8 ms·

Whether to Use Anki or SuperMemo

103 points by hnous927 8y ago

keiferski 8y ago
The fundamental flaw in the author's argument for using SuperMemo is that there is a ton of value in manually creating the decks yourself. When you write out an item in pencil on paper, then copy it to Anki and create a card, you're creating a memory and physical association with the creation of that card. When you just cloze pre-made selections of reading material, you're skipping this entire process. This is the same reason that downloading pre-made decks from Anki's website doesn't really work.
- bedhead 8y ago
  So true. There just aren't any shortcuts when it comes to learning a new language, and while creating cards/decks in Anki is a huge chore at times, it's also super effective in jack-hammering that information into your brain for long-lasting recallability.
- hnous927 8y ago
  I’m OP. Thank you for the feedback! Yes, I think decks have to be personalized. But I don't agree the argument that "writing out in pencil then transferring back to a Spaced Repetition Software" is better than "pre-made selections of reading material". For Incremental Reading, you have to select the important parts; there's no pre-made selection. It's just like highlighting; the material isn't pre-highlighted. I think the most important thing is the thought process: thinking which part is important and which isn't. The medium, whether you are doing it in paper and pencil is no difference than doing it digitally.
  - keiferski 8y ago
    The Medium, whether you are doing it in paper and pencil is no difference than doing it digitally. Science says otherwise: https://www.fastcompany.com/40476984/this-is-how-the-way-you-read-impacts-your-memory-and-productivity https://www.fastcompany.com/40476984/this-is-how-the-way-you...
    - hnous927 8y ago
      >"Studies have shown that taking notes by longhand will help you remember important meeting points better than tapping notes out on your laptop or smartphone." By "doing it" I meant the thought process, the selecting process of what's important, not the medium in which you do your "whole studying". Also that study means that taking notes by hands is better than with a computer. It doesn't mean learning with paper and pencil is better than with a computer, especially when we involve other things like a spaced repetition software.
burtonator 8y ago
I'f you're a spaced repetition enthusiast you might like Polar: https://getpolarized.io/ https://getpolarized.io/
- wahnfrieden 8y ago
  What’s the connection to SRS?
  - goerz 8y ago
    It implements an incremental reading system (which is built in to SM, but not Anki), including the ability to generate Anki flash cards.
deleted 8y ago
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Scarbutt 8y ago
What makes anki not suitable for "incremental reading" ( interleaving between reading and remembering) ?
- YOUTHFULdabber 8y ago
  There is most certainly a way to do 'incremental reading' in Anki, though it must be done manually. You can do virtually any type of reviewing in Anki with its high degree of customization.
- xkfm 8y ago
  You can import entire articles into Supermemo and break them down into flashcards without leaving the program. Anki just gives you flashcards. There's an incremental reading plugin for Anki, but it doesn't work very well. Incremental reading works by breaking down an article into flashcards. Basically, you go: article -> paragraph -> sentences -> flashcards (usually with cloze deletions). But, because the algo manages when you see everything, I don't have to worry about doing all of that in one step. Polar Bookshelf (getpolarized.io) is more of an open source solution for archiving documents at the moment. You can export annotations/extracts from Polar into Anki, but you don't get the spaced repetition with the actual reading of articles like you do with Supermemo. I read a bit of the article, decide if making an extract of that portion is worth it, and then click next repetition when I'm done/bored reading it. I'll then get another article/flashcard/extract (of another article). You also have tools for marking up articles and saving your place. Every day I review around 30-50 flashcards, and 30-50 articles/extracts of articles. With Supermemo, I don't have to decide (or rather, I give up the ability to decide) what I'm going to read next; in favor of having everything scheduled by the algo. I go through about 800-1000 items in my RSS feeds once a day, save them into read it later/polar/bookmarks, and once a week, I throw the ones that still seem interesting into Supermemo. I probably spend 30min to an hour going through everything once a day, and another hour or so on Supermemo. Most of the items in my RSS feeds are admittedly junk around 95-98% or so (HN and HN comments, reddit rss feeds and comments, lobste.rs and comments, some news sites, a few personal blogs, and some forums), but I do get a few gems throughout the week. The newer Supermemo algorithm also tolerates breaks better than Anki (the last time I checked). So, for example, not using Supermemo while on holiday isn't an issue. I also keep aha moments from programming and some documentation in there as well. Edit: Here's a demo of incremental reading in Supermemo. He marks up articles much more than I typically do. There's a lot of features and functionality in the program. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DoQoeK53bP8& https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DoQoeK53bP8&
Stratoscope 8y ago
Note to writers: unless you're writing only for an audience that is already familiar with your terminology, it's helpful to spell out acronyms and initialisms the first time you use them. I skimmed this entire article out of curiosity. It uses the term SRS twenty times but never says what it means. I went back to the top and noticed the "not a prerequisite" link, so I looked at that article too. About six paragraphs in, the fourth mention of SRS finally gave me the key: "Spaced Repetition Software (SRS)". This tiny bit of knowledge gave me the context to understand what the articles were talking about. If you put definitions like this at the top of every article, you will have more informed readers who can better appreciate your insights.
- SlowRobotAhead 8y ago
  Exactly. Not only did I not know the terminology, in this case I didn’t know either product/software/service either. I had to find the “in case you missed my earlier post on” then in that the “my initial review” post then still had to figure out what he was talking about. OH.... it’s learning by repetition, updated flash cards, got it in three words. This was written by an engineer for sure! A short statement and purpose for people who don’t magically have all the information the writer has would have gone a long way.
  - hnous927 8y ago
    I’m OP. Thank you for the feedback! I have added a quick terminology guide at the top of each article. > A short statement and purpose... I will keep this in mind when writing articles in the future.
- hyperpape 8y ago
  It's worse than that, because even for someone who knows about SRS (via Anki), this is circuitous and hard to read. Anyone who's a fan of incremental reading/super memo would do us a favor by writing a new introduction that's more straightforward and credible. The fact that the introductions to incremental reading have this feel of "read these hundred things to grasp the genius of incremental reading" is a huge problem.
deleted 8y ago
[deleted]
chongli 8y ago
I'm really skeptical of these sorts of memorization systems, not because I think they don't work (I think they do), but because I see it as a brain "hack" that goes against the grain. What do I mean by this? I think of our memories as a kind of most-frequently-used (MFU) cache. We remember best when we use the information all the time. So when we use this sort of spaced repetition we're trying to artificially "warm up" the cache in our brains. We're not trusting our brains to remember the things that are most important in our lives. If you're trying to learn a language, you should learn the way children learn their first language: by speaking. Talk to people in that language constantly. If you don't know anyone who speaks the language, what are you learning it for? If you really need to learn the language (for work?) then find somebody who speaks it and arrange to meet them for coffee on a regular basis. If you're trying to memorize something else, such as theorems in math or standard library functions in a programming language, I'd advise against it. Learn the theorems by applying them and trying to prove stuff. Learn the library functions by doing actual programming. In the long run, if your knowledge is situated within a context and connected to other things you know (because you learned by doing) then I believe you'll understand it much better. Memorizing by rote, out of context, will help you to recall facts which often don't have any meaning to you.
- the_clarence 8y ago
  Have you ever learned a language in your 20s? If so, how good are you? How long did it take you? I personally have tried to learn many languages in my 20s. I’ve became good at figuring out what are the shortcuts to kickstart learning. The best one I found is to learn as many words as possible + simple grammar + useful verbs. If you have the time learn hundreds per day with memory tricks. Once you know enough start trying to have conversations. Grammar is not really important in the beginning but you need to learn conjugations (if there are any) at some point early. This is a much better approach vs trying to have convos when you know peanuts. If you’re planning to spend some weeks in a foreign country this is what I would advise to you. You are going to learn very little if you get there without having done that
  - hnous927 8y ago
    How do you propose to "learn as many words as possible"? What is the actual method? With Spaced Repetition Software like Anki or SuperMemo?
neikos 8y ago
The choice for me was quite simple, paying once for the great Anki app, or monthly subscriptions for SuperMemo? Since I abhor the subscription trend it made picking easy.
- sy7ar 8y ago
  The actual desktop SuperMemo app (supermemo 17 I believe) is not subscription based and is way way more powerful (but also convoluted and somewhat outdated UX wise). The web supermemo is dumb down and mainly for language learning.
  - jammygit 8y ago
    Can't use the desktop one easily on Linux however, and can't study on the train with it unless I'm mistaken.
skybrian 8y ago
The main hump I need to get over before committing to either tool is deciding what's important enough to remember. If I were learning a language, using spaced repetition would be obvious. In most other areas, it's not so clear whether it's important to remember the contents of any given book or article. I suppose I could apply it to remembering songs I've learned how to play, but I'm just doing it for fun.
- hnous927 8y ago
  It takes time to consider whether something is worth committing to memory. I constantly rewrite cards and delete them.
AlexCoventry 8y ago
I'm a bit surprised these systems still pay off for people. How many contexts require learning large bodies of unrelated facts, these days? Everything's just a google away. Even in the past, the only context where I would have used a system like this is language acquisition, and it's pretty clear that machine translation is going to surpass me very soon, if it hasn't already. For me, most interesting work involves conceptually coherent bodies of knowledge. Learn the conceptual framework, and you'll remember the details by partial reconstruction as you need them. At least, that's how it usually works for me.
- jszymborski 8y ago
  Unfortunately, high schools and university courses can rely on this sort of memorization quite heavily as a proxy for "understanding". My biochemistry courses, particularly early on, were at least 60% memorization, 40% conceptual/logical reasoning.
- nanofortnight 8y ago
  Medicine is a field I'm in where learning large bodies of unrelated facts is helpful, since it's a field where having a generalist's shallow understanding of a wide variety of fields is useful. Take biochemistry, for example, wherein one can see it as a series of mechanisms and is mostly memory work. Anatomy is similarly mostly memory work; one doesn't simply "reproduce" an understanding of the course of the vagus nerve from scratch. Not every field is maths or physics.
- roel_v 8y ago
  Spaced repetition is a very useful tool when making it through law school; it was for me and many of my cohort. It's very useful to improve scores on many tests, from first aid to tests for a hunting license. Is it very useful to 'really' learn? Only a bit. But there is value in improving test scores in its own right.
- ken 8y ago
  All of them except programming, I'd say. That sounds like a 2000's-programmer-centric view of the world. Modern software is unique among all the fields I've worked in, in that it combines: - people routinely working on systems far too complex for them to ever understand fully, and which often change completely on the timescale of weeks or months - all the relevant data on the web in a format (like error messages or function names) that's easy for google to index, and easy for users to type - people sitting in front of internet-connected computers anyway, and sufficient time slop that the team doesn't need an instantaneous answer When I was knee-deep in water at an archaeological dig 15 years ago and my professor called out "What species of tree is that by your knee?", or when I was working on the catwalk last week and my lead called over "Check that the instrument in front of you is safe", googling it would have been completely infeasible, for several reasons. They'd just replace me with someone who knows what they're doing. > Learn the conceptual framework, and you'll remember the details by partial reconstruction as you need them. When I took organic chemistry, they taught the special cases of each reaction type first, and then generalized them at the end of the year. When I took engineering physics, they made us start with the generalized form first, and then we had to derive the specifics as needed. At the time, I was frustrated by the chemistry approach (why didn't you tell us there was a simpler form?!), but 20 years later, I remember a lot more chemistry than physics (even though my grades in physics were much better). I might be able to fumble through an SN2 reaction if I needed to, but I'm sure I couldn't do anything at all useful with Maxwell's Equations.
dawidw 8y ago
I can see lot of doubts if flash card system is working. For some of the people certainly it is: http://augmentingcognition.com/ltm.html http://augmentingcognition.com/ltm.html The above is the first link from the HN discussion which I really recommend to everyone: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17846356 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17846356
bayesian_horse 8y ago
Spaced repetition is misunderstood. The original idea was to decrease the amount of time needed for long term memorization, over a different approach, like sequential or purely random repetition. However, many people now compare SRS over no repetition at all. One big problem of SRS is that it gets unwieldy with larger chunks of information. SRS is good for vocabulary, bad for medical texts. The much bigger problem is that it takes an unpractical amount of calendar time. If you have three months, yes you can SRS a few hundred words. If you have a week and want full recollection at the end, you'll still repeat the list of words a couple dozen times and SRS makes no difference. Another problem is the time it takes to prepare a database or a set of paper cards. By the time I prepare a database from a book I could probably read the thing twice or more times. For exams that require recital of information (for example medical or law exams) mnemonic techniques like the Loci method (also called memory palace) are much more reliable and more practical.
- hnous927 8y ago
  I’m OP. Thank you for the feedback! I don't see why not comparing "SRS over no repetition at all". To me, SRS or no SRS, they are all learning/studying methods. All SRS algorithm is expanding, i.e. increasing intervals. So maybe with continue success, it'll be: 1 day, 2, 4, 16, 40, 300 (arbitrary numbers). How do you propose to lean medical texts, if without SRS? Mnemonic techniques only work with rote recall, whereas flashcards, if formulated well, can help induction, understanding, not just recall.
  - bayesian_horse 8y ago
    The idea with SRS is that the exponential scheduling is supposed to be more efficient than random or sequential scheduling. I did study for medical exams with mnemonic techniques. Studies have shown that they do not inhibit understanding at all. In my experience they even help understanding. They totally dominate SRS on anything looking like a table or list. With text it's not as pronounced, but still you can memorize the key words, as few as possible, as many as necessary. Flashcards are first of all a rewrite of the original material. If that is really necessary, the original material sucks, at least for the purposes of the exam. The physical cards are marginally easier to use than a textbook, but then again, writing them takes a lot of time and effort.
habitue 8y ago
I figured this was written by someone working on or for supermemo, but it turns out it's not! The author details his journey from using Anki for 5+ years to switching to supermemo: https://masterhowtolearn.wordpress.com/2018/10/28/why-i-switched-to-supermemo-after-using-anki-for-5-years-with-over-50000-cards-and-420000-total-reviews/ https://masterhowtolearn.wordpress.com/2018/10/28/why-i-swit...
- hnous927 8y ago
  I’m OP. Thank you for the feedback. Yes I have no affiliation with SuperMemo whatsoever. My previous 5-year Anki experience gives me in a unique position when comparing both software.
deepprocess 8y ago
Been using Anki for a couple of years to learn Spanish. Was "ok". I now use Anki to learn Spanish but now I add imagery (also known as a mnemonic). Our minds don't remember text too well - but coupled with imagery they do. To boot, Anki supports audio files to even further ingrain the memory if you have the time to create the cards. If you're super imaginative, like the Russian Mnemonist Solomon Shereshevsky, (article on front page HN today) you wouldn't need to this do, you can create anything in your mind and recall it. This can in way (it's physically limited whereas Anki is not) be taken to pen and paper as well using the Leitner system, a few file folders and some paper. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leitner_system https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leitner_system So whatever you're trying to memorize - math, names, bible verses, numbers, languages -with imagery and with spaced repetition. I bought a book a while ago called "Fluent Forever" (not associated). The author has released an app to learn languages now using this imagery method. I personally don't like the app as it takes away the flashcard creation process reducing your "learning experience" to just a few taps. Anki, Supermemo, -insert SRS program here-, albeit harder, it's much more rewarding.
- innocentoldguy 8y ago
  I use Anki to learn Japanese vocabulary. I have found it much more useful when I use Kanji vs. Romanization. I see Kanji differently than I do Romanization and I wonder if there isn’t a picture quality to it that gets lost when I Romanize the words?
  - deepprocess 8y ago
    I think there's something there for sure. The ability to rewrite the Kanji correctly probably wouldn't be there (I believe it follows a strict pattern?). I was messing around with Arabic for a month and was able to memorize written words and what they meant but could not reproduce it if I wanted to.
MrTonyD 8y ago
I spend an insane numbers of hours on airplanes with my iPad. Any recommendations for which of these would be good for creating cards (with Apple pencil) and using on an iPad with no Internet connection?
edwardhusarcik 8y ago
I'm a medical student who uses Anki religiously. I'll vouch for it any day. Currently, I see around 300-1,000 flashcards a day and have been doing it for almost a year straight. Without Anki, I am not sure if I'd be doing nearly as well in school. It is really a game changer for my education (at least my medical education). I wish it was more user friendly, but it is free (on Android) so I can't complain. As for Supermemo comparison, Anki has been much easier for me to sync / utilize decks offline. I just keep a 24K card deck on my phone and sync it occasionally for a backup then I'm good to go.
- Latteland 8y ago
  I've had the idea that a lot of medical training (besides anatomy, chemistry, bio, many other things :-)) was memorizing a big decision tree to evaluate someone, which seems fundamentally different than flash cards. How do you learn that? Family history that pertinent , previous conditions etc.
  - edwardhusarcik 8y ago
    Hi Latteland! I do both. Anki is about the little facts that I want to retain after I understand the bigger picture. In fact, I never use Anki to learn anything and only for retention. Example flashcard: - Front: Which race has a higher prevalence of G6PD Deficiency? - Back: African Americans
- jammygit 8y ago
  How long does it take you to do those 300-1000 cards per day? I'm finding I'm reviewing at about 9s/card lately
  - edwardhusarcik 8y ago
    I'm slower than that. It takes up a good portion of my day everyday unfortunately.
    - jammygit 8y ago
jammygit 8y ago
Supermemo web doesn't let you export your cards. Maybe there's a way to do it, but I'm using anki so I never lose my cards in case the service goes away or has data loss
popcorncolonel 8y ago
This article comes at the perfect time for me, while I'm about to choose a tool to read Japanese sentences!
corollari 8y ago
A few months ago I built a Chrome extension that replaces the new tab page with an anki window, in an attempt to improve my browsing habits and it seems people overall are finding it useful so far, You can find the source code and links to the web store listings in https://github.com/corollari/ankiTab https://github.com/corollari/ankiTab
anotheryou 8y ago
Is SuperMemo free (unless you book pre-set vocab sets)? And is there an export function to avoid vendor lock-in? (Don't want to tempt my luck and waste my time scripting or writing a GDPR request) and are we talking about https://super-memo.com/ https://super-memo.com/ or https://www.supermemo.com/ https://www.supermemo.com/ ?
- xkfm 8y ago
  There's an actual program, and a saas version. The saas version isn't worth paying for (imo) over using AnkiWeb unless you wanted preformatted decks, and the most up to date version of the algorithm. I've experimented with using the website (mostly because I'm a fan of the software). It's mostly okay. I've been using Supermemo (the actual app) for a few years now on a daily basis. The app itself has a trial if you can find a download link somewhere, and I believe the site might be free if you import your own decks. As far as lock in, I believe you are also locked in unfortunately. This would be another reason to go with Anki or another solution if you just want flashcards.
- hnous927 8y ago
  We are talking about https://super-memo.com/ https://super-memo.com/. The supermemo.com/SuperMemo World is different. I never used the latter. I think they are managed by two different groups of people. SuperMemo 15 is free. The latest version is paid software unfortunately.
victor106 8y ago
I am an Anki user and would love to try SM but the UI is so clunky it is so hard to use. I wish someone put together a comprehensive guide/book on using SM. I went through a few on YouTube from the creator of SM and they were okay but it was still hard to use.
qwerty456127 8y ago
Is there a SuperMemo-like tool for Linux?

103 points by hnous927 8y ago

The fundamental flaw in the author's argument for using SuperMemo is that there is a ton of value in manually creating the decks yourself. When you write out an item in pencil on paper, then copy it to Anki and create a card, you're creating a memory and physical association with the creation of that card. When you just cloze pre-made selections of reading material, you're skipping this entire process. This is the same reason that downloading pre-made decks from Anki's website doesn't really work.

bedhead 8y ago
So true. There just aren't any shortcuts when it comes to learning a new language, and while creating cards/decks in Anki is a huge chore at times, it's also super effective in jack-hammering that information into your brain for long-lasting recallability.
hnous927 8y ago
I’m OP. Thank you for the feedback! Yes, I think decks have to be personalized. But I don't agree the argument that "writing out in pencil then transferring back to a Spaced Repetition Software" is better than "pre-made selections of reading material". For Incremental Reading, you have to select the important parts; there's no pre-made selection. It's just like highlighting; the material isn't pre-highlighted. I think the most important thing is the thought process: thinking which part is important and which isn't. The medium, whether you are doing it in paper and pencil is no difference than doing it digitally.
- keiferski 8y ago
  The Medium, whether you are doing it in paper and pencil is no difference than doing it digitally. Science says otherwise: https://www.fastcompany.com/40476984/this-is-how-the-way-you-read-impacts-your-memory-and-productivity https://www.fastcompany.com/40476984/this-is-how-the-way-you...
  - hnous927 8y ago
    >"Studies have shown that taking notes by longhand will help you remember important meeting points better than tapping notes out on your laptop or smartphone." By "doing it" I meant the thought process, the selecting process of what's important, not the medium in which you do your "whole studying". Also that study means that taking notes by hands is better than with a computer. It doesn't mean learning with paper and pencil is better than with a computer, especially when we involve other things like a spaced repetition software.

burtonator 8y ago

I'f you're a spaced repetition enthusiast you might like Polar: https://getpolarized.io/ https://getpolarized.io/

wahnfrieden 8y ago
What’s the connection to SRS?
- goerz 8y ago
  It implements an incremental reading system (which is built in to SM, but not Anki), including the ability to generate Anki flash cards.

deleted 8y ago

[deleted]

Scarbutt 8y ago

What makes anki not suitable for "incremental reading" ( interleaving between reading and remembering) ?

YOUTHFULdabber 8y ago
There is most certainly a way to do 'incremental reading' in Anki, though it must be done manually. You can do virtually any type of reviewing in Anki with its high degree of customization.
xkfm 8y ago
You can import entire articles into Supermemo and break them down into flashcards without leaving the program. Anki just gives you flashcards. There's an incremental reading plugin for Anki, but it doesn't work very well. Incremental reading works by breaking down an article into flashcards. Basically, you go: article -> paragraph -> sentences -> flashcards (usually with cloze deletions). But, because the algo manages when you see everything, I don't have to worry about doing all of that in one step. Polar Bookshelf (getpolarized.io) is more of an open source solution for archiving documents at the moment. You can export annotations/extracts from Polar into Anki, but you don't get the spaced repetition with the actual reading of articles like you do with Supermemo. I read a bit of the article, decide if making an extract of that portion is worth it, and then click next repetition when I'm done/bored reading it. I'll then get another article/flashcard/extract (of another article). You also have tools for marking up articles and saving your place. Every day I review around 30-50 flashcards, and 30-50 articles/extracts of articles. With Supermemo, I don't have to decide (or rather, I give up the ability to decide) what I'm going to read next; in favor of having everything scheduled by the algo. I go through about 800-1000 items in my RSS feeds once a day, save them into read it later/polar/bookmarks, and once a week, I throw the ones that still seem interesting into Supermemo. I probably spend 30min to an hour going through everything once a day, and another hour or so on Supermemo. Most of the items in my RSS feeds are admittedly junk around 95-98% or so (HN and HN comments, reddit rss feeds and comments, lobste.rs and comments, some news sites, a few personal blogs, and some forums), but I do get a few gems throughout the week. The newer Supermemo algorithm also tolerates breaks better than Anki (the last time I checked). So, for example, not using Supermemo while on holiday isn't an issue. I also keep aha moments from programming and some documentation in there as well. Edit: Here's a demo of incremental reading in Supermemo. He marks up articles much more than I typically do. There's a lot of features and functionality in the program. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DoQoeK53bP8& https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DoQoeK53bP8&

Stratoscope 8y ago

Note to writers: unless you're writing only for an audience that is already familiar with your terminology, it's helpful to spell out acronyms and initialisms the first time you use them. I skimmed this entire article out of curiosity. It uses the term SRS twenty times but never says what it means. I went back to the top and noticed the "not a prerequisite" link, so I looked at that article too. About six paragraphs in, the fourth mention of SRS finally gave me the key: "Spaced Repetition Software (SRS)". This tiny bit of knowledge gave me the context to understand what the articles were talking about. If you put definitions like this at the top of every article, you will have more informed readers who can better appreciate your insights.

SlowRobotAhead 8y ago
Exactly. Not only did I not know the terminology, in this case I didn’t know either product/software/service either. I had to find the “in case you missed my earlier post on” then in that the “my initial review” post then still had to figure out what he was talking about. OH.... it’s learning by repetition, updated flash cards, got it in three words. This was written by an engineer for sure! A short statement and purpose for people who don’t magically have all the information the writer has would have gone a long way.
- hnous927 8y ago
  I’m OP. Thank you for the feedback! I have added a quick terminology guide at the top of each article. > A short statement and purpose... I will keep this in mind when writing articles in the future.
hyperpape 8y ago
It's worse than that, because even for someone who knows about SRS (via Anki), this is circuitous and hard to read. Anyone who's a fan of incremental reading/super memo would do us a favor by writing a new introduction that's more straightforward and credible. The fact that the introductions to incremental reading have this feel of "read these hundred things to grasp the genius of incremental reading" is a huge problem.

deleted 8y ago

[deleted]

chongli 8y ago

I'm really skeptical of these sorts of memorization systems, not because I think they don't work (I think they do), but because I see it as a brain "hack" that goes against the grain. What do I mean by this? I think of our memories as a kind of most-frequently-used (MFU) cache. We remember best when we use the information all the time. So when we use this sort of spaced repetition we're trying to artificially "warm up" the cache in our brains. We're not trusting our brains to remember the things that are most important in our lives. If you're trying to learn a language, you should learn the way children learn their first language: by speaking. Talk to people in that language constantly. If you don't know anyone who speaks the language, what are you learning it for? If you really need to learn the language (for work?) then find somebody who speaks it and arrange to meet them for coffee on a regular basis. If you're trying to memorize something else, such as theorems in math or standard library functions in a programming language, I'd advise against it. Learn the theorems by applying them and trying to prove stuff. Learn the library functions by doing actual programming. In the long run, if your knowledge is situated within a context and connected to other things you know (because you learned by doing) then I believe you'll understand it much better. Memorizing by rote, out of context, will help you to recall facts which often don't have any meaning to you.

the_clarence 8y ago
Have you ever learned a language in your 20s? If so, how good are you? How long did it take you? I personally have tried to learn many languages in my 20s. I’ve became good at figuring out what are the shortcuts to kickstart learning. The best one I found is to learn as many words as possible + simple grammar + useful verbs. If you have the time learn hundreds per day with memory tricks. Once you know enough start trying to have conversations. Grammar is not really important in the beginning but you need to learn conjugations (if there are any) at some point early. This is a much better approach vs trying to have convos when you know peanuts. If you’re planning to spend some weeks in a foreign country this is what I would advise to you. You are going to learn very little if you get there without having done that
- hnous927 8y ago
  How do you propose to "learn as many words as possible"? What is the actual method? With Spaced Repetition Software like Anki or SuperMemo?

neikos 8y ago

The choice for me was quite simple, paying once for the great Anki app, or monthly subscriptions for SuperMemo? Since I abhor the subscription trend it made picking easy.

sy7ar 8y ago
The actual desktop SuperMemo app (supermemo 17 I believe) is not subscription based and is way way more powerful (but also convoluted and somewhat outdated UX wise). The web supermemo is dumb down and mainly for language learning.
- jammygit 8y ago
  Can't use the desktop one easily on Linux however, and can't study on the train with it unless I'm mistaken.

skybrian 8y ago

The main hump I need to get over before committing to either tool is deciding what's important enough to remember. If I were learning a language, using spaced repetition would be obvious. In most other areas, it's not so clear whether it's important to remember the contents of any given book or article. I suppose I could apply it to remembering songs I've learned how to play, but I'm just doing it for fun.

hnous927 8y ago
It takes time to consider whether something is worth committing to memory. I constantly rewrite cards and delete them.

AlexCoventry 8y ago

I'm a bit surprised these systems still pay off for people. How many contexts require learning large bodies of unrelated facts, these days? Everything's just a google away. Even in the past, the only context where I would have used a system like this is language acquisition, and it's pretty clear that machine translation is going to surpass me very soon, if it hasn't already. For me, most interesting work involves conceptually coherent bodies of knowledge. Learn the conceptual framework, and you'll remember the details by partial reconstruction as you need them. At least, that's how it usually works for me.

jszymborski 8y ago
Unfortunately, high schools and university courses can rely on this sort of memorization quite heavily as a proxy for "understanding". My biochemistry courses, particularly early on, were at least 60% memorization, 40% conceptual/logical reasoning.
nanofortnight 8y ago
Medicine is a field I'm in where learning large bodies of unrelated facts is helpful, since it's a field where having a generalist's shallow understanding of a wide variety of fields is useful. Take biochemistry, for example, wherein one can see it as a series of mechanisms and is mostly memory work. Anatomy is similarly mostly memory work; one doesn't simply "reproduce" an understanding of the course of the vagus nerve from scratch. Not every field is maths or physics.
roel_v 8y ago
Spaced repetition is a very useful tool when making it through law school; it was for me and many of my cohort. It's very useful to improve scores on many tests, from first aid to tests for a hunting license. Is it very useful to 'really' learn? Only a bit. But there is value in improving test scores in its own right.
ken 8y ago
All of them except programming, I'd say. That sounds like a 2000's-programmer-centric view of the world. Modern software is unique among all the fields I've worked in, in that it combines: - people routinely working on systems far too complex for them to ever understand fully, and which often change completely on the timescale of weeks or months - all the relevant data on the web in a format (like error messages or function names) that's easy for google to index, and easy for users to type - people sitting in front of internet-connected computers anyway, and sufficient time slop that the team doesn't need an instantaneous answer When I was knee-deep in water at an archaeological dig 15 years ago and my professor called out "What species of tree is that by your knee?", or when I was working on the catwalk last week and my lead called over "Check that the instrument in front of you is safe", googling it would have been completely infeasible, for several reasons. They'd just replace me with someone who knows what they're doing. > Learn the conceptual framework, and you'll remember the details by partial reconstruction as you need them. When I took organic chemistry, they taught the special cases of each reaction type first, and then generalized them at the end of the year. When I took engineering physics, they made us start with the generalized form first, and then we had to derive the specifics as needed. At the time, I was frustrated by the chemistry approach (why didn't you tell us there was a simpler form?!), but 20 years later, I remember a lot more chemistry than physics (even though my grades in physics were much better). I might be able to fumble through an SN2 reaction if I needed to, but I'm sure I couldn't do anything at all useful with Maxwell's Equations.

dawidw 8y ago

I can see lot of doubts if flash card system is working. For some of the people certainly it is: http://augmentingcognition.com/ltm.html http://augmentingcognition.com/ltm.html The above is the first link from the HN discussion which I really recommend to everyone: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17846356 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17846356

bayesian_horse 8y ago

Spaced repetition is misunderstood. The original idea was to decrease the amount of time needed for long term memorization, over a different approach, like sequential or purely random repetition. However, many people now compare SRS over no repetition at all. One big problem of SRS is that it gets unwieldy with larger chunks of information. SRS is good for vocabulary, bad for medical texts. The much bigger problem is that it takes an unpractical amount of calendar time. If you have three months, yes you can SRS a few hundred words. If you have a week and want full recollection at the end, you'll still repeat the list of words a couple dozen times and SRS makes no difference. Another problem is the time it takes to prepare a database or a set of paper cards. By the time I prepare a database from a book I could probably read the thing twice or more times. For exams that require recital of information (for example medical or law exams) mnemonic techniques like the Loci method (also called memory palace) are much more reliable and more practical.

hnous927 8y ago
I’m OP. Thank you for the feedback! I don't see why not comparing "SRS over no repetition at all". To me, SRS or no SRS, they are all learning/studying methods. All SRS algorithm is expanding, i.e. increasing intervals. So maybe with continue success, it'll be: 1 day, 2, 4, 16, 40, 300 (arbitrary numbers). How do you propose to lean medical texts, if without SRS? Mnemonic techniques only work with rote recall, whereas flashcards, if formulated well, can help induction, understanding, not just recall.
- bayesian_horse 8y ago
  The idea with SRS is that the exponential scheduling is supposed to be more efficient than random or sequential scheduling. I did study for medical exams with mnemonic techniques. Studies have shown that they do not inhibit understanding at all. In my experience they even help understanding. They totally dominate SRS on anything looking like a table or list. With text it's not as pronounced, but still you can memorize the key words, as few as possible, as many as necessary. Flashcards are first of all a rewrite of the original material. If that is really necessary, the original material sucks, at least for the purposes of the exam. The physical cards are marginally easier to use than a textbook, but then again, writing them takes a lot of time and effort.

habitue 8y ago

I figured this was written by someone working on or for supermemo, but it turns out it's not! The author details his journey from using Anki for 5+ years to switching to supermemo: https://masterhowtolearn.wordpress.com/2018/10/28/why-i-switched-to-supermemo-after-using-anki-for-5-years-with-over-50000-cards-and-420000-total-reviews/ https://masterhowtolearn.wordpress.com/2018/10/28/why-i-swit...

hnous927 8y ago
I’m OP. Thank you for the feedback. Yes I have no affiliation with SuperMemo whatsoever. My previous 5-year Anki experience gives me in a unique position when comparing both software.

deepprocess 8y ago

Been using Anki for a couple of years to learn Spanish. Was "ok". I now use Anki to learn Spanish but now I add imagery (also known as a mnemonic). Our minds don't remember text too well - but coupled with imagery they do. To boot, Anki supports audio files to even further ingrain the memory if you have the time to create the cards. If you're super imaginative, like the Russian Mnemonist Solomon Shereshevsky, (article on front page HN today) you wouldn't need to this do, you can create anything in your mind and recall it. This can in way (it's physically limited whereas Anki is not) be taken to pen and paper as well using the Leitner system, a few file folders and some paper. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leitner_system https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leitner_system So whatever you're trying to memorize - math, names, bible verses, numbers, languages -with imagery and with spaced repetition. I bought a book a while ago called "Fluent Forever" (not associated). The author has released an app to learn languages now using this imagery method. I personally don't like the app as it takes away the flashcard creation process reducing your "learning experience" to just a few taps. Anki, Supermemo, -insert SRS program here-, albeit harder, it's much more rewarding.

innocentoldguy 8y ago
I use Anki to learn Japanese vocabulary. I have found it much more useful when I use Kanji vs. Romanization. I see Kanji differently than I do Romanization and I wonder if there isn’t a picture quality to it that gets lost when I Romanize the words?
- deepprocess 8y ago
  I think there's something there for sure. The ability to rewrite the Kanji correctly probably wouldn't be there (I believe it follows a strict pattern?). I was messing around with Arabic for a month and was able to memorize written words and what they meant but could not reproduce it if I wanted to.

MrTonyD 8y ago

I spend an insane numbers of hours on airplanes with my iPad. Any recommendations for which of these would be good for creating cards (with Apple pencil) and using on an iPad with no Internet connection?

edwardhusarcik 8y ago

I'm a medical student who uses Anki religiously. I'll vouch for it any day. Currently, I see around 300-1,000 flashcards a day and have been doing it for almost a year straight. Without Anki, I am not sure if I'd be doing nearly as well in school. It is really a game changer for my education (at least my medical education). I wish it was more user friendly, but it is free (on Android) so I can't complain. As for Supermemo comparison, Anki has been much easier for me to sync / utilize decks offline. I just keep a 24K card deck on my phone and sync it occasionally for a backup then I'm good to go.

Latteland 8y ago
I've had the idea that a lot of medical training (besides anatomy, chemistry, bio, many other things :-)) was memorizing a big decision tree to evaluate someone, which seems fundamentally different than flash cards. How do you learn that? Family history that pertinent , previous conditions etc.
- edwardhusarcik 8y ago
  Hi Latteland! I do both. Anki is about the little facts that I want to retain after I understand the bigger picture. In fact, I never use Anki to learn anything and only for retention. Example flashcard: - Front: Which race has a higher prevalence of G6PD Deficiency? - Back: African Americans
jammygit 8y ago
How long does it take you to do those 300-1000 cards per day? I'm finding I'm reviewing at about 9s/card lately
- edwardhusarcik 8y ago
  I'm slower than that. It takes up a good portion of my day everyday unfortunately.
  - jammygit 8y ago

jammygit 8y ago

Supermemo web doesn't let you export your cards. Maybe there's a way to do it, but I'm using anki so I never lose my cards in case the service goes away or has data loss

popcorncolonel 8y ago

This article comes at the perfect time for me, while I'm about to choose a tool to read Japanese sentences!

corollari 8y ago

A few months ago I built a Chrome extension that replaces the new tab page with an anki window, in an attempt to improve my browsing habits and it seems people overall are finding it useful so far, You can find the source code and links to the web store listings in https://github.com/corollari/ankiTab https://github.com/corollari/ankiTab

anotheryou 8y ago

Is SuperMemo free (unless you book pre-set vocab sets)? And is there an export function to avoid vendor lock-in? (Don't want to tempt my luck and waste my time scripting or writing a GDPR request) and are we talking about https://super-memo.com/ https://super-memo.com/ or https://www.supermemo.com/ https://www.supermemo.com/ ?

xkfm 8y ago
There's an actual program, and a saas version. The saas version isn't worth paying for (imo) over using AnkiWeb unless you wanted preformatted decks, and the most up to date version of the algorithm. I've experimented with using the website (mostly because I'm a fan of the software). It's mostly okay. I've been using Supermemo (the actual app) for a few years now on a daily basis. The app itself has a trial if you can find a download link somewhere, and I believe the site might be free if you import your own decks. As far as lock in, I believe you are also locked in unfortunately. This would be another reason to go with Anki or another solution if you just want flashcards.
hnous927 8y ago
We are talking about https://super-memo.com/ https://super-memo.com/. The supermemo.com/SuperMemo World is different. I never used the latter. I think they are managed by two different groups of people. SuperMemo 15 is free. The latest version is paid software unfortunately.

victor106 8y ago

I am an Anki user and would love to try SM but the UI is so clunky it is so hard to use. I wish someone put together a comprehensive guide/book on using SM. I went through a few on YouTube from the creator of SM and they were okay but it was still hard to use.

qwerty456127 8y ago

Is there a SuperMemo-like tool for Linux?