[codersteve]

Cooking is different as it's something you do in order to eat--a basic necessity of life. So a cook would likely go home to cook a meal for his family but might not be happy about it.

Software development is not a basic necessity of life.

[greggyb]

Okay, so replace it with professional racing drivers who drive off the track; an illustrator drawing something in their free time; a photographer taking pictures of their friends; a manager who helps organize a charity event; a sysadmin who owns their own computer; really, any similar combination of employment and use of job-skills on personal time that would allow you to engage with the actual point of my comment.

My comment was not about cooks; that was just the first example that came to mind. The point is that sometimes people do things in their spare time that make use of the skills that their employer pays them for. Why is it inherently negative for an employee to use their job-skills for non-job purposes?

[codersteve]

>>Why is it inherently negative for an employee to use their job-skills for non-job purposes?

It's not. I guess my point to the original comment is that they might not put in as much passion on the after-hours stuff because they are tired from work; and that doing it because you're kind of obligated to do it (for family, friends) is different from being required to do it in order to keep your career moving forward.

[zck]

This sub-thread is the response to a sentiment I've never seen before -- wbronitsky's argument:

>Personally, I would want my employees to give me 100% of their effort on coding. If they are going home and coding, how much effort are they actually putting in at work?

The discussion is over "what should coding at home mean about a candidate or employee?" While certainly I agree with you that coding at home should not be /required/, I don't agree with the argument presented in the quote that says "coding at home means you're not working hard at work".