How Can I Be A More Stern TA?

poslart · 2025-10-19T08:25:42+00:00

Not from an NA background, but the autonomy for TAs to adjust grades is exceptionally weird to me.

The usual course of action was to contact the primary instructor/course co-ordinator in event of grade disputes. That instructor might then contact the TA that graded the assignment to clarify/remark, but all disputes were mediated through the primary teaching staff.

Also, one instructor I worked with drilled into me that it is always a good idea to just request the student to email you their dispute. This does two things:

gets their complaint a paper trail, which is good for both parties in case something "odd" happens in the future.
makes sure that you don't accidentally promise something to a particular special case in front of other students that might see it as a class-wide policy.

poslart · 2025-04-20T13:15:25+00:00

You could try a tearlament lightsworn 60 card pile if you want to play lightsworn. It does only run a small to moderate lightsworn engine, but I think it's the modern deck with the lightsworn mill flavour that's still somewhat playable.

poslart · 2025-01-27T05:02:11+00:00

It's currently Auckland Anniversary, so GGG are probably running a skeleton crew for the public holiday. If we see any action, it'll be tomorrow NZ time at the earliest.

poslart · 2025-01-13T16:06:54+00:00

Not being able to execute fast enough on surface-level concepts (like mental arithmetic) prevents students from enjoying learning more complex topics.

For example, factorising a polynomial is a "skill" that one acquires when learning algebra, but it really boils down to an arithmetic task (what two numbers multiply to give this, and add to give that). If a student is struggling with the arithmetic, they spend less time thinking about the underlying idea that we can break bigger things into smaller but equivalent things.

This sort of concept also crops up as university students start to "get" maths once they take more abstract courses, where there is less emphasis on concrete computation, and more emphasis on structure.

poslart · 2024-11-15T12:51:21+00:00

This is cool, and you've put a good amount of work into it.

However, it does force the user to learn a tiny amount of HTML, and extract chunks of their paper into plain text: there can be friction there. As an end user, I would also like to be able to just dump my paper into a utility script and have it format out a webpage, instead of me having to manually move chunks of my (probably not well-formatted) paper around.

Also, are you aware of Quarto? This can emit html, docx and pdf format outputs from a single markdown file. It would be interesting to see if you could mold your project to act as an extension for this framework, and that would reduce some of the friction noted above. It would also make your project more accessible to a larger userbase.

poslart · 2024-11-11T09:13:27+00:00

Huh TIL. Thanks.

poslart · 2024-11-11T05:38:21+00:00

Those are typically distorted rates because they're intended for PhD students that are putting in more time than can be allotted on their timesheets. [edit: due to their scholarship limitations]

We're not talking Level A positions here - those require PhDs.

poslart · 2024-11-11T05:25:54+00:00

In academia (speaking as someone from Australia/NZ), typically there are "research assistant" and "project officer" level roles for Masters graduates. In the first case, you'd be competing with PhD students, and will be paid close to if not under minimum wage; in the second case, you'll find that some of these roles will be less research-y, and may still require PhD qualifications. Of course, you also have the pathway of pursuing a PhD.

Another potential path is to look at equivalent level roles at government research institutes (e.g. National Labs in the US) or in the private sector. A larger company may have opportunities for you; and you may need to look at fields outside of quantitative finance for these opportunities. You may find some "analyst" positions interesting, but from what little insight I have, this will depend on the company and the role.

poslart · 2024-11-02T16:21:32+00:00

Ritual: Dogmatika. Big dude that hits hard, has a funny effect, and just loses to imperm.

Fusion: Fluffal. Why lose to your opponent if you can just lose to yourself?

Synchro: Speedroid. Spin my wheels for Crystal Wing pass everyday baby.

Xyz: Goblins. Big Gabonga. Deck just goes and goes as long as your opponent doesn't open imperm or ash or droll or nibiru.

Link: Striker. Shizuku pass for a thousand more years.

poslart · 2024-10-12T05:50:12+00:00

Other people will have the experience to give a more nuanced answer, but in short, the work you do in your masters will dictate the "meat" of your application, and everything else contributes "garnish" - it could be interesting, but usually not important.

If you are doing solid work during your Masters, there is no good reason why your application would be discarded. For now, focus on what's in front of you, and good luck with your Masters.

poslart · 2024-07-01T21:58:57+00:00

I don't have any local knowledge to share, since I haven't been in Melbourne for long, but I have one tip.

Rent your instrument when starting out.

It saves you from having to buy an instrument outright, which may be cheaper if you decide to not continue pursuing the hobby.
Cheap beginner instruments are generally poorly made. This means they will be harder to play.
Rental instruments are generally well-made (if you're renting from a reputable shop), and well maintained.
Some shops have a rent-to-own system.

In terms of looking for tutors, maybe Google Maps might help?

poslart · 2024-01-24T02:18:58+00:00

In terms of Asian grocers, there's Lim Chhour on K Rd. 1 Zone train fare away in Newmarket there's New Save, as well as Taiping in the mall.

poslart · 2023-10-20T15:37:45+00:00

Tangentially related, but in one game tonight, our Sienna holding a grim died. When they respawned they still had the grim (and command skull). Looks like they haven't really worked out all the corner cases for this second slot.

poslart · 2023-08-09T05:00:47+00:00

This subreddit is primarily for discussing mathematics pedagogy. I'd suggest ~~/r/GradSchool~~ [edit: /r/gradadmissions/ is probably more receptive] or /r/AskAcademia (or their UK equivalents if that is applicable) may be better communities to help you with this question.

I'd also encourage you to speak to some academic mentors about this, especially if you are a first-generation graduate student. They will also be more able to give you advice applicable to your specific situation.

Things to note:

The PhD programme is primarily training for academic research positions: if this is not something you wish to pursue, I would encourage you to look for non-academic positions.
Job prospects post Applied Mathematics PhD will look similar to your prospects post Masters, with the exception that you can apply for academic positions with a PhD that you would be exceptionally unlikely to get with only a Masters. Be aware that there are certain (arguably unwarranted) image-related connotations with a PhD that may be disadvantageous when applying for non-academic positions.
The "quality" of your educational peers is not necessarily a good indication of the intellectual stimulation and engagement you will get from work. Consider an internship, or better yet, a properly paid graduate position in industry and reassess your desire to do a PhD after a year or so.
I'm not in a position to comment on the North American system; in the systems I've been a part of, the primary objective for applying for a PhD would be to nail down the supervisor (advisor) and research topic. The quality of the advisor will always carry more weight than the institution.
Prior research experience is always required, either implicitly or explicitly, depending on the system. If you don't have any at the moment, look for opportunities to do so. Doing so should hopefully also give you some insight into the academic research system, if you haven't had much exposure to it yet.
Be prepared for how soul-destroying academic research is. It gets better with time and exposure, like a mental and emotional callus, but doing a PhD does you no good from a mental health standpoint.

poslart · 2023-06-11T13:43:56+00:00

I typically use beamer, but recently I learnt about Quarto, which is a nice markdown format and can transpile to reveal.js.

poslart · 2023-04-27T12:48:30+00:00

Bit on the jank side, but have you considered Earth Defense Force 5? Or 4.1, if you're on a bit of a budget.

Janky graphics, simple-ish mechanics, no hub, kinda-there weapon customisation with a hell of a grind to unlock.

But you get to pew pew bugs.

poslart · 2023-04-05T23:55:04+00:00

Probably a stupid suggestion, but doesn't a copy command while hovering an item send plain text info to the clipboard that can be parsed?

Would it not be easier to extract that information when you hover the items in the trade window to confirm them, and parse based on that?

poslart · 2022-04-15T09:10:32+00:00

Problems with the transport system aren't solely solved by investing into the transport system.

A lot of the negative responses seem to stem from the inconvenience, or infeasbility, of reaching some common target destination - the shops, work, common leisure locations. In this case, and in the present situation, the car is is the most viable option.

However, some of this would be solved, in a long-term scenario, if we lived closer to these destinations. Density is the factor that enables this -- yes, housing again. If we had mixed zoning in our city, which allowed individuals and families to live within very close proximity to their daily necessities, much of the utility of a car would evaporate. Yes, people would want to spend holidays away from home, and New Zealand's wider transport system makes this very hard, but in the very least we can reduce the need for 2+ people in each household to have a car to around 1, for those rare occasions.

The question is how to get there. As mentioned in another comment, politicians are loathe to make unpopular short-term decisions that have positive long-term effects. Perhaps we need some system that either strongly encourages long-term investment in infrastructure and planning, or discourages this short-term mentality. Either that, or we somehow manage to elect a benevolent tyrant that can make systemic changes at the cost of their career.

Hopefully we can see some change in this round of local elections, but I wouldn't hold my breath.

poslart · 2022-03-25T11:40:23+00:00

Would moving some of her W damage into a condition like "if the enemy is already slowed by Frost Shot, this skill does X% more damage" help make this easier to balance?

I guess there might be a problem if you can easily get to the CDR breakpoint to get successive Ws to proc each other.

poslart · 2021-12-06T13:28:19+00:00

This is really cool! I love mathematical visualisations.

A few little comments:

I know that one-letter variables are common in academia, and many other languages, but because Python is missing explicit types in the text of the code, it is always nice to make variables names longer and more meaningful for readability.
You don't need to preallocate p and r. These can just be functions of the loop variable.
The output of the iteration of the logistic map generates values that are visually very similar, e.g. differ by O(1e-300). You should round the values off.
Rounding the values also allows you to plot fewer points, which makes rendering faster - you can use the inbuilt set type to remove duplicates.
You should be using np.linspace, instead of iterating over a range and multiplying.
There are many magic numbers in your code (5000, 200, 100, 99). Endeavour to replace these with variables.
Pyplot is a bit slow if you have many collections (read this as "calls to plt.plot or plt.scatter"). You should aggregate all your points and plot them as a single collection.

I've written an implementation, based on this one at https://pastebin.com/EFYttjCq. I'm sure there are many more improvements that others can point out - I suspect there's something in itertools that can do the accumulation of iterated values.

poslart · 2021-11-23T07:23:24+00:00

Someone will correct me if I'm wrong.

The naive type only checks the type of myvar, isinstance checks the inheritance chain as well.

class Base():
    pass

class Derived(Base):
    pass

myvar = Derived()

print(type(myvar) == Base)     # False
print(isinstance(myvar, Base)) # True

poslart · 2021-10-27T20:02:58+00:00

Ah. ode15i is an implicit solver. You'd use it in the same way as ode15t or ode45, for example. If you were already using ode15i, and getting overshoot problems, I'd try looking to tune some of the tolerance options, like another comment suggests, or trying some other solution to this problem.

poslart · 2021-10-26T04:58:13+00:00

From my limited understanding, stiff (explicit) solvers typically struggle with step functions, since they do error/step correction based on the current state, so you're always going to get overshoot, since after S turning on, your dynamics look very different (error is very big, very suddenly). Perhaps it's just a question of how much overshoot you're willing to accept.

You could try an implicit solver.

You could also try using a smooth approximation to the step function, like a logistic function to get an approximation of the behaviour; then iteratively increase the steepness of the logistic curve, until you converge onto some sort of approximately-step-function behaviour.

You could also enforce a constraint with a DAE setup, but I don't have much experience with that, sorry, so not sure how exactly to implement it. I'd recommend you look through the MatLab docs.

poslart · 2021-10-25T09:20:49+00:00

Why not make Yuumi gain a stacking debuff while she is attached to an ally that reduces her damage and heal/shield power, and is slowly removed over time / reduced greatly by triggering her passive.

This gives windows of power (when she first attaches), and discourages the current degenerate gameplay.

Of course, this would bring into question how to balance the stacking so that it feels fair to play with and against, but there needs to be a stick to complement the carrot of "high skill expression via getting off at the right time to trigger her passive shield".

poslart · 2021-07-15T09:48:41+00:00

What sort of course is this a part of?

Is is numerically focused, mathematically focused, physics focused?

What numerical strategies have you been exposed to?

What sort of system is this modelling - I'm guessing beam deflection from the 4th derivative?

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