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Anki as Learning Superpower: Computer Science Edition

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Re: Anki as Learning Superpower: Computer Science Edition

#121

Post by BeetleB »

amelius wrote: post #21
bhrgunatha wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I use anki to document and remember all my emacs custom key-bindings. That might sound silly but it's easy to accumulate useful things over the years in emacs and forget about them. Emacs is vast and deep and there's a lot to learn and remember. It also serves the same purpose for key-bindings and functions in various modes and packages.

Wouldn't it be easier if you could just pop up a help screen with a good search option whenever you needed to know a certain key combination?

Ha! I used flashcards to memorize a fair number of Emacs shortcuts.

It's not always that easy to find - even with C-h a or C-h m, etc.

But the bigger benefit is even knowing that feature X exists and there is a key combination for it. I found flash cards useful because I would get an occasional "reminder" that X exists and I should use it more often!

A trivial example: flush-lines and keep-lines. I never knew these existed till I read them somewhere. I put it in my flashcards, and over time I would remember its existence and use it more and more.

Re: Anki as Learning Superpower: Computer Science Edition

#122

Post by cs8o2rjohkpw »

wenc wrote: post #72

Just wondering if anyone has tried combining Anki with handwriting for improved retention? (any personal experiments?) In language learning, memorizing words in a shallow way tends to not be as helpful as memorizing them in a sentence (shallow vs deep encoding). One can try to ankify sentences, but it's too easy to click on the green button and fool oneself that one has mastered the sentence. Anki works great for sni…

Yes. I made an single page app exactly for that.

WIP: Achenes: A small typing-only flashcard app

https://gitlab.com/beryl/achenes/info

Re: Anki as Learning Superpower: Computer Science Edition

#123

Post by leppr »

Smaug123 wrote: post #106
stjohnswarts wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I remember seeing people using flash cards in various science and math classes. The only thing that helped me to remember algos and derivations was to use them on some practical problem. I am as much as kinesthetic as visual learner, I think mainly because it keeps my brain from going into zombie repetition land. Don't even try to teach me something by just babbling about it in front of a class room. I need to experi…

This is true for most people; almost nobody is going to get a good understanding of something just by reading about it. But if you have already understood something, then Anki can help you solidify that understanding into the long term.

Actually for language learning at least, understanding doesn't need to come before rote memorization.

While "stupidly" learning a one-two word definition might not allow you to understand how a word is actually used, it will allow you to get its meaning should you encounter it in native material, delaying understanding to that moment.

Re: Anki as Learning Superpower: Computer Science Edition

#124

Post by ablekh »

I have just installed Anki on my Windows 10 computer and was disappointed to find that it has no ability to scale the application's UI or, better yet, configure font size (and, maybe even font family) on a per-component basis. If any Anki developers are reading this thread, please consider this comment as a relevant feature request.

Re: Anki as Learning Superpower: Computer Science Edition

#126

Post by [deleted] »

allenu wrote: post #111
Jabbles wrote: post #33

I have used Anki productively, I think it's a great tool, and should be a component of learning in many fields. But I can't help but think it could be a lot better, a lot more efficient, perhaps even 2x more. Anki allows you to customise many aspects of when cards are shown. But presumably those settings can be tuned for a individual, a subject, or even a card. One person probably doesn't have enough data to know wha…

I agree that there could be so much more to how cards are reviewed. For instance, what if some cards were made dependent on other cards? You could have some cards that have basic vocabulary and then another set of cards that use that vocabulary in sentences. There's no point in learning the sentences if you haven't sufficiently mastered the vocabulary, so what if the app showed you the sentence cards only if it has d…

[deleted]

Re: Anki as Learning Superpower: Computer Science Edition

#127

Post by adkadskhj »

patresh wrote: post #85
Jabbles wrote: post #33

I have used Anki productively, I think it's a great tool, and should be a component of learning in many fields. But I can't help but think it could be a lot better, a lot more efficient, perhaps even 2x more. Anki allows you to customise many aspects of when cards are shown. But presumably those settings can be tuned for a individual, a subject, or even a card. One person probably doesn't have enough data to know wha…

I agree with your comment. As a sidenote concerning your last point, Gabriel Wyner's book "Fluent Forever: How to Learn Any Language Fast and Never Forget It" explains in detail how to build an SRS system to learn a language and it strongly advises against using translation tasks in your SRS. Instead of thinking in the target language, your mind will create strong associations with the words in your original language…

These types of HN posts are so valuable to me.

I'm writing my own knowledge base / SRS system and i'd like to start from a mostly fresh dog-food-esque approach. I want to try and record information in such a way that it has the meat of that byte of memory, but pair it with something that could be used to trigger that memory-byte - like your image example.

In the end i'm sure it won't be a revolution, but nevertheless i'm hoping to find ways to bridge knowledge store & retention (ala SRS/etc).

I'm also quite interested in areas of learning. Eg i expect/desire to store far more information than i can retain. So i want a system that can help me move areas of knowledge based on my ability (or time availability) to retain.

Re: Anki as Learning Superpower: Computer Science Edition

#129

Post by rasen58 »

coldtea wrote: post #104
crumbshot wrote: post #74

I tried using Anki but found it far too boring to sustain my interest. Staring at fact flashcards for hours on end just felt like a waste of time. In my experience it was much more useful and engaging to learn by doing things (creating, writing, experimenting) that the facts were related to - then the most necessary facts would become deeply embedded in my memory, with others at just the right level of vagueness nece…

> Staring at fact flashcards for hours on end just felt like a waste of time. Why would you need to "stare at fact flashcards for hours on end"? The whole idea is the opposite, to minimize learning time, and only stare at a flashcard periodically at the time when it makes more sense.

This happens quite a lot when using Anki where you have to start doing it for hours. If you stop doing for weeks, and then try to come back, there are so many cards piled up that it would take so long to go through that you just don't feel like doing it anymore.

How would you solve this?

Re: Anki as Learning Superpower: Computer Science Edition

#130

Post by cehrlich »

rasen58 wrote: post #129
coldtea wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Staring at fact flashcards for hours on end just felt like a waste of time. Why would you need to "stare at fact flashcards for hours on end"? The whole idea is the opposite, to minimize learning time, and only stare at a flashcard periodically at the time when it makes more sense.

This happens quite a lot when using Anki where you have to start doing it for hours. If you stop doing for weeks, and then try to come back, there are so many cards piled up that it would take so long to go through that you just don't feel like doing it anymore. How would you solve this?

I've been using Anki to learn Japanese for about a year now, quite successfully.

The largest factor determining your daily reviews is your daily new cards - it depends on retention somewhat, but in general daily reviews after a few months stabilize at around 10x daily new cards.

So the best way to use Anki is to limit your daily new cards to an amount where you can easily handle the reviews. And yeah, you basically can't take a day off ever.

Anki is very powerful, but you also need to structure your learning/routine around it somewhat, or maybe another way to look at it is that you need to make Anki work for you. I currently spend about 15-20 minutes a day on Anki, earlier on in my language learning it was over an hour a day.

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