How much time do I spend learning?

Tuesday, March 07, 2017

Hi Sue, Your question the other day got me thinking, just how much time do I spend learning anyway? Well, here’s a breakdown from my most recent task.

What I learned this morning: last 2 mornings:

• How to highlight duplicate rows in Excel using Conditional Formatting (ref)

• How to efficiently and reliably create nested ArcMap Definition Queries (ref)

• Using FreeFileSync in update mode to update website is vastly faster than my old rsync script (5 min vs 20min+), while retaining safeguards against the common mistakes made when doing things manually.

Overall project

Build and post the March edition of the Bison blob map. Best case scenario, when all the parts are lined up it takes about 2 hours from start to finish, sometimes even only 1 hour if everything is clean. Median time is 3 hours. However this edition took 4.5 hours (spread over 2 days).

Activity	Description	Hours	Work	Learning
Discussion	send drafts; let web coordinator know map is up	0.2	0.2	0.0
Researching	Debug and write up solution to creating complex definition queries; publish to GIS Stack Overflow, ENV GIS KB.	1.6	0.3	1.3
Publishing	Upload map to website and create page entry (x2 because of typo). Also created new FreeFileSync config	0.7	0.5	0.2
Data	data scrubbing; document Excel finding duplicates	2.0	1.0	1.0
		4.5	2.0	2.5
		100%	44%	56%

 

What was the “extra” time spent on?

• Learning new solutions to new problems

• Devising improved solutions to existing problems

• Writing up those solutions so that next time they can be “just used”

• Publishing so others can benefit 
  (Including me! It’s not uncommon for me to rediscover my own historical solutions that I’ve forgotten about when searching the web at large.)

• Cleaning the project folder, archiving old files and deleting interim ones

It’s important to note that this map series has evolved over time, and been handled by at least 4 different individuals. Initially it took full time work for several days to create and publish each edition. With each iteration we are refining the process, removing inefficiencies, automating more, and looking for new and better solutions to challenges that are already solved.

The eventual aim is have the map a self-serve process: biologists feed in a spread sheet and get back a map in a few minutes. It’s possible and we’ll get there, but not without time invested learning, inventing and improving.

So a process that used to take ~15 hours is now only 3. We won’t know until next fall if the 2.5 hrs learning investment this week will pay dividends, but personally I think an expectation of pulling the median time down to 2 hours or better is reasonable.

Matt

Hmmm, this reads well to me. I should post on my blog… (but that would be yet one more step away from “working” wouldn’t it? ;-)

Work	You understand what to do,  no need to research or look things up, just push the buttons and get 'er done. (Consulting a quick reference guide or refreshing memory from manual on correct syntax or processing tools order of operations is still in this category. You do know what to do, just not every step and detail.)
Learning	Basically anything not captured by "work". You don't really know what to do. There is probably some basic  hunches and ideas based on past experience, but help on choosing the best path forward would be beneficial. Inventing from scratch from only your own brain will take a long time.