Solvitur Ambulando — Solutions Through Walking
There’s an old Roman saying, solvitur ambulando, which loosely translates to “it is solved by walking.” The idea is simple: when faced with a knotty problem, sometimes the best approach is to step outside and walk. With fewer distractions and more mental space, walking provides a practical form of reflection that often yields clarity.
This habit has become a regular part of my workflow. Thanks to live transcription tools and voice-to-text apps—commonly built into most smartphones—it’s now easy to capture ideas on the go. By simply talking into your mobile device, your thoughts are turned into usable text, often forming the foundations of a document before you even sit at a desk.
However, the ease of generating content this way comes with a caveat: it’s easy to create a lot of raw material. That means the real discipline lies not in idea generation, but in editing, organizing, and progressively refining what you’ve captured.
Using Voice-to-Text and AI Tools for Coding & Documentation
Using voice-to-text software—particularly mobile apps—has become incredibly convenient, with many free and widely available options. This means you can speak into your phone and dictate whatever you’re thinking.
For instance, if you’re out walking for half an hour, you can verbally explore your ideas in detail.
You should aim to speak naturally, using as much technical jargon or vernacular as needed. By the end of the session, you’ll likely have a sizable chunk of text saved in your app. Transferring this text to a more permanent location is usually straightforward.
Editing the Context
- Initially, however, the captured text will be quite unstructured. That’s where AI comes in. You can input this raw text into a tool like Copilot or another AI assistant to clean it up.
- At first, the output might struggle with spelling, context, or terminology—so you’ll probably need to review and edit it.
- But over time, as you provide more examples and context, the AI will start to recognize key terms, technical phrases, and even brand or software names—like “tidyverse” or “dbplyr” —and apply that understanding to tidy up your content more effectively.
Dealing with Volume
- This method allows you to generate a high volume of content rapidly. The real work then becomes editing—refining the text, reducing duplication, and making it concise and useful.
- The same applies to code: rather than spending hours crafting the initial draft, use tools to generate the bulk and then invest your energy in improving its quality.