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Ask HN: How do you organize your knowledge?

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Re: Ask HN: How do you organize your knowledge?

#71

Post by 8bitsrule »

For organizing -very broad- info (say, everything) a well-chosen categorizing system helps organize. Libraries use very complex ones ... but something modern & simple like Wikipedia's text-based categories might be fine. (Dewey used numbers ... brrr.) (Can always add them as needed.)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Contents/Categories

Once you've picked that scaffold to suit your needs, then no more than two or three indices before a piece of info (depending on how many subcategories you'll want to labor on) is easily searchable.

Re: Ask HN: How do you organize your knowledge?

#72

Post by gofreddygo »

TLDR version of what's in the comments :

  Anki
  Bear
  Bulletproof Workspace
  Commonplace
  Dokuwiki
  Emacs (org-mode)
  Evernote
  Everything
  Folder structure with files
  GTD
  GitJournal
  Github
  Google Docs
  Google Keep
  Joplin
  Markdeep
  Markdown
  Mental Pivot
  Mr. Dewey and his decimal numbering
  NeuraCache
  Notepad++
  Notion
  Obsidian
  OneNote
  Pen & Paper
  plain text (awk, sort, grep)
  Roam Research
  Spaceli
  Sublime
  SyncThing
  Synology
  Trello
  Trove
  Twitter
  Typora
  Vim
  Wiki
  Zettelkasten

Re: Ask HN: How do you organize your knowledge?

#73

Post by quickpost »

gofreddygo wrote: post #72

TLDR version of what's in the comments : Anki Bear Bulletproof Workspace Commonplace Dokuwiki Emacs (org-mode) Evernote Everything Folder structure with files GTD GitJournal Github Google Docs Google Keep Joplin Markdeep Markdown Mental Pivot Mr. Dewey and his decimal numbering NeuraCache Notepad++ Notion Obsidian OneNote Pen & Paper plain text (awk, sort, grep) Roam Research Spaceli Sublime SyncThing Synology Trello…

Laughed at this list.... But you missed org mode devotees!

Re: Ask HN: How do you organize your knowledge?

#74

Post by gofreddygo »

quickpost wrote: post #73
gofreddygo wrote: post #72

TLDR version of what's in the comments : Anki Bear Bulletproof Workspace Commonplace Dokuwiki Emacs (org-mode) Evernote Everything Folder structure with files GTD GitJournal Github Google Docs Google Keep Joplin Markdeep Markdown Mental Pivot Mr. Dewey and his decimal numbering NeuraCache Notepad++ Notion Obsidian OneNote Pen & Paper plain text (awk, sort, grep) Roam Research Spaceli Sublime SyncThing Synology Trello…

Laughed at this list.... But you missed org mode devotees!

Hah... I was being tongue in cheek with this list of usual suspects and assumed emacs implied org-mode for this. Made it explicit.

Re: Ask HN: How do you organize your knowledge?

#75

Post by rmhsilva »

aristofun wrote: post #70

This general “knowledge management” question is like a “time management” one — usually meaningless and sometimes a form of escapism. When you don’t have any particular emotionally charged goal(s) in mind — no time/knowledge management technique would really make a difference. But some of them might give you a good illusion of something important going on. And as soon as you have specific important goal in mind (like…

I've had a different experience.

In the times where an emotionally charged goal isn't driving me forward, adhering to disciplined regimes for time and knowledge management has helped me to prepare and therefore perform better in times there IS a highly motivating goal.

There don't have to be two extremes of X-management (one fuelled by emotion and one dragged down by apathy). Like anything, building a discipline in the slow times will set you up really well for when you need to run hard in the fast times.

All that said, I use Roam Research[0] for my knowledge management now. I consolidate my thoughts and ideas weekly, and aim for evergeen knowledge[1].

[0]: https://roamresearch.com/

[1]: https://notes.andymatuschak.org/z4SDCZQeRo4xFEQ8H4qrSqd68ucp...

Edit: formatting

Re: Ask HN: How do you organize your knowledge?

#76

Post by nicbou »

I use Todoist for lists, Google Keep for simple text notes (for now) and a weird tool of my own making for things that fit on a timeline (like diary entries). I put tutorials on my blog, bureaucratic processes on a separate website, and snippets of code on GitHub.

Re: Ask HN: How do you organize your knowledge?

#77

Post by lolive »

rasulkireev wrote: post #55
lolive wrote: post #21

Obsidian was the mind opener for me. Simple to use. Backuped on Dropbox on my various machines, it is my ubiquitous personal knowledge base. The fact that you can copy/paste HTML from web pages into it makes me rebuild knowledge I get from the internet into my own version. Really really a fundamental tool for me. The Vi of knowledge. PS: I don't know the other tools (notion, roam,...) PPS: a big downside in Obsidian,…

The is the Obsidian Publish service exactly for that usecase. ( https://obsidian.md/publish ), although it is paid. I'm sure there will be soon, if not already, an open source extension that allows you to do that.

Several people I know simply donate money to the Obsidian project directly. But I agree that paying for their publishing service is more a win-win. You help the project PLUS you get the publishing service. I will probably do that. (and yell that I need this or that feature, that the service does not provide yet :)

Re: Ask HN: How do you organize your knowledge?

#79

Post by [deleted] »

moasda wrote: post #36
jll29 wrote: post #19

After trying out various ways, online and offline (including studying Luhmann's famous "Zettelkasten" http://ds.ub.uni-bielefeld.de/viewer/image/ZL1A1001/1/#topDo... ), and the one that I stuck with is using plain text files. One's knowledge is too valuable and important to entrust it to a particular binary format that can soon no longer be read. Plain text is durable, portable, easy to process using UNIX command lin…

Very interesting, I also tried several approaches and came finally to text files. For me the most important feature are full text search and some kind of formatting, including basic support for images. As I couldn`t find a good tool I wrote my own Wiki server - 13 years ago and still using it every day: https://moasdawiki.net/

[deleted]

Re: Ask HN: How do you organize your knowledge?

#80

Post by e19293001 »

jll29 wrote: post #19

After trying out various ways, online and offline (including studying Luhmann's famous "Zettelkasten" http://ds.ub.uni-bielefeld.de/viewer/image/ZL1A1001/1/#topDo... ), and the one that I stuck with is using plain text files. One's knowledge is too valuable and important to entrust it to a particular binary format that can soon no longer be read. Plain text is durable, portable, easy to process using UNIX command lin…

Since you mentioned emacs. Have you tried org-roam?
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