Knuth Airgaps &
Knuth Buffers

<h1>Knuth Airgaps &amp;<br/>Knuth Buffers</h1>

[Donald Knuth](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Knuth) is a
[decorated](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Turing_Award) darling of computer
science.

Knuth knows how to maintain information hygeine.

## Knuth Airgaps

Knuth is unreachable via digital communication. He
[airgaps](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Air_gap_%28networking%29) himself from
the internet:

> I have been a happy man ever since January 1, 1990, when I no longer had an
> email address. I'd used email since about 1975, and it seems to me that 15
> years of email is plenty for one lifetime.  
> ...  
> I have a wonderful secretary who looks at the incoming postal mail and
> separates out anything that she knows I've been looking forward to seeing
> urgently. Everything else goes into a buffer storage area, which I empty
> periodically.
>
> — Donald Knuth
> [via his website](https://www-cs-faculty.stanford.edu/~knuth/email.html)

He also maintains airgaps between his machines:

> I currently use Ubuntu Linux, on a standalone laptop—it has no Internet
> connection. I occasionally carry flash memory drives between this machine and
> the Macs that I use for network surfing and graphics; but I trust my family
> jewels only to Linux.
>
> — Donald Knuth
> [via informit](https://www.informit.com/articles/article.aspx?p=1193856)

## Knuth Buffers

He buffers ideas on paper before putting them on machines:

> The kernel of the idea is first put on paper. Yeah, that's where I write and
> I'll write maybe five programs a week. Of course, literate programming. And
> these are before I describe something in my book, I always program it to see
> how it's working.
>
> — Donald Knuth [via Lex Friedman](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2BdBfsXbST8)

> I'm working on a research problem I generally begin by filling dozens of
> sheets of scratch paper with partial calculations. When I eventually get to a
> point where I can think about the problem while swimming, then I'm often ready
> to solve it.
>
> — Donald Knuth
> [via Authentic Inquiry Maths](http://authenticinquirymaths.blogspot.com/2015/11/maths-in-science-interview-with-don.html)

[Neal Stephenson](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neal_Stephenson) -- arguably one
of the best sci-fi authors of all time -- maintains a Knuth Buffer:

> I seem to remember seeing the transcripts for the Baroque Cycle were all
> handwritten. Are you still handwriting your books and if so, what advantages
> do you think it has over using a computer?
>
> > Mostly handwritten, yes. It's slower, and so each sentence spends longer in
> > the buffer before it gets written out, so first draft quality is higher.
>
> — Neal Stephenson
> [via reddit](https://old.reddit.com/r/books/comments/11h6hg5/i_am_neal_stephenson_scifi_author_geek_and_now/jas99aa/)