
In Programming, One is the Loneliest Number - tomh
http://www.codinghorror.com/blog/archives/000890.html
======
pg
True, there's no one to keep you in line if you work alone, but there are
_some_ people who are disciplined enough to keep themselves in line.

I think the real disadvantage of working alone is that you have no one to
bounce ideas off.

~~~
brlewis
As someone working alone, I find that not being able to bounce ideas off of a
parter is not that much of a problem once you have users. You can evaluate
ideas based on what users are saying or doing, or just try them out and see
what happens. The real disadvantage is that it just isn't as much fun as
working together.

~~~
iloveyouocean
But there are two categories of ideas: features to release to users, and
decisions about how to write/structure code. Of course users are the best
people to bounce features off of (although an initial 'partner filter' is
often valuable), but they most likely have nothing to say about actually
writing code, or for that matter almost any other business decision.

~~~
brlewis
Bouncing code-related ideas off each other may be important for some. I'm a
good enough coder that if I had someone to bounce ideas off of, I would be
doing it more for fun than for any tangible business advantage. Not that my
code is perfect, but I'm experienced enough now not to create any messes that
will be a nightmare to clean up.

------
staunch
It's easy to find yourself justifying bad decisions that were made for the
wrong reasons. A good partner can be a great reality check, in a way no one
else could. This is probably the biggest single advantage for me because I can
be dangerously stubborn on occasion.

------
dazzawazza
If you work alone you can never be sure you don't fall foul of the Dunning-
Kruger effect <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dunning-Kruger_effect> :-) (This
was on reddit today which is how I know about it!)

Seriously though. I basically code alone for 8 hours a day but I bounce my
ideas of off anyone that will listen and I freely give up half my coding time
to do this when the opportunity is there. There is nothing like a second
opinion.

