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I put my whole life into a single database

krausefx.com

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Re: I put my whole life into a single database

#151
post #150

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Quoted post unavailable.

Hey, can you please stop posting unsubstantive comments? You've done it repeatedly and we eventually ban such accounts—it's not what this site is for, and it destroys what it is for. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

Okai sorry

Re: I put my whole life into a single database

#152
post #109

This is super cool. In case you don't make it through to the project's webpage howisfelix.today, and read through to the end, here is the creator's conclusion: Overall, having spent a significant amount of time building this project, scaling it up to the size it’s at now, as well as analysing the data, the main conclusion is that it is not worth building your own solution, and investing this much time. When I first s…

I don't feel you will be able to detect big correlation by using that kind of system. If there is a big correlation to be found, it is likely to have already been found by researchers. I'm tracking my life by a similar system than OP, but the error with tracking is to start tracking useless things. For example OP track his calorie intake, it is a lot of work, and it is not really usefull at the end. It is unlikely to…

>> For example OP track his calorie intake, it is a lot of work, and it is not really usefull at the end. It is unlikely to correlate with any other measures he is doing (apart from weight).

Tracking calories is very very simple if you use an app like MyFitnessPal. For most foods you can scan the barcode or you can just enter the calorie data from the label.

Secondly, isn't weight a pretty important measure to track? It can impact a lot of things and therefore if you see you start to have too many days in a week that are above your calorie goal you can catch any gain before noticing it on the scales.

Re: I put my whole life into a single database

#153

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> A little = 140€ / month. Wow. What do people do, redecorate every year? Buy one new couch and there goes your budget for the year.

I recently did, thanks to a sale it came down to only 800€, the last one lasted almost 7 years, that translates to 10€/month.

So throw in a couple of beds, another couch, wardrobes, carpet, storage, fridge, oven, microwave, etc etc, and you've got your €140/month.

Re: I put my whole life into a single database

#154
post #95
post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For me "quantified self" has been half meditative. I have tracked daily water intake (and only water to keep it simple) and that has been a huge noticeable quality of life improvement. Waterminder on apple watch is the best. This year I added in daily mood tracking, and it's mostly focused on taking 5 minutes a day for myself to just jot notes down quickly. I'm using dailo and I have a few categories too (work good/o…

What was the quality of life improvement in tracking water intake? I find it interesting, because your body tracks it whether you want to or not, and I never found forcing myself to drink more water beneficial.

I think for me it helped me to see how often when I was thirsty I might actually eat a snack.

From there, it's also valuable because it's clear that in the past I might have a dehydration headache, eat something, and still have a headache because I was thirsty. By just incorporating a routine and simple 1 click tracking, that consistency has helped me to easily manage this. But as you said, for you it works "naturally". For me, I was pretty out of tune with that.

Re: I put my whole life into a single database

#155

This is super cool, but it is all manual data entry. I've tried manual data entry for tracking my personal metrics and the gaps make the data relatively useless. Consistency is key. Automation is key for 99% of the data with only a small amount requiring manual entry.

Author here. Yes, I agree. For this project, only 5% of the 383,000 data points were collected manually, the rest came from various data sources like RescueTime, Apple Health, Withings smart watch and such

Have you developed standardized automation and ETL integration patterns for pulling this data? What's your process for adding new automated data sources?

Re: I put my whole life into a single database

#156

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s surprisingly easy for some to get disconnected from the signs of dehydration. For example: when focused on a project I can go a couple days before realizing that I did not drink any water at all.

Are you not drinking anything to supplement your loss of water? You don't feel thirsty?

Not usually, and no don’t feel thirsty.

The signs I easily ignore are a little bit of brain fog, some reduction in physical energy, and dry skin. The dry skin is meh, and the other two are solved* with food that provides energy.

* = It does not actually resolve it, but it does “enough” and has a long enough lead time that it’s easy to have an instinct of “Oh I’m feeling run down, time to grab a snack” followed by “that didn’t quite get where I expected, I’ll give it time to digest” before forgetting about the whole thing as the project reabsorbs my attention.

Re: I put my whole life into a single database

#157

This is super cool. In case you don't make it through to the project's webpage howisfelix.today, and read through to the end, here is the creator's conclusion: Overall, having spent a significant amount of time building this project, scaling it up to the size it’s at now, as well as analysing the data, the main conclusion is that it is not worth building your own solution, and investing this much time. When I first s…

Men will literally devote hundreds of hours to building a bespoke database tracking every moment of their lives instead of going to therapy.

Instead of living, I would say.

Re: I put my whole life into a single database

#159
post #89
post #45

This project is super cool. I would recommend the author starts tracking the amount of CO2 he emits in a year, which could easily be approximated with the flight/transportation and food data he has. Carbon emissions per Capita per year in the US: 18 metric tonnes. In Italy: 8 metric tonnes [1]. Author is probably close to 60-80 with all the transatlantic flights. [1] https://www.theguardian.com/environment/datablog/2…

I'm happy to return to the comment section here and see I'm not alone in my frustration over the author seeming to take pride in this crazy amount of air miles. Until that chart I really enjoyed scrolling through the page, seeing all the time and obsession the author put into this.

Going through his blog, it appears the man is a digital nomad (and a minimalist in theory — he only owns two suitcases of stuff — which is important considering he's likely a wealthy person), and lives the life he loves; give him a break.

Btw, he isn't traveling just for the sake of traveling — he has conferences around the world, and he's a European working in USA which means he probably flies back and forth from his home country a lot more than an average American. (Doesn't help that North America is far away from everywhere else).

For what it's worth, he makes an attempt to schedule all his conferences such that he wouldn't have to keep flying to/from North America in between conferences.

Felix Krause, keep doing whatever it is that you do and enjoy your life.

Re: I put my whole life into a single database

#160
post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't feel you will be able to detect big correlation by using that kind of system. If there is a big correlation to be found, it is likely to have already been found by researchers. I'm tracking my life by a similar system than OP, but the error with tracking is to start tracking useless things. For example OP track his calorie intake, it is a lot of work, and it is not really usefull at the end. It is unlikely to…

>> For example OP track his calorie intake, it is a lot of work, and it is not really usefull at the end. It is unlikely to correlate with any other measures he is doing (apart from weight). Tracking calories is very very simple if you use an app like MyFitnessPal. For most foods you can scan the barcode or you can just enter the calorie data from the label. Secondly, isn't weight a pretty important measure to track?…

Author here - Tracking calories has impact on way more things than just the weight. e.g. choosing a low-fat diet vs a low-carb diet makes you feel very differently day to day, and every person might prefer something else. Also, there is a huge difference in energy levels and quality of sleep while I'm cutting vs while I'm gaining weight.
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