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Stop Taking Regular Notes; Use a Zettelkasten Instead

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Re: Stop Taking Regular Notes; Use a Zettelkasten Instead

#231

Post by omginternets »

omginternets wrote: post #220

I've come to realize that: 1. 80% note-taking value is in writing the info down in *any* form. 2. 19% is in re-reading your notes. Moreover, you'll evolve a loose/informal system if you stick with it long enough. You'll learn to read your past self. That's presumably what Herr Luhmann did. Note-taking changed my life. I urge people to stop chasing perfection and just get started.

As a follow-up: if you want to improve your ability to synthesize knowledge, but don't know where to start, I recommend Rich Hickey's Hammock-Driven Development talk [0]

Spoiler alert: it's all stuff your parents and teachers have told you before.

[0] https://youtu.be/f84n5oFoZBc.

Re: Stop Taking Regular Notes; Use a Zettelkasten Instead

#232

Post by type0 »

Normille wrote: post #49

Are Zettelkasten the latest Hipster fad? A fortnight or so ago, I saw a link on HN mentioning 'Zettelkasten' and had to look up the word, because I'd never heard it before. Since then, there must have been a Zettelkasten reference at least every other day.

Off course, there's even a Zettelkasten markdown notebook (Electron based) called Zettlr

https://www.zettlr.com/

Re: Stop Taking Regular Notes; Use a Zettelkasten Instead

#234

Post by mattbk1 »

m463 wrote: post #60
meagher wrote: post #22

People love doing things that feel like work, but aren’t. I’m terrified of picking up new systems like this without having a purpose. I could spend hours building out a graph, admiring all of MY knowledge, but not really have any intended use for it other than telling others about it and how I’m going to use it someday.

that is not an unreasonable fear. I'm reminded of something I read once. there are two kinds of people: - those who make lists and use them. - and those who make lists and lose them. I would say 90% of the todos and ideas I jot down and overorganize don't lead to anything. But the 10% I do - they keep the wheels from coming off my life. (to be fair, there is a very low cost of capture, and I do it all electronically)

I agree with this ratio. I generate a ton of ideas for projects or hobbies, but writing each one down and putting it away (in Trello, Joplin, GitLab issues, etc.) lets me move on with priorities rather than getting pulled into new things all the time.

Re: Stop Taking Regular Notes; Use a Zettelkasten Instead

#235

Post by ssivark »

nanna wrote: post #195
dangirsh wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Love org-roam. I've been heavily using it for a few months, and not looking back. Don't miss these additional packages, which build on org-roam: org-roam-server: better graph visualization and navigation [1] org-roam-bibtex: Reference management in your Zettelkasten [2] The latter, combined with org-ref and org-noter, is the most effective way I've found for taking notes on PDFs. Beautiful demo at [3]. FWIW RoamResea…

> tending to a setup like this in Emacs can easily become a time-sink I've started to wonder if the Emacs community should put together versions that are ready for different kinds of users out of the box. Say, a version for scholars with everything Auctex, org/org-roam, spell check, email, rss, etc already there, and a walkthrough to boot. Like a distro or spin, basically.

The rising popularity of Emacs “starter kits” (Doom, Spacemacs, Centaur, Prelude, etc) is exactly in this spirit. While not segmented by audience, each of them aims to provide sane defaults and package collections for a varied set of common use cases.

Re: Stop Taking Regular Notes; Use a Zettelkasten Instead

#236

Post by curryst »

vvillena wrote: post #162
M5x7wI3CmbEem10 wrote: post #11

I searched for hours for a viable Zettelkasten method: org-mode, vim-org, TiddlyWiki, Roam, Notion, Joplin, Notable, Obsidian, Zettlr. All of them were too complex, and not lightweight, cross-compatible, private/secure, or futureproof enough. I decided to settle on the default MacOS editor using a mix of .txt/.rtf files, with extensive folder organization and the built-in tagging system. I plan on consolidating journ…

Creating a hierarchy of notes using folders can be counterproductive. It will be easy to classify the majority of notes, but some of them will match multiple categories, or even none of them. Unfortunately, those notes are usually the most interesting. Case in point: I have some notes regarding good technical writing, and some notes concerning good Git usage. If I had a hierarchy, the first notes would go under "writ…

There are note taking systems that enabled that. Obsidian (from here a couple days ago) and Trilium both track links and backlinks, which can let you integrate that to a degree. It creates a web of information, as opposed to a strict hierarchical taxonomy. So you can link across those to hopefully maintain discoverability.

I generally dislike labeling systems. My interpretation of a label is too context-dependent and liable to shift over time. I.e. "architecture" could refer to either systems architecture or building architecture. And I frequently don't think that I'll have a conflict until some day I decide I want to learn about Napoleonic architecture for some reason. And then when I separate them, I'll end up forgetting what I called the label (was it systems-architecture? tech-architecture? application-architecture?) and I end up futzing around to figure out what the label was, breaking my flow of thought.

Re: Stop Taking Regular Notes; Use a Zettelkasten Instead

#237

Post by blueridge »

gas9S9zw3P9c wrote: post #196

This seems to be a new trend now. I'm skeptical. Many of the most successful people I know don't have complicated systems like this - instead of spending time on optimizing note taking, they actually get stuff done. In fact, many don't have systems at all. On the other side, most people raving about the systems are "productivity gurus" writing articles and books, not people who actually get stuff done or would be con…

See: “Better note-taking” misses the point; what matters is “better thinking”

And: People who write extensively about note-writing rarely have a serious context of use

Once loaded, scroll all the way to the right:

https://notes.andymatuschak.org/About_these_notes?stackedNot...

Re: Stop Taking Regular Notes; Use a Zettelkasten Instead

#238

Post by gexla »

slightwinder wrote: post #214
gas9S9zw3P9c wrote: post #196

This seems to be a new trend now. I'm skeptical. Many of the most successful people I know don't have complicated systems like this - instead of spending time on optimizing note taking, they actually get stuff done. In fact, many don't have systems at all. On the other side, most people raving about the systems are "productivity gurus" writing articles and books, not people who actually get stuff done or would be con…

> Many of the most successful people I know don't have complicated systems like this How do you know? Maybe their set of habits are a complicated system which they are just not aware of being a system, thus not they are not talking about as they consider it as natural or just obvious. It seems to be some kind of effect of the internet that people talking about everything leads also to people making big science and sy…

Right, iterating on your workflow is a normal part of work.

> I see a similar trend with org-mode users. It's great and all on a technical level (I've used it myself in the past) but it's easy to fall into the elisp and customization rabbit hole.

I think part of the issue is that people try to jump into the middle of something which has evolved without going through that evolution themselves. In other words, they need to go to the starting line and iterate from there rather than pushing through to the finish line. I have seen some complex workflows in Org mode, but those flows were built up over years.

The software analogy would be premature optimization. Developers attempting to use tools which are meant for scaling without knowing the how or why of these tools. If you don't know why you should use something, then you might not be to the point where you need it.

I learn the most about how to tackle a problem once I stumble across the need to fix the problem. The best tools are those I find when I then go in search for the fix.

Re: Stop Taking Regular Notes; Use a Zettelkasten Instead

#239

Post by ryanstorm »

gas9S9zw3P9c wrote: post #196

This seems to be a new trend now. I'm skeptical. Many of the most successful people I know don't have complicated systems like this - instead of spending time on optimizing note taking, they actually get stuff done. In fact, many don't have systems at all. On the other side, most people raving about the systems are "productivity gurus" writing articles and books, not people who actually get stuff done or would be con…

Anecdotal disagree here. I have a system that would probably be deemed complicated by anyone that would look at it (even more so than the OP article).

While I wouldn't consider myself the most successful person, I've got a lot done, and I attribute a lot of it to my system, notes, and organization. The system wasn't immediately complicated either, it has been developed and refined over 10 years to suit my needs. And for me in particular, it alleviates a lot of mental overhead and allows me to just focus on whatever it is I'm working on.

But that's just me, I think you do have a point to some extent. It depends on the person, YMMV.

Here's an article that goes into more about these concepts, the author calls it a "Second Brain": https://fortelabs.co/blog/basboverview/

Re: Stop Taking Regular Notes; Use a Zettelkasten Instead

#240

Post by frogpelt »

Normille wrote: post #49

Are Zettelkasten the latest Hipster fad? A fortnight or so ago, I saw a link on HN mentioning 'Zettelkasten' and had to look up the word, because I'd never heard it before. Since then, there must have been a Zettelkasten reference at least every other day.

You may have experienced the Baader-Meinhof phenomenon.

https://www.google.com/search?&q=baader+meinhof+phenomenon

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