I completed my BS degree several years ago. I carried a full-time school load and worked full-time. I got 90% of my school work done on the weekends. During the week I was too tired from work to do much more than the absolute minimum required of me for school. Not having a wife and kids helped too--no distractions at home.
Different people have different ways of coping. I am a morning person, so it's not difficult for me to get an extra hour in the day by getting up an hour early, but some people can't function like that. If you live in an "active" house, you may find it easier to set your alarm for an hour or two after everyone else is asleep, and get up and get some studying in (if your biological clock will let you). I find that four hours sleep is all I require for the short-term, so I could get up and get a little more work done and then get back to sleep. I sometimes do that when I have insomnia anyway--why toss and turn for an hour or two if I can get up and read for a while?
First thing to do is a little self-analysis? Are you the kind of person who can get a little bit of work done in various bits and pieces of available time, or do you need a sizeable chunk of time to set aside? Are you better in morning, afternoon, evening, or late night? Do you need as distraction-free a place as possible, or can you put up with household noise while studying? I bought a nature sounds CD set a while back, and putting one of those on while wearing headphones helps me to concentrate. Another thought would be a white noise generator (or pink, brown, etc. type of noise) to help block out distracting noises.
I've found that especially when learning something technical (programming language, data networking, etc.) the more different ways that I can approach the subject, the better. Reading is a passive activity and only activates certain parts of the brain. Writing is an active activity and activates different parts of the brain. I'll read a little bit of material, then re-write it in my own words to "burn" it into as many different neural pathways as possible. I also create mind-maps, limericks, stories, etc. to create as much mental diversity as possible for remembering the material. It helps.
You bring up a few good points. I have noticed that since I had to break away from a task for a few weeks at a stretch (like my Haskell learning) coming back to it means spending a few more days revising what I had learned! I like your suggestion of writing things down to leverage other parts of your brain. I do some mind-mapping, but probably not enough.
About me, I live by myself, so if I don't want to be disturbed, I put the phone off, and I am in complete solitude. I do have a full time job, which does take up a (fixed) number of hours everyday.
Why not just buy a netbook if you're going to carry something around that large? I'm not trolling here--it's a sincere question. I do like the idea of "e-ink" though, and I haven't seen a device that uses it, so my opinion might be changed in favor of ebook readers if the e-ink technology is really that much superior.
I flat-out refuse to use PayPal for anything. I am reluctant to use my credit card except for shopping sites that have a decent track record of security. A small site with a Comodo certificate won't get my business. If HN used Amazon for payment, then I would consider it since I already have CC info on file there, it's no additional risk to me. Like some others have said here, I don't think it would do much (if any) good for this site. It won't deter trolls, at least not dedicated trolls. I think moderation is the only way to keep this from degrading to Reddit, then Digg, and lastly 4chan. Delete posts that don't conform to this site's goals and TOS. Ban users that violate TOS more than 'x' times. I think this site is pretty good at self-policing itself already. The tone is much more business-like and adult than any of the other techie news/social sites that I frequent.
I sent this info to my sister. She teaches science in a high school and the school's Internet filter blocks all access to YouTube, so she was thrilled to learn about this.
I store all my account URLs, user IDs, and passwords in a text file that is inside of an encrypted TrueCrypt volume. The TrueCrypt volume appears as an ordinary file on my computer, and the password to decrypt it is stronger than any password inside the file (13 characters, mixed case with some numbers and symbols mixed in).
For non-critical accounts, I use an old Kerberos password from a long-expired ISP account that I used to have. It's burned into my memory as strongly as my own birth date. For more secure account needs, I have s stronger and longer password that I use. When I need to rotate passwords regularly, I use three characters of the month, a symbol, two digits of the year, and my old Kerberos password all concatenated together. It's easy to remember and difficult to crack because it's eleven characters long, and mixed-case alpha-numeric.
I also got prescription computer glasses a few months ago after using non-prescription reading glasses. They seem to work well, and I paid extra to get the anti-reflective coating too. I spend 8-16 hours a day staring at computer screens. I wish that my boss would replace the ancient 21-inch CRT displays on my desk at work with a flat screen LCD--even with good glasses, the displays are fuzzy (and I'm sure it's the displays and not my eyes now.)
Although the lower-case "G" is not easily discernible, the bright colors make it stand out more on my bookmarks toolbar, so I prefer it for that reason alone.
Gmail icon makes sense, it looks like mail. Next to that I have a G Docs icon which looks like some sort of painting and while it does stick out, it makes no sense whatsoever.
I personally prefer building my own systems so that I can upgrade or repair it easily. All of the big box manufacturers use non-standard cases, motherboards, and power supplies. They will use standard components like RAM, drives, etc. but motherboards typically won't be a standard form-factor like ATX.
Have you thought about modifying it so that it's not just eye candy, but can also be used for navigation (like proceeding to the page uncovered behind the curl)?
I feel the opposite way: eliminate CC: and keep BCC:. People use CC: way too often when a BCC: is more appropriate. Unfortunately, the worst abusers are the most clueless and least likely to change.
Different people have different ways of coping. I am a morning person, so it's not difficult for me to get an extra hour in the day by getting up an hour early, but some people can't function like that. If you live in an "active" house, you may find it easier to set your alarm for an hour or two after everyone else is asleep, and get up and get some studying in (if your biological clock will let you). I find that four hours sleep is all I require for the short-term, so I could get up and get a little more work done and then get back to sleep. I sometimes do that when I have insomnia anyway--why toss and turn for an hour or two if I can get up and read for a while?
First thing to do is a little self-analysis? Are you the kind of person who can get a little bit of work done in various bits and pieces of available time, or do you need a sizeable chunk of time to set aside? Are you better in morning, afternoon, evening, or late night? Do you need as distraction-free a place as possible, or can you put up with household noise while studying? I bought a nature sounds CD set a while back, and putting one of those on while wearing headphones helps me to concentrate. Another thought would be a white noise generator (or pink, brown, etc. type of noise) to help block out distracting noises.
I've found that especially when learning something technical (programming language, data networking, etc.) the more different ways that I can approach the subject, the better. Reading is a passive activity and only activates certain parts of the brain. Writing is an active activity and activates different parts of the brain. I'll read a little bit of material, then re-write it in my own words to "burn" it into as many different neural pathways as possible. I also create mind-maps, limericks, stories, etc. to create as much mental diversity as possible for remembering the material. It helps.