Sidebar Sidebar
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.

How to make use of time spent on the computer.

M

Melkor

macrumors 6502
Original poster
Oct 12, 2005
354
0
Recently I've noticed that I spend a lot of time on computers, which I don't have a problem with because I like computers :)

However, I find that I don't really achieve or learn much from my time spent.

Does anyone have any ideas of how I could spend my time more productivly and learn something?

So far I've thought of getting a photoshop tutorial and learning to be good at that. Also maybe a programming tutorial.

I thought this might be a good thread to give other people ideas as well.

Thanks :D
 
Melkor said:
Recently I've noticed that I spend a lot of time on computers, which I don't have a problem with because I like computers :)

However, I find that I don't really achieve or learn much from my time spent.

Does anyone have any ideas of how I could spend my time more productivly and learn something?

So far I've thought of getting a photoshop tutorial and learning to be good at that. Also maybe a programming tutorial.

I thought this might be a good thread to give other people ideas as well.

Thanks :D
Click to expand...
I would start messing with iLife. Its free, fun and can be quite useful/productive.
 
I find myself spending a lot of time looking up stuff on Wikipedia or Google. I enjoy just typing in people/bands/etc into Wikipedia and reading their information. Also with Google these days, if you've ever had a question about anything you could probably find the answer in Google in 10 seconds.

Oh yeah, other than that I browse Macrumors, stock sites or Fark.

jon
 
Melkor said:
However, I find that I don't really achieve or learn much from my time spent.

Does anyone have any ideas of how I could spend my time more productively and learn something?
Click to expand...
I spend my free time at MacRumours, so I probably don't. :p


I guess I did learn a bit about photography on the net, but a lot of it was while posting here. :eek: I also download a podcast and go to a website to learn Japanese.
 
iJon said:
I find myself spending a lot of time looking up stuff on Wikipedia or Google. I enjoy just typing in people/bands/etc into Wikipedia and reading their information. Also with Google these days, if you've ever had a question about anything you could probably find the answer in Google in 10 seconds.
Click to expand...

This is what I do most of the time when I'm on the computer...looking up stuff. I watch a lot of movie trailers and that about it...there was a time when I would be on MR every split second but as time go by I find myself moving away from MR:(


Bless
 
MacRumors, Facebook, and EBSCO. I'm still in grad school, so I'm doing lots of writing every week. I research for articles relative to teaching to share and write reviews for. I create lesson plans for assignments as well as my own classroom. I use Dreamweaver for a very simple website that is my graduate portfolio.

I use Photoshop to create avatars for MR.

Plus, a little entertaining video search every once in awhile. :D

That's how productive I am.

Me loves me Powerbook! :cool:
 
I'd encourage you to learn to program. I did (still learning, as I always will be really), and I've really enjoyed it. I spend most of the day on the computer, but by the time I was done I felt like I really accomplished something. I implemented two more fairly complex and important features in the application I'm developing.
 
mduser63 said:
I'd encourage you to learn to program. I did (still learning, as I always will be really), and I've really enjoyed it. I spend most of the day on the computer, but by the time I was done I felt like I really accomplished something. I implemented two more fairly complex and important features in the application I'm developing.
Click to expand...

How did you go about learning to program? I've always wanted to
 
Why, spend more time reading MacRumors, of course.:D

Seriously, though, I've learned a lot not only about my iBook (my first mac) but about computers and electronics in general just by reading these forums.

And like several other posters have pointed out, I also love to google random stuff and read about it.
 
Kittenwars.com :cool:

anyway get a lynda acount. at 25$ a month its well worth it and you can learn to use just about anything. their photoshop tutorials are real nice. Bert Monroy search fir him.

also get into some podcasts like: TwiT, Macbreak, dl.tv, diggnation, you'll learn stuff and the news.
 
Try surfing porn. Really. Not only will you enjoy yourself, you will learn quite a bit about yourself in the process.
 
iJon said:
I find myself spending a lot of time looking up stuff on Wikipedia or Google. I enjoy just typing in people/bands/etc into Wikipedia and reading their information. Also with Google these days, if you've ever had a question about anything you could probably find the answer in Google in 10 seconds.
Click to expand...
Seriously. I will look up some random thing on Wikipedia, and it will lead to reading about dozens of other things. It is the domino effect. It never ends.

Sometimes it gives you some conversation material for real life, too! Haha, likst I was reading about grocery stores, then Kroger, then parking lots. How random!
 
First you should always have iTunes playing something in the background, I generally stream my classroom lectures that I missed a few times and memorize them subconciously...:cool: :p :D , or I listen to the news or one of those lecture podcasts while surfing the net and checking email or writing papers.
 
Coolnat2004 said:
Seriously. I will look up some random thing on Wikipedia, and it will lead to reading about dozens of other things. It is the domino effect. It never ends.

Sometimes it gives you some conversation material for real life, too! Haha, likst I was reading about grocery stores, then Kroger, then parking lots. How random!
Click to expand...
Yeah no kidding. I was pretty impressed the other day cause I studied for my whole botany test with wikipedia. Didn't use my book and didn't have any notes, worked out quite well though.

jon
 
The wonderful things about these machines is they bring you so much stuff to read and so many things to look at. I mean, people are producing stuff constantly, and a computer with an Internet connection is this quasi-real time link to a mass of contemporary and historical publication.

We live in a time where we can surf from Ezra Pound to Homestar Runner to fixated, psychotic cats.

Can't know the future, but can't imagine a time I'd rather be alive.
 
viccles said:
How did you go about learning to program? I've always wanted to
Click to expand...

I bought Progamming in Objective-C by Stephen Kochan and went through it completely. I then bought Cocoa Programming for Mac OS X by Aaron Hillegass. I got about halfway through that before I was having enough fun programming that I didn't really want to keep working out of the book. I highly recommend both books. Programming in Objective-C is especially good, and it doesn't assume that you already know how to program in any language, it teaches you from scratch. Cocoa Programming for Mac OS X assumes you already know at least C, or C++ and really sort of is better if you already know ObjC, so I definitely recommend going through Kochan's book before you tackle Hillegass.
 
Google and Wikipedia rule my day - I'm actually addicted. I look up *everything*. If you could get degrees in looking stuff up I'd get an honorary doctorate!!

If you want to do something productive with a computer then fire up photoshop and start playing or load up xcode and find some tutorials. The photoshop route would probably be more enjoyable for a newbee though.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Register on MacRumors! This sidebar will go away, and you'll see fewer ads.
Top Bottom
Back