Date: Wed, 07 Jun 2000 12:24:44 -0400 From: Morbus Iff To: Cameron Barrett Subject: Heh... Dreaming of complicated tables. Ahh... I remember years ago when I could create a complicated table without using a WYSIWIG. It happened rather suddenly and I definitely saw it as a "coming of age"... ... Can't wait until the same happens with Perl, SQL, and Coldfusion... Morbus Iff signature on other computer... http://www.disobey.com/ ---- Date: Wed, 07 Jun 2000 21:44:26 +0100 From: Matt Webb To: Cam-List Subject: [camlist] html and sleep Resent-Date: Wed, 7 Jun 2000 16:49:29 -0400 (EDT) > There's something about the way we visualize such abstract things as HTML > tables in our minds that works as a kind of sleep stimulant I know exactly what you mean. I can zone out completely trying to figure out the best data structure or a good algorithm or the right combination of mysql tables. I find it's easy to do when I go to sleep because I can make more lateral leaps, but also I can 'see' more that internal visualisation that I get when programming. Do programmers get this more than other people? I've a friend who's a great physicist and he says he sees colours in the equations. Oh, and it helps me sleep because it's similar to a self-hypnosis technique i used to use when i couldn't sleep. -matt -- Visit my homepage at http://interconnected.org/home (you don't have to.) ---- Date: Wed, 7 Jun 2000 17:52:49 -0400 (EDT) From: Faisal Jawdat To: Cam_List Subject: Re: [camlist] html and sleep Resent-Date: Wed, 7 Jun 2000 17:53:15 -0400 (EDT) >I find it's easy to do when I go to sleep because I can make >more lateral leaps, but also I can 'see' more that internal visualisation >that I get when programming. Do programmers get this more than other people? Did you ever have tetris dreams? >I've a friend who's a great physicist and he says he sees colours in the >equations. I used to do that when I was a big math geek. Numbers had colors, and there were odd combination effects. I don't really remember how it worked any more, it was just sort of instinctive. -faisal ---- Date: Wed, 07 Jun 2000 17:52:58 -0400 From: Adam Fields To: Faisal Jawdat Subject: Re: [camlist] html and sleep Resent-Date: Wed, 7 Jun 2000 17:57:38 -0400 (EDT) Faisal Jawdat says: > > I find it's easy to do when I go to sleep because I can make > > more lateral leaps, but also I can 'see' more that internal visualisation > > that I get when programming. Do programmers get this more than other people? > > Did you ever have tetris dreams? Yup, but this is actually a well-known phenomenon associated with staring at video screens too long. Apparently fighter pilots trained in simulators see the same sorts of effects. I think that's probably different from the ability to visualize the solution to a hairy problem. ---- Date: Wed, 07 Jun 2000 22:59:56 +0100 From: Matt Webb Subject: Re: [camlist] html and sleep Resent-Date: Wed, 7 Jun 2000 18:00:32 -0400 (EDT) Faisal Jawdat wrote (7/6/2000 22:52): > > I find it's easy to do when I go to sleep because I can make > > more lateral leaps, but also I can 'see' more that internal visualisation > > that I get when programming. Do programmers get this more than other people? > > Did you ever have tetris dreams? It's spam nightmares all over again! > > I've a friend who's a great physicist and he says he sees colours in the > > equations. > > I used to do that when I was a big math geek. Numbers > had colors, and there were odd combination effects. I > don't really remember how it worked any more, it was just > sort of instinctive. I've read Feynmann essays where he said much the same thing. Colours seem to be quite popular. For me, programming, it's a kind of 'potential energy' thing. It feels quite high up to be nested in loops. Hmm. Very difficult to describe. Like when good scientists know something is correct when it looks 'beautiful'. There's something going on in the human brain and I really wish I knew what it was. Any neuroscientists on the list? -matt ---- Date: Wed, 7 Jun 2000 15:03:15 -0700 From: rcb Subject: Re: [camlist] html and sleep Resent-Date: Wed, 7 Jun 2000 18:02:11 -0400 (EDT) > Faisal Jawdat says: > > Did you ever have tetris dreams? I've had tetris dreams, and when I'm in the middle of designing a site I find myself dreaming in HTML. the content is about the regular emotional stuff, but somehow the *form* is in HTML. rcb http://www.rebeccablood.net ---- Date: Wed, 7 Jun 2000 18:05:57 -0400 (EDT) From: Faisal Jawdat Subject: Re: [camlist] html and sleep Resent-Date: Wed, 7 Jun 2000 18:06:25 -0400 (EDT) >Yup, but this is actually a well-known phenomenon associated with >staring at video screens too long. Apparently fighter pilots trained >in simulators see the same sorts of effects. I think that's probably >different from the ability to visualize the solution to a hairy >problem. Interesting. I'm not sure I follow (elaboration?). I was involved in some conversation about tetris dreams (which continued for years after I stopped playing tetris) with a group of people once, and someone who had been playing lemmings a lot commented that he had opened the door for his girlfriend and was somewhat surprised when she didn't walk through all the way to the far wall and bounce. Digression aside, I'm not sure that there is much of a difference between the visualization of spatial relationships and mathematical relationships, at least for me. I got in the same state of mind when trying to fit blocks together and take bubbles apart (bubblet), as when trying to solve out a formula, see code side effects, get objects talking to each other, or plot logistics. Or, at the very least, it feels that way - I get in the zone and if I get interrupted it takes me the same amount of time to get back in. A friend of mine who was until recently a Sr. Network Architect at UUNet claims that he designs routing meshes by visualizing building them in his head, and if he is interrupted he can see them falling apart in front of him. -faisal ---- Date: Thu, 8 Jun 2000 10:16:52 +0100 (BST) Subject: Re: [camlist] html and sleep Resent-Date: Thu, 8 Jun 2000 04:14:39 -0400 (EDT) > I've had tetris dreams, and when I'm in the middle of designing a site I > find myself dreaming in HTML. the content is about the regular emotional > stuff, but somehow the *form* is in HTML. I've had tcl/tk dreams and C++ dreams (but not java or sjavascript nightmares thank god). I've also had half-life dreams. (in fact I had a weird non-sleeping Half-Life experience when I was driving down a lane near my house and there was a rope hanging from a tree and my instant reaction was that it was one of those tongue beasts and my impulse was to try to shoot it. Quite bizarre) L. -- http://catless.ncl.ac.uk/Lindsay ---- Date: Thu, 8 Jun 2000 07:05:58 -0600 (MDT) From: Kirk Israel To: CamList Subject: Re: [camlist] html and sleep Resent-Date: Thu, 8 Jun 2000 08:56:10 -0400 (EDT) On Thu, 8 Jun 2000 Lindsay.Marshall@ wrote: > I've had tcl/tk dreams and C++ dreams (but not java or sjavascript > nightmares thank god). I've also had half-life dreams. (in fact I had a > weird non-sleeping Half-Life experience when I was driving down a lane > near my house and there was a rope hanging from a tree and my instant > reaction was that it was one of those tongue beasts and my impulse was > to try to shoot it. Quite bizarre) > Odder than that for me was what happened after playing about 3 days straight of Donkey Kong 64 (with a wallkthrough guide in hand, to get the damn thing done.) Walking down the street (for real, not as a dream) everything looked- different. It's like my sense of visual perspective had been broken, or like I was seeing it in action for the first time, or something. Cars seemed to shrink 'too much' as they zoomed by and receded into the distance, buildings by the sidewalk seemed impossibly tall, stretched somehow. I'm sure it was a result of being immersed in a less than perfect VR world. The effect was fairly druglike, actually, in fact I've taken substances that promised more but delivered less than that. Lasted 2 or 3 days. -- KirkIsrael@alienbill.com http://kisrael.com And so I'm leaving / You can find out how much better things can get And if it helps / I'd say I feel a little worse than I did when we met --Dar Williams, "As Cool As I Am" ---- Date: Thu, 8 Jun 2000 08:40:52 -0400 (EDT) From: Pete To: Cameron Barrett Subject: Camworld Feedback Name: Pete Link: http://zymm.com/raster/ > Lying in bed last night trying to get > to sleep, I came to the realization > that thinking about complex HTML > table structures actually helps. > There's something about the way we > visualize such abstract things as > HTML tables in our minds that works as > a kind of sleep stimulant I dunno, I think sometimes I *can't* sleep because I'm thinking of data structures, and how to code things better. When in doubt, just think of perl, and call the 'sleep' function ;) ---- Date: Thu, 8 Jun 2000 06:44:32 -0700 (PDT) From: Brian Lauer Subject: Re: [camlist] html and sleep Resent-Date: Thu, 8 Jun 2000 09:45:03 -0400 (EDT) Usually I find thinking about alogrithms and design issues right before sleep helps me to "dream" up a solution. But after reading all the messages about dreaming html, code and games I had the worst nightmare about trying to get my perl, html and database to all work together. No matter what I changed the interface always came out wrong. ------------------------------------ Brian M Lauer http://www.fozbaca.org/