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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

#41

Post by sinkasapa »

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.

A lot of people use org-mode for writing documents and note-taking. For instance, there are tools like the following:

https://github.com/weirdNox/org-noter

If you also use org-mode for tasks then you can add todo items to your notes that show up in your general agenda, which you may be using to keep track of meetings or events, as well.

Re: Org Mode – Organize Your Life in Plain Text

#43

Post by atgreen »

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…

If you use any of the Emacs hosted mail readers, org-mode is tremendously useful for tracking actions/TODOs. I use it with GNUS and the org agenda mode is how I organize my work (enterprise sales). It was a game-changer for me.

Re: Org Mode – Organize Your Life in Plain Text

#44

Post by nurbl »

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…

The article is pretty clearly written for someone who is already an emacs+org user. I guess it was posted mostly as a teaser of what can be done with it.

The "plain text" catch phrase is not baseless, though. One of the best things about org mode is that there really is a simple and intuitive markup format at its core. Most users probably only ever use the "outliner" features, which are pretty obvious. But once you're used to that, there are lots of more complex features you can start using, one by one. Or just ignore.

Being text, org mode files are also pretty easy to e.g. grep.

Re: Org Mode – Organize Your Life in Plain Text

#45

Post by nanna »

Having been using Emacs and org-mode for about 4 years now, I've been thinking a big mistake has been made in how the system is pitched. It's always something about it being 'plain text', which makes non-Emacs users say 'Why would I switch from my plain text editor? Or 'Why would I switch from a flashy GUI webapp version of this particular feature?'

Emacs can't be appreciated for any one feature, even org mode, powerful as that is. You have to take the entire system and all it's possibilities into account. Org mode is particularly special because it integrates so many of Emacs' features, from literate programming to keeping a Wiki, to scheduling, to keeping a diary, to file browsing, to accounting, to emailing, to so much more. But to try to judge one package like org mode is a bit like judging a car by the quality of its seats.

The only thing I've experienced which compares to this is, perversely, the Office 365 suite. Yes, of course, all the functions are completely different and I'm not making a like-for-like functionality comparison. But in Office365 an email client (Outlook) is integrated with a team's documents (via Sharepoint), chats (via Teams), calendar, etc, etc. The value of Office365 isn't in any one app, it's their integration. It's the entire system.

Obviously the Emacs system has a completely different and opposing design philosophy to Office365's. It's ground-up, fully-extendable, initially demanding, text based, exportable, self-hosted, free, and so on. All of which increasingly goes against the grain of the trajectory of software today. However for those who give it the time and effort, it really does offer to organise your life, and yes, in plain text.

Re: Org Mode – Organize Your Life in Plain Text

#46

Post by microtonal »

dijit wrote: post #14
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 licens…

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.

I am not an OmniFocus user, recent versions of OmniFocus can export data to the TaskPaper format (which is just plain text) or to a CSV file.

Re: Org Mode – Organize Your Life in Plain Text

#48

Post by [deleted] »

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.

[deleted]

Re: Org Mode – Organize Your Life in Plain Text

#49

Post by madballster »

I see a lot of comments arguing that it's not "worth it" to spend dozens of hours to "get into org-mode" when there are "intuitive tools" such as Evernote or Trello or Todoist etc.

What some are missing is the fact that low barriers to entry sometimes turn into barriers to growth at a later stage. After (!) one has sunk thousands of hours into them. I used to keep my academic notes in Evernote and it turned into hell after about 2,000 notes and a few years of work. I couldn't find things when I needed them, it didn't support a non-linear mode of work. It became my personal black hole that swallowed up information but never gave it back.

With org-mode I have created my very own filing and research system. After years of using it and thousands of articles I find things. Quickly. Now, with org-roam, I create hubs of knowledge and ideas that I can come back to at a later point without worrying about linearity or chronology. No longer do I need to know where things are. I know what ideas are in there. If I don't like a certain workflow, I can grow, develop or change my filing and note-taking system as I see fit.

In my opinion, org-mode eliminates the risk of hitting any sort of barrier after years of sunk costs.

Re: Org Mode – Organize Your Life in Plain Text

#50

Post by ylk »

truncate wrote: post #19
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 bigg…

I think beorg[1] solves a lot of your problems? It integrates with your calendar, shows you notifications and allows you to properly edit your entries.

I found out about it through HN, iirc, and it’s how I got started with using org-mode.

[1]: https://beorg.app

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