Ask HN: What skills/hobbies/curiosities do you find compatible with programming?

1 pointsn00bdude4y ago2 comments

I once heard from a friend a theory that the memorization of the myriad “Indian Gods” helped him more naturally memorize the “nested layers / arrangements” of code.

Are there any such things from “daily life” / from “growing up” that you feel may have contributed towards your development as a coder?

If there is a natural or learned way about which you’ve picked up a new prog. language, what is it that your mind almost naturally has always grasped? Good with numbers? Puzzles? Where does one’s mind go when seeking to solve a programming problem?

What skills do you feel (beyond work ethic) make a HQ programmer?

2 comments

ggm4y ago

Screenprinting multiple colours, and like additive, point registered techniques. Higher points for things you have to do in some sense "backwards"

Knitting, writing knitting patterns. Both iterative and recursive qualities inherent in knitting complex clothes (mathematicians might call them a manifold)

Most games of patience. Many games like "nine man morris" or "solitare" puzzles, Rubik's cube (group theory)

Rowing, cycling. Cyclical repeated path following.

Train, carriage, aircraft and bird spotting. Sets, set theory, groups, sequences. Yes, obsessive behaviour too..

Cooking. Generating complex recipes

steerpike4y ago

Rock climbing and bouldering - often feels like the physical equivalent of trying to gracefully solve puzzles in much the same way I think about programming.

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