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Hashcards: A plain-text spaced repetition system

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Re: Hashcards: A plain-text spaced repetition system

#131

Post by wisty »

magarnicle wrote: post #90
wisty wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> A couple of quick suggestions later, and she went to being mad at me about not having heard the problem through before trying to fix it badly Sounds like you're not the only one at fault lol. Do you get mad at your wife if she offers suggestions before emotionally connecting? And would it still be too late even if she realises how "stupid she was"?

Part of the reason offering suggestions is 'wrong' is because it implies that they haven't tried to think of solutions to their problem. You are unwittingly implying that you are smarter than they are, even if that is not your intention.

If feel like only someone who is kind of dumb or insecure would think that ...

Smart people will even talk to a rubber duck to solve problems, because sometimes there's something obvious you missed.

Re: Hashcards: A plain-text spaced repetition system

#132

Post by wodenokoto »

I’d like to have deck-wide variables/lookup tables and links.

The decks for studying Japanese that I’d like would have RTK/wanikani style elements used for mnemonics and I’d like them shown in the answer along with a full description and cross references.

Right now I’d have to build a templating system to prebuilt my deck and import it and it’s just a lot of work on top of the work of building the content, but mostly it makes it difficult to edit/update cards while studying.

Re: Hashcards: A plain-text spaced repetition system

#133

Post by btilly »

BeetleB wrote: post #129
btilly wrote: post #125

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Interpreted literally, my version is clearly false. But when combined with my explanation of how I think about it, I don't believe it is false. More importantly, to me, it engages me with the exact tradeoff that I have found myself choosing between. I find it helpful to make the choice explicit, rather than implicit and driven by emotion. If your version works for you, then great. But for me, prioritizing useful over…

> If your version works for you, then great. I'm not sure that our versions differ. > But for me, prioritizing useful over right, begs the question of what useful means, and who gets to define it. The other party, generally. What I meant by "being useful" is to begin with finding out what the other person needs. What problem are they actually trying to solve? It could be a technical problem different from what they c…

I find this an interesting conversation, but don't want to continue it in public.

If you want to take it offline, my email is in my profile.

Re: Hashcards: A plain-text spaced repetition system

#135

Post by tvshtr »

CGamesPlay wrote: post #106
tvshtr wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think that many devs missed the fact that Anki went through major rewrite and all of its business logic/its brain/api are now contained in few rust crates. They're a pleasure to work with and it's very easy to write alternative frontends (just finished one). You don't have to import anything because you can just use the same db, and cards as Anki.

Wow, I haven't used Anki since... before they switched to date-based releases, but the new version is a big step improvement from versions I have used previously. When I updated, opening the app for the first time opened the terminal for a text-based installer, which didn't inspire confidence, but it's well improved. (This isn't really related to the backend changes you're mentioning, but this comment inspired me to…

The PyQt GUI is still meh but overall it's much better (and nowadays much much faster). I think it's still unnecessary crufty and unfriendly in places. That being said I wrote both web and TUI front-ends and it can definitely be streamlined and cleaned up. Interestingly, stripped of the GUI, running core (with old db and profile) uses just ~15MB.

Re: Hashcards: A plain-text spaced repetition system

#136

Post by wisty »

seizethecheese wrote: post #87
wisty wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> A couple of quick suggestions later, and she went to being mad at me about not having heard the problem through before trying to fix it badly Sounds like you're not the only one at fault lol. Do you get mad at your wife if she offers suggestions before emotionally connecting? And would it still be too late even if she realises how "stupid she was"?

What’s the point of this? One only can control one’s self. Who cares if the other person was in the wrong too.

What is the point in replying to me then?

Maybe you should take action if you think someone else is in the wrong? You did.

Re: Hashcards: A plain-text spaced repetition system

#137

Post by knowsuchagency »

0cf8612b2e1e wrote: post #44
btilly wrote: post #40

I think that the real power of spaced repetition is not in flashcard applications like this. It is in behavior modification. Let's take a real example to show how this works. August 19, 2025. My wife called me in to help her decide what to do about a dentist that she thought was ripping her off. A couple of quick suggestions later, and she went to being mad at me about not having heard the problem through before tryi…

I love this example because the correct, wise approach is so alien to my mind that I do not know how to respond to such situations. I am a professional problem solver, you described a problem, yet you do not want it solved? Just talk about it being annoying, like an immutable facet of the universe? Should I retort about my grievances with gravity making roof repairs a bear?

It’s just like in programming interviews—sometimes you need to clarify your understanding before diving into potential solutions

Re: Hashcards: A plain-text spaced repetition system

#138

Post by RealityVoid »

tbossanova wrote: post #120
RealityVoid wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I feel you, I totally do. I get wanting to vent and wanting to be heard but solutions should come first. Honestly, when I hear people annoyed about offering solutions I get their need to engage with them differently but I also kind of believe they have a dysfunction about how they relate to the world.

If solutions always come first then you might never get a chance to vent. Maybe venting clears the annoyance from the brain enough to make it easier to understand any solutions that might be offered. Also sometimes I have been offered solutions that seem obvious to me, like did you really think I hadn’t thought of that? Which is especially piquing haha

> Also sometimes I have been offered solutions that seem obvious to me, like did you really think I hadn’t thought of that? Which is especially piquing haha

Yes, but that's still a solution minded thing. I sometimes complain as well, but, as mentioned, as sort of a rubber ducking method. I listen to the proposals again, I go, nah, tried that, It leads to X, that doesn't work because of Y, but, sometimes, even with these obvious solutions, there are tiny aspects I overlooked or bypasses I did not consider, so this is still potentially useful. And, yes, if we both can't find a solutin that is acceptable, then comiseration is in order. But I'd never manifest anger or disapproval about someone wanting to help.

Re: Hashcards: A plain-text spaced repetition system

#139

Post by tpoacher »

btilly wrote: post #36
tpoacher wrote: post #25

I don't mind people comparing such projects against Anki, this is natural since Anki is quite dominant in this space, but I feel like every criticism of Anki on that list was either highly subjective, exaggerated, unfair, or outright wrong and unkind (in a "one does not climb a ladder by throwing others off it" manner). Not saying this is what Fernando intended to do here, but his sharp opinion does come across a bit…

His list is a list of reasons why he was motivated to do something. It does not matter how subjective the list is, since its purpose is not to convince others. It just matters that it connects with him. If you're potentially interested in his project, you should evaluate your interest based on how much you think like him. If his complaints aren't yours, no skin off your back. Just ignore him. If they are, read farthe…

Yes, like I said, I didn't think denigrating Anki was specifically Fernando's purpose here.

However the reason I find it off-putting is because, as someone who generally lives in the terminal, and Anki is one of the few remaining GUI apps I rely on, I actually "would" have preferred a decent terminal alternative with similar features. But introducing the alternative by saying how much Anki sucks immediately puts me off when all that criticism doesn't resonate with me.

It literally works as anti-promotion here: if Hashcards promotes itself as missing all those features of Anki which I think are great, and my time is limited, then I have much less of an incentive to invest the time to check it out. Which is ironic, because in reality it may be great (like most of his other work) and actually suit my use-case really well.

Re: Hashcards: A plain-text spaced repetition system

#140

Post by pityJuke »

tvshtr wrote: post #83
yellow_lead wrote: post #19

I'm happy to see others in the space, but I wish Anki competitors would implement a decent 'import from Anki' feature. Otherwise, I think most existing users of SRS are unlikely to switch (because we use Anki and have thousands of cards there already). The data format of Anki is a bit complicated but at least it's SQLite. I've seen a ton of shared decks and resources on ankiweb, but it's true you can't easily put the…

I think that many devs missed the fact that Anki went through major rewrite and all of its business logic/its brain/api are now contained in few rust crates. They're a pleasure to work with and it's very easy to write alternative frontends (just finished one). You don't have to import anything because you can just use the same db, and cards as Anki.

This feels as if it deserves a write up, did not know that they migrated from Python to a primarily Rust backend. Would love to know the why/what from the team.

(Anecdotally, Anki has seen a huge quality increase in the past couple of years.)

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