"a lack of commitment to one thing is just as productive as doing nothing at all."
I'd agree with this statement completely. Everything I've built that I'm proud of has always been something where I took my time, had a clear vision, drafted out exactly what I wanted and then didn't just take it on as "just a side project" but when needed, forced myself to see it through to the end.
I think he has some really good points about side projects in general. I think we (or at least myself) can tend to view them as things like hey let me build a framework so I know how to do it, without any clear goals in mind (besides the vague one). Then you do it for a while and afterwards maybe you have learned maybe not, maybe you just give up because you never have the time, and then you wasted the 4 hours you spent starting the project. This is more for myself, but I think when I get an idea now or want to make a side project, I'm going to force myself to sit down, spend the half hour and write down a clear set of goals that I want to achieve, and only after this start.
"a lack of commitment to one thing is just as productive as doing nothing at all."
If your goal is to build a finished product, yes, this is absolutely true. But if you choose ambitious projects beyond your current expertise, bringing the project anywhere beyond the planning stage will be a valuable experience for the purpose of learning.
Me and most people I know just have side projects for the fun of it. Why do we need strict metrics and goals?
Side projects boil down to two types - "for fun" and "for profit (maybe)".
My side projects are like yours; I dabbled for some time with machine learning and AI, despite being under-educated and under-brained. And though my projects never really succeeded I sure did learn a lot, and some of that familiarity helps with (and helped me get) my current job. The rewards were the fun of messing around and trying to understand something, and I didn't need a metric or goal for that.
what I was trying to say is that I think you need to be committed regardless. Even if your only goal as in your case is to learn something like how compilers work and not to make anything finished, I think we'd benefit by having clearer goals (such as now I want to build a small NFA from regex) and also having the commitment to not give up until we have achieved the goal.
I'd agree with this statement completely. Everything I've built that I'm proud of has always been something where I took my time, had a clear vision, drafted out exactly what I wanted and then didn't just take it on as "just a side project" but when needed, forced myself to see it through to the end.
I think he has some really good points about side projects in general. I think we (or at least myself) can tend to view them as things like hey let me build a framework so I know how to do it, without any clear goals in mind (besides the vague one). Then you do it for a while and afterwards maybe you have learned maybe not, maybe you just give up because you never have the time, and then you wasted the 4 hours you spent starting the project. This is more for myself, but I think when I get an idea now or want to make a side project, I'm going to force myself to sit down, spend the half hour and write down a clear set of goals that I want to achieve, and only after this start.