[wonder_er]

I use it to remember the names of persons I encounter in my day-to-day.

Coworkers, neighbors (like that neighbor 3 blocks away that I talked with for a few minutes about {such-and-such}, but don't see that often), restaurant employees/proprietors, delivery people, maintenance workers, friends-of-friends I've met.

Without Anki I have an abysmal memory for names. I have aphantasia[0] which might relate to my difficulty with names.

Now, with Anki, (if I'm using it regularly) I have a freakishly good memory for names. :)

Goes a long way to helping others feel welcome and appreciated, which in turn means _I_ end up feeling welcome and appreciated. A very virtuous cycle.

Edit: I'm a software engineer, but most of my Anki usage is not focused on software engineering directly. To create new Anki cards, I follow the "20 rules for formulating knowledge"[1], so it takes a bit of work before I can take some new bit of information and "process" it to something ready for Anki.

[0] https://www.facebook.com/notes/blake-ross/aphantasia-how-it-...

[1]: https://www.supermemo.com/en/archives1990-2015/articles/20ru...

[lemming]

I'm curious, what format do you use for cards to do this? Do you use Cloze cards like: My delivery driver is ___? How do you specify in the card which co-worker you mean?

[wonder_er]

I'm a few days late, so I don't know if you'll see this.

When adding "people cards", I do anki's forward-and-reverse card, and I build the card so I can read both sides, and generate the opposite side.

I'm just trying to build an association in my brain for their name, so I might do:

Front: "people: Neighbors to west, older couple, he likes woodworking"

Back: "people: Joe and Trish"

I only use a single Anki deck for all my cards, which span many interests, so I'll usually give myself a word to specify the topic, like "Go, Ruby, People, Mental Models"

Or if I can grab a headshot or picture from Slack, Twitter, or LinkedIn, I'll often put the picture on the front, name on the back.

When I review the card "from the back", I try to remember what the person looks like.

I have aphantasia [0] so this form of recall is effortful.

[0] https://www.facebook.com/notes/blake-ross/aphantasia-how-it-...

[lemming]

I did come back and see this, so thanks for taking the time to write it up! That's very interesting and useful.