How I Work: Front End Developer Gina Binetti, of VHX

Gina Binetti recently helped launch the new iOS app for online video distribution platform VHX, and if not for a required course in college, she might not have turned to programming.

“I’d been required to take a Visual Basic class, and I distinctly remember the absolute delight in writing simple conditional statements and immediately becoming the teacher’s pet in a sea of mostly math-intolerant design students forced to fulfill a curriculum,” she said.

In her pre-VHX life, she made this flash game for the Pepperidge Farms Goldfish brand, among other creations.

In our ‘How I Work’ series, we hear smart methods from smart people in Brooklyn, and Binetti is just that.

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What’s the first thing you do every day before doing any tech-related work?

Recently, a friend asked me to join her for a daily 7:15 a.m. yoga class and the other person in the conversation could not contain her laughter.

So while I tend to struggle with prematurely parting with my dreams, I’ve found that using a light therapy box (or Seasonal Affective Disorder lamp, because everything should be labeled by the DSM) is tremendously helpful for making me awaken earlier and be alert faster. My routine now is to pry myself from the covers, make coffee or tea and read a book under the light for 20 minutes. I find this much more peaceful than going straight to the web for stimulation.

How often do you check your email, and do you use any program to get to ‘Inbox Zero’?

First activity at work is usually some quality time with the inbox and then another long session with personal mail at the end of the day. I turn off push notifications and alerts so I’m not as distracted by email, but of course the compulsion is breathing down my neck all day. I’m currently using and liking Google Inbox. I love both organization and swiping, so it’s definitely helping me silence the unnecessary noise and get to the good stuff.

How do you keep track of your revenues and expenses?

I have daily alerts sent from my bank that note transactions and weekly alerts from Mint.com reminding me of my net worth and that I’ve spent unusual amounts on traveling again.

When you need to take a break, what are you turning to?

Our office embodies a boyish youth-from-the-80s spirit, so the main break activity for a while was playing TowerFall on our MAME cabinet. I’m not terribly confident with fighting games though, so my break is going to consist of one or more of the following: Instagram, Facebook, Brain Pickings, taking a quiz to figure out which aging punk singer’s rusty heroin spoon I am. If I’m at home, my break will likely be noodling on an acoustic guitar.

What’s your gear?

I’m pretty minimal. MacBook Air at home and work. I still love my old matte Cinema Display. I’ve been living and breathing Xcode for the last 10 months or so as far as app-making tools go.

I really dig PaintCode for Objective-C vector assets and TexturePacker for condensing my custom Flash animations into a sprite sheet for UIKit.

What’s one time saving tip you have?

I’m not exactly known for having a respect or understanding of time, but I’d say “always make a prototype!” Also, draw pictures. I’m a very visual person and need to draw lines and boxes before I begin a project or address a problem. If you can dedicate real time to plotting out your code strategy, you will likely save a lot of time later in the development process.

For anyone who wants to cut down on hair time, try dry shampoo powder.

What’s one way in which you believe your day-to-day work is better now than it has been? Is there something you do now (or don’t do) that you didn’t do before (or did) that has made a big difference?

In a tech startup, people seem to rely more on digital communication and that can lead to misunderstandings and inefficiencies. You don’t want to be disruptive in a small office of busy nerds, but I find it can be more effective to resist the urge to IM or email and just speak to a human being for clarity and harmony.