Conversation

Notices

1. clacke (clacke@social.heldscal.la)'s status on Wednesday, 23-May-2018 05:14:01 EDT clacke
   > "Andy," Bob said, "I don't want you to pray to the duck. I want you to ASK THE DUCK YOUR QUESTION."
   
   > I licked my lips. "Out loud?" I said.
   
   > "Out loud," Bob said firmly.
   
   > I cleared my throat. "Duck," I began.
   
   > "Its name is Bob Junior," Bob's superintendant supplied. I shot him a dirty look.
   
   > "Duck," I continued, "I want to know, when you use a strap hanger, what keeps the sprinkler pipe from jumping out of the strap when the head discharges, causing the pipe to..."
   
   > In the middle of asking the duck my question, the answer hit me. [...]
   
   > I turned to look at Bob. Bob was nodding. "You know, don't you," he said.
   
   https://siderea.dreamwidth.org/1368412.html
   1. clacke (clacke@social.heldscal.la)'s status on Wednesday, 23-May-2018 05:21:43 EDT clacke

      in reply to
      > But what you do need to do, to harness the much observed rubber duck debugging effect, is to *talk aloud*.
      
      It's probably super helpful, and I probably should do it, but even when I'm alone I'm basically socially embarrassed over talking to stuffed animals.
      
      But you *do* get the rubber duck effect even when you start writing a bug report or a StackOverflow question, and then never post it because you got the answer on the way of writing it.
      
      As you are preparing to present the question to another person, you won't leave any stone unturned, any measurement unmeasured, because you apply to yourself the future social embarassment of not having done your homework in front of your peers.
      
      When you think to yourself, you get away with all kinds of shenanigans and short-circuited conclusions. Not so when you prepare for communicating to a peer.
      
      But, to reiterate, the vocalization probably helps a lot too. I know I have used my colleagues as rubber ducks when I should have just used a rubber duck. I really should get over that vocalization embarrassment issue.