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I No Longer Tell My Friends about Anki/SuperMemo

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Re: I No Longer Tell My Friends about Anki/SuperMemo

#81

Post by AstralStorm »

istjohn wrote: post #50
xupybd wrote: post #2

Outside of learning a language are there many times that wrote memorization is useful? I can't think how I would use this in a software development sense. Coding katas come close to this and a useful but I'm not sure flash cards would do the same. Maybe it would be handy to memorize a libraries API but then if I use something enough that memorization would be useful I'll learn it by way of using it.

I think we've all found ourselves looking up a command line option for that one bash utility for the upteenth time. Throw it in a flash card and never look it up again. The same with text editor shortcuts, API's, etc. My shop teacher would tell us to write down when we needed to borrow a tool. If we had to borrow a tool twice, it was time to go and buy it. I think the same rule is useful for spaced repetition. Even i…

And you have used hours of training on a thing used once every blue moon.

Congratulations, I guess?

Generally something is worth optimizing it this much when you're going to use it more than 10 times. Insert obligatory xkcd chart here: https://xkcd.com/1205/

There are things that are this useful, but they're generally in category of mathematics, potentially physics, chemistry or linguistics.

Learning parameters of a shell command, especially all of them, is a waste. Learn useful things first.

This is the main problem SuperMemo and Anki sets face, the ordering is by difficulty only and not by product of difficulty times usefulness.

Re: I No Longer Tell My Friends about Anki/SuperMemo

#82

Post by Balgair »

jacquesm wrote: post #3
xupybd wrote: post #2

Outside of learning a language are there many times that wrote memorization is useful? I can't think how I would use this in a software development sense. Coding katas come close to this and a useful but I'm not sure flash cards would do the same. Maybe it would be handy to memorize a libraries API but then if I use something enough that memorization would be useful I'll learn it by way of using it.

Traffic signs musical notation geography history chemistry metallurgy physics healthcare ... This is one of those 'what have the Romans done for us' comments. Intelligence + facts = smarts. Facts are to thinking like fuel is to an engine, without facts your thinking will be either useless or wrong. So regardless of how smart you are some degree of access to facts is a requirement and if you can do this without having…

Not to nit-pick, but physics? What would you use flash-cards for in physics? Memorizing equations? Why would you ever do that?

Re: I No Longer Tell My Friends about Anki/SuperMemo

#83

Post by kazinator »

keiferski wrote: post #63
kazinator wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There isn't anything to type; just buttons to hit.

That's an inefficient way to learn. Especially with foreign languages, where it's beneficial to type out the word or phrase.

Other than keyboarding/IME practice, there is no benefit to typing out a word or phrase compared to recalling the word or phrase and seeing that it matches exactly. If you see the right spelling in your mind and "hear" the word, you obviously know the word and could type it if required.

(For languages with an ideographic writing system, there is a benefit to writing by hand, but that's a whole separate story.)

It sounds as if your flashcards are in a format where the foreign word is the answer, or embedded in the answer via a cloze. That's not the only way Anki is used. If the flashcards are in a foreign-word -> definition format, the typing would have to be definition-side, to which there is little benefit. All the more obviously so for definitions that are in your native language. Definitions are too verbose to type out, and difficult to machine-grade due to variations in wording.

I understand the efficiency benefit that keyboarding can bring, but it's not realized in Anki.

I made a very good application for kanji memorization, where the keyboard is the key to efficiency. The reason is that in this program, all of the characters you are tested on appear on the same screen simultaneously. You type answers into blanks next to each character, and use Tab to move from one to the next. The machine grades your answers when you're done; you don't have to engage in time-wasting self-checking. This is extremely fast because you can operate in pipeline mode: your eyes scan ahead several characters while your fingers type without stopping. Also, if you're having trouble recalling, you can just leave the answer blank and then easily return to it before submitting the test for grading. Often, your mind will come up with the answer in the background, while you are filling other answers.

The main source of inefficiency in Anki is the stop-and-go blocking: being shown one card at a time, and not being able to go to the next card until passing the current card. Anki is best used for the cards for which that is the most efficient approach: cards that have a simple front, and a complex back that requires self-evaluation. For cards that have a one or two word answer that can be machine-checked, I would find (or develop) something much more efficient than Anki.

Re: I No Longer Tell My Friends about Anki/SuperMemo

#84

Post by istjohn »

AstralStorm wrote: post #81
istjohn wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think we've all found ourselves looking up a command line option for that one bash utility for the upteenth time. Throw it in a flash card and never look it up again. The same with text editor shortcuts, API's, etc. My shop teacher would tell us to write down when we needed to borrow a tool. If we had to borrow a tool twice, it was time to go and buy it. I think the same rule is useful for spaced repetition. Even i…

And you have used hours of training on a thing used once every blue moon. Congratulations, I guess? Generally something is worth optimizing it this much when you're going to use it more than 10 times. Insert obligatory xkcd chart here: https://xkcd.com/1205/ There are things that are this useful, but they're generally in category of mathematics, potentially physics, chemistry or linguistics. Learning parameters of a…

Someone calculated they expect to spend a total of around 5 minutes over their entire life studying each new Anki card. That's not such a high bar for inclusion. Spaced repetition is very efficient. Of course, it's still not reasonable to memorize entire man pages.

Re: I No Longer Tell My Friends about Anki/SuperMemo

#85

Post by buzzerbetrayed »

henrikeh wrote: post #28
keiferski wrote: post #16

SRS is the classic technical user situation. Anki looks like it’s from 1995 and has a massive initial learning curve with specialized vocabulary to learn (Cloze, decks, etc.) When it’s advertised, the copy is overly technical and confusing to the average person. Just look at SuperMemo’s home page, for an example: https://www.supermemo.com/en To get widespread SRS adoption, two things need to happen: 1. The primary so…

I’m always curious about the “Anki should be prettier” comment. I use Anki a lot, so I’m not in the best position to judge its first-hand impression. But, what would you say should change? Both in terms of visuals and interaction? Genuinely asking.

Just downloaded it as a result of this post. Seems highly functional, and something I think I'm going to try and use. But to answer your question, here is my one nitpick: On the Mac app, why do some of the "tabs" at the top replace the contents of the current window, while others open up a whole new window. For example, clicking on "Decks" shows a list of desks in the main Anki window. Clicking on "Stats" opens up a second window, and leaves the main window unaffected. What is the purpose of this inconsistency. I personally rarely want a second window in an App, as it is another window I have to manage. But perhaps some people like having 3 Anki windows open at once, and being able to simultaneously see their Decks, Stats, and Browse content at once. But if this is how the workflow is supposed to be, you shouldn't make all the buttons look like tabs at the top.

Re: I No Longer Tell My Friends about Anki/SuperMemo

#86

Post by TheDong »

btrask wrote: post #57
TheDong wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> if you really think SR is the best thing ever, don't argue with people - prove us wrong. Prove you wrong how? By learning things with it? Plenty of people already have used SR to pass tests, aid in learning a language, etc. There are scientific papers that show SR to be an effective learning tool. I really don't get what you're asking for. It's not like SR learning is going to let you "unleash your strength on the…

> Prove you wrong how? By learning things with it? The author of the article is specifically struggling with his evangelism. He says he thinks the world would be a better place if everyone used spaced repetition. I don't know (can't imagine honestly) what sort of utopia he envisions, but he needs to show instead of tell. Just like I need to. It's so insanely hard to lead people. I think the only thing that works is t…

> The author of the article is specifically struggling with his evangelism. He says he thinks the world would be a better place if everyone used spaced repetition. I don't know (can't imagine honestly) what sort of utopia he envisions, but he needs to show instead of tell. Just like I need to.

This standard isn't tenable for some things.

For example, I think the world would be a better place if we gave everyone free healthcare. What's that, the standard for this has to be me literally doing the thing I'm advocating for?

In a similar vein, all the author's really saying is "if people cared about learning, and implemented strategies to learn, we'd live in a better world" (a more informed, thoughtful society perhaps). Whether SR actually accomplishes any of that is questionable, but the idea that people continuing to practice to learn will improve the world does not seem like it merits a "show me and I'll believe you" answer.

Just like it's unreasonable to say "well, implement free healthcare, until then I won't believe that it's worth doing", it's unreasonable to say "convince everyone to use SR, until then I won't use it or be convinced". It's an impossible bar.

It's also impossible to lead by example for aggregate behaviors. If you think that a park would be better if everyone picked up dog poop, and you lead by example by picking up all your dog's poop, that doesn't mean you're wrong if other people still don't pick up their own dog's poop.

Re: I No Longer Tell My Friends about Anki/SuperMemo

#87

Post by brailsafe »

Taking Anki out of it, it's certainly challenging to be circumspect about the things you're enthusiastic about just not mattering either to anyone or just to the specific person you're droning in about it to. Likewise if someone asks, they might just be doing so because they know it's something you're enthusiastic about, and aren't looking for your lit review on the subject.

"Oh you skateboard? I was thinking of getting into that" is now met with a meager acknowledgement and nothing more. "Can you teach me?" is now met with "No", because people just don't really give a damn and they have other stuff going on that they might not realize in the moment. Replace skateboarding with programming or anything else and you have feigned interest, so it's best to turn it around and ask them what they're into.

Bringing Anki back into it for a second, I did not have any success with Anki software or really any software. It just did not help me beyond giving me access to long lists of words. Instead, SR with written flash cards and questions seems like night and day.

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