#309 – 约翰·卡马克：毁灭战士、雷神之锤、虚拟现实、人工通用智能、编程、电子游戏与火箭

所以有些想法是关于直接裂变能量转换的，比如裂变碎片转换，也许你可以设计出不需要蒸汽涡轮机等设备的东西，即使最终效率较低。

So there's, like, some of these thoughts around, like, direct fission energy conversion, you know, fission fragment conversion that, you know, maybe you milled something that doesn't require all the steam turbines and everything even if it winds up being less efficient.

这在编程中也很常见，了解如果真正深入研究并推进到极致时能实现什么总是好的，因为有时会出现不连续性。

So that applies a lot in programming where there's always it's always good to know what you could do if you really sat down and took it took it far because sometimes there's discontinuities.

比如在用户反应时间方面。

Like, around user reaction times.

在某些点上，1秒和750毫秒之间的差异并不大。

There are some points where the difference between operating in one second and seven hundred and fifty milliseconds, not that huge.

你会在网页统计数据中看到这点，但对大多数可用性指标影响不大。

You'll see it in web page statistics, but most of the usability stuff, not that great.

但如果降到50毫秒，突然间就会感觉惊艳无比。

But if you get down to fifty milliseconds, then all of a sudden, this just feels amazing.

明白吗？

You know?

这就像你的指令被立即执行，而不是发出命令后还要等待响应。

It's just like doing your bidding instantly rather than you're giving it a command, twiddling your thumbs, waiting for it to respond.

因此有时候确实需要全力以赴突破某些临界点，但在许多工作的价值评估中存在广阔的低效区间，多走那一步往往得不偿失。

So sometimes it's important to really crunch hard to get over some threshold, but there are there are broad basins in the value metric for lots of work where it just doesn't pay to even go that extra mile.

有些工匠就是不愿接受这种理念，这完全值得尊重。

And there are craftsmen that, you know, they just don't wanna buy that, and more power to them.

如果有人坚持说'不'，

You know, if somebody just wants to say, no.

我的骄傲源于我的作品。

I'm going to be my pride is in my work.

我绝不会做出任何未尽全力的东西。

I'm never going to do something that's not as good as I could possibly make it.

我尊重这种态度，有时我自己也是如此，但我更倾向于关注更大的价值图景。

I respect that, and sometimes I am that person, but I try to focus more on the larger value picture.

你需要选择战场，将资源投入到最终能带来最佳用户价值的领域。

And you do pick your battles, and you deploy your resources in the play that's going to give you sort of the best user value in the end.

如果把地球生命进化看作编程过程，效率似乎并非被优化的首要目标。

Well, if you look at the evolution of life on Earth as a kind of programming effort, it's it seems like efficiency isn't the thing that's being optimized for.

就像自然选择虽然效率低下，但它能不断适应，通过这种适应性过程构建出越来越复杂、越来越智能的系统，最终结果相当有趣。

Like, natural selection is very inefficient, but it it kind of adapts, and through the process of adaptations, building more and more complex systems that are more and more intelligent, the final result is kind of pretty interesting.

因此我对JavaScript也持同样看法。

And so I think of JavaScript the same way.

它就像一团巨大的混沌——不适用的东西会自然消亡，对人们有用的东西会自然存活，从而形成一个庞大的开发者社区不断产出代码，有些代码具有粘性，有些则没有。

It's like this giant mess that, you know, things naturally die off if they don't work, and they if they if they're become useful to people, they kinda naturally live, and then you build this community, large community of people that are generating code, and some code is sticky, some is not.

没人真正清楚哪些部分低效高效或存在临界点，比如代码的可靠性如何。你只能运行它，假设它能工作，然后被意外状况打脸，这种过程非常具有进化论的色彩。

And nobody knows the the inefficiencies or the efficiencies or the breaking points, like how reliable this code is, and you kinda just run it, assume it works, and then get unpleasantly surprised, and then that's very kind of the evolutionary process.

这确实是个很好的类比。我们可以延伸出很多观点——在编程的早期阶段，当你只能使用有限字节工作时。

So that's a really good analogy, and we can go a lot of places with that where in the earliest days of programming when you had finite you could count the bytes that you had to work on this.

那些黑客们会为了比别人的乘法运算少用一条指令而绞尽脑力，代码被雕琢得如此完美。

You had all the the kind of hackers playing code golf to be one less instruction than the other person's multiply routine to kind of get through, and and it was so perfectly crafted.

当你完成一个程序时EBE时，那简直就是一件水晶艺术品，因为当时根本没有那么多偷懒的方式。

It was a crystal piece of artwork when you had a program because there just were not that many you couldn't afford to be lazy in different ways.

而在许多方面，我看到这与符号人工智能工作类似——如果你没有资源说‘好吧，我们这里要做数十亿个可编程权重’

And in many ways, I see that as akin to the symbolic AI work where, again, if you did not have the resources to just say, well, we're gonna do billions and billions of programmable weights here.

你必须将其简化为一种符号化且精心设计的形式。

You have to turn it down into something that is symbolic and crafted like that.

但这绝对不是DNA、生命和生物进化的运作方式。

But that's definitely not the way DNA and life and biological evolution and things work.

一方面，我们体内包含的编程代码如此之少，这几乎令人感到谦卑。

I you know, on the one hand, it's it's almost humbling how little programming code is in our bodies.

你知道吗？

You know?

我们拥有几十亿个碱基对，这些数据多年来都能轻松存进一个U盘里。

We've got a couple billion base pairs, and it's like this all fits on a thumb drive for years now.

而我们的大脑甚至只占其中更小的一部分。

And then our brains are even a smaller section of that.

可能只有50兆字节左右。

You've got maybe 50 megabytes.

这可不是像香农极限那样信息密度完美的传输方式。

And this is not like Shannon limit perfectly information dense conveyances here.

这些就像是混乱的代码。

It's like these are messy codes.

你知道吗？

You know?

它们被分解成氨基酸。

They're broken up into amino acids.

其中很多并不执行重要功能，或者以非常笨拙的方式运作。

A lot of them don't do important things, or they do things in very awkward ways.

但这正是一个不断叠加积累的过程。

But it is this process of just accumulation on top of things.

你需要规模，既需要种群规模来推动这个过程。

And you need you need scale, both you need scale for sort of the population for that to work out.

在早期，五六十年代那个计算机的远古时代——甚至七十年代互联网刚兴起时，据说只有18台主机接入。

And in the early days, in the the fifties and sixties, the the kind of ancient era of computers where you could count when they say, like, when the Internet started even in the seventies, there were, like, 18 hosts or something on it.

当时就是这样一个有限的规模，人们仍在竭力优化每个细节。

It was this small finite number, and you were still optimizing everything to be as good as you possibly could be.

但现在有数十亿设备在运行，一切都在不断发展。

But now it's billions and billions of devices and everything going on.

你可以看到这种非常自然的进化过程：尝试许多新事物，许多事物会失败，当风投投资了错误的技术栈导致项目完全失败或无法扩展时，他们就会损失资金。

And you can have this very much natural evolution going on where lots of things are tried, lots of things are blowing up, venture capitalists lose their money when a startup invested in the wrong tech stack and things completely failed or failed to scale.

但要知道，好的成果确实会从中产生。

But, you know, but good things do come out of it.

观察不同事物发生方式的模仿进化很有趣，比如一开始提到的'Hello World'。

And it's interesting to see the the mimetic evolution of the way different things happen, like mentioning hello world at the beginning.

有趣的是像这样的小事——现在每个程序员都知道'Hello World'，而这完全是个随意的决定，源自Unix和C语言的统治地位以及早期的类似例子。

It's funny how some little thing like that where everybody every programmer knows hello world now, and that was a completely arbitrary sort of decision that just came out of the the dominance of Unix and C and early examples of things like that.

所以每天都有数百万次实验在进行，但有些事物确实会脱颖而出，在适应性竞争中获胜——无论是心智空间、编程技术还是其他方面。

So millions of experiments are going on all the time, but some things do kind of rise to the top and win the fitness war for whether whether it's mind space or programming techniques or anything.

比如Stack Exchange上有个叫'Code Golf'的网站，人们用各种语言比赛谁能写出最短的程序来完成特定任务，看到那些精通技艺的大师们挑战编程语言的极限真的很有意思。

Like, there's a site on Stack Exchange called Code Golf where people compete to to write the shortest possible program for a particular task in all the different kinds of languages, and it's really interesting to see folks kind of that are masters of their craft really play with the limits of programming languages.

这景象真的很美。

It's really beautiful to see.

通过所有不同的编程语言，你能看到一些古怪的编程语言和主流语言，比如Python 2和3之间的差异。

And across all the different programming languages, you get to see some of these weird programming languages and mainstream ones, python difference between Python two and three.

你能看到C与C++、Java之间的区别，也能看到JavaScript等等。

You get to see the difference between c and c plus plus and Java, and you get to see JavaScript, all of that.

看到代码高尔夫这类任务揭示出编程语言中蕴含的无限可能性，确实很鼓舞人心。

And it's it's kinda inspiring to see how much depth of possibility there is within programming languages that code golf kind of tasks reveal.

我们大多数人如果从事编程工作，写的都是些相当常规的代码——这是构建大型系统的方式，但很高兴看到这些语言中依然蕴藏着创造性天才的可能性。

Most of us, if you do any kind of programming, you kinda do boring kind of very vanilla type of code, that's the way to build large systems, but it's nice to see that the possibility of creative genius is still within those languages.

这种可能性就蕴藏在那些语言之中。

It's laden within those languages.

既然你再次被公认为史上最伟大的程序员之一，你认为什么造就了一个优秀的程序员？

So given that given that you are once again one of the greatest programmers ever, what do you think makes a good programmer?

或许说，一个优秀的现代程序员。

Maybe a good modern programmer.

我刚在Meta给TPM组织做了场长篇演讲，我最核心的观点是：我们做的一切都应该源于用户价值。

So I just gave a long rant slash lecture at Meta to the TPM organization, and my my biggest point was everything that we're doing really should flow from user value.

要知道，我们做的所有好事，其实我们并非技术人员。

You know, all the good things that we're doing, it's like we're we're not technical people.

就像你不应该仅仅为某个具体事物感到自豪。

It's like you shouldn't be taking pride just in the specific thing.

比如，CodeGolf这类东西是个有趣的解谜游戏，但它真的不应该是你的主要动力。

Like, CodeGolf is the sort of thing it's a fun puzzle game, but that really should not be a major motivator for you.

就像我们在为人们解决问题，或是给他们提供娱乐。

It's like we're solving problems for people or we're providing entertainment to people.

我们正在做的是对人们有价值的事，这会取代他们生活中的其他事物。

We're doing something of value to people that's displacing something else in their life.

所以我们希望提供的净价值超过他们本可以做的事，但他们却选择使用我们的产品。

So we wanna be providing a net value over what they could be doing, but instead they're choosing to use our products.

这就是我的意思，听起来可能老套或俗气，但我从根本上认为这就是让世界变得更美好的方式。

And that's where I mean, it sounds trite or corny, but I fundamentally do think that's how you make the world a better place.

如果你给人们创造的价值超过你和团队付出的成本，那么世界就会变得更美好。

If you have given more value to people than it took you and your team to create, then the world's a better place.

人们从价值较低的事物转向选择使用你们的产品，他们的生活因此变得更美好。

People have they've gone from something of lesser value, chosen to use your product, and their life feels better for that.

如果你们在经济上实现了这一点，那确实是件非常好的事情。

And if you've produced that economically, that's that's a really good thing.

另一方面，如果你们花费了荒谬的金额，就像把大量现金扔进了碎木机，也许你们应该对所做的事情不那么自我感觉良好。

You know, on the other hand, if you spent ridiculous amounts of money, you've just kind of shoveled a lot of cash into a wood chipper there, and you should maybe, you know, not feel so good about what you're doing.

所以对某个具体架构、技术或代码序列感到自豪是可以的——获得一点微笑就像小小的多巴胺刺激——但最高层级的衡量标准应该是你们正在创造有价值的事物。

So being proud about, like, a specific architecture or a specific technology or a specific code sequence that you've done, it's great to get a little smile, like a tiny little dopamine hit for that, but the top level metric should be that you're building things of value.

现在你们可能会陷入关于如何定义用户价值、如何实际量化的争论，这方面可能存在巨大分歧。

Now you can get into the argument about how you you know, what is user value, how do you actually quantify that, and there can be big arguments about that.

但至少很容易就能判断出：

But it's easy to be able to say, okay.

那个愤怒的用户显然没有从你们的产品中获得价值。

This pissed off user there is not getting value from what you're doing.

而那边脸上洋溢着笑容的用户，当某个功能触发时那瞬间的喜悦，就是价值产生的明证。

This user over there with the big smile on their face, I the moment of delight when something happened, there's a value that's happened there.

我是说，你至少得承认用户价值这个概念是存在的。

I mean, if you you have to at least accept that there is a concept of user value.

即便你难以精确量化它，通常也能做出相对比较的论证。

Even if you have trouble exactly quantifying it, you can usually make relative arguments about it.

比如这个方案比那个更好。

Well, this was better than this.

我们已经做出了改进。

We've improved things.

要知道，作为开发者，服务用户就是你的职责所在。

So, you know, being a, you know, being a servant to the user is your job when you're when you're a developer.

开发者。

Developer.

你要创造出对他人有价值的东西。

You You wanna wanna be producing something that, you know, other people are gonna find valuable.

如果你具备技术思维，就要找到正确的杠杆，用最少精力设计出能创造最大价值的方案。

And if you are technically inclined, then finding the right levers to be able to pull, to be able to make a design that's going to produce the most value for the least amount of effort.

And it always has to be, kind of divide there's a ratio there where you it's a problem at the big tech companies, you know, whether it's, you know, MetaGoogle, Apple, Microsoft, Amazon, companies that have almost infinite money.

And it always has to be, kind of divide there's a ratio there where you it's a problem at the big tech companies, you know, whether it's, you know, MetaGoogle, Apple, Microsoft, Amazon, companies that have almost infinite money.

I I mean, I know their CFO will complain that it's not infinite money, but from most developer standpoints, it really does feel like it.

I I mean, I know their CFO will complain that it's not infinite money, but from most developer standpoints, it really does feel like it.

And it's almost counterintuitive that if you're working hard as a developer on something, there's always this thought, if only I had more resources, more people, more RAM, more megahertz, I then my product will be better.

And it's almost counterintuitive that if you're working hard as a developer on something, there's always this thought, if only I had more resources, more people, more RAM, more megahertz, I then my product will be better.

And that sense that at certain points, it's certainly true that if you are really hamstrung by this, removing an obstacle will will make a better product, make more value.

And that sense that at certain points, it's certainly true that if you are really hamstrung by this, removing an obstacle will will make a better product, make more value.

But if you're not making your core design decisions in this fiercely competitive way where you're saying feature a or feature b, you can't just say, let's do both, because then you're not making a value judgment about them.

But if you're not making your core design decisions in this fiercely competitive way where you're saying feature a or feature b, you can't just say, let's do both, because then you're not making a value judgment about them.

You're just saying, well, they both seem good.

You're just saying, well, they both seem good.

I don't wanna necessarily have to pick out which one is better or how much better and tell team b that, sorry, we're not gonna do this because a is more important.

I don't wanna necessarily have to pick out which one is better or how much better and tell team b that, sorry, we're not gonna do this because a is more important.

But that that notion of always having to really critically value what you're doing, your time, the resources you expend, even the opportunity cost of doing something else.

But that that notion of always having to really critically value what you're doing, your time, the resources you expend, even the opportunity cost of doing something else.

要知道，这一点极其重要。

That's, you know, super important.

那么，让我请教你关于如何衡量价值的这些重大讨论。

Well, let me ask you about this the big debates that you're mentioning of how to measure value.

是否有可能用数字化的方式来衡量？还是说可以走乔尼·艾维那种设计师路线——想象某人使用产品时脸上露出微笑，想象使用过程中体验到的爱与喜悦？

Is it possible to measure it kind of numerically, or can you do the sort of Johnny Ive, the designer route of imagining sort of somebody using a thing and imagining a smile on their face, imagining the experience of love and joy that you have when you use the thing.

这是设计视角的考量。如果你开发的是像Linux这样更底层的东西，你会想象可能有开发者遇到并使用它，因此变得更快乐、更高效。

That's from a design perspective, or if you're building more like a low lower level thing for like Linux, you imagine a developer that might come across this and use it and become happy and better off because of it.

那么你如何看待这些不同方式？

So where do you land on those things?

这是可量化的吗？

Is it measurable?

我猜想，像Meta和谷歌这样的公司可能会尝试量化这些指标。

So I imagine, like, Meta and Google will probably try to measure the thing.

他们就像试图优化用户参与度之类的数据。

They'll try to it's like you try to optimize engagement or something.

我们来衡量参与度。

Let's measure engagement.

然后我觉得有种——我是说，我欣赏设计师那种伦理观，比如设想一个无法量化的未来，并努力让那个与今天不同的未来中的某人感到快乐。

And then I think there is a kinda I mean, I I admire the designer ethic of, like, think of a future that's that's immeasurable, and you try to make somebody in that future that's different from today happy.

所以我通常倾向于，如果你能获得任何好的指标，那就一定要倾听数据。

So I do usually favor if you can get any kind of a a metric that's good, by all means, listen to the data.

但你可能在这方面走得太远，我们曾遇到过问题，比如，嘿。

But you can go too far there where we've had problems where it's like, hey.

我们遇到了性能回退问题，因为花哨的新遥测系统正在进行大量文件写入来归档这些数据，因为我们需要收集信息来判断我们的计划是否有效。

We had a performance regression because our fancy new telemetry system is doing a bazillion file rights to kind of archive this stuff because we needed to collect information to determine if we were doing you know, if our plans were good.

所以当信息可用时，绝不应该忽视它。

So when information is available, you should never ignore it.

我是说，所有

I mean, all

使用产品的用户，实际使用产品的人类，大量的人类用户，你可以看到

users using the thing, human beings using the thing, large number of human beings, and you get to see sort of at

所以从零到一的过程中，当你尝试全新事物时，确实需要做出某种程度的猜测。

So there's zero to one problem of when you're doing something really new, you do kind of have to make a guess.

但我在Meta一直强调的一个观点是：我们现在拥有足够多的用户，任何人在VR中想尝试的东西，都会有感兴趣的用户群体。

But one of the points that I've been making at Meta is we have more than enough users now that anything somebody wants to try in VR, we have users that will be interested in that.

你不能凭空提出一个完全未经实践的想法，然后说‘我要这么做，因为我觉得这可能有意思’。

You do not get to make a completely greenfield blue sky pitch and say, I'm going to do this because I think it might be interesting.

我向所有人发起挑战。

I challenge everyone.

无论是通过VR工作替代桌面办公，还是以不同方式与人交流，或是玩游戏，总会有人使用这些技术。

There are going to be people, whether it's, you know, working in VR on your, like, on your desktop replacement or communicating with people in different ways or playing the games.

即使你选择某个我们目前尚未涉足的小众领域，也至少会有成千上万拥有头显设备的用户成为你的目标市场。

There are there are going to be probably millions of people or at least in if you pick some tiny niche that we're not in right now, there's still gonna be thousands of people out there that have the headsets that would be your target market.

我常告诫人们：要关注这些真实用户。

And I tell people, pay attention to them.

不要虚构用户需求。

Don't invent fictional users.

不要为了迎合你设想的市场细分矩阵，虚构出像Alice、Bob、Charlie这样的用户角色。当你拥有真实用户可供合作时，沉迷于假想用户是一种错误。

Don't, you know, make an Alice Bob Charlie that fits whatever matrix of of tendencies that you wanna break the market down to because it's a mistake to think about imaginary users when you've got real users that you could be working with.

但另一方面，为产品保持整体愿景的完整性确实有其价值。

But, you know, on the other hand, there is there is value to having a kind of wholeness of vision for a product.

像Meta这样的公司明白权衡之道，你可以有像SpaceX或史蒂夫·乔布斯时代的苹果这样的企业，那里有一个极具影响力的领导人物，能够进行非常细致的微观管理，直接否决说‘不’。

And companies like Meta have, you know, they understand the trade offs where you can have a company like SpaceX or, you know, Apple in the the Steve Jobs era where you have a very powerful leading personality that, you know, that can micromanage at a very low level and can say it's like, no.

那个手柄需要不同设计，或者那个图标的色调需要调整。

That handle needs to be different or that, that icon needs to change the tint there.

他们显然从中获得了巨大价值。

And they clearly get a lot of value out of it.

同时也有大量员工在离职后讲述关于在那里工作的恐怖经历。

They also burn through a lot of employees that have horror stories to tell about, working there afterwards.

我的观点是，当领导者处于他们能够理解下属所有事务的极限状态，并能对所有情况形成明智见解时，团队才能发挥最佳状态。

My position is that you're at your best when you've got a leader that is at their limit of what they can kind of comprehend of everything below them, and they can have an informed opinion about everything that's going on.

你必须相信，一个拥有三、四十年经验的人，理应具备刚从训练营出来的贡献者所不具备的智慧。

And you take somebody, it's you've gotta believe that somebody that has thirty, forty years of experience, you would hope that they've got wisdom that the the just out of boot camp person, contributing doesn't have.

如果他们表示'那里有问题'

And that if they're like, well, that's wrong there.

你或许不该那样做，或者干脆就别那样做

You probably shouldn't do it that way or or even just don't do it that way.

换种方式来做

Do it another way.

这其中确实有价值，但不能超过某个限度

So there's value there, but it can't go beyond a certain level.

是的

I am yeah.

我是说，我亲历过史蒂夫·乔布斯当着我的面说些技术方面完全错误的话，因为他并不在那个技术层级工作

Mean, I have Steve Jobs stories of him saying things that are just wrong right in front of me about technical things because he was not operating at that level.

但当这种模式奏效时，当你遇到那种全身心投入产品、真正在意每个细节的激情型领导者时，我认为这具有巨大价值

But when it does work and you do get that kind of passionate leader that's thinking about the entire product and just really deeply cares about not letting anything slip through the cracks, I think that's got a lot of value.

但另一方面，也有人主张要建立能自主提出创意的独立团队——这几乎像是反资本主义或反自由市场的观点，他们质疑为何要让伟大领袖来独断专行，毕竟自由市场确实能产生意想不到的成果

But the other side of that is the people saying that, well, we wanna have these independent teams that are bubbling up the ideas because and, like, it's it's almost it's anti capitalist or anti free market to say it's like, want my grand you know, my great leader to go ahead and dictate all these points there where clearly free markets bring up things that, you know, you don't expect.

比如在VR领域，我们见证了许多现象。

Like, in VR, we we saw a bunch of things.

早期人们认为会成为关键应用的领域，结果完全不是那样。而那些可能被决策委员会否决的内容，在某些情况下却取得了巨大成功。

Like, it didn't turn out at all the way the early people thought were gonna be the key applications and things that, you know, would not have been approved by, you know, the the dark cabal making the decisions about what gets into the store turned out to, in some cases, be extremely successful.

所以，确实有段时间我确实提出了一个建议。

So, yeah, I definitely kinda wanted to be there was a point where I did make a pitch.

就是，嘿，

It's like, hey.

让我当VR领域的独裁者，我会把事情搞定。

Make me VR dictator, and I'll go in and get shit done.

但Meta的企业文化不允许这样。

I am and that's just it's not in the culture at Meta.

你懂我的意思吧？

You know?

而且他们明白其中的利弊权衡。

And they they understand the trade offs.

他们和我...这根本不是他们想要的公司模式，也不是他们团队希望运作的方式。

They I and that's just not the way that's not the company that they want, the team that they that they wanna do.

这很耐人寻味，因为VR——我们稍后会深入讨论——对我来说，VR将以何种方式改变世界仍不明确。

It's fascinating because VR, and we'll talk about it more, it's still it's still unclear to me in what way VR will change the world.

因为VR显然将以某种方式从根本上改变这个世界，但具体如何改变尚不明确。

Because it does seem clear that VR will somehow fundamentally transform this world, and it's unclear to me how.

嗯。

Yeah.

对。

Yeah.

而且...

And it's

等你想讨论这个话题时随时告诉我。话题切换。

Let me know when you wanna get into that.

等等，稍等一下。

Well, hold on a second.

嗯。

Yeah.

所以坚持做史上最优秀的程序员。

So in the stick to the the you being the best programmer ever.

好的。

Okay.

早期的时候，你还没有承担带领团队这类成人责任，可以只专注于编程。

In the early days, when you didn't have when when you didn't have adult responsibilities of leading teams and all that kind of stuff, and you can focus on just being a programmer.

约翰·卡马克的高效一天是怎样的？

What did the productive day in the life of John Carmack look like?

敲键盘多少小时？

How many hours is the keyboard?

睡多久？

How much sleep?

大脑运转的能量来源是什么？

What was the source of calories that fueled the brain?

那是什么感觉？

What was it like?

你几点起床的？

What time did you wake up?

在很长一段时间里，我都能保持非常稳定的良好工作状态。

So I was able to be remarkably consistent about what was good working conditions for me for a very long time.

我从来不是那种会通宵工作20小时不间断的程序员。

I was never one of the programmers that I that would do all nighters going through work for twenty hours straight.

通常12小时后我的大脑就开始变得迟钝。

It's like my brain generally starts turning to mush after twelve hours or so.

但努力工作确实很重要，几十年来我一直如此。

But the hard work is really important, and I would work for for decades.

我每周工作60小时。

I would work sixty hours a week.

我每天工作10小时，每周6天，并努力保持高效。

I would work a ten hour day, six days a week, and try to be productive at that.

在我年轻时，没有孩子和其他责任的时候，我的日程安排相当灵活。

Now my schedule shifted around a fair amount when I was young without any kids and any other responsibilities.

我当时采用了一种循环作息，每天大约晚一小时起床，全天候轮转。有时下午两三点才到办公室，然后工作到凌晨或半夜两三点。

I was on one of those cycling schedules where I'd kind of get in an hour later each day and roll around through the entire time, and I'd wind up kind of pulling in at two or three in the afternoon sometimes and then working again past, you know, midnight or two in the morning.

那时只有我一个人在努力推进项目，通常独自待在办公室里。

And that was when it was just me trying to make things happen, I am and I was usually isolated off in my office.

基本上没什么人会打扰我，这样我能完成大量编程工作。

People generally didn't bother me much at in, and I could get a lot of programming work done that way.

后来要送孩子上学之类的事情，我就调整成了更规律的作息。

I did settle into a more normal schedule when I was taking kids to school and things like that.

所以孩子是迫使你每天固定时间起床的关键因素？

So kids were the forcing function that got you to wake up at the same at the same time

我清楚意识到这种作息对工作效率影响不大。如果随性起床，通常每天都会比前一天稍晚些。

each clear to me that there was much of a difference in the productivity with I with that where I kind of feel if I just get up when I feel like it, it's usually a little later each day.

但最近我决定尝试把作息往前调，改成早上八点起床，重新安排日程。

But I just recently made the focusing decision to try to push my schedule back a little bit earlier to getting up at eight in the morning and trying to to shift things around.

比如，我经常在自己身上做实验，研究该怎么做才能更高效。

Like, I'm I'm often doing experiments with myself about what should I be doing to to be more productive.

最近几个月我意识到的一件事是，我经常会去散步或跑步。

And one of the things that I did realize was happening in recent months where I would I would go for a walk or a run.

我每天大约走四英里，通常是在太阳下山时进行，现在德州的天气依然非常炎热。

I I cover, like, four miles a day, and and I would usually do that just as the sun's going down at here in Texas now, and it's still really damn hot.

我会在八点半左右出门，完成运动后洗澡，但这给我的白天留下了一个时间缺口，之后我还有几个小时，有时晚上没人打扰时反而是我效率最高的时候。

But I'd go out at 08:30 or something and cover the time there and then the showering, and it was putting a hole in my day where I would have still a couple hours after that, and sometimes my best hours were at night when nobody else is around, nobody's bothering me.

但这个白天的缺口是个问题，所以就在几周前，我决定做出改变：

But that hole in the day was a problem, so just a couple weeks ago, I made the the change to go ahead and say, alright.

我要稍微早起一点。

I'm gonna get up a little earlier.

我要先完成散步或外出活动，这样就能获得更多不被打断的时间。

I'm gonna do walk or get out there first so I can have more uninterrupted time.

所以我仍在调整这类因素，以优化我的工作效率。

So I'm still playing with factors like this as I kind of optimize my my work efforts.

但你知道，长期以来每周工作60小时是常态。

But it's always been you know, it was sixty hours a week for a very long time.

某种程度上，我心底里其实有点羡慕那些能进行马拉松式编程的程序员。

To some degree, I had a little thing in the back of my head where I was almost jealous of some of the programmers that would do these marathon sessions.

比如戴夫·泰勒就是其中一个典型代表。

And and I had, like, Dave Taylor, one of the guys that he had.

他就是那种会睡在办公桌底下的人，完全符合人们对黑客的刻板印象。

He would be one of those people that would fall asleep under his desk sometimes and all the the kind of classic hacker tropes about things.

而我内心总有点困扰，因为我做不到那样——我无法连续编程20小时，12小时后我就效率低下了。

And a part of me was, like, always a little bothered that that wasn't me, that I I wouldn't go program twenty hours straight because I'm just I'm falling apart and not being very effective after twelve hours.

12小时编程当然没问题，但之后基本就做不出什么聪明的工作了，至少我是这样。

I mean, yeah, twelve hour programming, that's fine when you're doing that, but it never you're not doing smart work much after at least I'm not.

但人的类型各不相同。

But there's a range of people.

很多人骨子里不明白这点：有人每天睡4小时依然思维敏捷，也有人稍微熬夜就完全崩溃。

I mean, that's something that a lot of people don't really get in their gut, where there are people that work on four hours of sleep and are smart and can continue to do good work, but then there's a lot of people that just fall apart.

所以我确实告诉人们，我总是尽量保证八小时睡眠。

So I do tell people that I always try to get eight hours of sleep.

这并不是说要逼自己更努力、起得更早，那样我只会做得更糟。其实只要合理安排优先级，每周工作一百小时的同时仍能保证八小时睡眠。

It's not this, you know, push yourself harder, get up earlier, I just do worse work, where, you know, there's you can work a hundred hours a week and still get eight hours of sleep if you just kind of prioritize things correctly.

但我确实相信要努力工作，多干活。

But I do believe in working hard, working a lot.

我记得有位游戏开发者说过，现在很多人对高强度工作有抵触情绪，我经常为此在网上争论。

I'm there was a comment that game dev made that that I know there's a backlash against really hard work in a lot of cases, and I get into online arguments about this all the time.

他基本意思是：每周四十小时？那简直像兼职工作。

But he was basically saying, yeah, forty hours a week, that's kind of a part time job.

如果你真正投入其中，做自己认为重要且热爱的事，多干就能多出成果。

And if you are really in it, you're doing what you think is important, what you're passionate about, working more gets more done.

当你见识过那种高强度工作的人后，真的很难反驳这种观点——就像，不，

And I it's just really not possible to argue with that if you've been around the people that that work with that level of intensity and just say, it's like, no.

他们真该停下来了。

They should just stop.

我几年前就重新思考过这个问题，当时我用了一个虚构的例子来说明

And we had I kinda came back around to that a couple years ago where I was using the fictional example of, alright.

有些人会一本正经地说，他们认为

Some people say they'll say with a straight face, they think, no.

如果你每周工作超过40小时，你的效率会降低

You you are less productive if you work more than forty hours a week.

他们通常误解了这一点：你工作8小时后每小时的边际产出可能低于峰值时段，但并不意味着你实际完成的工作量减少了

And they're generally misinterpreting things where your your marginal productivity for an hour after eight hours is less than in one of your peak hours, but you're not literally getting less done.

确实存在一个临界点，超过后你会开始出错、表现越来越差，甚至适得其反，但这个临界点绝不是8小时、10小时或12小时

There is a point where you start breaking things and getting worse worse behavior and everything out of it where you're literally going backwards, but it's not at eight or ten or twelve hours.

我用的虚构例子是：想象有一颗小行星即将撞击地球，毁灭全人类

And the fictional example I would use was, imagine there's an asteroid coming to impact you know, to to crash into Earth, destroy all of human life.

你希望埃隆·马斯克和SpaceX团队——那些正在建造拦截器来偏转小行星的人

I do you want Elon Musk or the people working at SpaceX that are building the interceptor that's going to, to deflect the asteroid?

你希望他们五点准时下班吗？

Do you want them to clock out at five?

因为，该死的，他们再工作几个小时只会做出更差的成果。

Because, damn it, they're just gonna go do worse work if they work another couple hours.

而且，你知道的，这看起来很荒谬。

And, you know, it seems absurd.

不过那只是个假设，大家都可以不以为然。

And that's a hypothetical, though, and everyone can dismiss that.

但当新冠疫情来袭时，所有医护人员显然都在拼命工作，我就觉得，好吧。

But then when coronavirus was hitting and you have all of these medical personnel that are clearly pushing themselves really, really hard, and I'd say it's like, okay.

你希望这些科学家研发治疗方法和疫苗、救治所有患者吗？

Do you want all of these scientists working on treatments and vaccines and caring for all of these people?

他们每天工作超过八小时真的会把事情搞砸吗？

Are they really screwing everything up by working more than eight hours a day?

当然，人们会说我是个混蛋才会说这种话，但你知道，这就是事实。

And, of course, people say I'm just an asshole to say something like that, but it's I you know, it's the truth.

工作时间越长，完成的事情就越多。

Working longer gets more done.

嗯，这算是第一层。

Well, so that's kind of the layer one.

但我也想补充一点，至少我认为，根据个人和任务的不同，在那些高峰时段投入更多更努力的工作会让你接下来的一周表现更好。

But I'd like to also say that, at least I believe, depending on the person, depending on the task, working more and harder will make you better for the for the next week in those peak hours.

对某件事的深度投入会让你对其产生某种深刻的理解。

So there's something about a deep dedication to a thing that kinda gets deep in you.

所以，努力工作不仅仅关乎当下产出的工时，更在于它对你未来数周乃至数月产生的影响。

So it's it's the the hard work isn't just about the raw hours of productivity, productivity, it's it's the the it's the thing it does to you in the in the weeks and months after too.

你在某些方面正在磨练自己。

You're tempering yourself in some ways.

而且我觉得，这就像《寿司之神》里演的那样。

And I think, you know, it's like Jiro dreams of sushi.

如果你真的全身心投入制作寿司，日复一日地长时间工作，你就会成为你所做之事的真正匠人。

If you really dedicate yourself completely to making the sushi, like, to to really putting in the long hours day after day after day, you become a true craftsman of the thing you're doing.

当然，现在存在一些讨论：你是否牺牲了很多个人关系？

Now there's, of course, discussions about are you sacrificing a lot of personal relationships?

你是否牺牲了在那段时间里本可以做的许多其他事情？

Are you sacrificing a lot of other possible things you could do with that time?

但如果你纯粹谈论成为某项艺术的大师或工匠，那么投入更多时间不仅仅是为了做更多事。

But if you're talking about purely being a master or a craftsman of your art, that more hours isn't just about doing more.

而是为了在你所做的事情上变得更好。

It's about becoming better at the thing you're doing.

是的。

Yeah.

我也不会反驳那些只想做最低限度工作的人。

And I don't gainsay anybody that wants to work the minimum amount.

他们生活中有其他优先事项。

They've got other priorities in their life.

我要表达的唯一观点并不是每个人都应该努力工作。

My only argument that I'm making, it's not that everybody should work hard.

而是如果你想成就某事，更长时间、更努力地工作就是实现它的途径。

It's that if you want to accomplish something, working longer and harder is the path to getting it accomplished.

那么，让我问问你这个问题。

Well, let me ask you about this then.

那个传说中的工作与生活平衡。

The the mythical work life balance.

对于工程师来说，这似乎是程序员这类职业中的一个特点——努力工作确实能提高生产力，但同时也引发了关于个人关系、家庭这类事情的疑问，你是如何找到工作与生活平衡的？

Is for an engineer, it seems like that's one of the professions in the for for a programmer where working hard does lead to greater productivity in it, but it also raises the question of sort of personal relationships and all that kind of stuff, family, and how are you able to find work life balance?

你有什么建议可以提供，也许能分享一些你个人经验之外的见解？

Is there advice you can give, maybe even outside of yourself?

在你多年的生活经历中，是否在这方面获得了一些智慧？

Have you been able to arrive at any wisdom on this part in your years of life?

我确实认为不同的人有不同的需求，这因人而异。

I do think that there's a wide range of people where different people have different needs.

这不是一个放之四海而皆准的方法。

It's not a one size fits all.

我当然适合我自己的方式。

I am certainly what works for me.

我可以明确地说，我与普通人在很多方面不同——事物对我的影响、我想做的事、我的目标都不同，甚至影响事物的杠杆也不同。比如，我从未感受过倦怠，而我知道许多做出世界领先成果的聪明人却会感到倦怠，这种情况从未发生在我身上。

I I can tell enough that I'm, you know, I'm different than a typical average person in the way things impact me, things that I wanna do, my goals are different, and sort of the the levers to impact things are different, where, you know, I have literally never felt burnout, and I know there's lots of brilliant, smart people that that do world leading work that get burned out, and it's never hit me.

我从未有过那种‘我根本不在乎这个’的时刻。

You know, I've never been at a point where I'm like, I'm I just don't care about this.

我从未产生过‘不想再继续做这个’的念头。

I don't wanna do this anymore.

但我始终拥有从事多种有趣工作的灵活性。

But I've always had the flexibility to work on lots of interesting things.

要知道，我总是可以把注意力转向其他事情，并乐在其中地投入工作。

You know, I can always just turn my gaze to something else and have a great time working on that.

实际上，努力工作的能力很大程度上在于能够有多样选择，并将时间用在最合适的事情上。

And so much of that so much of the ability to actually work hard is the ability to have multiple things to choose from and to use use your time on the most appropriate thing.

比如，有些时间段对我来说最适合研读需要深入思考的新研究论文。

Like, there are there are time periods where I am it's the best time for me to read a new research paper that I need to really be thinking, you know, hard about it.

也有些时候我可能应该只是快速浏览整理旧笔记，因为你知道，我状态并不在线。

Then there's a time that maybe I should just scan and organize my old notes because my you know, I'm just not on top of things.

然后有时候，好吧。

Then there's the time that, alright.

来吧，快速敲出几百行代码。

Let's go, you bang out a few 100 lines of code for something.

所以能在这些状态间切换真的很有价值。

So switching between them has been real valuable.

看来你对你做的所有事都心怀喜悦，这本身就是一种工作与生活的平衡，作为第一步。

So you always have kind of joy in your heart for all the things you're doing, and that that is a kind of work life balance as a first sort of step.

是啊。

Yeah.

确实如此。

I do.

所以你总是很快乐。

So you're always happy.

确实。

I do.

我

I

是啊。

yeah.

而且保持快乐。

And while Happy.

对。

Yeah.

我是说，就像很多人会说我看起来总像个严肃的人，你知道的，就那样面无表情地坐着，甚至皱着眉头、板着脸盯着什么东西看。

I mean, that's like I a lot of people would say that often I look like kind of a grim person, you know, with just sitting there with a a neutral expression or even, like, knitted brows and a frown on my face as I'm staring at something.

这就是你快乐时的样子。

That's what happiness looks like for you.

没错。

Yeah.

某种程度上确实如此，好吧。

It's it's kinda true where that that it's like, okay.

我正在挺过这个阶段。

I'm pushing through this.

我在这里取得了进展。

I'm making progress here.

你知道，我明白这并不适用于所有人。

I am you know, we I know that doesn't work for everyone.

我知道这对大多数人都不适用。

I know it doesn't work for most people.

但在这些情况下，我一直试图做到的是：我不想让可能是这类人的人被别人告知'不'。

But what I am always trying to do in those cases is I don't wanna let somebody that might be a person like that be told by someone else that, no.

甚至不要尝试将其作为一种选择——你知道，工作与生活的平衡与你毕生事业之间的选择，其实有一小部分人可以通过对事物保持痴迷而获得极大满足。

Don't try don't even try that out as an option where I you know, work life balance versus kind of your life's work, where there's a small subset of the people that can be very happy being obsessive about things.

而且，痴迷往往能完成那些仅仅靠务实、谨慎、平庸的工作所无法完成的事，至少短期内无法完成。

And, you know, obsession can often get things done that just practical, prudent pedestrian work won't, or at least won't for a very long time.

关于你早期营养摄入的传说可不少。

There's legends of your nutritional intake in the early days.

关于作为一个程序员，某种程度上像运动员，你有什么想说的？

What what can you say about sort of as a you know, being a programmer as a kind of athlete.

嗯。

Mhmm.

那么，当时支撑你的营养来源是什么？

So what what what was the nutrition that fueled?

说实话，我在这方面一直不太讲究，我吃得不多也就勉强过得去。

So I have never been that great on I on really paying attention to it where I'm good enough that I I don't eat a lot.

你知道，我从来不是那种大块头，但有趣的是，我记得自己是个不快乐的青少年，没什么钱，而让我烦恼的事情之一就是不能随心所欲地买披萨吃。

You know, I've never been, like, a big heavy guy, but it was interesting where one of the things that I can remember being an unhappy teenager, not having enough money, and, like, one of the things that bothered me about not having enough money is I couldn't buy pizza whenever I wanted to.

是啊。

Yeah.

所以我后来有钱了，就买了好多好多披萨。

So I got rich, and then I bought a whole lot of pizza.

这就是定义啊，所谓富有就是这种感觉

That was defining like, that's what being rich felt like

是很多小事情。

is A lot of little things.

比如，我可以买所有想买的披萨、漫画书和电子游戏。

Like, I could buy all the pizza and comic books and video games that that I wanted to.

其实并不需要太多钱，但披萨确实是其中之一。

And it really didn't take that much, but the pizza was one of those things.

而且很长一段时间里，软件确实如此。

And it's absolutely true that for a long time, it did software.

我每天都订一份披萨外卖。

I had a pizza delivered every single day.

你知道，送餐员都认识我了，多年后我才发现，显然因为我是优质客户，他们一直没给我涨价。

You know, the delivery guy knew me by name, and I didn't find out until years later that apparently I was such a good customer that they just never raised the price on me.

我用了六年前的旧价格订披萨，他们还是每天给我送。

And I was using this six year old price for the pizzas that they were still kind of sending my way every day.

所以你那时一天只吃一顿？

So you were doing eating once a day?

或者你是

Or or were you

其实是分散开的

It would be spread out.

你知道的，吃几片披萨

You know, you have a few pieces of pizza.

晚些时候再吃些，可能家里还有些吃的

You have some more later on, and I'd maybe have something at home.

这是Facebook（现Meta）的一个好处，他们确实把员工喂得不错

It was one of the nice things that Facebook meta is they do they feed you quite well.

现在可能是DoorDash这类外卖了，但他们确保每个人都吃得很好

You get a different I guess, now it's DoorDash sorts of things delivered, but they take care of making sure that everybody does get well fed.

我在Meta办公室工作的那六年，可能吃得比以前更好

And I probably had better food the those six years that I was working in the Meta office there than I used to before.

不过对我来说还算顺利

But I've it's worked out okay for me.

我的身体一直很健康。

My health has always been good.

我平时运动量相当充足，而且饮食有度，尽量避免那些对身体不太好的东西。

I I get a a pretty good amount of exercise, and and I don't eat to excess, and I avoid a lot of other kind of not so good for you things.

所以在我这个年纪，状态依然保持得不错。

So I'm still doing quite well at my age.

你是否曾有过某种...我不知道该怎么说...与食物或咖啡相关的精神体验？

Did you have a kind of, I don't know, spiritual experience with food or coffee or any of that kind of stuff?

我是说，就像编程时用音乐营造氛围那样——比如我会听着棕色噪声编程，或是通过营造环境氛围，包括摄入体内的东西，所有这些构建行为都能成为一种仪式，赋能整个编程过程。

I mean, you know, the programming experience, you know, with music and or or like, I listen to brown noise in a program, or like creating an environment and the things you take into your body, just everything you construct can become a kind of ritual that empowers the whole process of the program.

你和披萨之间有过这种关系吗？

Did you have that relationship with pizza?

还是说

Or

真要算的话应该是健怡可乐。

It would really be with Diet Coke.

我是说，现在依然有那种感觉，你知道的，放下罐子，打开一罐健怡可乐。

Mean, there still is that sense of, you know, drop the can down, crack open the can of Diet Coke.

好的。

Alright.

现在我认真了。

Now I mean business.

我们要开始干活了。

We're getting to work here.

直到现在依然如此。

Still, to this day Yeah.

健怡可乐现在还是

Is Diet Coke is still part

可能每天八到九罐。

of the Probably eight or nine a day.

不错。

Nice.

好的。

Okay.

你的设备配置怎么样？

What about your setup?

有几个屏幕？

How many screens?

用的是什么键盘？

What kind of keyboard?

有什么特别的东西吗？

Is there something interesting?

用的是什么IDE？

What kind of I IDE?

Emacs、VIM还是现代编辑器？

Emacs, VIM, or something modern?

Linux系统吗，还是其他操作系统，笔记本，或者任何让你开心的工作设备？

Linux, what, operating system, laptop, or any any interesting thing that brings you joy?

所以我在某种程度上经历了文化迁移，早期在整个游戏开发领域存在一种独特的文化，与硅谷的风险投资文化截然不同，你懂的。

So I kind of migrated cultures where early on through all of game dev, there was sort of one culture there, which was really quite distinct from the more Silicon Valley venture, you know Right.

为事物而生的文化。

Culture for things.

它们是不同的群体，思维方式有着显著差异——至今我仍认为许多大公司可以从硬核游戏开发领域学到东西。最让我震惊的是，那些手握数十亿资金的硅谷风投支持的公司，对调试器和集成开发环境竟如此排斥。

It's they're different groups, and they have pretty different mores in the way they think about things where and I still do think a lot of the big companies can learn can learn things from the the hardcore game development side of things where it still boggles my mind how I am how hostile to debuggers and IDEs that so much of them, the kind of big money get billions of dollars Silicon Valley venture backed funds are.

哦，这很有趣。

Oh, that's interesting.

抱歉打断。

Sorry.

你是说像谷歌和Meta这样的大公司对...

So you're saying, like like, big companies like Google and Meta are hostile to

他们不太推崇调试器和IDE。

They are not big on debuggers and IDEs.

比如很多工作都用Emacs、VIM这类工具完成，而且我们默认调试器在大多数系统上根本不管用。

Like, so much of it is like Emacs, BIM for things, and we just assume that debuggers don't work most of the time for the systems.

这种观念很大程度上源于对Linux的偏见，我个人的成长经历是从个人电脑开始，然后是DOS系统，最后是Windows系统。

And a lot of this comes from a sort of Linux bias on a lot of things where I did come up through the the personal computers and then the DOS and then I am, you know, Windows.

那时候用的是Borland工具，后来转到了Visual Studio。

And it was Borland tools and then Visual Studio.

而且

And

你喜欢用调试器吗？

Do you appreciate the buggers?

非常喜欢。

Very much so.

我的意思是，调试器能让你深入了解那些过于复杂的系统。

I mean, a debugger is how you get a view into a system that's too complicated to understand.

如果有人觉得只要读代码就能理解系统，这种想法简直荒谬——在大型系统里你连完整读一遍代码都做不到。

I mean, anybody that thinks just read the code and think about it, that's an insane statement in the you can't even read all the code on a big system.

你必须通过实验来理解系统。

You have to do experiments on the system.

通过添加日志语句、重新编译和重新运行来进行调试，这种方式效率极其低下。

And doing that by adding log statements, recompiling, and rerunning it is an incredibly inefficient way of doing it.

我的意思是，是的，你总能完成任务，即使你用的是石器时代的工具。

I mean, yes, you can always get things done even if you're working with stone knives and, you know, and bearskins.

这正是优秀程序员的标志——无论用什么工具，你都能找到方法解决问题。

That's that is the mark of a good programmer is that given any tools, you will figure out a way to get it done.

但当你拥有更好的工具时，效果会令人惊叹。比如不用经历反复编译、运行、调试的循环，而是像Lisp那样拥有REPL环境，可以交互式地完成惊人的工作。

But it's amazing what you can do with sometimes much, much better tools where instead of just going through this iterative compile, run, debug cycle, you have the you have the old Lisp direction of, like, you've got a REPL, and you're working interactively and doing amazing things there.

不过在很多情况下，调试器拥有非常强大的用户界面，可以暂停程序、检查所有变量、设置各种断点。

But in many cases, a debugger has a very powerful user interface that can stop, examine all the different things in your program, set all of these different breakpoints.

当然，你也可以用GDB之类的工具实现这些，但这涉及用户界面的基本原则：当操作过于复杂时，人们就不会经常使用它。

And, of course, you can do that with GDB or whatever there, but this is one of the user interface fundamental principles where when something is complicated to do, you won't use it very often.

有些人只有在黔驴技穷时才会启用GDB，通常是在某个问题上耗费了大量时间之后。

There's people that will break out GDB when they're at their wit's end, and they just have beat their head against a problem for so long.

但对于游戏开发出身的人来说，他们甚至在发现问题之前就会习惯性地使用调试器，随时停下来查看运行状态。

But for somebody that kinda grew up in game dev, it's like they were running into the debugger anyways before they even knew there was a problem, and you would just stop and see, you know, what was happening.

有时候你甚至能在完成一次编译周期前就修复问题。

And sometimes you could fix things even before you, you know, even before you did one compile cycle.

你可以在调试器里直接说：'好吧，我就在这里改一下'。

You could be in the debugger, and you would say, well, I'm just going to change this right here.

然后，没错，这样就解决问题了，可以继续了。

And, yep, that did the job and fix it and go on.

对于不了解的人来说，GDB是一种流行的Linux调试器，主要用于C++吗？

And for people who don't know, GDB is a sort of popular, I guess, Linux debugger primarily for c plus plus?

它能处理大多数语言，但你知道，它基于C语言，继承了Unix的传统。

They they handle most of the languages, but it's, you know, it's based on c as the the original kind of Unix heritage.

它有点像命令行工具，不够用户友好，不能提供清晰的可视化效果，你说得完全正确。

And it's kinda like command line, it's not user friendly, it's not it doesn't allow for clean visualizations, and you're you're exactly right.

所以你通常是在束手无策时才会用这种调试器，遇到通过看代码无法解决的问题时才不得不使用它。

So you're using this kind of debugger usually when you're at wit's end and there's a problem that you can't figure out why by just looking at the codes, you have to find it.

我想这就是普通程序员使用它的方式。

That's how, I guess, normal programmers use it.

但你说应该有工具能可视化并辅助编程过程，作为常规编程流程的一部分，帮助更深入地理解代码。

But you're saying there should be tools that kind of visualize and help you as part of the programming process, just a normal programming process to to deep understand the code deeper.

是的。

Yeah.

当我处理C/C++代码时，我总是通过调试器运行它。

When I'm working on, like, my c c plus plus code, I'm always running it from the debugger.

你知道，我输入代码后。

You know, just I type in the code.

我就会运行它。

I I run it.

很多时候，我写完代码后的第一件事就是设置断点并逐步执行函数。

Many times, the first thing I do after writing code is set a breakpoint and step through the function.

其他人可能会说他们在大脑里完成这个过程。

Now other people will say it's like, I do that in my head.

但人脑对这些东西的解释容易出错，而我写的是全新的代码。

Well, your head is a faulty interpreter of all those things there, and I've written brand new code.

我想逐步执行代码，单步调试，检查各种变量，看看它是否真的按照我的预期运行。

I wanna step in there, and I'm gonna single step through that, examine lots of things, and see if it's actually doing what I expected it to.

调试器确实像一种伙伴。

It it is a kind of companion, the debugger.

就像你现在是在与另一个存在进行交互式编程。

Like, it you're you're now coding in an interactive way with another being.

调试器虽然有点笨拙，但非常可靠。

The debugger is a kind of dumb being, but it's a reliable being.

这是个有趣的问题：AI在编解码器和生成代码这类能力中扮演什么角色，可能会出现能以深刻有趣的方式理解代码并与你协作的工具。

It's that is an interesting question of what role does AI play in that kind of with codecs and this kind of ability to generate code that might might be you might start having tools that understand the code in interesting deep ways that can work with you.

我是说，这里有一整个光谱，从静态代码分析器到各种动态工具，再到理论上能理解那些人类根本无法理解的程序的AI。

I mean, there's there's a whole spectrum there from static code analyzers and various kind of dynamic tools there up to AI that can conceivably grok these programs that no literally no human can understand.

它们虽然庞大、错综复杂且相互关联，但并非超出理解范围。

They're they're too big, too intertwined, and too interconnected, but it's not beyond the possibility of understanding.

这已经超出了我们在处理问题时，头脑中能保持的那种可变状态的范围。

It's just beyond what we can hold in our heads as kind of mutable state while we're working on things.

而且我再次强调，我是静态分析器等工具的大力支持者，尽管有些人讨厌被程序指摘他们的代码写法，觉得'我比程序更懂'。

And and I'm a big proponent, again, of things like static analyzers and some of that stuff where you'll find some people that don't like being scolded by a program for how they've written something where it's like, oh, I know better.

有时确实如此，但对我来说这是非常非常宝贵的经历，而且不是很多人能获得这样的机会。

And sometimes you do, but that was something that I was it was very, very valuable for me when and not too many people get an opportunity like this to have.

这几乎是程序员的一种精神体验，对id软件代码库的觉醒——那可是数百万行代码。

This is almost one of those spiritual experiences as a programmer, an awakening to the id software code bases were a couple million lines of code.

我曾用过几种不同的分析工具，但我特意彻底梳理了整个代码库，用尽我能找到的所有工具。

And at one point, I had used a few of the different analysis tools, but I made a point to really go through and scrub the code base using every tool that I could find.

结果令人大开眼界。我们以拥有最健壮、最强固的代码著称，我记得微软曾告诉我们Xbox崩溃数据，我们的故障率极低，他们甚至说那些可能是真正的硬件错误。

And it was eye opening where we had a reputation for having some of the the most robust, strongest code, you know, where there were some, you know, great things that I remember hearing from Microsoft telling us about crashes on Xbox, and we had this tiny number that they said were were probably literally hardware errors.

而其他重要作品的故障记录则高达数百万条。

And then you have other significant titles that just have millions of faults that are getting recorded all the time.

因此在很多层面上，我为我们的代码感到自豪。

So I was proud of our code on a lot of levels.

但当我用这些代码分析工具彻底检查时，里面的错误数量令人震惊——有些你甚至可以说'好吧...'。

But when I took this code analysis squeegee through everything, it was it was shocking how many errors there were in there, things that you could say, okay.

这是复制粘贴时未修改的内容，还有很多类似情况，最常见的问题是printf格式字符串中数据类型错误，这可能导致崩溃，而你知道，这类问题确实需要警告提示。

This was this was a copy paste, not changing something right here, lots of things that were know, the most the most common problem was something in a a printf format string that was the wrong data type that could cause crashes there, and, you know, you really want the warnings for things like that.

其次是缺少对可能发生的空指针检查，这可能导致严重问题。

And the next most common was missing a check for null that could actually happen that could blow things up.

这些都是C/C++中最典型的问题。

And those are obviously, like, top C, C plus plus things.

每个程序员都会遇到这类问题。

Everybody has those problems.

但那些可能出问题的各种小细节的长尾效应，包括我们优秀程序员自己写的代码——

But the long tail of all of the different little things that could go wrong there and we had good programmers in my own code.

我不是在挑剔别人的代码。

It's not that I'd be looking at.

就像'哦，这段代码是我写的。'

It's like, oh, I wrote that code.

那明显有问题。

That's definitely wrong.

我们已经使用这个一年了，它就像一艘潜艇，你知道的，就像一颗地雷埋在那里等着我们踩上去。

We've been using this for a year, and it's this submarine you know, this mine sitting there waiting for us to step on.

这让人感到谦卑。

And it was humbling.

我最终得出结论：任何在语法上被允许的语言特性，只要代码库足够大，最终都会出现。

It was and I reached the conclusion that anything that can be syntactically allowed in your language, if I'm it's gonna show up eventually in a large enough code base.

光有良好的意图并不能阻止这种情况发生。

I you're not gonna good intentions aren't going to keep it from happening.

你需要自动化工具和防护措施来处理这些事情。

You need automated tools and guardrails for things.

这些措施始于静态类型检查，甚至包括动态语言中的类型提示。

And those start with things like static types and or or even type hints in the more dynamic languages.

但那些反对的人会说，这样做会拖慢我的开发速度。

But the people that rebel against that that basically say, that slows me down doing that.

这种说法确实有一定道理。

There's something to that.

我理解这一点。

I get that.

你知道，我也曾在笔记本上东拼西凑地写过代码。

I've written you know, I've cobbled things together in a notebook.

我当时就想，哇。

I I'm like, wow.

能这样直接运行出来真是太棒了。

This is great that it just happened.

不过，是啊，这有点不靠谱，但它运行得挺好。

But, yeah, that's kinda sketchy, but it's working fine.

我不在乎。

I don't care.

这确实又回到了价值分析的问题，有时候不在乎反而是对的。

It does come back to that that value analysis where sometimes it's right to not care.

但当你在乎的时候，如果这个东西要存在多年、会有其他人参与开发、并且要部署给数百万用户使用，那么你就需要运用所有这些工具了。

But when you do care, if it's going to be something that's going to live for years and it's gonna have other people working on it, I and it's gonna be deployed to millions of people, then you wanna use all of these tools.

你会被告知说，不行。

You wanna be told it's like, no.

你在这里、这里和这里都搞砸了，这确实需要一种对自我认知的检查，你必须接受一个事实：你做的每件事都充满了缺陷。

You've screwed up here, here, and here, and that does require kind of an ego check about things where you have to to be open to the fact that everything that you're doing is just littered with flaws.

并不是说，哦，你偶尔会有糟糕的一天。

It's not that, oh, you occasionally have a bad day.

而是无论你输出什么代码流，都会存在统计规律性的错误。

It's just whatever stream of code you output, there is going to be a statistical regularity of things that you just make mistakes on.

而且我认为关于测试驱动设计、单元测试与分析方法的争论一直存在。

And I'm and I do think there's the whole argument about test driven design and unit testing versus kind of analysis and different things.

我更倾向于分析方法，就像你不能运行程序直到修复这个问题，而不是运行它后指望单元测试以某种方式捕捉错误。

I am more in favor of the analysis and the stuff that just like you can't run your program until you fix this rather than you can run it and hopefully a unit test will catch it in some way.

是啊。

Yeah.

在我的私人代码里，我到处都加了断言。

In my private code, I have asserts everywhere.

是啊。

Yeah.

对我来说，这种独裁式的规则——比如‘这一点应该成立’——有种令人愉悦的感觉。

It just there's something pleasant to me, pleasurable to me about sort of the dictatorial rule of, like, this should be true at this point.

而且太多次了，我犯了本不该犯的错误，我原以为自己不是会犯那种错误的人，但我还是一再犯错。

And too many times, I've made mistakes that shouldn't have been made, and I would assume I I wouldn't be the kind of person that would make that mistake, but I keep making that mistake.

因此，断言确实能及时抓住我的错误，总是很有帮助。

Therefore, an assert really catches me, really helps all the time.

所以我的代码中，大概有10%到20%的私人代码只是为了个人使用而写的断言。

So my code I would say, like, 10 to 20% of my private code just for personal use is probably a search.

而且它们都是活跃的注释。

And they're active comments.

理论上这些东西不会对程序产生任何影响。

That is one of those things that in theory, they don't they don't make any difference to the program.

如果一切按预期运行，它们永远不会触发。

And if it was all operating the way you expected it would be, then I they will never fire.

但即使你一开始写对了代码，外部环境也会发生变化。

But even if you have it right and you wrote the code right initially, then circumstances change.

程序之外的世界在不断变化。

The world outside your program changes.

事实上，这正是我在很多情况下偏爱静态数组大小声明的原因——我曾经历过一个阶段，那时觉得通用集合类就足够了。

And in fact, that's that's one of the things where I'm kind of fond in a lot of cases of static array size declarations where I went through this period where it's like, okay.

现在我们有了通用的集合类。

Now we have general collection classes.

我们应该把所有东西都变成可变的。

We should just make everything variable.

因为我早期经历过《毁灭战士》对某些元素有固定限制的时代。

I because I had this history of in the early days, you get Doom, had some fixed limits on it.

后来人们开始制作越来越疯狂的内容，不得不不断提高各种限制——线条数量、区域数量等等。

Then everybody started making crazier and crazier things, and they kept bumping up the different limits, this many lines, this many sectors.

这看起来是个好主意。

And it seemed like a good idea.

我们应该把这个做得完全通用化

Well, we should just make this completely generic.

它可以增长到任意大小

It can go kind of go up to whatever.

确实有些情况下这样做是正确的，但另一方面，当外界变化超出你的预期时，能够及时获知这种变化也很重要

And there's cases where that's the right thing to do, but it also the other aspect of the world changing around you is it's good to be informed when the world has changed more than you thought it would.

如果你使用一个持续增长的集合，你将永远无法发现这个问题

And if you've got a continuously growing collection, you're never gonna find out.

你可能会遇到性能的二次方级下降——原本你以为只会出现少量实例，但由于设计风格变化，突然间就增长到了上万个

You might have this quadratic slowdown on something where you thought, oh, I'm only ever gonna have a handful of these, but something changes and there's a new design style, and all of a sudden, you've got 10,000 of them.

所以我倾向于在很多情况下选定一个数值，比如某个漂亮的2的幂次方数，设置好并在代码中加入断言提示

So I kinda like, in many cases, picking a number, some, you know, nice round power of two number, and setting it up in there and having an assert saying it's like, hey.

你已经触及这个上限了

You hit the you hit this limit.

当使用量达到你预期值的10倍时，或许应该重新评估当初的所有设计选择是否仍然适用

You should probably think are the choices that you've made around all of this still relevant if somebody's using 10 times more than you thought they would.

嗯。

Yeah.

这段代码最初是基于这种世界观和约束条件编写的。

This code was originally written with this kind of worldview, with this kind of set of constraints.

你当时是以这种方式思考这个世界的。

You were you were you were thinking of the world in this way.

如果出现问题，就意味着需要重新审视最初的设计，能有这种反馈机制挺好的。

If something breaks, that means you gotta rethink the initial stuff, and it's it's nice for it to for it for it to do that.

有没有类似键盘或显示器之类的东西？

Is there any stuff like keyboard or So I'm fairly monitors?

在这方面我比较保守，直到几年前才升级到三显示器。

I'm fairly pedestrian on a lot of that where I I did move to triple monitors, like, in the last several years ago.

我用双显示器很长时间了，可能早就该升级了，但直到发现现在的显卡通常都有三个输出端口才想到。

I had been dual monitor for a very long time, and I and it was one of those things where probably years later than I should have, I'm just like, well, the video cards now generally have three output ports.

我应该直接把第三个显示器也装上。

I should just put the third monitor up there.

这绝对是个纯粹的胜利。

That's been a that's been a pure win.

对此我非常满意。

I've been very happy with that.

是啊。

Yeah.

不过，我并没有花哨的键盘鼠标之类的设备

But, no, I don't have fancy keyboard or mouse or anything really

关键是IDE要有好用的调试器和工具，不是Emacs、VimRoute配健怡可乐那种

key thing is an IDE that has helpful debuggers, has helpful tools, so it's not the Emacs, VimRoute, and then Diet Coke.

对。

Yeah.

所以我确实花了——你知道，我用了一周的闭关时间，心想：好吧

So I did spend you know, I spent one of my weeklong retreats where I'm like, okay.

我决定强迫自己用经典VI编辑器，虽然我知道有人会说根本不该这么做

I'm gonna make myself use it was actually classic VI, which I know people will say you should never have done that.

你本应该直接使用VIM的。

You should have just used VIM directly.

但是，你知道的，我已经尽力尝试了。

But, you know, I gave it the good try.

就像是，好吧。

It's like, okay.

我现在处于一种经典的Unix开发者模式，我花了一周时间在这上面。

I'm being in kind of classic Unix developer mode here, and I worked for a week on it.

我用Anki来教自己记住那些不同的快捷键组合之类的。

I I used Anki to, like, teach myself the the different little key combinations for things like that.

最后，感觉就像是，好吧。

And in the end, it was just like, alright.

这有点像我的内战重演阶段。

This was kind of like my civil war reenactment phase.

你懂吧？

You know?

就像我走出去，像过去的人们那样做事，从那个角度来看还挺有趣的。

It's like I'm going out there doing it like they used to in the old days, and it it was kind of fun in that regard.

现在好多人啊。

So many people right now.

但它当时在尖叫

But it was screaming

当他们正在听这个的时候。

as they're listening to this.

所以重申一下，关键在于这不是现代版的Vim，不过确实如此，我懂的。

So, again, the out is that this was not modern Vim, but still, I yes.

最后能回到我的Visual Studio环境让我非常开心。

I was very happy to get back to my visual studio at the end.

是啊。

Yeah.

其实我经常为此纠结，因为我主要用Kinesis键盘和Emacs。

I'm actually I struggle with this a lot because so I use a Kinesis keyboard, and I use Emacs primarily.

正如你所说，我觉得我能完全理解这些代码。

And I I feel like I I can exactly as you said, I can understand the code.

我能浏览这些代码。

I can navigate the code.

在Emacs里用Lisp可以构建很多东西。

There's a lot of stuff you could build within Emacs with using Lisp.

你可以自定义很多功能来帮助自己审视代码，比如理解代码和可视化代码的各个方面。

You can customize a lot of things for yourself to help you introspect the code, like, to to help you understand the code and visualize different aspects of the code.

你甚至可以运行调试器，但这需要付出努力。世界在不断前进，更好的创意层出不穷，这让我也需要像你说的那样退一步思考，但我现在还在打这场内战。

You can even run debuggers, but it's it's work, and the world moves past you, and the better and better ideas are constantly being built, and that that puts a kind of I I need to take the same kind of retreat as you're talking about, but now I'm still fighting the civil war.

我需要某种程度上迈进21世纪。

I need to kinda move into the twenty first century.

看起来世界或者说很大一部分世界正在转向Visual Studio Code，这让我觉得很有趣——一方面是针对JavaScript生态，另一方面IDE这类工具你希望它能无限快。

And it does seem like the world is or a large chunk of the world is moving towards Visual Studio Code, which is kind of interesting to me against the JavaScript ecosystem on the one hand, and IDs are one of those things that you want to be infinitely fast.

你希望它能立即响应。

You want them to just kind of immediately respond.

而且，说实话，我认识一个人。

And, like, mean, heck, I've got there's someone I know.

我是个老派游戏开发者，至今仍在使用Visual Studio 6。

I'm an old school game dev guy that still uses Visual Studio six.

在现代电脑上运行这种老软件，所有操作都瞬间完成——因为它原本是为运算速度慢十万倍的电脑设计的。

And on a modern computer, everything is just absolutely instant on something like that because it was made to work on a computer that's 10,000 or a 100,000 times slower, so just everything happens immediately.

而所有现代系统都让人觉得，它们太臃肿了——为什么这里要刷新屏幕，那里要移动光标，这边要更新那个，那边又闪动那个。

And all the modern systems just feel you know, they feel so crufty when it's like, oh, why is this refreshing the screen and moving around and updating over here and something blinks down there and you should update this?

你知道，我们在获得惊人灵活性的同时，确实也失去了一些东西——但大多数人对此都很满意。

And there's you know, there there are things that we've lost with that incredible flexibility, but lots of people get tons of value from it.

我很高兴看到它甚至征服了许多VIM和Emacs的老用户，他们开始觉得：

And I am super happy that that seems to be winning over even a lot of the old VIM and Emacs people that they're kind of like, hey.

也许Visual Studio Code并不差劲。

Visual Studio codes may be, you know, not so bad.

这可能是个最终的和解方案——让所有人都能对类似工具感到基本满意。

I am that may be the final peacekeeping solution where everybody is reasonably happy with with something like that.

所以

So

你能解释一下什么是点计划文件以及它在你的生活中扮演了什么角色吗？

can you explain what a dot plan file is and what role that played in your life?

它是否仍在发挥作用？

Does it still continue to play a role?

回到id Software的早期，我们的一大独特之处在于我采用了NextStations或NextStep系统，这些系统来自史蒂夫·乔布斯在苹果公司之外创立的公司。

Back in the early, early days of id Software, one of our big things that was unique with what we did is I I had adopted NextStations or kinda NextStep systems from Steve Jobs' out in the out in the woods away from Apple company.

这其实挺有意思的，因为我并没有Unix系统的背景。

And I they were basically it was kind of interesting because I did not really have a background with the Unix system.

很多人都是在大学时期就沉浸其中了。

So many of the people, they get immersed in that in college.

你知道，这为他们设定了很多文化预期。

And I you know, and that's you know, that sets a lot of cultural expectations for them.

我并没有那些经历，但我知道我的背景是——我曾是个狂热的Apple II粉丝。

And I didn't have any of that, but I knew that my background was I was a huge Apple two fanboy.