Seems like a Silly Question, but how do you organize your files.
I struggle to find a way to keep my reference documentation organized such as ebooks relevant for programming or other related tasks.
thanks for reading
Ask HN: How do you organize your files
1–10 of 44 posts
Re: Ask HN: How do you organize your files
#2If its for e-books only, you can try adobe digital editions or calibre. You can tag and create collections with search functionality on most formats.
Re: Ask HN: How do you organize your files
#3Calibre may be a little rough looking but it's very powerful and it's what I use.
Edit: Also you might want to make a small title edit s/files/ebooks unless you are inquiring about other types of files as well.
Re: Ask HN: How do you organize your files
#4[deleted]
Re: Ask HN: How do you organize your files
#5Beside the usual `Images`, `Videos`, `code` directory, the single most important directory on my system is `~/flash` (as in : flash memory). This is where my browser downloads files and where I create "daily" files, which I quickly remove.
This is a directory that can be emptied at any moment without the fear of losing anything important, and which help me keeping the rest of my fs clean. Basically `/tmp` for user.
Re: Ask HN: How do you organize your files
#6Most of my files stay in the download folder. If I think I will need them at a later stage against I upload them to my Google Drive. Google is quite good at searching stuff - for me that also works for personal files. I have probably 100 e-books that are on my reading list and will never get read by me...
Re: Ask HN: How do you organize your files
#7Beside the usual `Images`, `Videos`, `code` directory, the single most important directory on my system is `~/flash` (as in : flash memory). This is where my browser downloads files and where I create "daily" files, which I quickly remove. This is a directory that can be emptied at any moment without the fear of losing anything important, and which help me keeping the rest of my fs clean. Basically `/tmp` for user.
Why not just use `/tmp`?
Re: Ask HN: How do you organize your files
#8I have my files pseudo-organized, meaning I kind of try to keep them where they should be logically, but since this varies a lot - they're not really organized.
The thing is - I use "everything" a free instant file search tool from voidtools.
It is blazingly fast, just start typing and it finds files while you type.
It uses the ntfs file system (windows only, sorry everyone else) existing index to perform instant searches, it is hands down the ultimate most fast file search tool I have ever encountered - files literally are found while you type their names, without waiting for even a milli second.
So, no organization (the ocd part of me hates this) but i always find my files in an instant, no matter where i left them.
Re: Ask HN: How do you organize your files
#9recoll has worked great for a document index.
https://www.lesbonscomptes.com/recoll/
I also recommend calibre for e-books, but I never got to the "document store" stage that I think some people have.
Re: Ask HN: How do you organize your files
#10Roughly this scheme:
~/dev for any personal project work
~/$COMPANY for any professional work I do for $COMPANY
~/teaching for teaching stuff
~/research for academic research (it's a big mess unfortunately)
~/icl for school related projects (where "icl" is Imperial College London)
For my PDFs I use Mendeley to organize them and have them available everywhere along with my annotations.
I store my books in iBooks and on Google Drive in a scheme roughly like: /books/$topic/$subtopic
Usually organizing your files is usually just commitment, move files off ~/Downloads as soon as you can :-)