[a3n]

> box your time

What exactly does that mean. I'm not saying this isn't a real thing (I really have no idea), but the only time I've heard the phrase used in person was by people who get ahead by posturing.

When someone uses it sincerely, what do they mean? What does it look like, as opposed to not boxing your time? What specifically does it solve?

[RandomOpinion]

>When someone uses it sincerely, what do they mean? What does it look like, as opposed to not boxing your time? What specifically does it solve?

A technical analogy would be depth-first search of a solution space, e.g. in a simple chess AI.

If the search has a cut-off depth = deterministically bounded length of search time = time-boxed

If the search does not a cut-off depth = unbounded (potentially infinite) length of search time = not time-boxed

[tbirrell]

I've always understood it to mean that you put an arbitrary deadline on the issue. ie "If I have not solved this by 12:15, I'll get help/move on". I'm not sure why it's called "boxing time" and I could be totally off base, but it makes sense.