Unix

Linux is headache. It gives you too many choices.

— Me@2011.07.14

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But Linux is necessary.

— Me@2020-01-23 08:53:29 PM

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Applicants must also have extensive knowledge of Unix, although they should have sufficiently good programming taste to not consider this an achievement.

— MIT job advertisement

— Hal Abelson

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2020.02.15 Saturday (c) All rights reserved by ACHK

Creative constraints

Imagine you were asked to invent something new. It could be whatever you want, made from anything you choose, in any shape or size. That kind of creative freedom sounds so liberating, doesn’t it? Or … does it?

If you’re like most people you’d probably be paralyzed by this task. Why?

Brandon Rodriguez explains how creative constraints actually help drive discovery and innovation.

With each invention, the engineers demonstrated an essential habit of scientific thinking – that solutions must recognize the limitations of current technology in order to advance it.

Understanding constraints guides scientific progress, and what’s true in science is also true in many other fields.

Constraints aren’t the boundaries of creativity, but the foundation of it.

— The power of creative constraints

— Lesson by Brandon Rodriguez

— animation by CUB Animation

— TED-Ed

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We cannot change anything until we accept it. Condemnation does not liberate, it oppresses.

— Carl Jung

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2018.02.17 Saturday (c) All rights reserved by ACHK

E1.2

Do not be too timid and squeamish about your actions. All life is an experiment. The more experiments you make the better.

— Emerson

One experience [almost] always helps another, because the first experience betters you, to deal with the second experience; even if the first experience is unpleasant.

— Me@2011.07.16

— Me@2015.11.19

2015.11.19 Thursday (c) All rights reserved by ACHK

Action | Uncertainty

Action can decrease your uncertainty. That’s why the policy of “go as far as you can see, and when you get there, you’ll see farther” works, as long as the overall direction is correct.

— Me@2011.07.25

Go as far as you can see, and when you get there, you’ll see farther. — Thomas Carlyle — Me@2003

見步行步, 行步見步 — 卓韻芝

2014.11.15 Saturday (c) All rights reserved by ACHK

The Nice Guy Paradox, 2

Being a nice guy can be a problem, because “always being nice” gives no feedback and no directions. In effect, “always being nice” gives people an infinite number of choices. Remember,

choices ~ headaches

In other words, you should be nice as often as possible, but not always. Be angry when you have to.

— Me@2011.06.26

— Me@2014.06.22

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2014.06.22 Sunday (c) All rights reserved by ACHK

Deadline 5

投之無所往,死且不北。死焉不得,士人盡力。兵士甚陷則不懼,無所往則固,深入則拘,不得已則鬥。

— 孫子兵法

Throw your soldiers into positions whence there is no escape, and they will prefer death to flight. If they will face death, there is nothing they may not achieve. Officers and men alike will put forth their uttermost strength.

Soldiers when in desperate straits lose the sense of fear. If there is no place of refuge, they will stand firm. If they are in hostile country, they will show a stubborn front. If there is no help for it, they will fight hard.

— The Art of War (Sun)/Section XI

When there is no choice, there is no uncertainty.

You do not have to use any brainpower to make any decisions.

So you take the actions directly.

— Me@2011.04.26

choice ~ uncertainty

fear ~ the feeling of uncertainty

no choice ~ no fear

別無選擇 ~ 沒有不安

— Me@2013.09.08

2013.09.09 Monday (c) All rights reserved by ACHK