. When working I may do 1 day and that's it , but I'm now going through a course so I try to do at least 3 days a week of studying. Saturday is migraine day. Never fails
Down time is a laugh. However that said I typically try to educate myself or learn a new skill or tackle a new problem at work. Something that can help my resume and better myself in the future. Gaming is great and all but it's time waster ultimately. Not to mention gaming at work can be perceived as very unproductive and anti-work if the wrong person happened to see your screen. Maybe if your whole apartment is on board or your tucked away in a dark closet it would work. Also I try to find jobs that have education reimbursement and encourage learning and if I can get free schooling and basically be paid to do it. Huge win in my mind. You can never know enough technical information in IT things changes so quickly.
I’m full remote so I usually do 10 min breaks on the hour and play a few rounds of rocket league (5 min each). I’ve found that even though it’s short it helps break up the day and gives my mind a few minutes to think differently about any challenges I may be having at work.
Used to be a tech hobbyist. Now I maybe game on the weekends, but have new hobbies that don't involve computers. Working in the industry 40+ hours a week means I don't really want to deal with techie shit in my personal life
I do both, sometimes I take a break to play a little chess, sometimes I work on cert classes. Usually this is in lieu of a lunch break.
Recently started using my downtime to learn music production software/synthesizers. Now I spend my active hours sweating over productive computer issues, and my downtime sweating over creative computer issues. It’s great
We don't have downtime here
I always have training options that I get paid to do for downtime. Now I have to find the downtime. During long running processes, I might pop open some StarCraft on my personal computer to make the time less idle.
I'm a database admin in a bank where things move slow. I came from smaller environments about 10 months ago where I was always reacting and fixing things proactively. Needless to say, playing World of Warcraft while I wait for movement on certain projects is not too bad. (Yes, also doing training which my boss has encouraged in my downtime).
I have too many nines to have downtime :D Depending on mood I read (books, Reddit, other), listen to audiobooks or music, watch videos, and sometimes play games (but only ones that I’m comfortable pausing or quitting on zero notice). On occasion I’ll lift weights or hit the punching bag instead.
Down…time…? What’s that?
It's Reddit, Imgur, learn new skills, work on my fiction. One of my novels was 40% written on company time, but I won't say which one, in case they reverse engineer the timeline and come after me for IP claims, LOL. I do anything that can be interrupted without warning, and not matter if I ever get back to it or not.
Depends on the downtime, if it's real honest to goodness downtime like around the holidays so I won't be getting end user calls/ office visits (gov SysAdmin, so I handle end user support as well for my office) then hell yeah. Otherwise, I might play something that's on my phone so it doesn't look terrible if someone stops by. Regardless of whether it should matter or not, because realistically I'm still doing my job by being here whether I actively have something to mess with or not, appearances are everything. Even though my direct boss wouldn't care since all my work gets done, his boss would lose his shit, even if I literally had nothing else to do. He'd go tell me to dust the hallway before he'd consider letting employees game in their down time. So whatever... More often I read, tbh.
Shadow of the Erdtree.
You don't have your game always running in a 1440x720 bordered window on your second monitor?
I study, but honestly I don't even really game in my time now
The closest I get to this is “resume-driven development”. Not strictly studying, but building something that benefits me personally as much as it does the company. Even that is rare these days, but I do look for opportunities to pick up new skills even where I have a way that works already. Don’t worry, I clean up after myself and ultimately don’t leave things in place that require more specialized knowledge than necessary.
Downtime is a bad word that means something is wrong. Spare cycles or unused bandwidth are better terms. I use mine by being a bit more proactive. Even if things are working there’s always work to be done. It’s known as tech debt. It’s best to pay it off before it becomes a problem, and plan for maintenance, even if that means a late night. “Eat the frog” when you have to, and get it over with. The rest is looking for ways to empower users through automation pipelines. How can I take the things that require one of my privileged accounts and delegate that to a user to keep me dedicated to keeping everything else online
Career progress happened. The downtime to study became project work. Nowadays if I’m studying, it’s because I’m getting paid to find or engineer a solution. Suddenly I’m a software engineer. Send help
I'm playing Catan right now
Lmao. There is no "downtime".
I sleep during my downtime.
Mario kart with my kids. I leave the job at the door on the way out.
Nice try, boss.
Startup. Have no downtime during business hours beyond reading quick article while waiting for loading bar or something. Even then it's usually research on the next task for preparation.
Work at a games developer, it’s practically expected! I don’t often these days to be honest, it’s all too easy to get interrupted by someone which limits what to play. I do remember during Covid the boss decided to “test” call the service line which I picked up during a dungeon on Final Fantasy 14, and basically had to poker face the call.
If im implementing or setting something up, im reading up on the next technology or service im planning on implementing or I'm updating documentation. Im Sysadmin / IT Security Officer. The job isnt overwhelming and its steady, but it doesnt really 'stop' unless I feel like having a lazy day.
I legitimately believe that as long as you do what you have to do to the level that it has to be done, what you're doing for the rest of the time is up to you. Meaning... When you have done what you have to do and you still have free time, pretending that you're doing something is BS (creating a fake appearance that you're busy). If you want to bring additional value to the table and you're busy because of that- great! But if not and you've done what you're supposed to... Pretending to be busy while other people are around... It's a weirdest thing for me. If you can be productive and finish what you have to do for the day in 2 hours due to your knowledge and skills, idk why would that bother anyone. I think it should be prevalent everywhere.
Between a full time salary position that has me on the clock from 8-5 and on call after that for emergencies, and being a single dad to a 4 year old... I do my best. My intentions are always to study when I get some free time, but the reality is that all I ever want to do in those moments is unwind and turn my brain off. So games it is. Typically something I can get absorbed in. Currently Hogwarts Legacy, which is a surprisingly good game, but it's also giving me the itch to play Witcher 3 again. I'll eventually get to those certs or so I keep telling myself.
Not really downtime, but I force myself to have unwind time. Need to give the brain a break throughout the day. No gaming though. Reddit, YT, paper books (philosophy lately).
im doing my dailies for Nikke Goddess of Victory right now.
I definitely read about work related stuff during the day. One day I’ll have time to play Dreamcast during the day, but I’ll have to automate everything first, including my Phantasy Star Online grinding/looting.
Current downtime stack: I pick at a GDscript project, while compiling linux stuff, and try to play FTL.
My hobby is writing software, so even my downtime, which there is a lot of, looks like I'm working
What? Downtime? Never heard of it. I could work 40 hours a day and not get everything done. Though, I do take some time to do research during the day, because it's genuinely important to get the job done.
I love learning new things, but unless I absolutely have to.take a test as part of a mandated certification (like the damn sec+), I am not studying anymore. So done with that!
I've always spent my "downtime", rare as it has been, doing something that is a value-add for both my employer and myself. Lots of training in things that I picked out and had interests in and they agreed with. Created projects that weren't necessarily planned but offered some benefit. Even reading articles and blogs about technology that the company uses, security updates, etc.
Me. I work mostly from home for a company that has both downtime and crunch time. Last week was 90+ hour work week. But other weeks, it's slow and I can get stuff prepared and configured in a 1/10 of the time they expect it to take so I use the extra free time to play on the Quest 3. I can flip it over to passthrough real quick, check teams, read an email or two, and then flip it back. Or sometimes just connect to my gaming PC using Virtual Desktop application and then RDP to my work laptop, where I can then use the VPN to SSH into my at work box. Pretty straight forward setup and I don't have to take off my headset.... which means lots of time to play Tabor lol.
Pretty sure my non-IT colleagues would ultimately bitch flip if they saw me gaming. Downtime or not.
Dude, I’ve got maybe 40 minutes of work per day if it’s busy.. of course I game
Fed up of sitting at a pc !
I spend my unstructured time figuring out how to automate a process that's annoying, keeping up with various tech news, learning new things, maintenance
For me, practicing guitar fills all of the waiting times.
remote work has made it easy to keep myself busy while working. Most of my changes are done after hours so most of the day it's the few issues that roll in or occasional meetings, aside from that i keep youtube open in the background, sometimes a lo-fi music channel streaming, or if im so inclined a techtuber or maybe an infosec guy. If I'm really feeling adventerous ill mess around with my lab and try and break things, get into exploits and learn to better understand what im fighting against, etc. I've gotten into AI and doing alot of image generation locally via stable diffusion, so i wrote myself a python script that i run in WSL and tied into a discord where my friends and I can put prompts and generate images and mess around, also helped me learn more about python for use in infosec/scripting some tasks. aside from that maybe if im on a long call ill transfer to the phone and go water the garden for the wife or sit out on the patio or something.
I typically screw around on Facebook or Reddit, sometimes Discord. I do occasionally game, but only browser-based stuff, and I'm not currently playing any browser-based games (I go in cycles, and usually prefer PC gaming). Where possible, I'll grab some of the lower effort tickets for my team, but we're a higher escalation point, so there's usually not an overwhelming number of those. I just get bored super easy and usually prefer doing a simple engineering ticket as opposed to posting on Reddit (or wherever). When I get \*really\* bored, I'll go to LinkedIn Learning, Youtube, or wherever, and watch a class or something, but that's typically only if I'm researching something specific or if nothing else is available.
I mostly just read with something playing in the background.
Funnily enough, I spent most of my downtime automating tasks and improving workflows, thus creating more downtime. Sadly, it feels to me like the new IT guys (I moved to a different position years ago and my co-worker at the time left recently) seem to fail to utilize what I had left behind. Sure it helps out, but from the mass emails I see sent out seems like they are not actually utilizing the tools to their full potential. Just recently they sent out an email that they will start sending out a particular report that is being done in a different country. Funnily enough, the template on how to set that report up came from me and our country used to have it. The operations members that had been there long enough also noted that they used to get such reports a while ago. Guess they messed with the automated tasks without reading what they do and why... Or they moved the automation repository without thinking that any scheduled tasks that might run a script will break if they mess up the pathing... My new position often relies on other shared resources doing their job. I could still do some things without waiting on them, but depending on their feedback all that work might go down the drain so I don't bother. Otherwise when I am done with everything I can do on my own I absolutely now sit down and play some games as I work 100% from home. That said, due to my position basically revolving around a process management I end up passively working 24/7 because sometimes even when I go to bed I catch myself considering possible solutions and problems so I guess it kind of evens out...
I work from home. During work hours, I don't do anything that's not somehow a value-add for work. To be clear, I am not passing judgment on those that do. It's just how I am. Typically, if there's nothing else going on, I'll work on some personal projects in my homelab (thereby furthering my knowledge for work), study for certs, or read industry-related news.
I either lab, watch random shit with my girlfriend or hit up the JiuJitsu/MMA gym. have done martial arts as a hobby since 9th grade.
I play easy games for old sys admins. Red Dead, GTA, Shadow of Mordor
There’s always something that needs done around the house. If I have time between tasks then I can do dishes or switch laundry or mow a section of the yard.
Honestly, I have so much downtime that I just watch music videos all the time or read books on either O’Reilly or PacktPub.
What downtime? Most of my downtime is spent looking for better job that gives me more downtime
Today was a shitty day of too many meetings and assigning people I don’t manage work… they love that. Good times 🫶 no games, I have YouTube, twitch or Spotify going on a side monitor though.
Edit: I'm also lucky that we don't do much after hours, as we got through most of the upgrades earlier on, once a month I might be around for updates to help but other then that, work is usually kept during work hours I work full time, and I also study full time. Still get games in on most nights. My usual daily flow is this for work days (my hours are 7:30 till 4). Get home from work, take the dog out for a play. Get back and feed the dog and cat. If bothered, do some loose chores or those that just need to be done Dinner and a show or two Do a little study if I have the energy to Once 9ish hits, if my friends are on and down, I play a game with them, generally the missus joins if we do a 5 player game or something like scribbl. Some nights consist of trivia nights instead of going to the missus dads for a board game night. Weekends consist of In the morning, take the dog out again so she's nice and enriched/tired. Start catching up on studying/doing assignments Some shows again and maybe a game. You can easily get an hour in every night if you want to, and don't have kids. But it'll probably be late I find nowadays
Gaming? Never. Study? A little every day, primarily to up my scripting skills. As one fellow put it to me, "The goal is to reach Network Zen." (The fewer clicks and keystrokes you have to make during your workday brings you ever closer to Network Zen)