Preface

I finally start to translate some of my high school works here. It is not because I have nothing else important to do, but to commemorate the positive parts of my messy adolescent. I wish I will always have a teenager’s mind, and act as a serious adult, till my end. While translating, I realized a lot I have not noticed before. So the writings and thoughts are a lot more mature than their original forms, which may make it seem overstated that a high schooler can figure all those out. However, the core ideas were indeed formed around 2014, when I was a fairly active thinker of everything I learned.

Another aspect about the works is that I could not have the chance of thinking any of the ideas without the introduction to programming by Mr. Fan, who is continuing to teach the next generation of computer scientists in a high school. I also appreciate a lot about the free environment back then, shaped by my parents and other teachers in Ganzhou no. 3 middle school. You can have your own “research”, even as a high schooler, if people around you are supportive. I also have been feeling lucky that I did not have to go through the sweaty general tests for college admission. The free exploration of computer sciences not only brought me to a top school, but also gave me a completely different mindset from the others. I think luck is an indicator of uniqueness, which can never be replicated by simply pushing hard.

The third point I want to mention is that I have been liking useless knowledge, not because it can be useful in 1,000 years, but because it is interesting. Interesting ideas are usually unique, but may not be successful. My high school works still look interesting to me. Some of them may be extended to be more interesting, or even useful. But I usually stopped somewhere, without further exploitation. That actually ensured my broad knowledge of many areas, but limited the ceiling of my achievement in a particular topic. I have been fixing this issue with my postgraduate study, though I still value interest more than usefulness.

Each work I share in this column is in the form of an article. They are not like any traditional essays or modern scientific reports. They are more like brain teasers that you can implement as computer programs. When translating, I also try to be a bit literary, baking in some of my thoughts in recent years. I decide to write three types of articles: appetizers, main courses and desserts. Appetizers are the brain teasers which might give you a smile after realizing the solutions. Main courses are something connected to a particular algorithm in computer science. Desserts are some exploration beyond the conventional algorithms. If you ask me where are the drinks, well, I drink water.