Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Hashcards: A plain-text spaced repetition system

borretti.me

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

121–130 of 198 posts

Re: Hashcards: A plain-text spaced repetition system

#121

Post by BeetleB »

btilly wrote: post #70
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.

This attitude reminds me of another phrase that I've internalized. Choosing to be right, is choosing to be alone. Whatever you choose to put above trying to get along with others, limits who can be part of your group. In the extreme, you will feel absolutely justified. And yet be absolutely alone. As an example, language communities that focus on being able to find the ideal way to program (eg Lisp) tend to splinter.…

> Choosing to be right, is choosing to be alone.

And as another commenter put it:

> You can be right, or you can be happy.

Are both invoking a false dichotomy. I phrase it differently:

"Put the focus on being useful, not on being right."

One often can be both right and useful. More importantly, being useful often means ignoring (minor) wrong things.

I had a coworker who focused on being right to the extreme. When someone would get stuck on a technical problem, he was masterful in being correct without helping the other person. He wouldn't look at the bigger picture, and wouldn't spend time trying to understand the other person's goals beyond the immediate problem he was facing.

Often, the person seeking help was phrasing things poorly (because of a poor understanding), and instead of diagnosing the problem, he'd just focus on what was said and provide a very correct and useless answer.

I was like that (perhaps I still am), just not to as extreme degree. The difference was that I wasn't as annoying in being correct, and people were comfortable in telling me "Yes, but none of what you said is helping me!" at which point I was forced to understand the bigger picture.

So: Before jumping to be right, focus on the real problem, and solve that (i.e. being useful). Forget the little minor incorrectness that was presented to you. Dwelling on correcting it is helping no one.

Re: Hashcards: A plain-text spaced repetition system

#122

Post by tbossanova »

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.

Yeah. Step 1 is basically to say “damn, that sucks … what do you think you might do?” (or other clarifying questions).

Re: Hashcards: A plain-text spaced repetition system

#123

Post by furyofantares »

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?

In what way are you a professional problem solver such that it applies to random problems in peoples' lives?

The thing that drives me nuts is when people start throwing out immediate ideas, sometimes before I've even given a full account of the problem. But even if they do wait, I don't feel like explaining why all your immediate ideas don't work - most of the time, I've also already thought of those things. Try asking questions instead.

Re: Hashcards: A plain-text spaced repetition system

#124

Post by btilly »

spankibalt wrote: post #110
EE84M3i wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How do you grade a card like this?

One could grade how close or accurate one's reaction was to "reacting the right way in similar situations", which was the stated goal: > "Because my goal is to react the right way in similar situations, [...]."

I seek that kind of grade in separate prompts telling me to review for that issue.

Those reviews are generally conversations with my wife.

I'm happy to say that I've been passing with flying colors. (Mixed with some regrets that I didn't start this many years ago...)

Re: Hashcards: A plain-text spaced repetition system

#125

Post by btilly »

BeetleB wrote: post #121
btilly wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This attitude reminds me of another phrase that I've internalized. Choosing to be right, is choosing to be alone. Whatever you choose to put above trying to get along with others, limits who can be part of your group. In the extreme, you will feel absolutely justified. And yet be absolutely alone. As an example, language communities that focus on being able to find the ideal way to program (eg Lisp) tend to splinter.…

> Choosing to be right, is choosing to be alone. And as another commenter put it: > You can be right, or you can be happy. Are both invoking a false dichotomy. I phrase it differently: "Put the focus on being useful, not on being right." One often can be both right and useful. More importantly, being useful often means ignoring (minor) wrong things. I had a coworker who focused on being right to the extreme. When som…

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 right, begs the question of what useful means, and who gets to define it. The answer to that situation isn't currently obvious to me. I've spent most of my life putting one foot in front of the other, chasing fairly clear goals. And now I'm trying to figure out what goals I should even be chasing at the moment.

It may be that your version might appeal to some future version of me. But for present me, my version is far more directly relevant.

Re: Hashcards: A plain-text spaced repetition system

#126

Post by seizethecheese »

btilly wrote: post #108
seizethecheese wrote: post #88

Curious what HN thinks about a spaced repetition social network. You could mark items in the feed to space repeat for yourself. This would also function as a “retweet”, which would align incentives such that content that gets promoted is actually durably useful or interesting. The posts people make would repeat to themselves too, so the source content should be good.

I have no idea when I'll go on a cruise next. But if I do and make friends on the cruise, I'm going to call them afterwards on a spaced repetition schedule. I think that this should turn some of those temporary friendships into lifelong ones instead!

I'm not sure if you meant to reply to this comment. If you did, I'd love to know what you mean :)

Re: Hashcards: A plain-text spaced repetition system

#127

Post by dangus »

MichaelNolan wrote: post #38
analogpixel wrote: post #21

Does anyone outside of people in school or language learners use these type of tools in any interesting ways?

Know personally in real life? No. But there are plenty of examples of people using Anki/SRS tools for interesting things outside of school or 2nd language. I’m firmly in the camp that SRS is widely underrated and underused for working adults. Some examples would be Michael Nielsen, Gwern Branwen, Andy Matuschak and u/SigmaX (reddit - not sure his real name) * http://augmentingcognition.com/ltm.html * https://gwern.ne…

They'll always be "underrated" and underused because they're so damn unenjoyable.

Sure, we all need to study and learn things in life here or there, but the flashcardification of the process makes it boring and painful.

From my own personal experience trying it, I find the process to be too far removed from the practice of accomplishing what you are setting out to learn to do. An analogy might be like memorizing a recipe by using Anki cards and not physically cooking it versus doing cooking it a bunch of times without deliberately trying to memorize the recipe. For me, the latter is far more effective because you have your 6 senses of mnemonics to memorize what you are doing. I may not remember that I need 2 cups of flour, but I remember that I scooped my purple flour scoop twice and that the white contents felt powdery like flour and grainy like sugar. Even if I forgot the recipe my body would have smelled, seen, touched, weighed the material and I have all these physical clues to work with.

Learning by doing, experiencing, immersing is more of a "repetition that you don't even know you're doing" while Anki/SRS has the feeling of a chore and an obligation.

Re: Hashcards: A plain-text spaced repetition system

#128

Post by btilly »

seizethecheese wrote: post #126
btilly wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have no idea when I'll go on a cruise next. But if I do and make friends on the cruise, I'm going to call them afterwards on a spaced repetition schedule. I think that this should turn some of those temporary friendships into lifelong ones instead!

I'm not sure if you meant to reply to this comment. If you did, I'd love to know what you mean :)

Fibonacci works well, and I'm sure that they'll remember me a week later.

So schedule a call for a week after the cruise. Then 2 weeks after that. Then 3 weeks after that. Then 5, 8, 13, 21, and so on.

Each call will bring back for both of us what it was like on that cruise, bring back that connection, and make both of us feel that any other call (say to meet on another cruise) would be welcome.

At least that's the theory. I won't know how well it would work until after I try it.

(My wife and I are doing something similar. Every week we pick a memory that we put into a system we have. The joint review of our memories each Sunday is a high point. So I'm sure from that, that this would bring back that sense of connection.)

Re: Hashcards: A plain-text spaced repetition system

#129

Post by BeetleB »

btilly wrote: post #125
BeetleB wrote: post #121

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Choosing to be right, is choosing to be alone. And as another commenter put it: > You can be right, or you can be happy. Are both invoking a false dichotomy. I phrase it differently: "Put the focus on being useful, not on being right." One often can be both right and useful. More importantly, being useful often means ignoring (minor) wrong things. I had a coworker who focused on being right to the extreme. When som…

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 came to me with. It could be that they just wanted to vent and relate something (in which case it totally is not helpful to point out many of the (e.g. technical) mistakes they made in their narration). Being useful can be something different from all of the above.

My point was that when the focus is on being useful, you are more likely to ask yourself "How do I know my behavior/response is actually helping them?"

One can easily be right and yet not solve anyone's problem.

Re: Hashcards: A plain-text spaced repetition system

#130

Post by nomadygnt »

kuil009 wrote: post #105

Rather than treating SRS as a learning tool for facts, I find it far more valuable as a system for recording and periodically revisiting past judgments, especially to reflect on whether a decision made in context was actually a good one.

This seems really interesting to me as I don’t often work in domains that require me to know a lot of facts, but I still feel like SRS could be useful. I just don’t quite know how to use it. Could you give me an example of what you mean here? What kind of decisions do you find meaningful to periodically reflect on?
Post reply on HN