Note: I can’t believe it’s been 5 years since I first wrote my productivity hacking guide. I was a freshman at Berkeley when I published that article. Now I work full-time and still juggling various aspects of my life. A lot of productivity methodology has changed, and yet a lot has stayed the same. I’m rewriting this guide from scratch, and organizing the information in a more referential manner. That way, people can reference material that’s relevant to them and ignore everything else. I’m also releasing this guide in 5 parts, as not to overwhelm people too quickly. Read More

I recently read a book called “More Than Two: A Practical Guide to Ethical Polyamory” by Franklin Veaux and Eve Ricket. I didn’t know about polyamory before, and always lumped “poly” people with the rest of the sexually deviant groups of society. Because polyamory is a relatively new concept for most of the monogamous world, the authors spend a great deal of time outlining a guide for navigating in the world of polyamory. The upside of being so detailed in helping neophytes navigate complex relationships involving more than two people is that I learned a lot about relationships in general. “More Than Two” is probably my favorite book for navigating my friendships. Read More

People throw too much magic in their explanations. How does an individual detect magic in their explanations?

What is Magic?

I think of certain technical jargon as “magic” because its intended function doesn’t educate the audience and often acts as a curiosity stopper. I call these words Magic Words because you can substitute any magical term with the term “magic” and still walk away with the same level of understanding.

To use jargon and acronyms that people don’t understand can cause poor side effects. Using Magic Words can make people feel dumb for asking and mental models built on Magic Words as premises can be faulty and lead to errors. Read More

Today, I attended UC Berkeley’s Korean 10A class. Korean 10A is the 3rd level Korean class in UC Berkeley, and would normally require you to take 2 semesters of Korean classes at Berkeley (Korean 1A and Korean 1B), but I blew through both level’s material through the course of summer.

I started learning Korean at the beginning of summer. I had started taking classes at the local Korean community center in San Francisco. I started out in the introductory course, Introduction to Hangeul. By the end of summer, I had skipped four levels and finished the fifth level of Korean. How did I do it? Simple, I spent over 200 hours studying Korean. Read More

Table of Contents

How to Keep Your Friends

Summary

Part 1: Building a Great Network

Structural Analysis of One’s Social Network

The Environment Factor

How to Be a Good Friend

Starting with Generosity

Building Trust

Showing Gratitude

Establish Relevancy

Part 2: Planning Social Interactions

Planning a Date

On Spontaneity

Argument for 1-on-1 interaction

If you must go threesome or more

Post Date Procedures

Handing Out Rejection

Part 3: Increasing Your Collision Rate

Liking Their Facebook Posts

Offering Help

Asking for Help

Asking Them For Advice Read More

TABLE OF CONTENTS

1. Intro
   1. Objectives
   2. Your Learning Curve
   Strategies
   1. The Most Important Strategy: Get Started
   2. Be Part of a Community
      1. The Mentor
      2. The Peer
      3. The Mentee
      How to Find Answers
      1. Using Your Problem Solving Toolkit
      2. Googling
      3. Ask a Peer
      4. Ask a Mentor
      Debugging Deliberate Practice and Application Tactics
      1. The Best Tool: Get Your Hands Dirty
      2. Simplification
         1. Simplification of the Problem
         2. Simplification of the Examples
         Casework Other Tactics Tools
         1. Visceralization
         2. Metaphor
         3. Exploration
         4. A Coherent Meta-Example
         The Roadmap
         1. Semester 1 – Practical Programming
         2. Semester 2 – Data Structures & Discrete Mathematics
         3. Onwards
         Conclusion References/Resources

         Intro

         Learning computer science is one of the most enjoyable experiences in human life, also one of the most frustrating. You came across this page because either you want to learn about computer science, want to learn computer science, or want a computer science job. Whatever your motivation, computer science may seem like witchery to you. Geeks use overly complicated jargon to explain concepts to you. A friend of mine, Michelle Bu (who has an amazing anecdote about being a novice programmer by the way), noted that “programmers have a perpetual competition to see who can claim the most things as ‘simple.’” Read More

I’ve recently come to the conclusion that I have way too many meal points than it is necessary for a first-year individual. Usually around this time of the semester I try to think of ways I could spend some of those extra points. UC Berkeley has this policy over meal points to try to promote spending in which if you don’t use all your meal points by the end of the semester, you lose the points. It’s the use it or lose it policy. Under these guiding principles, I bought a yoga mat, a coffee tumbler, several minor sports equipments and packs and packs of candy. But now that it’s the second semester and I already have every fulfillable want fulfilled (along with taking on a low-sugar diet), I’ve been finding it increasingly difficult to spend my meal points. There is a finite amount of space in my stomach. As my floormate Patrick Truong has said, “I’m just sad that the Golden Bear Cafe doesn’t sell XBox 360’s.” Read More