
Ask HN: Do you maintain a log of what you learn? How often do you go over them? - deepan_s
Most of my leanings fades away as time elapses, except for those which I get a chance to correlate&#x2F;apply often at life. How do you manage your leanings ?
======
wenc
(copy-pasted with modifications from my comment on a similar thread posted
earlier)

I used to have an elaborate system, but I converged on a simple solution: I
stash everything in a single Google Docs document.

I made the conscious decision to optimize for ease of use, so that the
friction/effort to write something down is minimized.

At the same time, I also made a decision to not to adopt any organization
system -- anything that increases the friction of use is eschewed. Search was
all I needed. I've been using this system for the past 5 years or so, and it's
been very productive.

To extract ideas from it, I routinely re-read stuff (it's in log format, so
it's very easy to read) and use the Fieldstone approach (Weinberg)[1] to
coalesce similar and interesting thoughts and rewrite into larger thoughts.
I've gotten a lot of actionable ideas this way (that I actually go on to
execute on).

So it's a system optimized for postprocessing rather than pre-processing. (The
Fieldstone approach is a method from writing, rather than knowledge
management.) I find that pre-processing systems are unsustainable over the
long term unless you're exceptionally disciplined (also, it's hard to know how
to structure knowledge until you've processed it -- most interesting ideas are
a garbled mess when first encountered). I try to build systems that don't rely
on sustained human discipline or the necessity of shoehorning into known
organization units.

[1] [https://www.skmurphy.com/blog/2016/05/04/weinberg-on-
writing...](https://www.skmurphy.com/blog/2016/05/04/weinberg-on-writing-
fieldstone-method-useful-for-entrepreneurs/)

~~~
deepan_s
"I try to build systems that don't rely on sustained human discipline or the
necessity of shoehorning into known organization units." +1 I completely agree
on this.

The doc should have grown over time. Do you just append to the doc as you
learn something new or do you organise learnings within the doc. I am asking
this because if there is no structure there wouldn't there be too much of
context switches when you go over them ?

~~~
wenc
Yes I keep appending and rewriting. The doc keeps growing, but smaller
thoughts that form part of a bigger idea get coalesced and rewritten. This is
a constant process.

Rewriting is a process of refining. Most ideas get rewritten and iterated on
several times before anything coalesces. Also, it's common to have duplicate
ideas at different times so coalescing them simultaneously consolidates them.

For instance, when re-reading my doc, when I see multiple ideas related to say
topic A, I put all topic A items together (just copy-and-paste into adjacent
paragraphs -- nothing more), try to see the bigger picture and then try to
rephrase them more succinctly. I constant rewrite and synthesize the disparate
ideas into something more cohesive, kind of like snowballs clumping with some
getting bigger over time. Some ideas do die in the process (you can copy-and-
paste these into another Docs document), while others grow bigger and become
more precise in their expression.

The one idea behind the Fieldstone approach, often not considered in other
methods, is engagement of the emotions. Of 100 ideas, I may only feel
passionate about 5 at any given time because they resonate in my situation.
For instance, some ideas/arguments/metanarratives which were meh to me pre-
COVID now feel urgent, and with my current perspective, I've an emotional
investment in pursuing and expanding them.

You can have 100 ideas but you really on need to work on the few that you
really care about, ie. those whose time has come. Only pursuing ideas that
you're emotional about helps you focus and not be overwhelmed by the myriad
ideas that are in the document.

Inspiration is lumpy, but with a store of constantly refining/evolving
potential ideas in the greenhouse -- which you cultivate over time -- you are
better positioned to take advantage of those on the verge of blooming.

It reminds me of what Richard Feynman said about convincing others that you're
a genius: "always have 6 important problems percolating in your head; when you
come across a new idea, test it against the 6. Once in a while you will hit
jackpot and find a good match between problem and solution. Everybody will
then think you're a genius for seeing the connection so quickly, when in
reality you may have been thinking about the problem for years." (paraphrased)

~~~
klondike_klive
How long is your document currently, out of interest?

~~~
wenc
75 pages, 31k words.

~~~
mahalol
I think your approach sounds interesting.

When you say you write things down in log format, do you use a field as a tag?

Any chance you can paste an example entry?

~~~
wenc
I don't usually tag my entries though I could. Here are two interesting ideas
(by other people) that I came across, which I jotted down in order to process
later. As I come across other related ideas, I cluster and rewrite when I feel
like it, if they pique my interest.

\--

Credit cards are a form of microfinance for the privileged — they’re
essentially 30 day interest free loans.

\--

Tobi Luetke: use systems thinking as a shared language. Drawing diagrams
elucidates an idea and exposes assumptions.

\--

------
Arun2009
I find it terribly distracting to have all the things that I have tried to
learn in my "active" memory. So I cycle between phases where I am engaged with
a subject for a while, and then move on to the next item in my (circular) list
until I cycle back to the original subject again.

This is a serious impediment to developing any useful expertise in any area,
but I have sort of made peace with this tendency. But not all is lost. It has
been my experience that the next time I visit a previously learned topic, it's
significantly easy for me to load everything to my "active" memory, and build-
up from there. Apparently, you never truly forget the things that have once
learned well. See here, for e.g.:
[https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/11/081117110834.h...](https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/11/081117110834.htm)

> Scientists at the Max Planck Institute of Neurobiology have been able to
> show that new cell contacts established during a learning process stay put,
> even when they are no longer required. The reactivation of this temporarily
> inactivated "stock of contacts" enables a faster learning of things
> forgotten.

I am no expert on memory, but from what I have read on the topic, our long-
term memory is virtually unlimited, the main constraint being inability to
recall rather than the memory content being erased. If you have once learned a
topic well but haven't visited in a long time, you may not be able to recall
it very easily, but you will be able to recognize or relearn it better than
someone who doesn't have any exposure to the topic.

~~~
anukriti
"I am no expert on memory, but from what I have read on the topic, our long-
term memory is virtually unlimited, the main constraint being inability to
recall rather than the memory content being erased. If you have once learned a
topic well but haven't visited in a long time, you may not be able to recall
it very easily, but you will be able to recognize or relearn it better than
someone who doesn't have any exposure to the topic. "

I agree with your this part and personally my memory behaves the same way, but
I am not sure if it should be like this, because then for example if I am
having a conversation with someone about a topic I studied long back but did
not recall recently then I am unable to contribute anything to the
conversation although back in my mind I know that I studied or read about this
but because of this poor memory thing I have to remain silent.

------
sova
Keeping a daily journal with relevant work and discoveries is great. You can
use a simple text editor and keep appending the current date to the top of the
file and writing a few a lines. You can do one per-project, or a general one
for your daily life and activities. I reel back through the tape every few
months when I'm curious about the timeline of development/research/discovery.

Whittling it down, I think of it as Data, Insights, and Execution. First you
need lots of data, then you get insights, and finally you can execute when
you're close to maximizing on insights. Writing helps keep track of the first
two, and if you want to teach then execution = communication, or how you
package and present something.

~~~
deepan_s
Does the logs stick to your memory when you go through a bunch of them
together at once every few months ? Will it not be an overload at one go ?

~~~
sova
What do you mean by "learning?" because I mean something specific: the ability
to adapt to solving new problems. It's not something that is so easily reified
and commodified. If "learning" is remembering a password or a combination of
keystrokes, I would argue that that is closer to "rote memorization" and does
not really reflect the character or qualities of "learning" that this method
is more suitable for. You should only look through your long-term notes to
help solidify what you already know. If it's still blurry, then I would argue
the learning phase is not complete. Short-term notes like a notebook and
scratchpad, or a dry-erase board and camera on your phone, are better for
actual acquiring of knowledge.

~~~
deepan_s
You are spot on. Learning to me in this context is exactly what you have
described "the ability to adapt to solving new problems". For e.g. within a
social context a learning can be "when there is a mistake evaluate the intent
rather the result". Another one related to work can be "Approach a product
sale with an intent to solve the customer's pain and not to close the deal".
There are too many of these learnings and many of them are deep. Thats why, I
was wondering will one be able to get to the depth when many such learnings
are reviewed at one go once every few months.

------
Noumenon72
It doesn't make sense to keep going over an ever-growing pile of notes, like a
team of developers who's added so many features they don't have time to do
anything but maintain them. You want to organize your notes so that you can go
over them _just when you need them_ \-- when you're finally seeing that weird
concurrency problem, that's when you skim over those notes you took on
CountDownLatch or dining philosophers or whatever. So organize them and tag
them so when the time comes, you can search for "composite key best practices"
or "composing decorators" or whatever.

Usually you get a fair amount of review just from the stuff you read while
searching for other stuff you know is in there somewhere.

------
runjake
Follow the same question in Ask HN asked a few hours before this one:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23138530](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23138530)

------
Kagerjay
I found a hackernews link like a month ago about making a daily TIL (today I
learned) on github. I liked the idea enough so I made my own version:

[https://github.com/vincentntang/TIL](https://github.com/vincentntang/TIL)

It's where I store my code snippets, and a way to rubber ducky to myself.
Everything I write on there is directly something I had to look up and didn't
know off hand. Something to note is I do add things to my TIL during work
hours and spend 10-15 minute tops writing each `.md` file

I haven't really blogged much lately but this makes it easier to transition
after. I wrote a React useState and useEffect guide this morning from my TIL
notes

[https://www.vincentntang.com/react-use-effect-
explained/](https://www.vincentntang.com/react-use-effect-explained/)

I highly recommend making a daily TIL since I can rich search all my notes for
copy paste code I can use for projects

------
semicolonandson
My current philosophy is that programming is mostly about not making mistakes,
so I'm most interested in cutting my error rate than in learning the latest
tech, whatever that might be.

To that end, I keep a mistake log, into which I insert an entry after doing
something that either caused down-time or that caused my team to lose over an
hour of productive time. It now has over 500 entries in story format, along
with the relevant code. Some example titles (along with their tags in square
brackets):

\- [gotchas] references to relative file paths are brittle when there are
multiple entry points to a program

\- [gotchas] lazy evaluation cannot be cached in most systems

\- [unix] adding `sudo` affects $PATH and can cause commands not to be found

\- [gotchas] never confuse STDOUT with return value

\- [collaboration] never remove a flow in code without consulting all possible
stake-holders

\- [algorithms] when calling a sorting function, always ask yourself if
alphabetical or numerical

I plan on posting a video with more details on my YouTube channel soon.

------
AtomicOrbital
I have a main text file I refer to and make edits in throughout the day ... as
a developer I keep any programming specific nuggets here ... each topic has
its area as in

ubuntu tricks ___________

keeping one file makes it easier to search or browse ... separately I have
other text files for broad categories like nyc, shop, bb ( catch all )

from a terminal ( Ubuntu ) I enter this to search

svl 'some string here'

where svl is an alias to a bash script containing

stringPattern=$1

cat ~/MEGA/notes.txt | grep --color=auto -B 10 -A 15 -i "$stringPattern"

I use mega nz for cloud storage so all this is mirrored on any box I use ...
been using similar my entire career so this file today has over 90,000 lines
of text notes ... I find such a process essential to be productive across a
vast array of problem domains

------
AnimalMuppet
I keep a log of things like "here's the parameters for tar to extract a file"
(yeah, I know, there's man pages, but not all systems have them). I review
that item when I have to extract files from a tar archive. Until then, I don't
care if I forget it - that's what the file is for.

~~~
deepan_s
This approach works well for knowledge pockets where the discovery of
application of knowledge is naive. When you want to extract a tar file and
don't remember the command your brain know you have saved the command
somewhere in a log and you can find it. But think of knowledge areas where you
have to connect a few different learnings together to form an intuition on the
application of knowledge to a problem.

~~~
AnimalMuppet
For stuff like that, I _think_ that I keep the intuition without having to
write it down and review it later. But I could be mistaken. If I don't use the
intuition often enough to keep it available in my mental toolbox, then I don't
use it often enough for forgetting it to be a major loss.

------
kleer001
I try to learn new things with the goal of:

(1) attaining an intuitive sense for them

(2) memorizing as little jargon as possible (only the amount necessary to look
up things later).

(3) making my life richer

(4) making more accurate predictions about the world I encounter

How? It varies. Lots of lectures and listening with no written notes. I had a
professor who spoke so quickly I couldn't take notes as he spoke so I learned
to listen as learning.

Materially I make entries in a Google Doc which morphs often. The headings
change and move around, entries are deleted and modified.

-

Precise dates and proper nouns do not interest me. IMHO that's all dry
memorization, bits that don't connect to other bits, that's stamp collecting
and tantamount to hoarding (which I think is gross, a literal failure of
hygene).

------
sdwolfz
Started documenting the things I learn in a section of my website called
"snippets". It's purpose is to be a registry of copy-paste resources, like a
personal stack overflow, and I'm trying to keep it as small and short as
possible. Also I don't write things there right away. First they go in a
"backlog" in my notes, and once I require the knowledge but forget the details
I transition it into a post on the website. This forces me to still remember
stuff and helps keep only the relevant pieces around. Still very new to this
approach, only time will tell if it's indeed worth the effort.

~~~
deepan_s
The 2 stage approach sounds interesting. Do you cycle out notes from the
second stage (snippets website). Do you follow different review frequencies
for those 2 stages.

~~~
sdwolfz
Barely done this for a month now so the process is still young, but my plan is
to keep around only the relevant snippets and update them in case anything
changes. As to how often I review them, or the backlog, basically whenever I
have time or I feel like doing it (trying not to put more pressure on me
schedule than necessary).

The only things that I do "urgently" would be to add elements to the backlog,
and to fix errors in the published snippets. For everything else, I put a
reminder in my calendar for the weekend, or after work in case I feel
energetic enough.

------
xueyongg
I simply just write them down as a form of blogging content. I personally
think if you are on a personal journey to learn, everything you learn coupled
with your own perspective could potentially be the eureka moment for another.
Keep a journal!

Here's my 'journal' to share my learning as a Software Engineer as well. Hope
you enjoy it!

[https://blog.phuaxueyong.com/post/2020-02-29-articles-in-
sec...](https://blog.phuaxueyong.com/post/2020-02-29-articles-in-second-half-
of-feb)

------
chipuni
I put new facts into Anki (
[https://apps.ankiweb.net/](https://apps.ankiweb.net/) ) and then they get
reviewed daily, with a steady, slow addition of new facts.

It's a very effective way to keep everything in long-term memory. (It's also
very difficult. You're trying to recall items that are just at the edge of
your memory.)

~~~
deepan_s
Interesting. Do you have fixed schedule every day to go through the facts in
Anki or is it more on a ad hoc basis ?

~~~
chipuni
Yes, I use Anki every day.

When I was working from an office, I used the commute time (I take the train)
to practice Anki. Now, it's the evenings.

------
tanin
I don't go over my notes. When I need some piece of info, either I know I
noted this and go look for it or I just search with a few good keywords on my
notes.

Also, I just keep notes in one giant text file. I'd love some sort of fuzzy
search though.

------
apopapo
I write things down in cherrytree nodes.
[https://www.giuspen.com/cherrytree/](https://www.giuspen.com/cherrytree/)

------
gdocter1
With the goal of _not_ having to go outside my normal flow of learning, I use:

\- Readwise.io: to capture and resurface highlights I make on my Kindle \-
Pocket: to capture web reading and highlighting (readwise works here too)

Simple, effective :)

------
itsmeamario
I keep a blog with short entries on how to do / repeat things. Also writing it
down helps me focus and get my head straight about what I'm trying to learn.

------
opticnerve
[https://jrnl.sh](https://jrnl.sh)

------
breakfastquark
What do you mean by learnings? Actual skills or facts like TIL?

~~~
deepan_s
I meant the later

