15 ms·

How to Take Smart Notes

469 points by Anon84 7y ago

dapithor 7y ago
I replied about this project before but surprised it hasn't reached more mainstream awareness. Piggydb former and now Cotoami [1] [1]: https://piggydb.net/2019/03/06/why-its-harder-to-discover-valuable-knowledge-in-tree-structured-note-taking/ https://piggydb.net/2019/03/06/why-its-harder-to-discover-va...
cek 7y ago
Interesting the first few principles are not about note-taking, but writing in general. If you believe in the power of the written word to drive clarity (e.g. as in Amazon-style 6-page narratives), these principles are gold: Principle #1: Writing is not the outcome of thinking; it is the medium in which thinking takes place Principle #2: Do your work as if writing is the only thing that matters Principle #5: Standardization enables creativity Principle #6: Our work only gets better when exposed to high-quality feedback
- BiteCode_dev 7y ago
  Principle #1 is too extreme. While I confirm that writing is a powerful medium for thinking, anybody writer with a shower to take or a hike to walk will tell you that thinking takes place in many ways. Parts like "If you want to learn and remember something long-term, you have to write it down" depends so much of context. Again, writing down does help me to commit things in memory, but for some information, audio is better. For others, repeating in my head is better. Good advice all in all, but the definitive tone of the article is not needed IMO.
  - jacquesm 7y ago
    There is this tendency to reduce everything to simple rules that are simply wrong. Nuance takes more effort to put into words and to understand. And so we end up with these 'soundbite' bits of wisdom that are worse than nothing at all. Writing something down requires clarity, and clarity can be gained in many ways. Writing something down that isn't clear yet will result in (hopefully) spotting that lack of clarity before you press 'send' or 'publish'. But that doesn't mean that all for stuff that ends up written is happening while writing it down and without a very good idea of what you are trying to communicate beforehand you'll end up with bad writing.
    - analog31 7y ago
      This is an interesting point because it could help explain why scientists enjoy programming, even when we sometimes do it to our own detriment. Nothing clarifies a quantitative thought process better than having to write it down in the form of code. And the code either runs or it doesn't, so you know that at least it has some level of self consistency before you walk away from it.
  - class4behavior 7y ago
    You should first read the actual explanation of the first principle. It is not what you've understood it as.
  - simonh 7y ago
    > While I confirm that writing is a powerful medium for thinking, anybody writer with a shower to take or a hike to walk will tell you that thinking takes place in many ways. This is an article about note taking, not taking showers or going on hikes, or thinking in general, so I think trying to interpret its points outside that context is unreasonable. I think you’re imposing an unreasonably literal an exclusive interpretation of the point. The author doesn’t say it’s the _only_ medium. On definitive tone, would the article really be clearer if it constantly went off on digressions about non-note taking contexts to every single point? I see criticisms of articles like this here all the time and it’s really tiresome. If every article linked here was full of caveats and digressions on every last point, they would be unreadable. I’ll take a succinct, opinionated expression of someone’s experience and point of view over a rambling exploration of every last facet of a topic any time.
    - ken 7y ago
      > The author doesn’t say it’s the _only_ medium. No, but the author does say: "Completing these tasks is exceedingly difficult inside the confines of our heads. We need an external medium in which to perform this elaboration, and writing is the most effective and convenient one ever invented."
      - thawaway1837 7y ago
        Which is not even close to saying that writing is the only medium, and in fact confirms that there are other mediums to think, including just keeping stuff in your head.
        michael-ax 7y ago
        We reason symbolically and in an alphabetic culture such as our its entirely forgivable to name paper and the scribbles you put on it in order to think 'writing'. Keeping stuff in your head while thinking with the stuff in your head changes it. The same with memories. If you have not noticed this, please challenge the statement: Keeping stuff in your head does not work; you need to externalize in order to use your differential engine, aka brain in order to 'think.' Having said all this, I think because I am. not the other way 'round! everything else that you may think is thinking, maybe emotional/felt or aesthetic judging, would come from deeper down the stack. Anyway, tell me about these other media.. and show me how you're not driving complex symbolic insights with them! its all reasoning by analogy for us anyway :)
  - Wowfunhappy 7y ago
    Agreed, I think I'd just change a single word: > Principle #1: Writing is not the outcome of thinking; it is a medium in which thinking takes place "the medium" → "a medium". It's still a powerful statement.
    - michael-ax 7y ago
      I come in peace, but look, say I'm exploring things in martial arts. Then I'm only listening to the kinesthetic domain, sinking into it if you will by dismissing ratio in order to learn through another mode. I can learn like that, without any thinking at all! We can only learn anchored in feedback, and if you can give yourself the feedback while writing, talking out loud alone, or better yet, with a listener, then you get feedback that keeps you thinking. Verbalization and conversation maybe media, but writing, coding, sketching definitely are places where I notice my thinking.. What other 'media' did you have in mind?
  - hakunin 7y ago
    I can’t help but wonder if perhaps the helpfulness of a lot of these principles is different for people who can or cannot see/hear in their mind. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19618927 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19618927
  - m463 7y ago
    I feel a tension that I'll lose an idea unless I write it down. After it is written down, I'm able to work with it in a relxaed manner. I think recording it with audio might be ok too, because you won't lose the idea. But the next step after that is to work with it, and audio doesn't easily give you immediate playback. With writing there's sort of a feedback loop where you look at what you wrote and turn it over and figure out what's wrong with it and rewrite it or expound on it. That said, it's your call on "lists of 10 things" because there are some trite internet ones, and some 10-commandment ones.
- glenstein 7y ago
  I confess I'm having trouble understanding what principle #2 means. I would appreciate it if someone who read that and responded with a feeling of 'yeah that definitely makes sense' could elaborate.
  - digitalsushi 7y ago
    I interpreted it to mean that if we do not rely on writing, but merely use it as an augmentation, that our record will be incomplete and therefore not trustworthy, just a list of rumors. To promote the writing to a first class witness is necessary for it to be truly a work partner, a reliable source and a type of a mind to confer and converse with, in a weird but equal way as another person.
  - clSTophEjUdRanu 7y ago
    I took it as meaning elevate the importance of notes. Don't just haphazardly scribble, put high effort and thought into your writing. One of my professors did this. His notes looked as if they were literally fit to print exactly as is. He would do multiple drafts of his own notes.
  - a_wild_dandan 7y ago
    Another way he states that principle is essentially "write as if you're going to publish your work." (In a journal, blog, etc.) This purpose informs how you work on the subject. It will encourage you not to gloss over vague explanations or detour into irrelevant minutiae. After all, the presentation (you'll never give) will be an embarrassment if you get a core question and fumble through an answer because don't really understand it.
- jhoechtl 7y ago
  I vigorously conquer principle #5: standardisation is the enemy to creativity
  - cgriswald 7y ago
    The author has two main points: 1. That the creative part should be applied to first creating the standard, and then when dealing with the ideas, deal with the ideas, not the process. 2. That a standardized process makes creating easier because you're not trying to do it all at once. It's hard to argue with either one of these. Additionally, constraints are often very helpful in the creative process. Let's say you're developing a character for a novel. Would you rather face a blank page or a character profile? You're still free to break the standard as necessary, but you've at least got some kind of foundation to stand on. Even being a hacker is about being creative in the face of standard processes...
yread 7y ago
How does "21/3d26g53" fit into the numbering system described? Why even mention it?
- bfishadow 7y ago
  It’s a branch system. So that string means literally: Card 21 -> 3, d -> 26, g -> 53
- OJFord 7y ago
  I struggled with that too - but I think it's because the first (pre-/) line is the only one not to be lettered, in the diagram it's `1a` not because it's `a` on `1`, but because it's `a` on the `1`-th branch off `1`; in total it's `1/1a`. So `3` is the third branch off `21`, `d` marking that it's the d-th (fourth) in line on that branch. But maybe I'm still wrong, I agree it's not clear. Edit: Having said that, even by what I'm saying it should end `53a`, not just `53`.
bfishadow 7y ago
Is there an app for that? Seriously.
- OJFord 7y ago
  There are some links here, from purpose-built to a post on using Trello for it: https://zettelkasten.de/tools/ https://zettelkasten.de/tools/
- eandre 7y ago
  I believe this is what Roam[1] is kind of built for, whether they intended it or not. I haven't used it but was inspired to take another look at it after this article. [1] https://roamresearch.com/ https://roamresearch.com/
  - qxxx 7y ago
    agree, this seems to be everything what Luhmann did. All the branches can be own sub bullet in roam or even a sub page connected to the parent.
  - inakarmacoma 7y ago
    Has anyone given this a try whose also used by analysts in the past? I'm curious how they compare
- lucasverra 7y ago
  Isn't any mindmap app (i use https://whimsical.com https://whimsical.com) a support for this theory of branching ideas ?
  - pier25 7y ago
    No because mindmaps are trees not graphs.
- LeoTinnitus 7y ago
  For tasks, I use TickTick. I know it works for Windows, MacOS, and Android and it has been a godsend for me. The premmium features seem nice and I'd maybe one day pay for them but it's totally not necessary. If you're looking for notetaking and documentation of stuff then I wouldn't really know where to start with that.
jvanderbot 7y ago
Simply keeping a list of ideas has made a huge difference for me. Instead of feeling distracted by an idea when I should be focusing on something else, storing it somewhere means I can come back to it. Reviewing the idea list inspires me and gives me something to do when I'm bored. Finding articles or papers related to an idea, or capturing random thoughts about it is as easy as dumping it in a folder (eg in Dropbox ) that is numbered by the idea. Appending the number to notes or file names makes it easy to find information as well. I read an article that inspired me to write down every idea no matter how silly, and to try to work on 5 to 10 of them at once, and to always have one that is my main driver. Over the last 4 years, I've tallied 264. One has supported my research for 3 years (#021). One is my primary hobby (#013). Several have since been announced as results or products by major companies, validating the idea and removing the need to work on it. --- EDIT: I cannot quickly find the article, but I'll summarize. 1. Write down 100 ideas in one sitting. Any ideas. By the end, you'll be forced to really think outside your comfort zone, since everything prior is usually your first-order thoughts. 2. Choose 10 of the most promising to work on. Work means just pay attention to, make incremental prototypes, etc. 3. Choose the top contender to throw your weight behind. Maintain a 1/10/100 ratio as you retire ideas. --- My difference is I keep the list rolling and append new ideas as they come. I never sit down and make myself write a new batch (I should!). I'm actively working on about 5-10, in various stages of funding (I'm on a semi-soft money funding model). EDIT 2: Found! http://blog.fogus.me/2015/11/04/the-100101-method-my-approach-to-open-source/ http://blog.fogus.me/2015/11/04/the-100101-method-my-approac...
- almata 7y ago
  Any chance you still have that article around? I would like to read it if possible.
  - jvanderbot 7y ago
    I'm not able to find it, but it wasn't much more than a blog post exposing the points I mention in the edited comment. If anyone can remember it (it was a HN post), that'd be great!
JshWright 7y ago
> For example, you could memorize the fact that arteries are red and veins are blue. This is not a "fact", it's just a common convention used in medical drawings. The actual fact is that arteries are bright red, and veins are a dull red.
- hartator 7y ago
  Well. That kind of makes the full article of taking “smart notes” not that smart.
- deleted 7y ago
  [deleted]
Ahrens-Luhmann 7y ago
I feel the entire article is very confusing. Maybe I would need to have read the book to understand the article. I went in with the expectation of informative guidlines to effective notetaking, and left feeling i hade read a very lengthy way of saying taking notes is important. Coupled with a description of a complex way to archive notes(slip box), with no explanation of how to use the structure (your box).
- dot1x 7y ago
  That's no coincidence. The book on which this article is based on is _exactly_ the same (I read it). There are maybe a couple of ideas in the entire 200 pages book and it just runs in circles.
asterisk_ 7y ago
Note-taking seems to have gained popularity on HackerNews over the past few weeks (or my attention has been biased towards these submissions, at least). I've long been interested in the domain of "personal knowledge engineering" and this clearly seems a common thread within our community. As a brief overview of the "SOTA:" * Emacs and Vim users skew towards Org-mode or Vim wiki. * Roam Research is sort of a recent web-based alternative. * There's a lot of competition in the domain of fully-fledged note taking apps. Evernote has long been viewed as a king of note-taking but lost its edge over time (bad editor, bugs, lack of attention to their users). Memex seems to be gaining popularity even though their software looks somewhat buggy at the moment. * Otherwise, people naturally develop their own (similar) systems. I myself have independently developed a custom-made Vim wiki before starting research into this topic. It basically consists of a few grepping/Vim aliases to search/create Markdown in a `~/.notes` folder, backed up to GitHub. `mod+-` is bound to an i3 sratchpad where Vim is constantly open to `~/.notes/index.md`. This drastically reduces friction when making new notes. In any case, seems interesting that a lot of the personal note-taking systems have separately adopted similar principles to what Zettelkasten proposes: 1. Heavy reliance on tagging 2. Some sort of deep linking 3. Preference to making small, independent "knowledge chunks"
- inakarmacoma 7y ago
  Any comparisons between Roam and DynaList?
- hhs 7y ago
  > 1. Heavy reliance on tagging > 2. Some sort of deep linking This makes me think of Ted Nelson’s Docuverse [0]. Thanks for the note-taking review. [0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Docuverse https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Docuverse
- nextos 7y ago
  I use a small subset of Org Mode myself. But I think people focus too much on tools vs method. Plain text plus ripgrep can work great. Lühmann used pen and paper, and he built some hugely successful Zettelkastens. Many users at Zettelkasten.de write super simple notes in Markdown. Actually, I'd never move away from plain text or a plain text format like Org, Markdown or similar as it is really future proof. Will Roam or Evernote be around and well maintained in 20 years? Probably not. I'd recommend you to use your favorite text editor plus Markdown. If your favorite text editor is Emacs, then consider Org.
akkartik 7y ago
Useful past submissions: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21208196 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21208196 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22085837 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22085837 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22337681 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22337681
notjustanymike 7y ago
The most important improvement to my note taking was the elimination of a computer. Ideas, digressions, illustrations, concerns, and more are difficult to translate to a machine using a keyboard or mouse. A tablet is better, but the fidelity of a drawing app isn't as good as paper. Paper, it turns out, is always "on". There's no battery to worry about, no booting up and loading the app, and no Slack notification interrupting your flow. Paper calms you, because you know it never ever interrupts. I've really enjoyed evolving the tools I use for notes. Right now I take all notes in a large dotted moleskin using a Rotring Pro. Turns out the more enjoyable a tool is to use, the more likely you are to use it. The notebook is the lower end Moleskin ($20 for a 3-pack), and that's a nice balance between quality and feeling comfortable "wasting" a page.
- tartoran 7y ago
  Notetaking on paper feels the best. I was thinking of a moleskin sized note scanner that outputs to a moleskin sized e-paper device. The device could sit at the end of the notebook and contain a whole archive of notes.
- cgriswald 7y ago
  I like Moleskin, Leuchtturm1917 and similar because they are bound nicely. For applications when I'm okay with spiral bound I really like Mead's Cambridge Limited. They're more expensive, but have a great paper-feel and the covers aren't too flimsy. My process is to write everything in mechanical pencil, then review and trace over certain things (depending on topic) with Pigma pens with archival ink.
  - notjustanymike 7y ago
    What pencil do you use?
    - cgriswald 7y ago
      Pentel Graphgear1000 0.7mm I prefer the thinner lines of a 0.5mm pencil, but I'm old enough that it's pretty obvious I'm never going to learn to not break the tiny leads. Edit: A Japanese friend introduced me to Pentel's black erasers. I've found what appears to be the same product in the United States, but they're shorter, so I generally try to find some place I can buy them from over there, despite the extra cost.
gardenfelder 7y ago
The slip box diagram reminds me of Ted Nelson's ZigZag. But then, the numbering system raises an issue: in Zettelkasten, as practiced in Roam, and to degree in FedWiki, you can effectively transclude notes in other dimensions. In Roam and FedWiki, the identity system of slip boxes is replaced by slugs based on the note's title.
abtin08 7y ago
We are actually building a tool right now sharing many similar principles from the post. If you are also obsessed about this space, we are looking for more engineers to join us. we're pre-launch, reach out to me at abtin.setyani@gmail.com or on twitter : @s_abtin
tfolbrecht 7y ago
There so many posts with stuff like this, but what’s really had a positive impact for me is using my own custom notation. Nothing fancy, no org mode, wikis, markdown, just brackets and characters.
- celeritascelery 7y ago
  Why has that worked better for you?
  - tfolbrecht 7y ago
    It's concise, simple, portable so I can use whatever text editor or notes app. I've gotten burnt out on switching.
Tarkus69 7y ago
I find taking notes on "the guide" revolutionary. It's a tree like application to take notes. https://the-guide.it.softonic.com/ https://the-guide.it.softonic.com/
- hu3 7y ago
  A better link: http://theguide.sourceforge.net/features.html http://theguide.sourceforge.net/features.html
a_c 7y ago
For me the steps are taking smart notes are 1. Get started, doesn't matter how dumb your notes are 2. Use tiddlywiki for connecting ideas 3. Read the book How to Read a Book 4. Repeat
chrisweekly 7y ago
History of Zettelkasten and well-informed recommendations by an expert in the field. See also RoamResearch.com and NessLabs FTW
nataz 7y ago
How I take notes: For professional life: Pen + dot grid notepad - developed independently, but similar to the bullet journal technique. Dot grid plus pens make the whole thing ultra customizable. I can sketch engineering designs, make a calendar, track action items, take detailed notes, all in the same format. The key is to be strict with page numbers, dates, and index as much as possible. Things I occasionally miss - keyword search (I can still look things up by date or subject in the index), multimedia inserts (think dragging video/photos/sound clips into one note), never ending space (notebooks run out of pages), easy backups (thinking about digitizing with photos or scans), team collaboration (if this is necessary I use Trello). Things I like - no OS/tech stack compatibility issues, "it just works", lighter then a laptop/tablet, don't need to charge, easy to read, can bring into a secure area (where outside electronics are not permitted), travels well, hard to damage. http://bulletjournal.com/get-started/ http://bulletjournal.com/get-started/ For personal life: add Google keep for simple lists, and then a mix of Trello and dot grid for larger projects (less strict formatting than professional life project management). How I index using pen/paper: Every page has a number in the upper outside corner. Every entry into the note book has a title + subject tag, date, and the initials of a list of people linked to that entry. For easy reading and scanning I put all of this on one line. The title and subject are dark lined (thick), followed by the date MM/DD/YY, and then the initials inside a ( ). Each piece of info is separated by a ";". All of the info listed is underlined. under the intro line, I also break down actions, notes, calendar adds, etc with 3-4 different symbols. All I all this makes it clear and easy to scan quickly as you are looking for things. Each month I have 4 or 5 pages devoted to organization. I have a task list. Two bulleted columns. Old tasked are migrated over from the previous month. New tasks are added as soon as they are generated. Completed tasks get an X through the bullet. Migrated tasks get an >. Tasks that are linked to journal entries get a page number and a tag. I have a calendar page. 1 column, all dates of the month listed . Meetings, important actions and events are are listed by day, or with arrows over multiple days. Linked by tag/page number if applicable. I have a subject index. Major tags, reoccurring subjects, get a line or two. Page numbers with those subjects are added to the index. I realize this sounds complicated, but it's not once you get into a routine. The biggest this is it's okay to make "mistakes", and to get used to not having a delete key. Change is part of the notebook. Think of it like a change log. It's also important to be able to see what you change. Since I work in pen, I just make a single line through things I want to change. Note: when I finish or complete something on a task list or the calendar, I'll mark or change the symbol, I won't cross something out just because I'm done with it. Finally, I have a bunch of multi color pens I use. They are all the same brand/model, but I tend to use a different color each day. That makes it obvious as you are scanning that you are on the next day. I don't use specific colors for anything in particular, too hard to keep track of. Hope this helps. Reposted from an older thread @ https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17799232 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17799232
michael-ax 7y ago
Captured and tagged. Thank you vm! I have seen so many play-things in the note-space that I want to give just a few stats from my 6yo personal emacs setup: I capture and refile into 14 .orgs indexed at varying depth using the agenda ag and helm for search as needed. grep "\\" bmarks/*.org |wc etc say there are 5669 notes, 62652 lines 437644 words 3,663,683 bytes total. since 3/14 I have annotated 111 pdfs, linked many more, captured 508 images. 300+ days logged before switching to a weekly format 201 weeks ago. I can attest to the sentiment that there is actual communication going on between creator and such a system. :) a multi-media key takes me into capture and either a line-oriented popup for 'jots', a floating window or a full-screen distraction free mode where i can quickly see, that the great thing i discovered yesterday slipped from my mind 5 years ago. The most important improvement to my note taking was realizing that, like Luhmann, I wasn't taking notes but curating an exo-brain. I had seen emacs as a rinky-dink over-complicated under-documented religious thing -- and not as the low-stress 'does everything except long-lines really well and never crashes' thing that is now at the heart of my computing life. So.. to continue learning emacs for the next 30 years is definitely on my agenda because its worth it for the quality without a name .. absent elsewhere. It was cool to see how his manual linking (not just tags) would force him to review the neighborhood he would place his cards in. I neglect that sometimes and so the epiphanies and understanding I get from integrating content have to sometimes wait a cycle or two or come when i check things in or close out the day. Anyway? My point? Invest yourself into org-mode and take notes for a few years to learn how to take better notes while building something that can last you a whole life long. it worked for me. ty!
dang 7y ago
Related from yesterday: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22337681 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22337681 Related from a few weeks ago: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22085837 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22085837
AlphaWeaver 7y ago
In the realm of note taking and personal knowledge management apps, I've been shopping around recently. Notion is very popular, and Roam Research [0] has been the popular scrappy upstart that people have been looking at, but I've been unhappy with these since neither has an API (and neither are open source.) I would _strongly_ urge HN readers to take a look at Tiddlywiki [1]. It's popped up on Hacker News before, and I wrote it off, but I've been taking a closer look recently and its _incredibly_ powerful, as well as completely customizable and open source. It runs off of a micro-kernel architecture, so the core application itself is implemented in code that you can change, edit, and manage just like you would do with your own notes. It's really easy to get started (it's a self contained HTML file) but seems so have some robust saving and backup functionality. Please please give it a look if you're looking at tools in this space. I've already started using it and I'm _very_ happy with it. (Not affiliated with Tiddlywiki, just a really happy user.) [0]: https://roamresearch.com https://roamresearch.com [1]: https://tiddlywiki.com https://tiddlywiki.com
- cc9one 7y ago
  This comment introduced me to TiddlyWiki, and I am quite happy with it so far. Does anyone have a recommendation for a markdown plug-in? The markdown plug-in from their website is no longer available. Thanks!
  - AlphaWeaver 7y ago
    I haven't looked very far, but if there isn't a decent plugin for it yet, it likely isn't incredibly hard to make. Here [0] is a link to a view I created that links to a markdown plugin (which should still work) as well as to information about TW's plugin architecture. If you're interested in learning even more about TW's internal architecture, check out their developer documentation here [1]. [0]: https://tiddlywiki.com/#%24%3A%2Fconfig%2FPageControlButtons%2FVisibility%2F%24%3A%2Fcore%2Fui%2FButtons%2Fpermaview:%5B%5BMarkdown%20Plugin%5D%5D%20Plugins%20PluginMechanism https://tiddlywiki.com/#%24%3A%2Fconfig%2FPageControlButtons... [1]: https://tiddlywiki.com/dev https://tiddlywiki.com/dev
    - 7y ago
c-smile 7y ago
Thanks, just added the note about the notes into my Sciter Notes :) http://notes.sciter.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/02/note-note.png http://notes.sciter.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/02/note-note... CTRL+C in browser and CTRL+V in Sciter Notes (https://notes.sciter.com https://notes.sciter.com) + tag and book selection.
markus_zhang 7y ago
During my work as a business/data analyst, I have found a way to organize my project notes, scripts, dashboards and spreadsheets. PART I - Paper notes (Yes I still keep paper notes) 1 - Prepare a batch of 10-20 prints of my special note-taking pdf for each project, depending on the size (small if within 4 sprints, and big if more than 4); 2 - Write down names of attendees during the meetings, so that I know who to contact when I need info 3 - Prepare a folder for each project and always put the notes, one page for a meeting, in the following order: Top -> Always the most urgent or important meeting notes. E.g. KPI meetings, or telemetry meetings Then I put the rest meeting notes on reverse chronological order (most recent at top) In this way, I can always review the previous meetings, as well as the most urgent issues in under 5 minutes, which is good because I work in Agile and in most of the companies that I worked for, this means Fast, not Efficient. PART II - Electronic notes, scripts, dashboards and spreadsheets I have a top-level One-Drive folder called "Company_Team_Name", which is also shared between Win10 (Host) and Ubuntu (VirtualBox). I have two child folders under it, "Company_Team_Name/Project" and "Company_Team_Name/Task". I use the following tools: Excel, for results of analysis and other stuffs; SQL, my bread and butter; Python, sometimes I write Python scripts to help my analysis. I do not like notebooks so I write fully operational programs; Shell, some Linux command line tools, like csvsql, are very useful for simple tasks; Tableau, for all dashboards; Typora, for all research note taking I organize the project folders in Datagrip, as I pretty much need SQL for every report. 1 - In Ubuntu/Win10, create a new folder under "Company_Team_Name/Project" with the name of the new project, assuming it's a 4+ JIRA long project, not an overnight task. 2 - In Datagrip, create the following folders for each report (I worked long enough to know that we need these reports): "./Pre_Analysis" -> For pre analysis of the project, usually some data dumps or small analysis of similar features in the past; "./AB_Test"; "./Small_Analysis" -> We usually release a feature to only 5%-20% of the population for technical sanity check and small analysis (actually same as full analysis but only on most important KPIs); "./Full_Analysis" -> 100% population Full Analysis, usually performed twice because CXOs will require a more detailed look after reading the first full analysis; "./Tableau" -> put all dashboards here 3 - SQL scripts, Python scripts, Typora mds and Excel spreadsheets will be grouped under each report sub folder In the meantime, I'm considering writing a shell script, or a Python script to automate creating those folders. I'm also considering using each Project folder as the venv directory for Python, but since all projects use the same Python package configuration (pandas, odbc, etc.) I just install packages on the primary Python interpreter. This is a configuration that I find to be extremely efficient to work in an Agile environment.
lethologica 7y ago
I’ve tried this and failed with a Tiddlywiki. I found the Métis if entering data too cumbersome and gave up. All I want is a single text file that I Can take multiple notes in and link those notes internally in that single file. I wish Apple notes had an easy way of doing this but for now I’m stuck with writing HTML.
- bobbylarrybobby 7y ago
  I am routinely blown away by the fact that apple doesn't expose URLs for individual pieces of your data that they store (emails, notes, messages, files, etc). There's no way to reference another note in the current note except to share the other note and get its iCloud link. However, there is an editor that makes linking between notes seamless, called Bear (bear.app).
urlwolf 7y ago
I'm sold on the zettelkasten method. I've tried zim, cherrynotes, trilium... I've found two things that matter most for me: 1/ you need an editor where typing latency is low. Below 10ms. Otherwise you will get in a bad mood and make more mistakes. Electron apps need not apply 2/ creating, linking, and finding notes must be fast On top of that, it must be future proof. I've found the ideal solution in howl (howl.io). This is a text editor, built in moonscript and with sane default. Typing latency is 6ms, faster than anything else I could find (on linux, non compositing window manager) The trick for liking (in markdown) is autocompletion. It will autocomplete based on all buffers open. My trick is to run :exec ls (list of files in the project directory) and leave this buffer open. Then ctrl space will autocomplete filenames. The rest is trivial. Oh God, Howl deserves so much praise. I hope it gets picked up on HN one day. It's only missing a tiny push, having a community around it would be amazing.
- dot1x 7y ago
  nvALT fits the bill, as does "Archiver"
daffy 7y ago
Does anyone do this in org mode? Do you use Luhmann's numbering in headings?
daffy 7y ago
Why is the first branch off 1 1/1 rather than 1a?
- deleted 7y ago
  [deleted]
- daffy 7y ago
  https://niklas-luhmann-archiv.de/nachlass/zettelkasten https://niklas-luhmann-archiv.de/nachlass/zettelkasten
deleted 7y ago
[deleted]

469 points by Anon84 7y ago

I replied about this project before but surprised it hasn't reached more mainstream awareness. Piggydb former and now Cotoami [1] [1]: https://piggydb.net/2019/03/06/why-its-harder-to-discover-valuable-knowledge-in-tree-structured-note-taking/ https://piggydb.net/2019/03/06/why-its-harder-to-discover-va...

cek 7y ago

Interesting the first few principles are not about note-taking, but writing in general. If you believe in the power of the written word to drive clarity (e.g. as in Amazon-style 6-page narratives), these principles are gold: Principle #1: Writing is not the outcome of thinking; it is the medium in which thinking takes place Principle #2: Do your work as if writing is the only thing that matters Principle #5: Standardization enables creativity Principle #6: Our work only gets better when exposed to high-quality feedback

BiteCode_dev 7y ago
Principle #1 is too extreme. While I confirm that writing is a powerful medium for thinking, anybody writer with a shower to take or a hike to walk will tell you that thinking takes place in many ways. Parts like "If you want to learn and remember something long-term, you have to write it down" depends so much of context. Again, writing down does help me to commit things in memory, but for some information, audio is better. For others, repeating in my head is better. Good advice all in all, but the definitive tone of the article is not needed IMO.
- jacquesm 7y ago
  There is this tendency to reduce everything to simple rules that are simply wrong. Nuance takes more effort to put into words and to understand. And so we end up with these 'soundbite' bits of wisdom that are worse than nothing at all. Writing something down requires clarity, and clarity can be gained in many ways. Writing something down that isn't clear yet will result in (hopefully) spotting that lack of clarity before you press 'send' or 'publish'. But that doesn't mean that all for stuff that ends up written is happening while writing it down and without a very good idea of what you are trying to communicate beforehand you'll end up with bad writing.
  - analog31 7y ago
    This is an interesting point because it could help explain why scientists enjoy programming, even when we sometimes do it to our own detriment. Nothing clarifies a quantitative thought process better than having to write it down in the form of code. And the code either runs or it doesn't, so you know that at least it has some level of self consistency before you walk away from it.
- class4behavior 7y ago
  You should first read the actual explanation of the first principle. It is not what you've understood it as.
- simonh 7y ago
  > While I confirm that writing is a powerful medium for thinking, anybody writer with a shower to take or a hike to walk will tell you that thinking takes place in many ways. This is an article about note taking, not taking showers or going on hikes, or thinking in general, so I think trying to interpret its points outside that context is unreasonable. I think you’re imposing an unreasonably literal an exclusive interpretation of the point. The author doesn’t say it’s the _only_ medium. On definitive tone, would the article really be clearer if it constantly went off on digressions about non-note taking contexts to every single point? I see criticisms of articles like this here all the time and it’s really tiresome. If every article linked here was full of caveats and digressions on every last point, they would be unreadable. I’ll take a succinct, opinionated expression of someone’s experience and point of view over a rambling exploration of every last facet of a topic any time.
  - ken 7y ago
    > The author doesn’t say it’s the _only_ medium. No, but the author does say: "Completing these tasks is exceedingly difficult inside the confines of our heads. We need an external medium in which to perform this elaboration, and writing is the most effective and convenient one ever invented."
    - thawaway1837 7y ago
      Which is not even close to saying that writing is the only medium, and in fact confirms that there are other mediums to think, including just keeping stuff in your head.
      - michael-ax 7y ago
        We reason symbolically and in an alphabetic culture such as our its entirely forgivable to name paper and the scribbles you put on it in order to think 'writing'. Keeping stuff in your head while thinking with the stuff in your head changes it. The same with memories. If you have not noticed this, please challenge the statement: Keeping stuff in your head does not work; you need to externalize in order to use your differential engine, aka brain in order to 'think.' Having said all this, I think because I am. not the other way 'round! everything else that you may think is thinking, maybe emotional/felt or aesthetic judging, would come from deeper down the stack. Anyway, tell me about these other media.. and show me how you're not driving complex symbolic insights with them! its all reasoning by analogy for us anyway :)
- Wowfunhappy 7y ago
  Agreed, I think I'd just change a single word: > Principle #1: Writing is not the outcome of thinking; it is a medium in which thinking takes place "the medium" → "a medium". It's still a powerful statement.
  - michael-ax 7y ago
    I come in peace, but look, say I'm exploring things in martial arts. Then I'm only listening to the kinesthetic domain, sinking into it if you will by dismissing ratio in order to learn through another mode. I can learn like that, without any thinking at all! We can only learn anchored in feedback, and if you can give yourself the feedback while writing, talking out loud alone, or better yet, with a listener, then you get feedback that keeps you thinking. Verbalization and conversation maybe media, but writing, coding, sketching definitely are places where I notice my thinking.. What other 'media' did you have in mind?
- hakunin 7y ago
  I can’t help but wonder if perhaps the helpfulness of a lot of these principles is different for people who can or cannot see/hear in their mind. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19618927 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19618927
- m463 7y ago
  I feel a tension that I'll lose an idea unless I write it down. After it is written down, I'm able to work with it in a relxaed manner. I think recording it with audio might be ok too, because you won't lose the idea. But the next step after that is to work with it, and audio doesn't easily give you immediate playback. With writing there's sort of a feedback loop where you look at what you wrote and turn it over and figure out what's wrong with it and rewrite it or expound on it. That said, it's your call on "lists of 10 things" because there are some trite internet ones, and some 10-commandment ones.
glenstein 7y ago
I confess I'm having trouble understanding what principle #2 means. I would appreciate it if someone who read that and responded with a feeling of 'yeah that definitely makes sense' could elaborate.
- digitalsushi 7y ago
  I interpreted it to mean that if we do not rely on writing, but merely use it as an augmentation, that our record will be incomplete and therefore not trustworthy, just a list of rumors. To promote the writing to a first class witness is necessary for it to be truly a work partner, a reliable source and a type of a mind to confer and converse with, in a weird but equal way as another person.
- clSTophEjUdRanu 7y ago
  I took it as meaning elevate the importance of notes. Don't just haphazardly scribble, put high effort and thought into your writing. One of my professors did this. His notes looked as if they were literally fit to print exactly as is. He would do multiple drafts of his own notes.
- a_wild_dandan 7y ago
  Another way he states that principle is essentially "write as if you're going to publish your work." (In a journal, blog, etc.) This purpose informs how you work on the subject. It will encourage you not to gloss over vague explanations or detour into irrelevant minutiae. After all, the presentation (you'll never give) will be an embarrassment if you get a core question and fumble through an answer because don't really understand it.
jhoechtl 7y ago
I vigorously conquer principle #5: standardisation is the enemy to creativity
- cgriswald 7y ago
  The author has two main points: 1. That the creative part should be applied to first creating the standard, and then when dealing with the ideas, deal with the ideas, not the process. 2. That a standardized process makes creating easier because you're not trying to do it all at once. It's hard to argue with either one of these. Additionally, constraints are often very helpful in the creative process. Let's say you're developing a character for a novel. Would you rather face a blank page or a character profile? You're still free to break the standard as necessary, but you've at least got some kind of foundation to stand on. Even being a hacker is about being creative in the face of standard processes...

yread 7y ago

How does "21/3d26g53" fit into the numbering system described? Why even mention it?

bfishadow 7y ago
It’s a branch system. So that string means literally: Card 21 -> 3, d -> 26, g -> 53
OJFord 7y ago
I struggled with that too - but I think it's because the first (pre-/) line is the only one not to be lettered, in the diagram it's `1a` not because it's `a` on `1`, but because it's `a` on the `1`-th branch off `1`; in total it's `1/1a`. So `3` is the third branch off `21`, `d` marking that it's the d-th (fourth) in line on that branch. But maybe I'm still wrong, I agree it's not clear. Edit: Having said that, even by what I'm saying it should end `53a`, not just `53`.

bfishadow 7y ago

Is there an app for that? Seriously.

OJFord 7y ago
There are some links here, from purpose-built to a post on using Trello for it: https://zettelkasten.de/tools/ https://zettelkasten.de/tools/
eandre 7y ago
I believe this is what Roam[1] is kind of built for, whether they intended it or not. I haven't used it but was inspired to take another look at it after this article. [1] https://roamresearch.com/ https://roamresearch.com/
- qxxx 7y ago
  agree, this seems to be everything what Luhmann did. All the branches can be own sub bullet in roam or even a sub page connected to the parent.
- inakarmacoma 7y ago
  Has anyone given this a try whose also used by analysts in the past? I'm curious how they compare
lucasverra 7y ago
Isn't any mindmap app (i use https://whimsical.com https://whimsical.com) a support for this theory of branching ideas ?
- pier25 7y ago
  No because mindmaps are trees not graphs.
LeoTinnitus 7y ago
For tasks, I use TickTick. I know it works for Windows, MacOS, and Android and it has been a godsend for me. The premmium features seem nice and I'd maybe one day pay for them but it's totally not necessary. If you're looking for notetaking and documentation of stuff then I wouldn't really know where to start with that.

jvanderbot 7y ago

Simply keeping a list of ideas has made a huge difference for me. Instead of feeling distracted by an idea when I should be focusing on something else, storing it somewhere means I can come back to it. Reviewing the idea list inspires me and gives me something to do when I'm bored. Finding articles or papers related to an idea, or capturing random thoughts about it is as easy as dumping it in a folder (eg in Dropbox ) that is numbered by the idea. Appending the number to notes or file names makes it easy to find information as well. I read an article that inspired me to write down every idea no matter how silly, and to try to work on 5 to 10 of them at once, and to always have one that is my main driver. Over the last 4 years, I've tallied 264. One has supported my research for 3 years (#021). One is my primary hobby (#013). Several have since been announced as results or products by major companies, validating the idea and removing the need to work on it. --- EDIT: I cannot quickly find the article, but I'll summarize. 1. Write down 100 ideas in one sitting. Any ideas. By the end, you'll be forced to really think outside your comfort zone, since everything prior is usually your first-order thoughts. 2. Choose 10 of the most promising to work on. Work means just pay attention to, make incremental prototypes, etc. 3. Choose the top contender to throw your weight behind. Maintain a 1/10/100 ratio as you retire ideas. --- My difference is I keep the list rolling and append new ideas as they come. I never sit down and make myself write a new batch (I should!). I'm actively working on about 5-10, in various stages of funding (I'm on a semi-soft money funding model). EDIT 2: Found! http://blog.fogus.me/2015/11/04/the-100101-method-my-approach-to-open-source/ http://blog.fogus.me/2015/11/04/the-100101-method-my-approac...

almata 7y ago
Any chance you still have that article around? I would like to read it if possible.
- jvanderbot 7y ago
  I'm not able to find it, but it wasn't much more than a blog post exposing the points I mention in the edited comment. If anyone can remember it (it was a HN post), that'd be great!

JshWright 7y ago

> For example, you could memorize the fact that arteries are red and veins are blue. This is not a "fact", it's just a common convention used in medical drawings. The actual fact is that arteries are bright red, and veins are a dull red.

hartator 7y ago
Well. That kind of makes the full article of taking “smart notes” not that smart.
deleted 7y ago
[deleted]

Ahrens-Luhmann 7y ago

I feel the entire article is very confusing. Maybe I would need to have read the book to understand the article. I went in with the expectation of informative guidlines to effective notetaking, and left feeling i hade read a very lengthy way of saying taking notes is important. Coupled with a description of a complex way to archive notes(slip box), with no explanation of how to use the structure (your box).

dot1x 7y ago
That's no coincidence. The book on which this article is based on is _exactly_ the same (I read it). There are maybe a couple of ideas in the entire 200 pages book and it just runs in circles.

asterisk_ 7y ago

Note-taking seems to have gained popularity on HackerNews over the past few weeks (or my attention has been biased towards these submissions, at least). I've long been interested in the domain of "personal knowledge engineering" and this clearly seems a common thread within our community. As a brief overview of the "SOTA:" * Emacs and Vim users skew towards Org-mode or Vim wiki. * Roam Research is sort of a recent web-based alternative. * There's a lot of competition in the domain of fully-fledged note taking apps. Evernote has long been viewed as a king of note-taking but lost its edge over time (bad editor, bugs, lack of attention to their users). Memex seems to be gaining popularity even though their software looks somewhat buggy at the moment. * Otherwise, people naturally develop their own (similar) systems. I myself have independently developed a custom-made Vim wiki before starting research into this topic. It basically consists of a few grepping/Vim aliases to search/create Markdown in a `~/.notes` folder, backed up to GitHub. `mod+-` is bound to an i3 sratchpad where Vim is constantly open to `~/.notes/index.md`. This drastically reduces friction when making new notes. In any case, seems interesting that a lot of the personal note-taking systems have separately adopted similar principles to what Zettelkasten proposes: 1. Heavy reliance on tagging 2. Some sort of deep linking 3. Preference to making small, independent "knowledge chunks"

inakarmacoma 7y ago
Any comparisons between Roam and DynaList?
hhs 7y ago
> 1. Heavy reliance on tagging > 2. Some sort of deep linking This makes me think of Ted Nelson’s Docuverse [0]. Thanks for the note-taking review. [0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Docuverse https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Docuverse
nextos 7y ago
I use a small subset of Org Mode myself. But I think people focus too much on tools vs method. Plain text plus ripgrep can work great. Lühmann used pen and paper, and he built some hugely successful Zettelkastens. Many users at Zettelkasten.de write super simple notes in Markdown. Actually, I'd never move away from plain text or a plain text format like Org, Markdown or similar as it is really future proof. Will Roam or Evernote be around and well maintained in 20 years? Probably not. I'd recommend you to use your favorite text editor plus Markdown. If your favorite text editor is Emacs, then consider Org.

akkartik 7y ago

Useful past submissions: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21208196 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21208196 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22085837 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22085837 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22337681 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22337681

notjustanymike 7y ago

The most important improvement to my note taking was the elimination of a computer. Ideas, digressions, illustrations, concerns, and more are difficult to translate to a machine using a keyboard or mouse. A tablet is better, but the fidelity of a drawing app isn't as good as paper. Paper, it turns out, is always "on". There's no battery to worry about, no booting up and loading the app, and no Slack notification interrupting your flow. Paper calms you, because you know it never ever interrupts. I've really enjoyed evolving the tools I use for notes. Right now I take all notes in a large dotted moleskin using a Rotring Pro. Turns out the more enjoyable a tool is to use, the more likely you are to use it. The notebook is the lower end Moleskin ($20 for a 3-pack), and that's a nice balance between quality and feeling comfortable "wasting" a page.

tartoran 7y ago
Notetaking on paper feels the best. I was thinking of a moleskin sized note scanner that outputs to a moleskin sized e-paper device. The device could sit at the end of the notebook and contain a whole archive of notes.
cgriswald 7y ago
I like Moleskin, Leuchtturm1917 and similar because they are bound nicely. For applications when I'm okay with spiral bound I really like Mead's Cambridge Limited. They're more expensive, but have a great paper-feel and the covers aren't too flimsy. My process is to write everything in mechanical pencil, then review and trace over certain things (depending on topic) with Pigma pens with archival ink.
- notjustanymike 7y ago
  What pencil do you use?
  - cgriswald 7y ago
    Pentel Graphgear1000 0.7mm I prefer the thinner lines of a 0.5mm pencil, but I'm old enough that it's pretty obvious I'm never going to learn to not break the tiny leads. Edit: A Japanese friend introduced me to Pentel's black erasers. I've found what appears to be the same product in the United States, but they're shorter, so I generally try to find some place I can buy them from over there, despite the extra cost.

gardenfelder 7y ago

The slip box diagram reminds me of Ted Nelson's ZigZag. But then, the numbering system raises an issue: in Zettelkasten, as practiced in Roam, and to degree in FedWiki, you can effectively transclude notes in other dimensions. In Roam and FedWiki, the identity system of slip boxes is replaced by slugs based on the note's title.

abtin08 7y ago

We are actually building a tool right now sharing many similar principles from the post. If you are also obsessed about this space, we are looking for more engineers to join us. we're pre-launch, reach out to me at abtin.setyani@gmail.com or on twitter : @s_abtin

tfolbrecht 7y ago

There so many posts with stuff like this, but what’s really had a positive impact for me is using my own custom notation. Nothing fancy, no org mode, wikis, markdown, just brackets and characters.

celeritascelery 7y ago
Why has that worked better for you?
- tfolbrecht 7y ago
  It's concise, simple, portable so I can use whatever text editor or notes app. I've gotten burnt out on switching.

Tarkus69 7y ago

I find taking notes on "the guide" revolutionary. It's a tree like application to take notes. https://the-guide.it.softonic.com/ https://the-guide.it.softonic.com/

hu3 7y ago
A better link: http://theguide.sourceforge.net/features.html http://theguide.sourceforge.net/features.html

a_c 7y ago

For me the steps are taking smart notes are 1. Get started, doesn't matter how dumb your notes are 2. Use tiddlywiki for connecting ideas 3. Read the book How to Read a Book 4. Repeat

chrisweekly 7y ago

History of Zettelkasten and well-informed recommendations by an expert in the field. See also RoamResearch.com and NessLabs FTW

nataz 7y ago

How I take notes: For professional life: Pen + dot grid notepad - developed independently, but similar to the bullet journal technique. Dot grid plus pens make the whole thing ultra customizable. I can sketch engineering designs, make a calendar, track action items, take detailed notes, all in the same format. The key is to be strict with page numbers, dates, and index as much as possible. Things I occasionally miss - keyword search (I can still look things up by date or subject in the index), multimedia inserts (think dragging video/photos/sound clips into one note), never ending space (notebooks run out of pages), easy backups (thinking about digitizing with photos or scans), team collaboration (if this is necessary I use Trello). Things I like - no OS/tech stack compatibility issues, "it just works", lighter then a laptop/tablet, don't need to charge, easy to read, can bring into a secure area (where outside electronics are not permitted), travels well, hard to damage. http://bulletjournal.com/get-started/ http://bulletjournal.com/get-started/ For personal life: add Google keep for simple lists, and then a mix of Trello and dot grid for larger projects (less strict formatting than professional life project management). How I index using pen/paper: Every page has a number in the upper outside corner. Every entry into the note book has a title + subject tag, date, and the initials of a list of people linked to that entry. For easy reading and scanning I put all of this on one line. The title and subject are dark lined (thick), followed by the date MM/DD/YY, and then the initials inside a ( ). Each piece of info is separated by a ";". All of the info listed is underlined. under the intro line, I also break down actions, notes, calendar adds, etc with 3-4 different symbols. All I all this makes it clear and easy to scan quickly as you are looking for things. Each month I have 4 or 5 pages devoted to organization. I have a task list. Two bulleted columns. Old tasked are migrated over from the previous month. New tasks are added as soon as they are generated. Completed tasks get an X through the bullet. Migrated tasks get an >. Tasks that are linked to journal entries get a page number and a tag. I have a calendar page. 1 column, all dates of the month listed . Meetings, important actions and events are are listed by day, or with arrows over multiple days. Linked by tag/page number if applicable. I have a subject index. Major tags, reoccurring subjects, get a line or two. Page numbers with those subjects are added to the index. I realize this sounds complicated, but it's not once you get into a routine. The biggest this is it's okay to make "mistakes", and to get used to not having a delete key. Change is part of the notebook. Think of it like a change log. It's also important to be able to see what you change. Since I work in pen, I just make a single line through things I want to change. Note: when I finish or complete something on a task list or the calendar, I'll mark or change the symbol, I won't cross something out just because I'm done with it. Finally, I have a bunch of multi color pens I use. They are all the same brand/model, but I tend to use a different color each day. That makes it obvious as you are scanning that you are on the next day. I don't use specific colors for anything in particular, too hard to keep track of. Hope this helps. Reposted from an older thread @ https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17799232 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17799232

michael-ax 7y ago

Captured and tagged. Thank you vm! I have seen so many play-things in the note-space that I want to give just a few stats from my 6yo personal emacs setup: I capture and refile into 14 .orgs indexed at varying depth using the agenda ag and helm for search as needed. grep "\\" bmarks/*.org |wc etc say there are 5669 notes, 62652 lines 437644 words 3,663,683 bytes total. since 3/14 I have annotated 111 pdfs, linked many more, captured 508 images. 300+ days logged before switching to a weekly format 201 weeks ago. I can attest to the sentiment that there is actual communication going on between creator and such a system. :) a multi-media key takes me into capture and either a line-oriented popup for 'jots', a floating window or a full-screen distraction free mode where i can quickly see, that the great thing i discovered yesterday slipped from my mind 5 years ago. The most important improvement to my note taking was realizing that, like Luhmann, I wasn't taking notes but curating an exo-brain. I had seen emacs as a rinky-dink over-complicated under-documented religious thing -- and not as the low-stress 'does everything except long-lines really well and never crashes' thing that is now at the heart of my computing life. So.. to continue learning emacs for the next 30 years is definitely on my agenda because its worth it for the quality without a name .. absent elsewhere. It was cool to see how his manual linking (not just tags) would force him to review the neighborhood he would place his cards in. I neglect that sometimes and so the epiphanies and understanding I get from integrating content have to sometimes wait a cycle or two or come when i check things in or close out the day. Anyway? My point? Invest yourself into org-mode and take notes for a few years to learn how to take better notes while building something that can last you a whole life long. it worked for me. ty!

dang 7y ago

Related from yesterday: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22337681 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22337681 Related from a few weeks ago: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22085837 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22085837

AlphaWeaver 7y ago

In the realm of note taking and personal knowledge management apps, I've been shopping around recently. Notion is very popular, and Roam Research [0] has been the popular scrappy upstart that people have been looking at, but I've been unhappy with these since neither has an API (and neither are open source.) I would _strongly_ urge HN readers to take a look at Tiddlywiki [1]. It's popped up on Hacker News before, and I wrote it off, but I've been taking a closer look recently and its _incredibly_ powerful, as well as completely customizable and open source. It runs off of a micro-kernel architecture, so the core application itself is implemented in code that you can change, edit, and manage just like you would do with your own notes. It's really easy to get started (it's a self contained HTML file) but seems so have some robust saving and backup functionality. Please please give it a look if you're looking at tools in this space. I've already started using it and I'm _very_ happy with it. (Not affiliated with Tiddlywiki, just a really happy user.) [0]: https://roamresearch.com https://roamresearch.com [1]: https://tiddlywiki.com https://tiddlywiki.com

cc9one 7y ago
This comment introduced me to TiddlyWiki, and I am quite happy with it so far. Does anyone have a recommendation for a markdown plug-in? The markdown plug-in from their website is no longer available. Thanks!
- AlphaWeaver 7y ago
  I haven't looked very far, but if there isn't a decent plugin for it yet, it likely isn't incredibly hard to make. Here [0] is a link to a view I created that links to a markdown plugin (which should still work) as well as to information about TW's plugin architecture. If you're interested in learning even more about TW's internal architecture, check out their developer documentation here [1]. [0]: https://tiddlywiki.com/#%24%3A%2Fconfig%2FPageControlButtons%2FVisibility%2F%24%3A%2Fcore%2Fui%2FButtons%2Fpermaview:%5B%5BMarkdown%20Plugin%5D%5D%20Plugins%20PluginMechanism https://tiddlywiki.com/#%24%3A%2Fconfig%2FPageControlButtons... [1]: https://tiddlywiki.com/dev https://tiddlywiki.com/dev
  - 7y ago

c-smile 7y ago

Thanks, just added the note about the notes into my Sciter Notes :) http://notes.sciter.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/02/note-note.png http://notes.sciter.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/02/note-note... CTRL+C in browser and CTRL+V in Sciter Notes (https://notes.sciter.com https://notes.sciter.com) + tag and book selection.

markus_zhang 7y ago

During my work as a business/data analyst, I have found a way to organize my project notes, scripts, dashboards and spreadsheets. PART I - Paper notes (Yes I still keep paper notes) 1 - Prepare a batch of 10-20 prints of my special note-taking pdf for each project, depending on the size (small if within 4 sprints, and big if more than 4); 2 - Write down names of attendees during the meetings, so that I know who to contact when I need info 3 - Prepare a folder for each project and always put the notes, one page for a meeting, in the following order: Top -> Always the most urgent or important meeting notes. E.g. KPI meetings, or telemetry meetings Then I put the rest meeting notes on reverse chronological order (most recent at top) In this way, I can always review the previous meetings, as well as the most urgent issues in under 5 minutes, which is good because I work in Agile and in most of the companies that I worked for, this means Fast, not Efficient. PART II - Electronic notes, scripts, dashboards and spreadsheets I have a top-level One-Drive folder called "Company_Team_Name", which is also shared between Win10 (Host) and Ubuntu (VirtualBox). I have two child folders under it, "Company_Team_Name/Project" and "Company_Team_Name/Task". I use the following tools: Excel, for results of analysis and other stuffs; SQL, my bread and butter; Python, sometimes I write Python scripts to help my analysis. I do not like notebooks so I write fully operational programs; Shell, some Linux command line tools, like csvsql, are very useful for simple tasks; Tableau, for all dashboards; Typora, for all research note taking I organize the project folders in Datagrip, as I pretty much need SQL for every report. 1 - In Ubuntu/Win10, create a new folder under "Company_Team_Name/Project" with the name of the new project, assuming it's a 4+ JIRA long project, not an overnight task. 2 - In Datagrip, create the following folders for each report (I worked long enough to know that we need these reports): "./Pre_Analysis" -> For pre analysis of the project, usually some data dumps or small analysis of similar features in the past; "./AB_Test"; "./Small_Analysis" -> We usually release a feature to only 5%-20% of the population for technical sanity check and small analysis (actually same as full analysis but only on most important KPIs); "./Full_Analysis" -> 100% population Full Analysis, usually performed twice because CXOs will require a more detailed look after reading the first full analysis; "./Tableau" -> put all dashboards here 3 - SQL scripts, Python scripts, Typora mds and Excel spreadsheets will be grouped under each report sub folder In the meantime, I'm considering writing a shell script, or a Python script to automate creating those folders. I'm also considering using each Project folder as the venv directory for Python, but since all projects use the same Python package configuration (pandas, odbc, etc.) I just install packages on the primary Python interpreter. This is a configuration that I find to be extremely efficient to work in an Agile environment.

lethologica 7y ago

I’ve tried this and failed with a Tiddlywiki. I found the Métis if entering data too cumbersome and gave up. All I want is a single text file that I Can take multiple notes in and link those notes internally in that single file. I wish Apple notes had an easy way of doing this but for now I’m stuck with writing HTML.

bobbylarrybobby 7y ago
I am routinely blown away by the fact that apple doesn't expose URLs for individual pieces of your data that they store (emails, notes, messages, files, etc). There's no way to reference another note in the current note except to share the other note and get its iCloud link. However, there is an editor that makes linking between notes seamless, called Bear (bear.app).

urlwolf 7y ago

I'm sold on the zettelkasten method. I've tried zim, cherrynotes, trilium... I've found two things that matter most for me: 1/ you need an editor where typing latency is low. Below 10ms. Otherwise you will get in a bad mood and make more mistakes. Electron apps need not apply 2/ creating, linking, and finding notes must be fast On top of that, it must be future proof. I've found the ideal solution in howl (howl.io). This is a text editor, built in moonscript and with sane default. Typing latency is 6ms, faster than anything else I could find (on linux, non compositing window manager) The trick for liking (in markdown) is autocompletion. It will autocomplete based on all buffers open. My trick is to run :exec ls (list of files in the project directory) and leave this buffer open. Then ctrl space will autocomplete filenames. The rest is trivial. Oh God, Howl deserves so much praise. I hope it gets picked up on HN one day. It's only missing a tiny push, having a community around it would be amazing.

dot1x 7y ago
nvALT fits the bill, as does "Archiver"

daffy 7y ago

Does anyone do this in org mode? Do you use Luhmann's numbering in headings?

daffy 7y ago

Why is the first branch off 1 1/1 rather than 1a?

deleted 7y ago
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daffy 7y ago
https://niklas-luhmann-archiv.de/nachlass/zettelkasten https://niklas-luhmann-archiv.de/nachlass/zettelkasten

deleted 7y ago

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