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Use a work journal

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Re: Use a work journal

#161

Post by Forge36 »

sudhirkhanger wrote: post #150
hubraumhugo wrote: post #96

It's surprising how many devs are trying to overoptimize for productivity with various fancy tools and techniques, when it actually comes down to simple basics. Here is what I rely on as a founder who does a lot of context switching: - a never-ending text file for todos and work journal [0] - calendar for planning (and blocking focus time) - website blocker - turned off notifications [0] https://news.ycombinator.com/…

How do/would you use it over various systems? What's the best way to cloud sync this? One might have to use it on work machine with restrictions around installing apps.

I use org mode and sync with a git repository. Thoughtfully emacs and git are both approved.

Re: Use a work journal

#162

Post by merlincorey »

kgeist wrote: post #78
senkora wrote: post #13

I keep a stack. Whenever I am interrupted, I push a task onto the stack. When I finish a task, I pop it from the stack. Each task has an associated journal file. Sometimes I reorder the stack.

Similar workflow, except I have 3 lists: TODO, Pending and Done. "TODO" is actionable items. It's a reorderable stack of work I need to do. Same: interruption pushes a task to the stack, when I finish a task I pop it from the stack, etc. So I always know what to do next. "Pending" is an unordered list of things I'm awaiting. Say, I asked someone to do something, and they promised they'd get back to me in a few hours…

> However, I organize files by day, not by task. Each day I create a new file for the day by copying the lists of the previous day's file minus the DONE list. I don't modify lists for previous days, so it's kind of an append-only log so I can see what was the state for any particular day. 1 file per day is easy to see as a whole as it mostly fits in one screen (and inside my working memory). I use plain text files because I found it much simpler to use, I don't have to install any software, it just works, and it's easily searchable.

For my working files I use a similar system except I separate at least Months, often Weeks, and sometimes Days into subheadings for easy time tracking of tasks on various time partitions.

So when I need to start a new heading for a new day, I just move all the incomplete TODO items into it, similar to you moving them into a new file.

Occasionally I manually archive the completed tasks into files by year with headings by month only when I no longer need their full granularity.

Re: Use a work journal

#163

Post by rigmarole »

esskay wrote: post #156

Evey time I've tried essentially journaling for my own sanity I get too bogged down in the way to actually do it. Logseq and Obsidian are often mentione but by the time I've figured out how the hell to use thier obscure syntax (why the hell am I programming, its a journal) I've lost interest. I'd like for there to be an out of the box option, but there doesnt seem to be any. When you bring this up in discussions like…

What syntax are you trying to use or thinking that you need? In Obsidian for example, remove all plugins except Daily Note and just start typing. Ignore all syntax except maybe bullets. Ignore properties and links. Ignore any habit-tracking or database tricks people say you need. Ignore the graph.

Or consider using Vim/Neovim and set a leader hotkey to open today’s journal/YYYY-MM-DD.txt

Re: Use a work journal

#164

Post by deskamess »

bongodongobob wrote: post #70
nlawalker wrote: post #21

What finally got this to stick for me was abandoning all notion of structure and organization (and formal concepts like “logging” and “journaling”) and optimizing fully for capture over retrieval, then relying on search tools and proximity for the latter. I have the OneNote icon in the notification area configured to create a new quick note and use it liberally. Occasionally I look through all the pages, especially t…

It's the exact same thing as a messy desk pre computers. I'm a big subscriber of that idea.

No surprise that I am a very strong proponent of messy desk. Organized chaos.

Re: Use a work journal

#165

Post by bruce343434 »

esskay wrote: post #156

Evey time I've tried essentially journaling for my own sanity I get too bogged down in the way to actually do it. Logseq and Obsidian are often mentione but by the time I've figured out how the hell to use thier obscure syntax (why the hell am I programming, its a journal) I've lost interest. I'd like for there to be an out of the box option, but there doesnt seem to be any. When you bring this up in discussions like…

Have you tried appending a txt file?

Re: Use a work journal

#166

Post by merlincorey »

flakiness wrote: post #45

To me the hardest part of journaling (or Pomodoro, or whatever work-related methodology/hack) is to stick with it. I have a work journal. I abandoned it and came back, then abandoned it and came back again. It's an endless back-and-forth. To those who keep doing this for a longer period: Any tips would be appreciated.

We often need consistency and time to build up habits that stick.

I do everything including my own personal side projects in a work journal with time tracking for everything, but I had to work up to it being a natural part of my workflow.

Here's my suggested path to gaining these habits:

1. Initially just try to make sure you are taking SOME notes at the start or end of every day

  - it doesn't matter where they are or how they are formatted just always take some notes at the start or end of your day
2. Once you have gotten into the habit of taking daily notes, start figuring what kinds of things you need notes for most often and take those before or during those activities

  - for example if you often find yourself having to look back at work tickets to retrieve some important information, start adding that information to your notes
3. By the time you are taking daily notes and adding things you know you need notes for you probably have a lot of notes so start worrying about structure and formatting

  - for example maybe you decide text files with homegrown markup aren't going to scale and you look into something like Obsidian with Markdown or Emacs with Org-mode
4. Repeat iterations of using your chosen note taking methods daily, building good habits, and improving your note taking system for you

  - if it feels like something is taking more time than it is worth change how you are doing it so it takes less time or just stop doing it

Re: Use a work journal

#167

Post by leetrout »

rpdillon wrote: post #155
leetrout wrote: post #145

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have found, and advise teams I lead or work with, that the tool absolutely does not matter because it is the discipline to use the tool consistently that makes a difference. Now, having said that, shoving jira down peoples throats with all kinds of rules around tagging and whatever wears people out. So, yes, a text file, a google doc, linear or a few post-its on the wall.

> because it is the discipline to use the tool consistently that makes a difference. Agree, though I advise folks that tooling matters tremendously, because a bad tool requires more discipline to continue using than a streamlined tool.

This is very true. I guess I was thinking about all the times new people join a team and want to make changes to the team to fit the tools they prefer (including when a "big org" person rolls in wanting JIRA).

Toil and friction are killers.

In "Secrets of Productive People" Mark talks about building systems and that the lower level / background things should be reliable and without friction.

"Good systems for simple administration will free your mind for more productive work. Ideally you shouldn’t need to have to think about the lower-level stuff at all. Thinking needs to be kept for the high-level systems, which will be designed to fit each particular case. But even then the aim of designing a high-level system is to avoid eventually having to think about that system too."

Re: Use a work journal

#168

Post by alabhyajindal »

I use Sublime Text for my daily journal and it works really well. Typing in Sublime is a joy. I have it open throughout the day in a separate virtual desktop. Distraction Free mode is very cool!

Re: Use a work journal

#169

Post by devsda »

lelanthran wrote: post #112
simpaticoder wrote: post #30

The benefit of journaling is not just reentry, but that you begin to solidify the mental model into a concrete branching of possibilities that is tightly coupled to the specific problem. Your work becomes traversal and mutation of this tree. Several benefits accrue: you begin to see gaps in the tree, and can fill them in. You begin to have confidence in your mental model, recovering the time you used to spend going o…

> solidify the mental model into a concrete branching of possibilities that is tightly coupled to the specific problem. Your work becomes traversal and mutation of this tree. I wrote a program (used from a CLI, but I mostly use the GUI I developed for it) to do something similar for my own use: https://github.com/lelanthran/frame/blob/master/docs/FrameIn... I use it daily.

Not a comment about the project itself.

If someone wants to try a similar flow but cannot run the above for any reason, git can be used to achieve something similar. You can also make use of existing tooling around git for shell integration like PS1 and gui.

1. Your main/master branch is your root frame.

2. Child Branches + branch commits themselves are messages.

3. Pop is hard reset of branch to parent or branch switch

The main idea is your log resides in commit messages and not the commit data itself. You can try using commit data too but limit that for shared contextual information.

Wrapping it up(to generate phony changes and running git) in shell aliases or functions should be easy.

Re: Use a work journal

#170

Post by softwaredoug »

I like how a work journal reorients your locus of control, and focus on important vs urgent work.

You can get really reactive to whatever stuff is happening on your team that you lose the forest for the trees. And further as you get more and more senior, living off of reactivity is only counterproductive as you control your own time and its expected you try to shift to a focus of important over urgent work.

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