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People thinking pen and paper is simple have intentionally made it simple. Have you considered how many different kinds of paper/notebooks/slides/cards, kinds
by jxy 4y ago
People thinking pen and paper is simple have intentionally made it simple. Have you considered how many different kinds of paper/notebooks/slides/cards, kinds of pen/pencil/brush? Soon you'll start fiddling with your pens and papers, as some comments here have already started suggesting their personal favorite, including making your custom "eye dropper" pen.
Taking the same approach to pen and paper, digital interface is extremely simple, a keyboard and a display. Your system: text files. It's liberating. You open your note.txt,
ed note.txt
,
my previous notes
more notes
...
my last notes
a
now just write you new notes down
don't worry about anything
don't even worry about editing previous lines
just write
and done
.
w
q
And that's it.
- JadeNB 4y ago> People thinking pen and paper is simple have intentionally made it simple. > Taking the same approach to pen and paper, digital interface is extremely simple, a keyboard and a display. Your system: text files. It's liberating. You open your note.txt, <ed session snipped> And that's it. Surely that's also intentionally making a digital interface simple? I mean, both kinds—all kinds—of interfaces can be made simpler or made more complex depending on the user's tastes. That fact itself doesn't, I think, speak to any virtue or lack thereof on the part of any interface paradigm.
- ontouchstart 4y agocat > note.txt <<EOF … EOF
- CRConrad 4y agocat > note.txt <<EOF cat >> notes.txt <<EOF
- ontouchstart 4y agoYes. If we also add date >> notes.txt it would be a great immutable ledger .
- CRConrad 4y agoYeah, I was actually thinking of that too -- and how they should both be rolled up into an alias, for single-command dated notetaking. Dunno if that would work, though: What's the syntax for adding the "EOF" bit after what you type after invoking it?
- ontouchstart 4y ago$ alias dn='date >> notes.txt && cat >> notes.txt <<EOF' $ dn > Reply to https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32507878 > alias dn='date >> notes.txt && cat >> notes.txt <<EOF' > EOF $ cat notes.txt Thu 18 Aug 2022 01:41:18 PM UTC Reply to https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32507878 alias dn='date >> notes.txt && cat >> notes.txt <<EOF'
- CRConrad 4y agoYeah, but you had to type "EOF" to get out of the "cat >>" sub-process, didn't you? There's probably no way to automate / hide that away... (?) Sure, it's pretty good the way it is already, but it bugs me that you have to type that bit that isn't what you want to note. (Who, me? What OCD?)
- ontouchstart 4y agoThe essence of this tiny "interactive command line utility" is to capture user key strokes and redirect to a sub-process. So there gotta be a way to interrupt and exit the sub-process. "EOF" is just a convention. You can also get out of the sub-process with "Ctrl-D" like in Python shell. Interactive editors like vi/emacs also need to flush the buffer and save the content to the file, but you have to type something, such as ":w" and "C-x C-s" (or use GUI). If you want full automation without human input, I/O redirection is the way.
- wainstead 4y agoLine editors for the win.