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Ask HN: How do you organise your files and folders?

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Re: Ask HN: How do you organise your files and folders?

#131

Post by acidburnNSA »

silviogutierrez wrote: post #72
acidburnNSA wrote: post #63

Photos: In folders named "YYYY/MM.N Descriptive event title" like "2019/05.1 Birdwalk with Stephanie". This really helps me find things later. Technical library: Academic Topic/subtopic/ then pdf title Music: I use beets now, which imports and organizes everything Household: Accounts folder, Mortgage folder, Appliances folder with subfolders for each appliance containing manuals, photos, and maintenance info. Systems…

Are your venvs themselves the git repo too? Sounds like they're not, because you have a different project folder. What's your rationale for now putting the venv inside the project and ignoring it? À la node_modules. I've shifted to this after years of your method and like it. I do hate .gitignore expanding arbitrarily. But that's life.

They are not. The main reason is that I often use a venv in a few projects. This is just laziness really, and I don't think it's any better than what you're recommending.

Re: Ask HN: How do you organise your files and folders?

#132

Post by jakamau »

enobrev wrote: post #113
jakamau wrote: post #98

00.INFO - Notes, references, some original sources 10.TASKS - Any work I do for a specific person that can be completed in a week 20.PROJECTS - Multiple related tasks or tasks that have transmogrified into a full-blown project 30.MEDIA - Says what it does on the tin 40.ORGANIZATIONS - Different groups I've joined X0.CORE - Private or important to me alone X1.PRIMARY - Important to me and I'm responsible for it X2.SEC…

I'm surprised your dates are M.Y rather than Y.M. Doesn't that get confusing over time?

All of my dating is YYYYMMDD or YYYYMM. Anything that comes before the '.' (e.g. 41.Eberron Campaign) is a two digit code to describe the file, the first digit = type of document and the second digit = personal priority.

It's probably convoluted from the outside looking in, but it works for me.

Re: Ask HN: How do you organise your files and folders?

#133

Post by ellis0n »

In result of working with multiple unsorted files and systems+vms during 10 years my file structure evolves multiple times.

I made ideal top architecture called 'indexed tags':

project0 - tag: 'project', index: 0

project1 - tag: 'project', index: 1

I used automatic tools for drive differences with my drive.py tool. drive.py analyze two disks changes + calc hash for each file, then produce report

Plus:

+ cover all systems, languages & projects, docs, notes + big data things

+ independed mac-linux-win-vms bridge

+ remove random download chaos

+ minimalistic & lite

Minus:

- None

Linux and Mac base dirs (same for Cygwin):

~/src - everything is here

~/mnt - symlinks to mount drives

Backups:

/backup/ - projects backups

/DD/ - big data copies, iso, vms, dd, unsorted manual copy node_modules/

Projects examples:

System 1 disk 1. Primary system, and same structure repeats on every new system with any drive, and indexed tags will be filled while a time (depends by a tasks)

~/src/admin0 - admin projects

~/src/ai0 - AI pdfs, projects

~/src/apple0 - iOS & Mac test projects

~/src/gamedev0 - game dev projects

~/src/btc0 - bicoin projects

~/src/doc0 - for random pdfs

~/src/papers0 - for usable pdfs & docs

~/src/hack0 - hack projects

~/src/os0 - os projects

~/src/web0 - web projects

~/src/fonts0 - data fonts

~/src/sound0 - data sounds

~/src/tasks - bookmarks, notes, tasks, local docs

~/src/work0 - work projects

System 2 disk 1

~/src/tasks

~/src/work0

...

System N disk K

~/src/tasks

~/src/work0

*

Disks examples:

~/mnt/1 - for temporrary mount random image, usb

~/mnt/2..16 - like: 'mount random.iso.or.drive ~/mnt/2'

~/mnt/ext500 - ext4 500G linux only data of 500G hdd 1

~/mnt/m3T - hfs+ 3TB mac only data of 6T hdd 2

~/mnt/o1T - exfat 1T shared data of 6T hdd 2

~/mnt/l2T - ext4 2T linux only data of 6T hdd 2

~/mnt/b1T - exfat 1T shared backup of 1T hdd 3

~/mnt/2T - ntfs 2T win only of 2T hdd 4

~/mnt/a500 - linux 500G only of 500G ssd 1

~/mnt/b100 - linux 100G only of 500G ssd 2

~/mnt/c100 - linux 100G only of 500G ssd 2

~/mnt/d200 - linux 200G only of 500G ssd 2

~/mnt/m4T/backup - mac manual backups 1

~/mnt/b4T/backup - shared manual backups 2

~/mnt/m4T/DD/ - big data copies

~/mnt/m4T/DD/128G-OCZ_VERT_EX_PLUS - hard drive copy

~/mnt/m4T/DD/128G-OCZ_VERT_EX_PLUS/sdf.dd

~/mnt/m4T/DD/128G-OCZ_VERT_EX_PLUS/sdf.dd.sha256

~/mnt/m4T/DD/64G-SAMSUNG_USB - just a usb backup for easy format

~/mnt/m4T/DD/64G-SAMSUNG_USB/Downloads/* - random usb flash downloads

Verification & comparasion reports:

~/admin0/drive.py/log-a128g-0 - report 1 ~/mnt/m4T/DD/ copy and original ~/mnt/a128g

~/admin0/drive.py/log-a128g-1 - report 2 ~/mnt/m4T/DD/ copy and original ~/mnt/a128g

All old and new Windows systems has shared locations for common software (like in Linux or no a special structure is here, because windows chaos is not my primary target:

C:\Shared - everything is here

C:\Install - software installers

Re: Ask HN: How do you organise your files and folders?

#134

Post by mceachen »

enobrev wrote: post #117
philsnow wrote: post #92

~/dev # git repositories, unfiled. ~/Downloads # ... everything else In yesteryear I used to do a bit of local photo management (but now that's done in google photos for the most part) and a bit of local music management (but that's spotify/youtube nowadays). I would organize things differently but I've always been unsatisfied with having to reify some arbitrary subset of metadata about each file into a directory str…

YYYY/MM/DD or even YYYY/MM definitely tends to be too granular for photos in my experience, but I've been dumping the recent year's photos / videos into a YYYY directory every January (which takes seconds to do), and it's been great. Gives me a fresh new directory for all the new media for the year, without directory fatigue when looking for older photos. I also clear out the photos / videos on my phone at the same t…

> I'd love something self-hosted

You should try PhotoStructure. Self-hosted, runs on desktop or headless or docker, and auto organizes your photos and videos into datestamped directories using whatever pattern you want.

Disclaimer: I'm the author

https://blog.photostructure.com/introducing-photostructure/

Re: Ask HN: How do you organise your files and folders?

#135

Post by yboris »

sq_ wrote: post #82
yboris wrote: post #79

This is related to videos only: I wanted a way to browse a video collection, quickly search, and preview screenshots before viewing; also wanted to browse external hard drive without connecting it. So I created Video Hub App https://github.com/whyboris/Video-Hub-App - MIT open source https://videohubapp.com/ - $3.50 minimum price but $3.50 of every sale goes to the cost-effective Against Malaria Foundation

Not sure how you'd do it, but it would be really interesting to see an analysis of how the $3.50 going to the Against Malaria Foundation affects people's choice about whether to pay more. The idea of someone looking at it and thinking "well, I'm already paying $3.50 that goes to a good cause, may as well tack on another few bucks for the developer" seems like it would make sense, but I wonder if that would actually s…

I sold over 1,700 copies as of now (2+ years since 1.0.0 release). Some people have emailed to say they've given more because of it. Most people probably just by the app without knowing $3.50 goes to charity. Many choose to pay more (I suspect because they like the app so much - I get may emails with praise).

Re: Ask HN: How do you organise your files and folders?

#136

Post by DavidPeiffer »

Partitioned SSD. Probably unnecessary, would change things if I started over.

Most documents are in YYYY-MM-DD format

Pictures are a mess of filenames.

C:\ has normal Windows, default mappings for Downloads, Desktop, etc.

D:\ is my storage partition.

Root directory contains a TrueCrypt volume for anything sensitive

\Projects\ for all projects at any stage of completion.

\Pictures\ \Images\ (specifically for computer generated stuff) \Books\ \Software\ \Music\ \School\ \Old Desktop Files\ Probably some treasures in there \organize_this\ Maybe more treasures here

Re: Ask HN: How do you organise your files and folders?

#137

Post by otterlicious »

jaquers wrote: post #84

Save files to my desktop. When it gets too messy, I throw everything in a folder called "Cleanup". Repeat. When it gets messy again, I rename the Cleanup folder to Cleanup_ , then throw that and everything else in a new folder called "Cleanup". I'm about 7 deep at the moment.

This except instead of the desktop I just keep everything in the AutoRecover pane of Microsoft Office applications. My cleanup strategy: every so often when I'm feeling ballsy I say Yes when it asks me if I want to clear it out.

I realize this is almost as bad as the people who keep stuff in the recycle bin but I'm too busy to care. :-)

Re: Ask HN: How do you organise your files and folders?

#138

Post by simonebrunozzi »

jaquers wrote: post #84

Save files to my desktop. When it gets too messy, I throw everything in a folder called "Cleanup". Repeat. When it gets messy again, I rename the Cleanup folder to Cleanup_ , then throw that and everything else in a new folder called "Cleanup". I'm about 7 deep at the moment.

Only seven? Rookie. I probably have 15 to 20 folders that somewhat serve that purpose :P

Re: Ask HN: How do you organise your files and folders?

#139

Post by enobrev »

mceachen wrote: post #134
enobrev wrote: post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

YYYY/MM/DD or even YYYY/MM definitely tends to be too granular for photos in my experience, but I've been dumping the recent year's photos / videos into a YYYY directory every January (which takes seconds to do), and it's been great. Gives me a fresh new directory for all the new media for the year, without directory fatigue when looking for older photos. I also clear out the photos / videos on my phone at the same t…

> I'd love something self-hosted You should try PhotoStructure. Self-hosted, runs on desktop or headless or docker, and auto organizes your photos and videos into datestamped directories using whatever pattern you want. Disclaimer: I'm the author https://blog.photostructure.com/introducing-photostructure/

Thank you for the recommendation. Looking at my Downloads folder, it seems I tried it out about 6 months ago, very shortly after my son arrived. I imagine that may be why I never gave it much of a chance. I look forward to revisiting it.

Re: Ask HN: How do you organise your files and folders?

#140

Post by enobrev »

jakamau wrote: post #132
enobrev wrote: post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm surprised your dates are M.Y rather than Y.M. Doesn't that get confusing over time?

All of my dating is YYYYMMDD or YYYYMM. Anything that comes before the '.' (e.g. 41.Eberron Campaign) is a two digit code to describe the file, the first digit = type of document and the second digit = personal priority. It's probably convoluted from the outside looking in, but it works for me.

I see - and of course, that it works for you is most important.

I was thrown off by "11.2020 PRIMARY TASKS", which looked like November 2020 at first glance. Now that you mention it, I see that you have a YYYYMMDD filename on that same line.

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