The Computing Series

The Minimum Viable Revision

If the full protocol is too much, the minimum viable revision is one thing:

The monthly 30-minute session. Once a month, one framework chapter, recall the full list, check your misses, look up the misses, close the book, recall the misses once more.

Nine frameworks × 12 months = each framework reviewed once per year at minimum, with additional coverage for the ones that come up in rotation.

This is not optimal. It is the minimum that prevents full decay while being achievable under any workload.

Concept: Continuous Revision Protocols

Thread: T11 ← Feedback loops (Book 1) → Learning systems at organisational level (Book 6, Ch 15)

Core Idea: Four protocols — weekly (5 min, 3 compression blocks), monthly (30 min, one framework list), quarterly (2 hrs, full system design exercise), annual (half day, full book re-read) — form a revision system calibrated to the Ebbinghaus forgetting curve. Active recall, not passive re-reading, is the mechanism.

Tradeoff: Correctness vs Performance (F4 #9) — a perfect revision system would be daily and exhaustive; a minimal revision system is monthly and targeted; the optimal is the one that is actually followed

Failure Mode: FM11 (Observability Blindness) applied to your own knowledge — you believe you know the frameworks because you once read them; you find out you do not when you need them under pressure

Signal: Starting this book for the first time (begin the weekly protocol immediately); beginning of each month (monthly session); each quarter (quarterly session); year anniversary of reading this book (annual session)

Maps to: Reference Book Ch 1 (how to use), Ch 17 (quick reference cards — the primary tool for weekly revision); all framework chapters (the source material for monthly sessions)

Read in the book →