Deliberations are Self-defining!
July 15, 2021•382 words
That headline is a bit of wordplay: considering things at length is actually the opposite of liberating. Essentially, it leads to analysis paralysis. That's where I am this summer.
First of all, I bought a new laptop. I wanted something more modern. I have a 2 TB solid state drive. From my understanding, SSD's have some disconcerting properties. Since I may be misguided, I will not repeat my thoughts here. Suffice it to say that I am hesitant about loading it up with software.
Secondly, I'm in the midst of evaluating all the software I've acquired over the years. A good number of them fall into the category of "totally useless", in the sense that I'm moving away from activities that required such software. For example, I'm no longer writing automation code for clients. So Microsoft Visual Studio is totally useless.
Thirdly, I'm not sure about my evaluations! This is the part that is causing me to deliberate. What if I want to build a little program for myself? Without Visual Studio, I'm stuck with Excel VBA. Ugh! So, I reconsider, move Visual Studio to the "I might need this some day" category and then have to decide if it's worth installing on the new laptop.
Every program that I plan to install will make me wonder if it's going to spam the SSD with log files, backups and temp files. If I know about it, I can point the fire hose to one of my external USB hard drives. But for software like Visual Studio, I have no idea where the hose is spraying.
Finally, I intend to play a lot of games on my new laptop. I've already set my Steam Library to an external drive. Factorio is one such game.
I've scoured Reddit, Steam community and Factorio forums looking for pros and cons of running it from my SSD. (The cons won.) So now, I'm wondering what will happen if gameplay is unacceptable from the external drive. For context, you have to understand that I love Factorio and will destroy the SSD if it means I can play it. LOL
Deliberations are supposed to help one come to a decision. In my case, I may just conclude that everything is totally useless, except Steam. Now that would be liberating.