It’s always been hard for me to stay focused and motivated when writing any kind of a longer text, e.g. an article, paper or gasp thesis, even if I’m interested in the topic and enjoy the work. The Stack Exchange and Wikia gamification systems with points and badges being awarded work well for me. I tried to reward myself for certain research and writing accomplishments, but realized early on that I’m not good at defining milestones and choosing bounties. Therefore, I hope someone else has done it.
Is gamificated thesis writing a thing? Are there integrated software solutions to support that?
(I don’t use MS Word, but I could easily see how a plugin would detect the first quotation or the 10000th word etc. there. It would be great if it worked with Pandoc/Markdown or LaTeX instead.)
Related questions that are missing the gamification aspect
- How to make thesis-writing feel less tedious? – Writing up existing results, mentioning techniques like divide and conquer or pomodoro time
- Motivation to write the dreaded dissertation – What to do if you’re not interested in or convinced by the subject and degree, external motivation
- Optimizing a thesis writing workflow for Bachelor and Master theses – General advice on structure and workflow