TK, or the secret to effortless writing (2024)(atthis.link)
atthis.link
TK, or the secret to effortless writing (2024)
https://atthis.link/blog/2024/49629.html
24 comments
I just used to use: ????
It server the same purpose, placeholder for a word I couldn't think of, and wouldn't naturely appear in the text. Plus for me I could hammer out the four characters in frustration too, for not being able to think of the word/term I wanted.
It server the same purpose, placeholder for a word I couldn't think of, and wouldn't naturely appear in the text. Plus for me I could hammer out the four characters in frustration too, for not being able to think of the word/term I wanted.
Indeed a great trick. I often double it to TKTK just to make it stand out even more.
Fun fact: the Ghost.org editor looks for TK
https://ghost.org/changelog/tk-reminders/
Fun fact: the Ghost.org editor looks for TK
https://ghost.org/changelog/tk-reminders/
I've a very dim memory of having heard about it years ago (more than a decades), from an article of Cory Doctorow, and in my mind, he was the one who came up with the idea (and chose the letters TK).
But I can be wrong (maybe it's not from Doctorow, maybe the article did not even claim the paternity of coming up with TK but it was me badly understanding it, ...)
But I can be wrong (maybe it's not from Doctorow, maybe the article did not even claim the paternity of coming up with TK but it was me badly understanding it, ...)
TK is a very standard term, see William Safire's usage in this 1996 NY Times article: https://www.nytimes.com/1996/10/06/magazine/of-hacks-and-tk....
Mmm. This Q&A -- https://www.chicagomanualofstyle.org/qanda/data/faq/topics/M... -- suggests it's been kicking around as printing and journalism jargon since at least the 1980s, and I would expect probably earlier.
Paywall-free link:
https://archive.is/Ipm3J
https://archive.is/Ipm3J
I do this a lot but I use “TK:” with the colon to make it unambiguously grep-able (stands out better visually too)
If you use Brashtag notation you could insert #tk{} bag.
https://github.com/pratikdeoghare/brashtag
https://github.com/pratikdeoghare/brashtag
Tk without Tcl?
Shout out to Title TK by the Breeders.
Could you instead use any two numerical digits? Then you've got a tagging system with up to 100 tags.
This assumes you're writing according to guidelines that insist you spell out all numbers. i.e. 58 is always intentionally "fifty-eight", so "58" must be your own meta text.
This assumes you're writing according to guidelines that insist you spell out all numbers. i.e. 58 is always intentionally "fifty-eight", so "58" must be your own meta text.
> writing according to guidelines that insist you spell out all numbers
What? There exists such a guideline, which is not limited to very small numbers that can be written in at most two words?
That would have you writing things like one million, four hundred fifty-three thousand, one hundred fifty-eight instead of 1,453,158.
"TK: for the thousand one hundred and eleventh time, ditch this idiotic editing job"
What? There exists such a guideline, which is not limited to very small numbers that can be written in at most two words?
That would have you writing things like one million, four hundred fifty-three thousand, one hundred fifty-eight instead of 1,453,158.
"TK: for the thousand one hundred and eleventh time, ditch this idiotic editing job"
I think you can use whatever you want. The point is just to drop a quick marker that you can find later, and not interrupt your flow.
Ah, never mind. A slight refinement needed here.
AP style only spells out one through nine. 10 and above are written as numerals. So, you'd get 10 tags, not 100.
I think the regex would be: /(?<!\d)\d{1}(?!\d)/
AP style only spells out one through nine. 10 and above are written as numerals. So, you'd get 10 tags, not 100.
I think the regex would be: /(?<!\d)\d{1}(?!\d)/
GCP employees heart rate spiking at the title.
tl;dr
add tk when you hit a wall (abbreviated from 'to come', yet spelled with k as tc appears in many words)
add tk when you hit a wall (abbreviated from 'to come', yet spelled with k as tc appears in many words)
I slice my latke with a pocketknife.
I found the low frequency surprising as it's so easy to pronounce--I suppose tc is used in most cases. Here's what I found for bigram freqs near TK:
Ratios (count / total) and percentages:
Ratios (count / total) and percentages:
PG: 0.00047%
TK: 0.00046%
KK: 0.00045%
HQ: 0.00042%
FN: 0.00042%
True, but have you ever sliced your LATKE with a POCKETKNIFE?
...I did, a few years ago, when I went camping with some friends.
Because we know from the software engineering discipline that TODOs never get done, so the safe thing is to avoid that with TK.