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Org Mode – Organize Your Life in Plain Text

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Re: Org Mode – Organize Your Life in Plain Text

#11

Post by priomsrb »

birracerveza wrote: post #3

Org Mode keeps being pushed again and again, but honestly this title is one of the boldest claims I've seen about it. Just look at the document. It's a 400+kb HTML page of Emacs configurations, keybindings and other stuff that makes absolutely no sense unless you've been an avid Emacs user for years. Where is the Plain Text here? I see nothing of the sort. Sure, the output might resemble Plain Text, but it's clearly…

I started using org mode with doom Emacs. As an Emacs novice it was pretty easy to set up and came with some nice defaults for org mode.

Re: Org Mode – Organize Your Life in Plain Text

#12

Post by bjoli »

ape4 wrote: post #8
birracerveza wrote: post #3

Org Mode keeps being pushed again and again, but honestly this title is one of the boldest claims I've seen about it. Just look at the document. It's a 400+kb HTML page of Emacs configurations, keybindings and other stuff that makes absolutely no sense unless you've been an avid Emacs user for years. Where is the Plain Text here? I see nothing of the sort. Sure, the output might resemble Plain Text, but it's clearly…

Or just markdown

Markdown is comparable the the org mode format (although not favourably), but it can't be compared to org mode as a whole.

Re: Org Mode – Organize Your Life in Plain Text

#13

Post by kleiba »

birracerveza wrote: post #3

Org Mode keeps being pushed again and again, but honestly this title is one of the boldest claims I've seen about it. Just look at the document. It's a 400+kb HTML page of Emacs configurations, keybindings and other stuff that makes absolutely no sense unless you've been an avid Emacs user for years. Where is the Plain Text here? I see nothing of the sort. Sure, the output might resemble Plain Text, but it's clearly…

Org-mode clearly is two things:

1. A syntax for organizing information 2. An Emacs configuration to create and maintain files in said syntax.

Clearly, the "plain text" part of the quote that tripped you off refers to 1. And in theory, you can write and read that format in any editor that supports plain text files. But I think you're right that in reality, and unlike competitors like Markdown or reText, this one is tightly coupled to a single text editor: Emacs.

Does that make the tag-line wrong? I don't think so. But perhaps it sounds like a stretch in the light of point 2.

At the same time, I think this motto ("your life in plain text") has been around for a long, long time - from a time, when org-mode was less complex. Like many successful (niche or non-niche) products, it has grown tremendously in terms of features. So, perhaps that motto was more fitting to org-mode's beginning.

That said, all tools for using anything with a non-trivial set of options or features are complex. Think IDE's or Photoshop etc. -- you don't need all the features to get started and you won't even use all features on a regular basis. But whenever you want to do something, and the tools gives you the possibility to do it, it will make you happy.

That's why you end up with long instruction manuals.

Is it different for any other tool of sufficient complexity?

Re: Org Mode – Organize Your Life in Plain Text

#14

Post by dijit »

enitihas wrote: post #7

I was a big fan of org mode, and I still think nothing beats it for free form note taking. But if your use cases are very simple todo tracking, you might want to try OmniFocus. I have bene using OmniFocus and found a very easy to use replacement. It doesn't match the flexibility of org mode but gets the job done.

The wider implications of recommending a proprietary application (worse: a GUI based one which costs money and is only available on one platform) is that now your documents are tied to a particular time of reference in an ecosystem. Something which moves.

For context I have lost files because the old version of the software which could read the formats would not run on my operating system, and purchasing a new license for the updated version was no guarantee that it would work either as the format had changed.

Yes, this is a stupid qualm to have when Excel/Word exists, but in those cases the alternative is not easily digestible plain text documents.

The case for making things more proprietary and costly should come with serious considerations.

Especially at $10/mo. That's more than I pay for Netflix.

(FD: I'm not an org-mode or emacs user, and this was written on a Mac)

Information on the '.ofocus' file format here: https://github.com/tomzx/ofocus-format

Re: Org Mode – Organize Your Life in Plain Text

#15

Post by kinleyd »

birracerveza wrote: post #3

Org Mode keeps being pushed again and again, but honestly this title is one of the boldest claims I've seen about it. Just look at the document. It's a 400+kb HTML page of Emacs configurations, keybindings and other stuff that makes absolutely no sense unless you've been an avid Emacs user for years. Where is the Plain Text here? I see nothing of the sort. Sure, the output might resemble Plain Text, but it's clearly…

This user is probably in the 0.01% of hardcore org-mode users. For others like myself, org-mode files are far simpler. I have, for example, long eschewed even commonly used features like task management, preferring to focus on things like recording ideas, how to notes, anniversaries, progress logs, etc. After nearly a decade, I truly believe it has organized my life, in plain text.

Re: Org Mode – Organize Your Life in Plain Text

#16

Post by LandR »

tomcooks wrote: post #10

Can I get a quick rundown on why Org Mode is better (easier/faster/more organized/whatever you prefer) than a ~/TODO.md file? I use this format: ``` ## yyyy-mm-dd name of the homework - for tasks that have to be done ! for tasks that contain a warning, careful, beware > for tasks I am waiting for others to give me output about ? for tasks I am not sure about v for tasks I've completed x for tasks i won't do, WONTFIX…

In org-mode I can stop and start time running against a task and when I'm done get a breakdown of the total time spent on that task.

I can close tasks and it automatically update when I closed them. I can use keyboard shortcuts to cycle through what state a task is in. e.g. TODO, DONE, BLOCKED etc.

I can assign types to the task, and update these with a few simple keyboard shortcuts.

If I have a list of tasks, e.g.

    TODO Foo [0/3]
      - [ ] A
      - [ ] B
      - [ ] C
As I mark off A, B or C, the total on Foo [0/3] will auto update.

I can plan my week ahead org-mode agenda,where it will auto generate my week. I can see reports based on what I did and didn't get finished. I can archive this data off to an archive file.

I can easily create plaintext tables that will auto format for me to fit stuff, I can do calculations in them (as these plaintext tables are basically spreadsheets).

All through just typing text and learning some keyboard shortcuts.

And its always just plain text, I can open it in any editor and what I see will make sense.

Can write code in line in a number of languages (e.g. Ruby, LISP etc) and have it executed in the file.

Re: Org Mode – Organize Your Life in Plain Text

#18

Post by kleiba »

spekcular wrote: post #6
birracerveza wrote: post #3

Org Mode keeps being pushed again and again, but honestly this title is one of the boldest claims I've seen about it. Just look at the document. It's a 400+kb HTML page of Emacs configurations, keybindings and other stuff that makes absolutely no sense unless you've been an avid Emacs user for years. Where is the Plain Text here? I see nothing of the sort. Sure, the output might resemble Plain Text, but it's clearly…

I agree. Why use Org Mode when, for example, Workflowy exists? The latter is robust to your hard drive failing and downloadable in plaintext, too. And it looks better. And you don't have to learn a billion key shortcuts with silly names like "yank" to use it.

But you don't really have to learn many keyboard shortcuts at all to get started with org-mode. TAB is pretty much all you need in the beginning.

And later on, if you decide to keep using it, you can decide to add more shortcuts to your repertoire on a case-by-case basis.

"Yank" is not specific to org-more, btw, but Emacs lingo which predates, of course, a lot of modern UI conventions. Most other names are quite straight-forward.

Note also, that it's not the keyboard shortcut that is called "yank" - the latter is the name of a functionality which you could, if you wanted so, type out in order to use it. The keyboard short is there so you don't have to, and you don't even have to remember the proper name of the function that the shortcut is for.

Re: Org Mode – Organize Your Life in Plain Text

#19

Post by truncate »

spaniard89277 wrote: post #2

It looks like some people want to spend more time organizing their life than living their life. IDK man, I already need some willpower to use Trello and looks far easier.

Hah, as much as I wanted org-mode to work for me, I realized I'm spending more time on building a framework for organizing my time than probably actually organizing my time. And it's never over.

Sync all my calendars, OS notifications (considering the time it would take me to walk/drive), sync all this in mobile/iPad and be able to edit effectively there, and the list goes on. Laptop/Mobile notifications are the biggest ones, as if I'm not reminded on what I've to do, I will probably miss it anyways.

I've found org-mode much more practical for taking notes while working, as I'm already in Emacs writing code.

Re: Org Mode – Organize Your Life in Plain Text

#20

Post by ropeladder »

I've been trying out orgzly as a note dump replacement for Trello on mobile. It works ok but I tried setting up actual emacs the other day in order to convert the Trello json output to .org, and the experience was horrible. I couldn't install plugins because I needed to install a plug-in manager, and I couldn't install that because I needed to install another plugin or change some obscure GPG setting. On top of this you have to learn not only a whole new set of overly complicated commands but new vocabulary as well. I finally did get it working but oof. I'll stick with vim.
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