Gopher Memorize

Set reminders for any gopher.email task using spaced repetition, a memorization technique that increases the time between reminders as more reminders are sent.

Depends on gopher-app.

Usage

npm install --save gopher-app gopher-memorize then...

var GopherApp = require("gopher-app");
var gopherApp = new GopherApp(); // See gopher-app repo for configuration

var memorizeSkill = require("gopher-memorize")(gopherApp);

gopherApp.onCommand("remember", function(gopher) {
  memorizeSkill.memorizeTask(gopher); //  ⬅ Tells Gopher to memorize your task
  gopher.webhook.quickResponse("Memorizing!");
  gopher.webhook.respond();
});

// Called each time the reminder is triggered, at increasingly further intervals
gopherApp.on("task.triggered", function(gopher) {
  memorizeSkill.memorizeTask(gopher); // ⬅ Gopher continues to memorize
  gopher.webhook.quickResponse("An email with decreasing frequency");
  gopher.webhook.respond();
});

gopherApp.listen();

Spaced Repetition Algorithm

Conceptually, here is how it works

• Assume we have a spaced repititon sequence. For example, reminders that trigger after 1, 2, 3, 5, 8, ... days
• The reminderNumber reflects where the user is in that sequence. If user just started, their reminderNumber is 0, and their first reminder will be after 1 day.
• When a reminder triggers:
  • If the recipient succesfully remembered, reminderNumber increments by one, spacing the next reminder further than the last. (In the above example, the reminderNumber becomes 1 and the next reminder is two days out).
  • If the recipient did not remember, reminderNumber decrements by one, spacing the next reminder closer than the last. It does not, however, go below zero.
  • If a user does not respond, the reminder is re-sent a few times, then gets shut off automatically.

Most of the customizeability lies in altering the spaced repeition sequence. This sequence can be tuned to suit different memorization scenarios.

daysUntilNextReminder = (reminderNumber ^ decayExponent) * frequencyPref

• frequencyPref A user-editable frequency multiplier for different types of memorizations.
• reminderNumbe Which numer in the spaced repetition sequence we are on (described above)
• decayExponent How quickly the reminders spread out. (default 2.5). Not configurable by end-user (yet).

For example, a user is on their 3 reminder in in the spaced repedition sequence, the decay exponent is 2.5 and this particular task they have a frequency preference of .5. Their next reminder would be in 7.79 days.

There is room for improvement and specialization for specific types of memorizations. PRs are welcome, or fork this project and make your own Gopher Extension with a memorization skill.

Config

Optionally pass a configuration object to override memorization defaults.

// These are the default values
const memConfig = {
  defaultFrequencyPref: 1,
  frequencyPrefOptions: [0.1, 0.2, 0.5, 1, 1.5, 2, 5],
  decayExponent: 2.5
};
const memorizeSkill = require("gopher-memorize")(gopherApp, memConfig);

// Note: When passing custom a configuration, it will probably be easier to pass your configured skill via middleware.
gopherApp.app.use((req, res, next) => {
  const gopher = res.locals.gopher;
  gopher.skills.memorize = memorizeSkill;
  next();
});

When setting via middleware, future handlers can access it as follows:

gopherApp.onCommand("test", gopher => {
  gopher.skills.memorize.memorizeTask();
  gopher.webhook.quickRespond("Memorizing this!");
  gopher.webhook.respond();
});

Reference

The following methods are available within a handler always called within a handler.

memorize.memorizeTask(gopher)

Start memorizing a task

memorize.renderMemorizationControls(gopher);

Render UI to show and change memorization frequency

memorize.changeMemFrequency(gopher, freq);

Change memorization frequency to a new (floating point) number;

memorize.getMemInfo(gopher);

Retrieve informaiton about the current memorization. Specifically, reminderCount and frequencyPref

License

MIT