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Org Mode for Emacs – Your Life in Plain Text

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Re: Org Mode for Emacs – Your Life in Plain Text

#31

Post by preek »

I've switched to Emacs after 14 years of Vim (with the required evangelism^^). Initially it was because of Clojure, but then I tried org-mode. Now my GTD Setup (formerly Things.app), Notes for everything (formerly Evernote), Time Tracking (formerly Minco), Pomodoro Technique as well as writing slide decks (I'm a part time lecturer, so I do that a lot) are _all_ within org-mode. And not, because it's hipster, but because it's just so much better - plus it's completely platform agnostic and future proof, because it's just text.

Cannot recommend it more. I started using simple outlines for meeting minutes and quickly realised that it will be easy and more efficient to migrate the aforementioned workflows into org-mode, too.

A last one: Finally I can properly link between Mails, todos and notes (using mu4e for mails). That was never completely working on OS X with Evernote, Mail.app and Things and is just so important!

Re: Org Mode for Emacs – Your Life in Plain Text

#32

Post by carbonmachine »

b01t wrote: post #15

I don't use emacs; should I still invest my time in OrgMode?

I've used emacs solely for orgmode over the last year and I'm not sure I'd recommend it whole-heartedly. Orgmode is great, but the emacs learning curve is steep and unforgiving. It still feels as if I'm faking my way through an ancient language whenever I fumble through keyboard "shortcuts".

That said, it's incredibly powerful. Wouldn't continue to torture myself if it wasn't. I like the plain text files, the authoring experience (the document feels alive somehow), and I've never been more organized. I just wish it existed outside emacs!

Re: Org Mode for Emacs – Your Life in Plain Text

#33

Post by TeMPOraL »

colah3 wrote: post #24

I really like org-mode and used it heavily for about a year. But I found having my todo list on a single computer pretty limiting. Thankfully, there's a new generation of org-mode inspired cloud apps: * https://workflowy.com/ -- the most mature app * https://www.moo.do -- really nice Google Apps integration * https://checkvist.com/ -- extremely feature rich I'm really excited by these tools. I feel like org-mode has…

I'd say there's one primary "potential to improve" - a mobile app. The situation is better than it used to be, but frankly still not good enough IMO. Otherwise, an org-mode + Dropbox combo works perfectly for me; every computer I own or work on has Emacs installed anyway.

And it's hard to note down so much content on mobile that you won't be able to retype it back on a proper computer under 5 minutes.

Re: Org Mode for Emacs – Your Life in Plain Text

#35

Post by girzel »

neutronicus wrote: post #22
girzel wrote: post #10

It's always good to see Org mode flagged up (though it gets a surprising amount of love on HN). I use Org more or less constantly, and I'll take this opportunity to note an Org-related observation that I've been mulling over for a bit. It's apropos of nothing, but then so was this submission :) The observation has to do with how new Org users get to know the system. The whole thing can seem pretty daunting, especiall…

Do you have tips for the "document authoring" side of things?

No, just write your document :)

Seriously, that's the side of things where Org is meant to get out of your way, not provide you with a bunch of flashy tools. Learning to create and manipulate headings (move up, move down, indent, outdent) should take you all of fifteen minutes. Add plain lists, if you like, and footnotes. That's about it.

Where things do get complicated is when you start exporting documents, and realize it would look a bit better if this bit were just a bit different, and then... rabbit hole. But all that stuff, while fiddly, is pretty straightforward, it doesn't have the emergent complexity of agenda handling.

Re: Org Mode for Emacs – Your Life in Plain Text

#36

Post by TeMPOraL »

catnaroek wrote: post #27

Emacs has been my text editor of choice for quite a while already, and I'm pretty happy with it. But I've never seen the point to org-mode. What's the benefit over simply using a physical notebook to take notes and keep track of my schedule?

That's not the question for org-mode - that's the question of using digital vs. physical for note taking. And the answer probably depends on person.

For me, I went through everything. I've been switching around between paper and digital. I did GTD on paper, did Bullet Journal, and on the computer side I went through Workflowy, OneNote, using Outlook for tasks and some other things too. I eventually gravitated towards org-mode and stayed there.

For me the biggest advantage of org-mode over everything else, paper and digital alike, is its speed and flexibility. I ultimately dislike physical note-taking because my handwriting sucks. And other computer tools lack the speed you get from pure keyboard interface, and the flexibility of org-mode's Agenda system.

Re: Org Mode for Emacs – Your Life in Plain Text

#37

Post by Tomte »

"plus it's completely platform agnostic and future proof, because it's just text"

This always irks me a bit.

Being text doesn't mean that there is no file format and internal semantics to it.

Sure, it's easy to hack together some transformation in Perl, but "plus it's completely platform agnostic and future proof, because it's just binary" would be correct, as well. As long as the format is documented.

Re: Org Mode for Emacs – Your Life in Plain Text

#38

Post by TeMPOraL »

marktd wrote: post #20
intrasight wrote: post #2

I have been interesting in learning Org Mode since first finding out about it a couple years ago. I probably would have had more success if I'd started before purchasing a smartphone. Like a billion others, my smartphone as become my personal digital assistant. Now I would love to (again) have a smartphone with a full keyboard - but the market seems to have rejected that form-factor.

This is my concern as well - if I want to use Org Mode for everything, including "random thing that just occurred to me that I need to do," then what do I do if "random thing that just occurred to me that I need to do" occurs to me while I'm on my phone, not my computer? I want one unified way to organize my TODOs, and it seems like org-mode isn't great for that.

There's a mobile app you can use to note stuff down straight to an org-mode file and then sync it up via Dropbox. Otherwise, I'd note it down in whatever other app you have. If you're following any kind of productivity methodology like GTD, you'll probably have a time in which you can simply retype your notes from your mobile to your org-mode system.

Re: Org Mode for Emacs – Your Life in Plain Text

#39

Post by Fice »

colah3 wrote: post #24

I really like org-mode and used it heavily for about a year. But I found having my todo list on a single computer pretty limiting. Thankfully, there's a new generation of org-mode inspired cloud apps: * https://workflowy.com/ -- the most mature app * https://www.moo.do -- really nice Google Apps integration * https://checkvist.com/ -- extremely feature rich I'm really excited by these tools. I feel like org-mode has…

Emacs can transparently edit remote files: https://www.emacswiki.org/emacs/TrampMode

All you need is a machine accessible via ssh, and you won't have to trust centralized proprietary services.

Re: Org Mode for Emacs – Your Life in Plain Text

#40

Post by Vekz »

colah3 wrote: post #24

I really like org-mode and used it heavily for about a year. But I found having my todo list on a single computer pretty limiting. Thankfully, there's a new generation of org-mode inspired cloud apps: * https://workflowy.com/ -- the most mature app * https://www.moo.do -- really nice Google Apps integration * https://checkvist.com/ -- extremely feature rich I'm really excited by these tools. I feel like org-mode has…

Save your org-mode files to a dropbox directory or commit to a git repo to sync across multpile computers
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