261–270 of 302 posts
It's especially useful for graphics/visual programming tasks.
I love notebooks + erasable Frixion pens as an alternative to whiteboards. You can still get multiple colors the ability to erase, but you have a finer pen point for more accuracy and more permanence than a whiteboard (though I know you have to keep these notes away from heat as that's how they erase). It's especially useful for graphics/visual programming tasks.
Calling a notebook the “most important tool” for a dev is pure romanticism. Useful for some, sure, but let's not pretend it outweighs a debugger, version control, or CI. This isn't craftsmanship cosplay, it's software engineering.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I'm sure it's very personal :) Because everyone has their own reality, workflow and reading a piece either resonates or dissonates with you (personally). I personally find paper&pen both comforting and unsettling at the same time. Soothing because writing really helps sort out thoughts etc. Mindflow is different from flow "on the computer/phone/tablet". On the other hand, it's distracting because without an index sys…
On the other hand, it's distracting because without an index system (I start each notebook with two blank pages trying to index the contents; every other page has a number) it's easy to get lost. I use a smart pen that writes in a notebook, but also stores everything I write in memory. Every month or so I export the content of the pen to my computer via Bluetooth as OCRed PDFs. This is because my boss often asks me t…
Great discussion. In my opinion, the real takeaway isn’t about notebooks vs. digital tools, it’s about what shifts your mental gears. Every time we switch modes, it forces our brain to pay attention differently. That fresh context can boost focus, creativity, even recall. For example, I recently stopped coding all the time and picked up a new hobby at night, writing. That simple change gave my brain a reset and actua…
This is one of the reasons that I actually take notes in three different media: paper notebooks, an old-school digital voice recorder, and in text files. Different media have different advantages and disadvantages and represent different ideas for more readily. I have used the voice recorder less over the years but I find it optimal when time is limited and I have to move onto something else. Part of using a voice re…
Paper Notebooks + old-school Digital Voice Recorder (get one which takes replaceable batteries) are a great combo to train oneself to use regularly and consistently for everything.
Calling a notebook the “most important tool” for a dev is pure romanticism. Useful for some, sure, but let's not pretend it outweighs a debugger, version control, or CI. This isn't craftsmanship cosplay, it's software engineering.
The literal argument here is fine - using a notebook is antiquated and we have better tools. But the sentiment holds true. When you're building software designing good code is the most fundamentally important aspect of your job. All the tools you mention are things that enable you to delivery that code, but if the design of the code itself is wrong then they mean very little. The process of designing code feels like…
So far, I haven't found tools that beat pen and paper as tools for thinking _for me_.
I still do write a lot of digital notes too but I find that the flexibility of pen and paper — not to mention never having to worry about running out of battery compared to tablets or similar — crucial benefit.
Digital tools might result in better outputs but that's not what my notes are for. I prioritise minimising the friction that's between my thoughts and getting them on paper. On digital, I'm either limited by structure (f.ex. a Markdown file is limited by text being forced into lines) or having to change between tools when I want to jot down something in different format (text, circles, rectangles, arrows, whatever). It's a very small amount of work to switch between them but it cuts my thought because I need to think about the tools.
Pen and paper is the most direct connection my brain I've found.
Some of the most intelligent people I've ever met in math, physics, and computer science don't even use a notebook. They use printer paper and pen. When they're done, they throw the paper away. I have seldom found personal notes from far in the past to be useful. If there's something worth noting down, then it goes into documentation, so others can stumble upon whatever quirk I've come across in the future. If there'…
Donald Knuth works that way. In fact, most such people tend to do most of their thinking on paper, making small changes to the problem state, verifying if it sticks, and is going where they want it going. Rollback, make a different change to the same thing, or same change to different things. This goes on over hundreds of pages.
One of the advanced user level performers don't tend to view stationary(especially paper) as something that must be rationed or spent with limits.
I love notebooks + erasable Frixion pens as an alternative to whiteboards. You can still get multiple colors the ability to erase, but you have a finer pen point for more accuracy and more permanence than a whiteboard (though I know you have to keep these notes away from heat as that's how they erase). It's especially useful for graphics/visual programming tasks.
I have only had bad experiences trying to write with those pens. I bought a note capturing system that used them and it was just awful.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
The book Smarter Faster Better introduced me to the concept of disfluency - the idea that extra friction such as awkward fonts, new environments, different tools, etc will pull you out of autopilot mode and force you to think in new ways. I haven’t seen references to it elsewhere, but it’s changed how I approach problems and learning the last 9 years. Switching to a notebook is one great way I use to trigger this as…
Interesting. For me it's the opposite, e.g. just changing keyboard layouts between pc and mac breaks my brain hard, and I feel useless.