niracler

Prologue#

I Am Losing Myself#

These days, I have been sorting through this year's diaries in preparation for my year-end summary. I was shocked to find that the diaries from the first half of the year in Obsidian were such a mess. There are many scattered sentences without context, making it hard to recall what I was thinking at that time; I have lost most of myself from this past year. This reminds me of a recent anecdote from Wikipedia.

The Wikipedia entry for the Ship of Theseus has been edited over 1,700 times since its creation in July 2003, and currently, all phrases in the original text have been edited and replaced, resulting in a retention rate of 0%. (Source)

In 2019, I really liked "Land of the Lustrous." Four years later, when I received volume 12 this year, I found that my fondness for it had become a habit, and my feelings while reading it were completely flat. Looking back at the historical records, I couldn't help but wonder, "Did I really like it this much before?" Perhaps I am also losing myself gradually.

(In 2019, I was still lamenting the changes in the Lapis Lazuli.)

A Letter to My Future Self#

If there is a character that I could instantly fall in love with, it would be Sasaki from "The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya." Thus, the reason for writing this year-end summary may just be this one.

"Ten years from now, please do not forget today's self."

Perhaps everyone just wants to prove that they truly exist, hoping that others can recognize their existence in this world. Maybe everyone acts based on this simple principle. The only hope is that simple yet painful message: "Do not forget me."

(Connecting with others to confirm one's existence and that one has lived.)

What I Did This Year#

This year-end summary lists events in chronological order, with some events concluding at very late points. Even something like Tears of the Kingdom was still ongoing into the new year~~ And regarding work, the xlog version has once again been deleted.

January-February - Fire Emblem Engage#

I started playing Fire Emblem Engage this month. It was released on New Year's Eve, and I bought the digital version that same day. This time, I jumped straight into the super hard classic mode. During this period, I also watched many strategy videos. Unlike the previous installment, this one has no memorable plot. However, the gameplay is so rich that I played for 140 hours without getting bored (I even want to try more different combinations).

Engage is my game of the year. I really love tactical RPGs; they remind me of the excitement I felt playing "Romance of the Three Kingdoms: Cao Cao's Adventure" over a decade ago. When I played Three Houses, I was puzzled, "Why does the gameplay feel worse than games from over a decade ago?" However, if I were to elaborate on Engage, I could probably write another article of equal length. Maybe I'll write an article analyzing my favorite characters later.

(I managed to finish it during this New Year's holiday.)

March - Steam Deck Launch#

This month marked the end of my six-month "darkest period," and I finally emerged from the hopeless state of playing a mobile game. I resumed my work and life, and I started chatting again in my Telegram channel. However, upon my return, I found that my friends were no longer on Telegram, and it seemed I had become all alone. The result of recommending my friends to use Telegram was that my chat history now included another Deleted Account.

Secondly, I successfully passed my driving test. I failed the third subject before the New Year, and after the holiday, I had to practice again at a different location. This time, I finally passed. (However, I haven't had the chance to drive since, and I've almost forgotten how to do it🤣.)

I also began using GPT extensively at work, but what initially amazed me was New Bing. However, as New Bing's responses became shorter, I returned to the embrace of GPT 3.5.

I impulsively ordered a Steam Deck to distract myself. I say "impulsively" because during my "darkest period," I had messed up my personal finances. However, the Arch system Steam Deck is truly my dream console. I really want to sell my dusty Xbox now. Looking back, I even said something like this at the beginning of 2022.

Steam gaming platform + AMD graphics card + Arch Linux distribution + KDE desktop environment + Proton (Wine) => Steam Deck. How should I put it? I have high hopes for these technologies or platforms, but when combined, they seem to be a bit of a disaster~~

It wasn't cheap, costing nearly 5,000 yuan. In mid-March, if I were to buy it now, I could probably save a thousand yuan, and of course, the OLED version has been released now.

And well, the result is that I can show you this. This year, I created three accounts to play visual novels, and I became an honorary Turkish and honorary Argentinian~~

• niracler's 2023 STEAM Year in Review
• ks635704's 2023 STEAM Year in Review
• fi608402's 2023 STEAM Year in Review

(Mom, look at this ranking😑, but actually, it doesn't even add up to 100 hours.)

April - Shock! Little Sang Made Friends#

This month, I watched two seasons of "Westworld." During this time, there was a bit of a mix-up; I mistook episode 10 for episode 1, so I only realized after finishing episode 9 that what I had watched as "episode 1" was actually "episode 10," and I still haven't watched episode 1. However, I stopped after finishing the second season and did not continue.

I also caught up on "Girls." I didn't expect that Little Sang had found so many good friends. She even became a "sea king," which makes me envious, jealous, and want to relate. Later, I wrote a small article.

It all started during the summer of my first year of high school ten years ago. I remember that it was because I watched the anime of "Girls" that I used the drifting bottle feature in QQ Space to discuss life with some strangers (since I had no friends to chat with). I don't even remember how that summer passed; it seemed that only immersing myself in the virtual world of online games could fill the void. (I played so much that I couldn't play games for a long time afterward.) So, while watching "Girls," I found Little Sang's story exceptionally relatable. Looking back now, it's quite normal for someone who lacks real-life experiences to become immersed in the cyber world and do many embarrassing things in social interactions.

(Little Sang's harem is already full to the brim.)

May - Heaven's Great Magic Realm#

Every year, I go to a comic convention with friends, and this year was my first time at Firefly, and I watched the "Slam Dunk" movie the night before. After this event, my relationship with that friend rapidly declined. I later found out that he had started dating someone at that time and then broke up later.

During the May Day holiday, I accompanied my family to watch "The Long Season." I couldn't finish watching it with them before I had to go to work. At the same time, I played Tears of the Kingdom for the first time.

"Heaven's Great Magic Realm" is my comic of the year. It was from this work that I became interested in Masakazu Ishiguro's works. After reading all of Masakazu Ishiguro's works, I am now a solid fan of his. それ町 - Even if the manga has ended, the town still keeps moving - Recommendation - niracler

(Five stars indicate a work that shocked me.)

June - NANA and Cyber Bar#

This month, I watched and played two works: "NANA" and "VA-11 Hall-A." They contributed most of the music I listened to while working this year. Especially "VA-11 Hall-A," which is simply the cyber bartender's playlist.

I also started watching Wong Tze Wah this month, binge-watching all his stand-up comedy as a side dish.

(Although I was reading the "NANA" manga, which is all silent rock, when I listen to the anime's music, I get the feeling that "the one singing is Nana.")

(This is the playlist I've been listening to for over a hundred hours this year.)

July - The Trash Circle#

This month, I deeply understood that our company is still in a state of playing house. Yes, I haven't taken work seriously; I've been avoiding thinking about work. I recognized the trash circle and realized how poor the quality of my work was and how low the completion rate was. Because of this opportunity, I decided to register an account on xlog to write a blog.

I also watched "Unfortunate" this month.

After two years, I finally returned to my dormitory in Shenzhen. Time has passed, and some things have changed, but some things remain the same. My first xLog article was also written in Shenzhen. (It was the one about "VA-11 Hall-A.")

The theory of the trash circle from the senior in the article really impressed me. Looking back at myself, I was limited by the trash circle in high school. I thought I was working hard every day, but I was actually just spinning in a self-satisfying and self-touching circle, content with being in the top 30 of my grade, thinking that was my ceiling.

It wasn't until I went to university and interacted with classmates from different backgrounds that I realized, "The ceiling can be as high as a stratosphere." (Highly recommended; it can be read in 20 minutes.)

So, I started to get back into things this month; I played Windows games on Mac using gptk (Original).

August - Starting to Write xlog#

The turning point began this month; I felt something moving again. In a sense, I felt like I was alive again. After that, I set a goal to write a weekly journal and another article each week. (However, I've recently adjusted it to post a journal one week and other content the next.)

This month, I felt like my mind was filled with thoughts on how to write a blog. It felt like the gears that hadn't turned for three years suddenly started moving again. First, I updated the tools I subscribed to, then I revisited tech news. I also started using Pokemon Sleep and resumed exercising. (But I only persisted for a little over a month.)

I seem to have finally found my cyber bar. Yes, it's xLog. After three years of work (and three years of decline), I've accumulated some ramblings on my notebook, so I'll post one article here each week (on Sundays), and I'll try to make each one as complete as possible.

These were my words at that time; in reality, those so-called "ramblings" were mostly just titles in my previous diaries. It was also this month that I set up n8n for Telegram and realized how far behind I was in automation.

(The subsequent stories, I feel, don't need to be summarized; my weekly journals are my records, and it's definitely not because I'm lazy.)

As for 2024 - Get Out More#

Having written so much, 2023 was truly filled with ACG content. Moreover, it was more about talking than doing. I hope to get out more next year and try to shed the title of "cyber electronic person."

A person's perspective defines their height. If you see the same kind of people every day, read the same types of books/videos, and (read) write code belonging to the same domain, then your perspective is likely not broad enough. The internet is developing at an astonishing pace, and if you confine yourself to a small world, it's easy to become like the person in Tao Yuanming's Peach Blossom Spring: not knowing about the Han, regardless of Wei and Jin.

(Next year's Random List)

Input from the Past Two Weeks#

As for books, I'm reading "Steve Jobs: A Biography," and nothing else.

• Advanced RAG Techniques: Illustrated Overview - Baoyu's Sharing - Many questions were resolved in one go, and I've used it at work these past few days; I can get started~~

  This article comprehensively studies advanced retrieval-augmented generation techniques (RAG) and their algorithms, systematically organizing various methods. The article also includes a collection of links related to various implementations and research mentioned in my knowledge base.

• Whataaabout -

  Ideas for interesting activities you can do in a short time to expand your interests.

• Having A Game I’m Really Into Makes Every Day Incredibly Enjoyable | Plumshell - Before enlightenment chop wood, carry water. After enlightenment chop wood, carry water.

  Apparently, when humans have free time, they tend to stress over the past and future instead of focusing on the present. 显然，当人类有空闲时间时，他们倾向于对过去和未来感到压力，而不是关注现在。

• Home | endoflife.date - A website that records the EOL dates and support lifecycles of various products~~

  Check end-of-life, support schedule, and release timelines for more than 200 products in one place.

• MMSSbrc20/static: $MMSS logo and other static source -
• Degradation Theory — @meditic’s Blog - Precisely because of this, when an IT youth with an IQ of 147 is still struggling for a 3k salary, while a barbecue shop owner with an IQ of less than 50 is sitting in a Porsche playing with the app developed by that youth, I can't help but look up at the stars.
• Quickstart: Get started with the Gemini API in Node.js applications | Google AI for Developers - I estimate I won't be able to get to this until after New Year's, although it should only take an afternoon~~
• Linux Performance -

  A collection of documents, slides, and videos about Linux performance, mostly created by Brendan Gregg, with a focus on performance analysis.

• 1984 Apple's Macintosh Commercial (HD) - YouTube - With this hammer, Apple changed the world~~ Recently, I've been reading "Steve Jobs: A Biography." Such a world-changing team has reason to be fully committed to their work and passionate about their cause. I can't help but feel a twinge of envy; they deserve it.

  Say what you want about Apple, but the throwing of the hammer through the giant screen is such a powerful image. I think about it a lot these days. If only it were so easy to change the world.

Epilogue#

I admit, I wrote this until 1 AM on January 1st and didn't want to continue, so that's it. Happy New Year, everyone!!!