My favorite tech poem is Radia Perlman's "Algorhyme". She's the inventor of the spanning tree protocol.
Algorhyme
I think that I shall never see
a graph more lovely than a tree.
A tree whose crucial property
is loop-free connectivity.
A tree that must be sure to span
so packet can reach every LAN.
First, the root must be selected.
By ID, it is elected.
Least-cost paths from root are traced.
In the tree, these paths are placed.
A mesh is made by folks like me,
then bridges find a spanning tree.
Radia Perlman
I'd actually say I found that knowing I could understand this in condensed poetic form makes it a nice affirmation that I do actually understand some of this stuff, but I also learned a lot.
> “I have all this experience but I suffer from a thing that almost every person who doesn’t have an actual background in CS does: I have islands of knowledge with big gaps in between,” she said. “Every time I'd come across some concept, some data structure in the kernel, I'd have to go educate myself on it.”
I get the impression that Morgan Phillips avoids saying she has a background in CS due to not holding a degree in it. I think she has every right to state that she does have a background (being classified as a hacker goes without saying).
> I get the impression that Morgan Phillips avoids saying she has a background in CS due to not holding a degree in it. I think she has every right to state that she does have a background
That seems a bit semantic to me. She's basically saying "I never studied or worked extensively with X, so I have knowledge gaps about Y [which is tightly related to X, and often comes by studying X]".
As another researcher who is also sans-degree, I can see where she's coming from. To someone outside the field I would never split hairs about whether or not I have a formal CS background, whereas I might when speaking with a colleague or a professional peer.
Really? Go take a look at the two code snippets in "The Reentrant Kernel." I can't tell what the salient difference is supposed to be between them, much less how they are meant to illustrate the concept of reentrancy.
I mean, I appreciate the concept of what she's doing here, but that self-assessment sounds reasonable to me.
It's nice. I have more trouble groking the poem form so I would not use this, but certainly I understand those areas of tech where I wrote and researched say an article, far more than areas of flew over and just got working.
Each to their own learning I guess - but very nice
Reminds me of a discussion on HN a few years ago about painting some very famous algorithms on a canvas and expose them in exhibitions. There's a inherent form of beauty in some of them that may be visible even to the non-initiated.
Looking at a couple of them, I have no clue how it makes things any simpler. Removing line breaks and re-forming the text into correct sentences would make things easier to understand, imho.
It sounded from the article as though it had more to do with retention than simplification. Poetic expression optional, summarizing what you've read in your own words is a broadly-accepted method of internalizing the information.
It helps her to understand and remember it. You wouldn't use poetry for your own learning. I wouldn't either, but I don't expect others to only use what works for me. Some people would take notes, others might make visual diagrams, on paper or just in their head. Some people make narrative stories to help them learn and remember new concepts.
I'm sure it would make it simpler to her and probably keeps her motivated and encourages her to get a better understanding. It seems more of a way for her to personally understand the kernel, and she is just sharing the poems with everyone else for whoever wants to read.
[+] [-] leakybucket|11 years ago|reply
[+] [-] niels_olson|11 years ago|reply
I'd actually say I found that knowing I could understand this in condensed poetic form makes it a nice affirmation that I do actually understand some of this stuff, but I also learned a lot.
I hope this continues!
[+] [-] mrrrgn|11 years ago|reply
[+] [-] NAFV_P|11 years ago|reply
I get the impression that Morgan Phillips avoids saying she has a background in CS due to not holding a degree in it. I think she has every right to state that she does have a background (being classified as a hacker goes without saying).
Now, I am going to compile her poetry.
[+] [-] PhasmaFelis|11 years ago|reply
I've got a CS degree and 10 years of industry experience, and I'm still at clueless as she is and probably more.
[+] [-] doktrin|11 years ago|reply
That seems a bit semantic to me. She's basically saying "I never studied or worked extensively with X, so I have knowledge gaps about Y [which is tightly related to X, and often comes by studying X]".
As another researcher who is also sans-degree, I can see where she's coming from. To someone outside the field I would never split hairs about whether or not I have a formal CS background, whereas I might when speaking with a colleague or a professional peer.
[+] [-] probablybanned|11 years ago|reply
I mean, I appreciate the concept of what she's doing here, but that self-assessment sounds reasonable to me.
[+] [-] lifeisstillgood|11 years ago|reply
Each to their own learning I guess - but very nice
[+] [-] bsaul|11 years ago|reply
[+] [-] sytelus|11 years ago|reply
[+] [-] NAFV_P|11 years ago|reply
https://github.com/mrrrgn
[+] [-] pervycreeper|11 years ago|reply
Looking at a couple of them, I have no clue how it makes things any simpler. Removing line breaks and re-forming the text into correct sentences would make things easier to understand, imho.
[+] [-] JasonFruit|11 years ago|reply
[+] [-] garmega|11 years ago|reply
[+] [-] tcheard|11 years ago|reply
I'm sure it would make it simpler to her and probably keeps her motivated and encourages her to get a better understanding. It seems more of a way for her to personally understand the kernel, and she is just sharing the poems with everyone else for whoever wants to read.