Organization for cavemen (and cavewomen)

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luke
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Organization for cavemen (and cavewomen)

Postby luke » Fri Jul 23, 2021 12:24 pm

I use mp3s on a thumb drive for my portable language learning audio. Works in the car, works at the computer. (using it at the computer was a recent realization, and is part of why this post is addressed to fellow cave dwellers. Things come slowly).

A lot of my audio is FSI drills, but it applies to audiobooks mp3s as well.

Normal approach is "I'm good enough at this bit right now", or "I've listened to this", so remove it from the memory stick. That's always been with me. Even non-cave people understand why you'd do this, even if they don't get why you'd use a thumb drive and copy files in the 2020s.

I'll get to my new realization shortly. Just creating the backdrop here.

Two things that came to me over the last few days...
  1. I can create multiple folders with the exact same content but with different objectives.
    This is where I figured I could have an "understand" folder and a "can repeat" folder. That may seem like a silly distinction, but it's what I came up with. You can use any distinction you want though if you have more than one goal for the same mp3.
  2. I can save difficult stuff in another folder, instead of deleting them with a small sense of guilt because I'm not quite where I'd like them to be.
    So the realization here, which seems so obvious, but has taken decades to figure out and is why I'm self-identifying as "caveman". I'm assuming us cavemen are not as smart as the rest of you.

I've often had and used notion, "I'll just repeat the whole thing (course, book, whatever) again at a later date and the harder stuff will be easier and I'll do the 'cleanup' on understanding or whatever at that time". I've done this. Have had thoughts like, when I finish unit 30 of 55 in FSI Basic Spanish, maybe I should repeat the whole shebang again, or should I just press on? The realization du jour solves my dilemma. Instead of reluctantly removing the last mp3 or two from the folder I've been working on, just copy it to a "review" folder. (yes, cavemen know a little French. We needed it to communicate with our neighbors back in the day).

Tiny additional bit of background. My typical FSI unit has 40-60 mp3s. I edited the audio a long time ago for organization, procrastination, standardization, and now, realization. Typical drill has enough time to respond if I know what to do pretty well, but there isn't much "think" time. I removed the excess think time all those years back.

My method goes something like:
  1. Each FSI unit has a folder (directory). The mp3s and folders are named in ASCII order to match the manual.
  2. Start on the first mp3 in the folder. Generally repeat the mp3 until comfortable or bored or frustrated. (comfort is the goal).
  3. Repeat step 2 on to the next mp3.
  4. If a drill was pretty easy today and was pretty easy yesterday, and I feel quite comfortable, delete it. Otherwise, it will still be in the drill folder for tomorrow. I usually don't get through an entire unit on the first day. Sometimes it takes a few days to get to every exercise in the unit.
  5. The next day, I just start back with the first file in the folder.
  6. If a drill lingers around and is one of the last few in the folder and still isn't a breeze, move it to the reviewN folder. (N there is the unit number. Just decided now that will be helpful, so the "review" stuff can be organized and repeated at longer intervals.
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Re: Organization for cavemen (and cavewomen)

Postby jeffers » Fri Jul 23, 2021 12:48 pm

I still like working with folders. Every media player that I know of tries to ignore folders and create its own organisation system to make it "user-friendly", with the result that things I put together often end up separate and things I separate often end up together.

I have always kept the media for my language courses in their own folders, but the idea of separating them out into a folder of files I'm "finished" with and files I still want to review is a great idea.
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luke
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Re: Organization for cavemen (and cavewomen)

Postby luke » Fri Jul 23, 2021 3:31 pm

jeffers wrote:I still like working with folders. Every media player that I know of tries to ignore folders and create its own organisation system to make it "user-friendly", with the result that things I put together often end up separate and things I separate often end up together.

I have always kept the media for my language courses in their own folders, but the idea of separating them out into a folder of files I'm "finished" with and files I still want to review is a great idea.

I'm glad I'm not the only caveperson here.

And a tiny amplification. My computer is the long term storage. Lately I've been doing FSI mostly from home with the computer and only sometimes on the road in the car. (before the pandemic, it was the exact opposite).

The "done" stuff never gets deleted from my computer. I just remove it from my memory stick. The 1+1 I tried to retell was that the memory stick can be the current track storage. It can be used at the computer (obviously, but I just figured that out :lol:)

Multiple folders for the same content is also an organization technique.

The twinge of guilt or shame for "still not as good as I expect" can be managed with tiny little backup folders for the tough stuff. And the point I'd normally "delete the folder and move on" is the opportunity to rename the folder and copy it from the memory stick to the computer for long term backup AND it's still on the memory stick and can be reviewed at a much more comfortable pace, rather than face my imperfection or for-the-moment unreasonable expectations every single day. And, when I look at these "review" folders, it's exactly the stuff I've found to be the hardest for whatever reason.

The caveman is feeling like a genius right now. Probably delusional, but a more pleasant personal delusion than others that occasionally occupy my head.
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Re: Organization for cavemen (and cavewomen)

Postby Iversen » Fri Jul 23, 2021 9:53 pm

I totally agree with the idea of defining your own folders using a purpose-driven plan and not the hopeless chaos that would be the result of letting some kind of 'smart' software do the organising. However I have stored so few sound files with speech that I couldn't see the purpose in subdividing them. And my notes from text studies are allowed to pile up until I throw them out. I do however have lots of bilingual printouts sorted according to language, and even though it originally only was a case of collector's madness it has now been a smart decision because I have found out that these old printouts are ideal as goodnight reading - I know the words, and I don't expect anything surprising to happen as I might with a new text.

The only place where I want to have some measure of order is in my physical book collection: travel guides are ordered after continent and country (except some that are too big for my shelves), and the same applies to my language books -they are generally ordered after langauge families and languages, but I have had collected tiny ones in a special section, however still ordered after language. My literary books are placed at the backside of my shelves, but at least they are ordered according to language.

I don't have any collections of e-books or sound books so I suppose I'm not even a caveman, but rather a surviving dinosaur. In contrast my photo-and-postcard collection and my musical collections have been transferred to files and they are organized down to the last pixel, and I have backups of everything important. I don't know why there is this difference.
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