Comment Re:Not quite without customers... (Score 1) 386
Sorry hit send too soon, replying to myself, bad form.
In my case when I had long commute times, I sometimes solved bug in my head that had eluded me all day pounding on the keyboard trying to find out what was happening. When you are forced away from the screen/keyboard and you must think for yourself without any help from documentation or debugger or anything else, your may realise that your assumptions had been wrong from the start and your design was not optimal, for instance.
Now I have a more academic job where sometimes I have to come up with mathematical proofs, or at least things like novel algorithms that are not linked to producing lots of code in an editor. More often than not, they form up by themselves in my head when I'm doing something mindless and apparently unproductive: taking a shower, driving, grocery shopping, etc. Mind you this only happens after a lot of work (on paper or computer or just thinking), but the final step often somehow clicks when not thinking about it.
So unstructured, *boring* time is essential for many tasks. Also having fun. Many people like driving.