FEATURE SUGGESTION: "Mirror decks"

[doogooroo]

Hi Ernie,

Have a suggestion. How about making it possible to create a "mirror" deck that has the same content but with the slide order reversed of the original deck? The mirror deck would have its own attributes and its stats would be independent. Finally new cards created in either deck would get copied to the other deck automatically.

Here's my reasoning. I'm a Japanese interpreter and occasionally have to learn reams of vocab for a job. Having practiced for quite a few years now, I realise that the best preparation comes from drilling myself in both language directions. While I may be fine going from Japanese to English for a certain word pair, I may be really slow / unable going from English to Japanese for the same word pair. When you're routinely going from Japanese to English and vice versa, you need to be able to know you could do both smoothly.

What I want to be able to do in Flashcards Deluxe is create just one deck, let's say, Japanese in Side 1, English in Side 2. I'd then like to be able to simply create another "mirror deck" from this first one, with its own attributes. The default for the mirror deck would be to swap the slide order (i.e. English in Side 1 and Japanese in Side 2) and to reset the stats but otherwise stay the same content-wise. Finally, when I come across a new word to add to these two decks, I want to be able to add it to just one of them, but for it to be copied automatically to the "mirror" deck.

This would allow me to drill each deck individually and have the stats stored for each deck independently. To get the same functionality at the moment, I need to manually create two versions of each deck I want to learn in both language directions which is a bit of a pain.

I know it's possible at the moment to copy decks and to vary which slide is shown first but the stats get carried across and so "contaminate" reps done in the other direction. Ideally what I'm looking for is something quick where I can press a button - "create mirror deck" - and create a mirror deck with it's own attributes and its own stats, and one that automatically updates the content of both decks when just one is updated.

Hope this makes sense and that you'll give the idea some consideration.

Cheers,

Dougal

[arthaey]

Me too, FWIW

[Ernie]

Hi Dougal,

I think what you want is already available. You can use "combination decks" as mirror decks. This is exactly what I do for my own studies. Add a new combination deck, include the one base deck. In this new deck, change the show side first to "side 2". Finally, in the same Show Side First screen, change "Statistics Set" to "2". This will now use it's own set of statistics. So, you have one set of cards, and only need to update one deck. The "mirror" deck will get updated automatically. If you ever export the base/original deck, you'll notice that there are two sets of statistics for each card, one used by the base deck, and the other by to combo/mirror deck. Combo decks have their own deck settings, but have no card data... it all exists in the base deck.

Ernie

[doogooroo]

Ooooh! Very excited by your reply. Will have to try it out later today. Thanks Ernie!

[Dan]

Hi Ernie,

Your instructions on creating a "mirror" deck do give a new deck that complements the original. I'm looking for a bit more though. Is the following possible?

The method I'm using for long-term retention is to learn a set of cards twice: once with side 1 first, then with side 2 first. I then use spaced repetition to keep the facts fresh (I have some intervals bordering on 4 months now). However, I'd also like to have the two sides mixed together for review, in a single deck. Because, for some sets, one side is much easier than the other, I'd like to keep separate stats at the same time (so the "Show side first > Random" doesn't work).

The combination deck method you outline works great for creating the "side 2" deck, but then I'm not able to study the two as a single deck with separate sets of stats. If I could add the base deck twice, selecting side 1 once, and side 2 once, that would work.

Is there another way to do this (short of duplicating the base deck)?

Thanks for your fantastic app, and stellar support. You're a credit to the community.

Dan

[Ernie]

What I outlined should work as long as you always show side 1 first, or always show side 2 first. But, this won't work when showing a random side first. There is no way to use 1 deck, show a random side first, and use two different sets of statistics.

In fact, I don't think you can do this with two separate decks. You can create a combo with two separate decks, but the "show side first" setting and "statistics set" setting that will be used is the single setting for the combo deck, not the individual settings of the two source decks. Does this make any sense?

[Dan]

That does make sense, thanks.

Does it sound like a useful feature? While learning a foreign alphabet, for example, I'd like my knowledge to be "symmetrical". Right now I find that I struggle to go "the opposite way". I certainly can maintain two different decks (which is what I've been doing), but a single deck would be more elegant.

Thanks,

Dan

[Ernie]

Hi Dan. My instructions above were supposed to solve/explain this issue... maintain a single deck, but easily have the ability to study in both directions.

I've got a "statistics set" option in the "show side first" screen for this purpose. You can have one deck, but two different sets of statistics for each card. Whenever you set show side first to "2", change the statistics set to "2" also. To make this easier, I recommend creating a combo deck with these two settings already set to 2, so you can leave your base deck as 1.

If this doesn't help, let me know what I'm missing.

[norbert]

Hi Ernie,

I think the only thing that is missing is a setting to show
"either side 1 or side 2 randomly"
then the OP could create a combination deck, add the base deck, set this option and another statistics set, and could study.

BTW, that is actually not a bad suggestion, something like: one can select which sides are shown (like 1+2, or 1+3, or 1+2+3) and then one of these sides is shown randomly per card.

Best

Norbert

[Ernie]

Norbert,

I'm a little confused.
You can show side 1 or side 2 randomly. With card layouts, you can show 1+2 on one side, and 1+3 on the other.

I still think the limitation here is that when choosing random, the appropriate statistics set (1 or 2) is not automatically chosen, but rather the same statistic set is used regardless of which side is shown first.

Ernie

[norbert]

Uups, sorry, didn't realize that. I find always new things.

Thanks

[Katja from Hamburg]

What about this Ernie (as I also like to learn bi-directional):

At present on page "show side first" there are 1, 2, random, alternate and StaticSets 1 to 4.
Where any combination could be choosen i.e. Side-1 is not fixed connected to Static-1.

Remove StaticSets 1 and StaticSet 2 and offer instead  only the StaticSet "1-2-automatic" which could be combined with all sides i.e. with 1, 2, random or alternate.
What ever side is shown during training the answer will be taken for Static 1 if side 1 is shown first respectively for Static 2 if side 2 is shown first for this card. At least while showing a card you keep the information about first/second for this card as you need that for the colour.
That doesn't harm if someone like to test only side 1 first with Static 1- which leads to the same result.
And if someone like to test something else in addition he can still use StaticSet 3 or 4.

[Ernie]

Hi Katja. Including an "Automatic" statistic set option may be a great idea. And maybe a good default option.
I'm concerned I'll run into a complication related to scheduling, but let me think about this. It's on my to-do list now. Thanks for the idea!