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Comment by markus_zhang | Hacker News Reader

I tried to complete a simple 2D RPG that is a Ultima spinoff a few years ago. Nothing is technically impossible as it's just a simple 2D game but eventually I lost interest and broke away.

Now that I look back, there are two obstacles:

- I'm not really interested in such a game. I probably fancied about the genre as it's classic but I never finished any of the Ultima games.

- In the middle I tried to implement a full scale map editor. I managed to build a simple yet working one, but dropped the project once I realized that it needs a lot of work to write my own GUI (back then I'm using C++ and SDL2).

I also find out that once I know how to implement something on paper (e.g. if I can draw the process of an algorithm on paper), I usually lost the interest to implement it in code. It takes a huge amount of effort for me to complete assignments for the Data Structure class I'm taking, to the point that I'm thinking about dropping the class.

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> - In the middle I tried to implement a full scale map editor. I managed to build a simple yet working one, but dropped the project once I realized that it needs a lot of work to write my own GUI (back then I'm using C++ and SDL2).

Sharing my slightly unrelated experience, but Tiled2D is a nice piece of software to achieve this.

I've used it for one of my personal project, where I wanted to make a digital adaptation of a board game, and I needed to "digitalize" the game board[1]. I don't use the tiles or the tile grid at all, but just the "polygon" feature that allows me to draw the borders of the different regions. It's not at all why the software has been written, as the polygon is supposed to be a small feature to define areas in a tiled game, but it gets the job done.

[1] https://github.com/Longwelwind/swords-and-ravens/blob/master...

Thanks, I knew about Tiled at the time. The project was kinda of a learning project so I didn't bother to use an external tool. Now that I look back, that's probably how I approach all projects (not work-related): I just want to learn how it works superficially, and once I do I'd lose motivation and drop the project eventually.

Very nasty mindset I have to admit...

It's not a bad mindset at all. "Finishing" can be a goal and so can "learn a new thing in an enjoyable way". Sometimes I write code just because I get the urge to create a nifty data structure. Who cares if no one will ever use it or look at it again? I enjoyed making it.

I mean, what finishing means is personally defined by you. If you define finishing as learning what you set out to learn, then you finished.

> I also find out that once I know how to implement something on paper (e.g. if I can draw the process of an algorithm on paper), I usually lost the interest to implement it in code.

This is a perpetual problem for me. I start out interested in a lot of things, but once it's clear how to proceed, I get no pleasure out of the rote work required to implement the solution. Whether it's writing code, building something physical, playing a game, putting together a puzzle, or any other activity that involves some degree of thought or problem solving, as soon as there's nothing left to think about, I lose all interest. If there's a chance of an alternate outcome, I remain engaged to the last second (so I can finish PVP games, win or lose, but almost never finish a game of Civilization). It plagues me at work, too, but at least with work, I've got external motivating factors (insofar as I won't get paid if I never finish things).

Yeah exactly. I have been going on like this for almost 40 years and recently I decided to take a different approach:

- Stop working on projects that I know for sure I can't finish, basically that means I'll work on zero CS projects.

- Start hobbies that are either 1) Not of same type of CS projects, or 2) Something that takes a long time to understand.

I have been collecting fossils and learning Geology for a few months and so far it goes well: - Collecting fossils is easy to start

- It's very difficult to find good places to collect and even more difficult to collect very well preserved fossils

- I don't get to collect fossils every day, not even every week if the whether is bad, so zero chance of burning out

- Geology is not something that one can "figure out". In general science is not something I can "figure out" and then apply. It's not engineering.

However I still want to work on CS projects because I need an in-door hobby for the winter, maybe some day I can figure out a way :)

Good luck on your side too!

Interesting that you chose geology, as I often think that I'd have been happier as a geologist. I imagine there's a risk of getting bored with that as well, if it's your day job and you're doing the same sort of rote work all the time. In my fantasy, the primary appeal is that it's almost the opposite of sitting at a desk, except I suspect most professional geologists spend most of their time sitting at a desk looking at data on a computer. Seems like a fun hobby though!

I browsed through some books and websites and figured that most of the work of a "general" geologist is still indoors. Some sub-variants such as palaeontologists are exceptions, but still I figured most of time is still spent in labs, not in fields.

So yeah I agree it's a good hobby.

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