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

How to stop feeling lost in tech: the wafflehouse method

yacinemahdid.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

71–80 of 113 posts

Re: How to stop feeling lost in tech: the wafflehouse method

#71

Post by xg15 »

I wrote a toy program once, in which an agent should navigate on its own through a 2D platformer environment. Jump over obstacles/holes, climb stairs, etc.

The idea was that the agent would first receive a goal like "go to tile (15, 28)", then use Dijkstra's algorithm to create a "movement plan" - like "move 2 tiles to the right, trigger a jump, move 3 tiles to the left while in the air", etc - and then execute that plan.

My main takeaway was that even in this small toy world, with clearly defined goals, very simple, deterministic "physics", complete information and an "executor" that is 100% reliable and never gets tired or distracted, it didn't work.

The simplified assumptions about the "physics" in the plan-making stage didn't match how the environment actually behaved, and the agent ended up in a different place than planned after a small number of steps.

What worked was to only execute the first few steps of the plan, then throw the rest away and make a new plan from the new location, then repeat, etc etc.

If this stuff didn't even work in a toy world, with a computer, I can't imagine that making detailed steps for a 5 year period in the real world would work, with the planner having even less knowledge about the world to base their plan on.

Re: How to stop feeling lost in tech: the wafflehouse method

#72

Post by magospietato »

jebarker wrote: post #25

This is the opposite of what helped me to stop feeling lost in life. I grew up very goal oriented and executed towards those goals with focus and determination. Around when I turned 40 I realized I wasn't all that happy and I'd spent my entire life so far living for rewards that would come in the future. The problem is that those rewards didn't give sustaining satisfaction. They pass remarkably quickly when you get t…

This tracks with my career - highly goal oriented and highly stressful until I sacked it all off for a less intense, more code-focused role a couple of years ago.

What I will say is that the previous decade of goal-driven learning has given me a broad skill set that makes it a lot easier to follow my instincts to success.

Re: How to stop feeling lost in tech: the wafflehouse method

#73

Post by fulafel »

Animats wrote: post #68

It's really tough right now, because it's not at all clear what to learn. For most of the last century, if your objective for a college education included at least a middle class living standard, there were choices you could make which offered a high probability of that. This is no longer true. About US half of college graduates end up in jobs that don't really require a college education. It's worse in some other co…

There's an important difference between UBI and social welfare: UBI is for everyone including working people so you can work to earn income on top of UBI. Vs traditional welfare income transfers where it might not be worth getting a low income side job since its income would be deducted from your welfare payments. And it's not socially stigmatizing since everyone gets UBI.

Re: How to stop feeling lost in tech: the wafflehouse method

#74

Post by _hao »

I'm pretty sure the author hasn't actually followed his own advice. Also, the writing style was atrocious. I wouldn't trust anything said. Seems like the type of post he wrote for himself (nothing wrong with that), but I don't feel that asking a 20-25 year old to have a 5 year plan which is basically 1/4 of their conscious life is something useful or achievable for most.

Re: How to stop feeling lost in tech: the wafflehouse method

#75

Post by theshrike79 »

xg15 wrote: post #71

I wrote a toy program once, in which an agent should navigate on its own through a 2D platformer environment. Jump over obstacles/holes, climb stairs, etc. The idea was that the agent would first receive a goal like "go to tile (15, 28)", then use Dijkstra's algorithm to create a "movement plan" - like "move 2 tiles to the right, trigger a jump, move 3 tiles to the left while in the air", etc - and then execute that…

Isn't the A* algorithm something that kinda helps with this? Basically you recalculate the route every "step".

Re: How to stop feeling lost in tech: the wafflehouse method

#76

Post by theshrike79 »

shusaku wrote: post #21

I’m a big fan of the “just take a day or two to do nothing but think” part. We should cherish the fact that we are alive, and being without distractions just experiencing life is very valuable. But I don’t get the second part. Do we really need to be so goal oriented in tech specifically? I mean maybe if you wanted to go from being a programmer to a professional wrestler, I could see it. But if you’re just trying to…

Different strokes and all that. Some people are really goal driven and NEED that north star to aim for.

I'm not in that group. I just go with the feels and flow and if something interests me, I go there and investigate if it's fun.

If I had followed my "plan" from a decade+ ago, I'd be a middle manager / scrum master in a small/medium company with an ulcer and SSRIs. Maybe next in line for regional manager.

Had an opportunity to do something different and more varied, took it. Haven't regretted for a second.

Re: How to stop feeling lost in tech: the wafflehouse method

#77

Post by theshrike79 »

treetalker wrote: post #16

I'm not in tech, but in my experience, I've gotten furthest in the directions of my goals, and my best results, by: - keeping in mind the direction I want to advance, but - determining which activities I should repeat every day to move in that direction, - executing those activities consistently (every day) and regularly (according to rules/principles, as I learn/discover them), and - gradually refining that executio…

One more quote:

Neil McCauley (Robert De Niro) in Heat: A guy told me one time, "Don't let yourself get attached to anything you are not willing to walk out on in 30 seconds flat if you feel the heat around the corner."

Even if your heart is set on becoming the greatest at X and have the scrapbooks and timelines to prove it, don't hesitate to go for Y instead if it feels better and excites you more than doggedly sticking to The Plan

Re: How to stop feeling lost in tech: the wafflehouse method

#78

Post by xg15 »

theshrike79 wrote: post #75
xg15 wrote: post #71

I wrote a toy program once, in which an agent should navigate on its own through a 2D platformer environment. Jump over obstacles/holes, climb stairs, etc. The idea was that the agent would first receive a goal like "go to tile (15, 28)", then use Dijkstra's algorithm to create a "movement plan" - like "move 2 tiles to the right, trigger a jump, move 3 tiles to the left while in the air", etc - and then execute that…

Isn't the A* algorithm something that kinda helps with this? Basically you recalculate the route every "step".

I don't think so. A* just let's you add domain knowledge to the process of selecting the next candidate to explore.

But all (classic) pathfinding algorithms "teleport around" in the graph in some way, either switching between different candidate routes or backtracking from a dead-end. That makes it impossible to run the algorithm "live", I.e. have the agent navigate to a location as soon as the algorithm got to it.

Re: How to stop feeling lost in tech: the wafflehouse method

#79

Post by alecco »

jebarker wrote: post #25

This is the opposite of what helped me to stop feeling lost in life. I grew up very goal oriented and executed towards those goals with focus and determination. Around when I turned 40 I realized I wasn't all that happy and I'd spent my entire life so far living for rewards that would come in the future. The problem is that those rewards didn't give sustaining satisfaction. They pass remarkably quickly when you get t…

All this middle age crisis stems from having fewer children and even fewer grandchildren.

How to find meaning as childless person: help your relatives (Gen Z and Alpha are in crisis right now), help your community, donate blood, help disabled people, volunteer as firefighter. But above all, focus on doing it to people who are themselves pro-social.

Avoid sociopaths and alert people being abused. Just telling them something along the lines of "be careful with that one" is often enough to break the spell.

Re: How to stop feeling lost in tech: the wafflehouse method

#80

Post by research_pie »

Terr_ wrote: post #60
thanhhaimai wrote: post #22

For some reason, I see this style of "everything lowercase" more often recently. It distracts me from the content a lot. Was there a reason this style has become more popular?

Sometimes there's some sort of JS/CSS rendering trick that has broken on the page. However in this case words like "I'll" still contain their capital. In this context (not an immediate interactive chat) I find these issues awkward and disrespectful to the reader, the same as if the piece was filled with typos. When the author treats a post as worthless throwaway text which isn't worth fixing even when they have plent…

honestly the worst is when it’s all lowercase AND there are lots of typos.
Post reply on HN