saganist: My brain hurts

Michael Thelen (

saganist) wrote,
@ 2006-12-12 10:55:00

Current mood:	determined
Entry tags:	scrabble, zyzzyva

My brain hurts
For various reasons, my Zyzzyva cardbox backlog achieved an all-time high of over 14,000 questions yesterday. That's a lot. A very lot. So I spent 6 hours reviewing about 3,000 questions and got the backlog down under 11,000. Wooo hooo. Fortunately, many of those questions (the 5s, particularly) are starting to be pushed into higher cardboxes, so the load will begin to lighten a bit. Maybe one of these days I can get back to adding new words into the system. I remember those days of innocence, when I was actually expanding my word knowledge instead of digging my way out from under a crushing heap of 5s.

I'm determined not to hit the Reschedule button, though my finger has been hovering over it for several days. From the "Last Correct" values I've been seeing, and from some questions I specifically remember missing over Thanksgiving weekend, I'd estimate that I'm about two weeks behind. So cardbox 0 questions are being seen every 2 weeks instead of every day. That's bad. I could make it all go away with Reschedule, but then I'd miss out on hitting the high-cardbox questions that are currently ready for review. I really need the Push Back button as an alternative to Reschedule. It'll take some serious work to dig myself out, but I'm going to do it. Thank goodness I've got some vacation time coming up.

(Post a new comment)

redaragorn
2006-12-12 06:23 pm UTC (link)

I've thought a lot about a "push back" button before (specifically, I debated doing it manually with SQLite on a number of occasions). I always decided that as tempting as it was, it would still mess up the desired time intervals and therefore short circuit the whole point of the system. Then again, having so big a backlog that you only see them every two weeks does that, too. I think I've decided the BEST idea would be to not add the words to the system too fast in the first place. That's a terrific idea in hindsight, but it feels so wrong to be removing words from the cardbox system once you've gone down that road some distance. And I also very much know the feeling of wanting to just add all the words at once and just try to eat the whole elephant in one bite. Quite a conundrum. I guess the real best idea is to just KNOW all the words. But how to get there...

(Reply to this)(Thread)

	saganist 2006-12-12 09:27 pm UTC (link)
	Yeah, at the time I was adding them, I didn't think I was adding them too quickly. I was able to keep up, anyway. But then Zyzzyva 1.0.0 development happened... ... and I think I actually did add the 5s too quickly, too. But now that they're all in there, it's nice to know that I've seen them all at least, I don't know, three or four times. (Reply to this)(Parent)

	xpmorgan 2006-12-12 07:05 pm UTC (link)
	head explodes xp (Reply to this)(Thread)

	redaragorn 2006-12-12 08:31 pm UTC (link)
	YOUR HEAD A SPLODE (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

	magratheazaphod 2006-12-13 08:44 am UTC (link)
	YES (Reply to this)(Parent)

	vavaverity 2006-12-12 09:09 pm UTC (link)
	Wow, that IS a lot. I cleared out my super memo databases today. They were all reloaded back to 1,000. I started to go through the top 1000 sevens again, one by one and only am choosing to commit those I missed. I had way too many things set to quiz to keep up with and that really defeats the purpose. (Reply to this)(Thread)

	redaragorn 2006-12-12 09:41 pm UTC (link)
	So, pardon my ignorance, but does Super Memo keep track of past records (right/wrong records) even on words you're not actively drilling yourself on? That's one big plus to the Zyzzyva cardbox in my book; it even tracks your performance on quizzes that aren't "cardbox" quizzes per se, not that I ever quiz myself like that anymore. (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

vavaverity
2006-12-12 09:47 pm UTC (link)

crosstables can explain better how it works, he's the guru. It doesn't save things in a file if that's what you mean.

I am pretty sure it functions just like Zyzzyva, but without that added functionality. If you're at the PC, Zyzzyva is definitely the way to go. I really have to take the time to understand how it works properly. I have not tried the cardbox yet, or the export feature that I begged for, or even figured out how to sort by probability even though Mike patiently explained to me.

(Reply to this)(Parent)

(Anonymous)
2006-12-12 11:42 pm UTC (link)

I don't know if it tracks the number of times you got a question right (and it probably doesn't need to if it's putting it on a certain cardbox anyway), but it does track the number of times you got a question wrong (regardless of whether it's in your active list).

It has a 'leech alert' feature that alerts you if a question coming up is a question that you most often get wrong. You can actually quiz yourself on those questions like those that you got wrong 4 or more times.

I have the PC version, so I don't know if that feature is included in the Palm version.

(Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

	deillort 2006-12-12 11:57 pm UTC (link)
	oops, that was me. More on leeches: http://supermemo.com/help/leech.htm (Reply to this)(Parent)

	tempgirl 2006-12-12 10:55 pm UTC (link)
	(btw, I added you as a friend.....just FYI... -Ulu from Jungle.) (Reply to this)

	magratheazaphod 2006-12-13 08:45 am UTC (link)
	I officially blame you if I fail my exams. Also, I definitely just wrote "fale" instead of fail. Argh (Reply to this)

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