Feynman: I am burned out and I'll never accomplish anything (1985)

Post by ibic » Sun, Apr 25, 2021, 2:24 PM UTC

Post by marcosdumay » Sun, Apr 25, 2021, 2:29 PM UTC

jackdawed wrote: post #42

bradrn wrote: post #16

> When I was in high school, I'd see water running out of a faucet growing narrower, and wonder if I could figure out what determines that curve. I found it was rather easy to do. Out of curiosity, does anyone know the solution to this problem? I wouldn’t even know how to approach it. (I’m an undergraduate physics major; I know nothing about fluid dynamics, but from Feynmann’s description I suspect that isn’t necessa…

I imagined it has to do with how the water coming out of a faucet is affected by gravity, and gains velocity. If you imagine two cross section slices, one near the faucet, and the other near the sink, the bottom slice is going faster than the top due to gravity. Another insight is that the amount of water (flow rate) passing through these slices remain constant. To keep the flow rate the same, it has to be narrower.…

Post by klondike_klive » Sun, Apr 25, 2021, 2:32 PM UTC

agumonkey wrote: post #68

nicbou wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I learned my trade by playing. I suspect that many other people on HN also did. Now I do something very different, and that also came from playing, as did many of the skills that made it possible. I still write code, but it's entirely for fun. It's a completely different experience from closing tickets in an office. I do many other things that aren't very cost-effective, just because they're fun. They might not pay t…

I wonder how much is made by very simple emotions: - playing - competition - noble obligations (helping someone else) I keep looking at adult life in dismay because what people consider work would barely amount to 20 minutes of soccer when we were kids. We used to run wild for hours, hurt ourselves, attempt everything that could work and we kept asking for more. Can we plug that back into daily adult jobs ?

Post by goguy » Sun, Apr 25, 2021, 2:34 PM UTC

ryandrake wrote: post #110

rhn_mk1 wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is a sweet spot somewhere between the extreme of not using pre-built tools and drowning in them. I've been following a similar path: automation and testing give me certainty and peace of mind when I'm working on bigger teams, so they should also improve my personal projects, right? Well, the difference is that my personal projects are used only by me in limited ways, and I also don't have to worry that someone…

Every third party tool (or library dependency, by the way) is something that will have to be well understood, maintained and fixed when broken. Which is why I try to avoid them for the most part in my personal and work projects. When someone at work says "Hey, lets just use Xyz package I found online! It does just what we want!" you need to ask: Who fixes it when it causes a problem that stops us from shipping? Who d…

Post by goodpoint » Sun, Apr 25, 2021, 2:43 PM UTC

Netcob wrote: post #44

Goal-oriented work, creativity and motivation definitely have a difficult relationship. In programming, I learn the most things simply by experimenting at home on my own. I'm thinking about switching jobs, so I wanted to learn some new frameworks and concepts to help with that, and I decided to make my personal projects a bit more "professional". Use continuous integration, focus more on web stuff, build and automati…