This is exactly what I do, except I don't save the to do lists. Instead, I simply spin out any ideas and notes I'd taken into a separate new note. I've got around 10,000 notes now that I've never looked at, but I simply like knowing they are there as it seems to provide a nice psycholgoical foundation for the continued evolution of my ideas/thoughts.
I tried vimwiki and it's really cool. However I couldn't get to "one step up" because it was so vim-specific and I didn't have access to that on every system I used. As a compromise I decided to lean into editor snippets for personal productivity and automation, since these are available in just about every major editor. The rest of my tools are externalized and called as such from the editor, like pandoc and various little apps and system scripts.
Yes, I retired Evernote when I discovered Vimwiki. I keep wondering, though, am I shortchanging myself by not using org. mode? But I don't know emacs and I am not sure whether it makes sense to make such a costly transition.
Depends. For just checklists org-mode is overkill, I use a few custom shortcuts
in Vim for that.
But org-mode also has a couple additional features like time tracking and a way
to generate summarised tables based on that tracking, or the agenda. Either way
learning Emacs just for org-mode is probably only a good idea if you really want
to use the features coming with it in one package.
There is a danger in making things too complicated. You reduce the number of systems you can access it on, and you increase the complexity of just doing basic stuff.
Humanity made a huge number of advancements using just simple paper and ink.
I used vimwiki. Switched over to Org a couple years ago and I really like the change. If you use Spacemacs and Evil mode you should feel pretty at home.
Easiest way to get started with org is to start simple. Just use the indented headings and source (code) blocks. Once comfy there you can branch out into tables and todos. Then maybe use the agenda (I personally don’t).
I’ve never had to write elisp or anything other than normal vim commands.
Are you missing anything? Probably not. Depends on how in depth you want to get. But, I’ve done the transition and thought it was positive. :)
I do the same thing on my Linux machine, except I also have scripts I wrote for conveniently adding various tasks and notes to my file with automatic formatting which I predefine in another file for various types of tasks. I then have a cron job that regularly reads the file everyday and puts new items into a Postgres database so I can run queries later through a web interface I host from my home on a static IP so I can check tasks when I’m away from my computer. My plan is to eventually allow for myself to push items into the database and have the txt file sync up with the new lines of text automatically when I startup my machine.
Any chance that you could share those scripts and cron job? I think something like that could be useful to the system I'm trying to build around text files for my own personal productivity.
It is similar, but has some unique characteristics that make it interesting (and to me, compelling). The primary one is easy, automatic, and fast bidirectional linking. The other that comes to mind is the lack of a hierarchical organizational structure; there’s no thinking about “what bullet does this new thing need to be indented under” when compared to WorkFlowy.
If you’re a fan of WorkFlowy I recommend checking it out; I suspect there’s a good chance it will resonate with you.
This is very close to what I do, with a few modifications. Biggest difference is that I use Emacs Org-mode (https://orgmode.org/) which automates things like date strings, building a daily agenda, adding due dates, and the monotony of getting your itemized lists properly indented. (and a whole lot more)
Everything lives in my TODO.org file that's mirrored via dropbox between all my devices and on my phone where I use the Beorg app on the iphone (https://beorgapp.com/).
I archive my finished TODO items at the end of the year. Taking the opportunity to delete (mark CANCELED) things that no longer need doing and carrying over any TODO items that still need getting done.
I do this and it is extremely powerful and extensible.
On top of this, I also track how much time I spend on different projects and then run a script that generates graphs to summarize my weekly and monthly usage of time.
However, I still use a physical daily agenda to take from my TODO list one or two concrete tasks I will focus on each day.
You sound like someone that could really use Syncthing if youre into your own DIY cloud. I absolutely love it and I don't need an account to use it either.
I've instead gone for a git repo hosted on my VPS. That way I can use all the version control features of git, as well as the various tools that make it easy to look through my history, etc.
I have attempted something similar for some time, but always have issues making a habit of it. My solution is to use a physical piece of paper that I can always carry with me. The physicality of it is a great reminder for me.
In the last few months Ive moved to a single vc'ed text file for work notes and a notebook for tasks and calendaring similar to the typical bullet journal but broken into weeks instead of months. I love it far more than shucking my life into 2-5 productivity apps because I can change my system on a dime. Sometimes my week calendar is a quarter page, sometimes its 2. Having my work notes in git makes them constantly available to my team and eventually Id like to let them contribute. I dont think id even consider personal info management in any other way.
I do exactly this, but with the sticky notes application. I find it easier to shuffle and tweak the raw text than moving around and editing discrete todo items, and I have it covering the next 2-3 weeks at any given moment with longer term stuff noted at the bottom. I've also started carrying around a small notepad that acts sort of like a buffer for the todo list, both incoming items that occur when I'm not at the keyboard and outgoing data/thoughts for meetings. It feels more like a natural extension of my memory than any todo app I've tried.
For awhile at work I used Windows' sticky notes extensively. My wallpaper at the time was an image of old fence boards, so the two combined to make a little kanban on my desktop.
For people on the go that need somewhat more organization I like iAWriter for iPhone (let’s you use md files for notes) and then you can also edit the markdown files directly on your laptop in the iCloud folder. Everything syncs up nicely in a nonproprietary format it’s seriously life changing
Yup! And if you work in a team and need version control for your notes there’s an app called Working Copy which integrates perfectly. Then you push changes directly to a git repo which acts as your source of truth
Yea that’s actually the most annoying thing for me too, I would rather use it with gdrive or Dropbox instead of iCloud (which is prone to a ton of issues). I had to do some hacky things to get it to work the way I wanted tbh.
For notes, I keep trying all kinds of apps and approaches, but I always come back to a single big text file. It's surprisingly easy to search. The main thing is it's just so convenient.
For work I used to use Evernote, but these days I just have a folder of markdown files named by date. (20200208.md)
Anytime I run a new command, SQL query or work on a new issue I try to write it down in the note before running it. Then I commit+push everything at the end of the day.
At least for me, knowledge degrades quickly. So having a history of that command I ran to fix X three weeks ago is a life saver.
I've found that better organization isn't really needed because find is good enough and I usually have a vague sense of where I'll find what I'm looking for anyway.
Also these day private GitHub repos are free. So it doesn't cost anything to setup.
For teams you can use runbooks as the same concept. Anytime you on work on an on-call issue record the steps you took to fix it. At Datadog we just used GitHub issues in a dedicated runbook repo, but almost anything could work. The point is to reduce friction as much as possible and eliminate decision points. You can always clean it up later but if the barrier for entry is too high developers won't bother doing it.
Remember this is a developer at their worst - it's 3am, they're fixing something they might know little to nothing about, and they're working as fast as possible under pressure. Any additional procedure needs to be as lightweight as possible.
But if you get it right, man does it make on-call and onboarding easier.
I've used a text file with a very similar workflow for a couple years and wholeheartedly agree it's a very flexible and useful tool. The trouble I had was what to do when I'm not in front of my computer. I tried sending myself TODO emails and I'd add them to the list later. That works pretty well. Although typing more than a line on a phone is kinda painful. And it requires the discipline to add the item to the list instead of leaving it in my inbox.
Recently I switched to a physical journal that I carry everywhere. I find a zen like joy in physically writing my thoughts and the portability can't be beat. I do miss the search though. Wish there was a way to combine these two systems without creating more work for me.
Ultimately the best system is whichever one you find it easiest to keep up to date. It's almost like negotiating with my lazy side. "Ok lazy brain, if you're too lazy to keep a list in google docs, let's see if you can get excited about this journal. Look it's got a picture if space on the cover!"
I've been using notebooks for years to write things down, but only recently I found one with a table of contents area at the front that has been immensely helpful in finding things later on.
Not OP, but these are quite popular with the bullet journal crowd. ToC, better paper than the likes of Moleskine, takes me right about a year to fill one up.
I've done something similar. Since 2001 I've used txt files, but I broke them up by having 1 file for each month.
It really does work nicely without getting in your way.
I tend not to include specific time logged entries tho. I just free form drop things in. That's why I like having it split up per month, it's so I can look back and get a high level picture of "oh, that's what I was working on 6 months ago" or in this case almost 20 years ago.
418 comments
[ 3.3 ms ] story [ 281 ms ] threadBut it really doesn’t matter what you use, the real benefit comes from having a process/habit of continuous review.
But org-mode also has a couple additional features like time tracking and a way to generate summarised tables based on that tracking, or the agenda. Either way learning Emacs just for org-mode is probably only a good idea if you really want to use the features coming with it in one package.
Humanity made a huge number of advancements using just simple paper and ink.
Easiest way to get started with org is to start simple. Just use the indented headings and source (code) blocks. Once comfy there you can branch out into tables and todos. Then maybe use the agenda (I personally don’t).
I’ve never had to write elisp or anything other than normal vim commands.
Are you missing anything? Probably not. Depends on how in depth you want to get. But, I’ve done the transition and thought it was positive. :)
I just switched to roamresearch.com. I like it a lot.
If you’re a fan of WorkFlowy I recommend checking it out; I suspect there’s a good chance it will resonate with you.
Everything lives in my TODO.org file that's mirrored via dropbox between all my devices and on my phone where I use the Beorg app on the iphone (https://beorgapp.com/).
I archive my finished TODO items at the end of the year. Taking the opportunity to delete (mark CANCELED) things that no longer need doing and carrying over any TODO items that still need getting done.
Of all the apps/tools I've tried, it turns out that the complexity of the tools was really just another form of procrastination.
Just a daily list I write out in the morning, and work through - bumping unfinished things up to the next day if needed.
[] Mon - task 1
[] Mon - task 2
[] Tue - task 3
[] Tue - task 4
This way I don't hard time lock the tasks and just do them until they're done
On top of this, I also track how much time I spend on different projects and then run a script that generates graphs to summarize my weekly and monthly usage of time.
However, I still use a physical daily agenda to take from my TODO list one or two concrete tasks I will focus on each day.
https://www.macstories.net/ios/my-markdown-writing-and-colla...
That's annoying, because my default sync service is OneDrive, and iOS generally supports it very well.
Maybe other folks will be into it too.
Now you’ve streamlined your notes.
nvUltra is hopefully right around the corner and I’m praying there will be an eventual iOS version.
http://www.43folders.com/2005/08/17/life-inside-one-big-text...
For notes, I keep trying all kinds of apps and approaches, but I always come back to a single big text file. It's surprisingly easy to search. The main thing is it's just so convenient.
Edit: This is a better link https://danlucraft.com/blog/2008/04/plain-text-organizer/
Anytime I run a new command, SQL query or work on a new issue I try to write it down in the note before running it. Then I commit+push everything at the end of the day.
At least for me, knowledge degrades quickly. So having a history of that command I ran to fix X three weeks ago is a life saver.
I've found that better organization isn't really needed because find is good enough and I usually have a vague sense of where I'll find what I'm looking for anyway.
Also these day private GitHub repos are free. So it doesn't cost anything to setup.
For teams you can use runbooks as the same concept. Anytime you on work on an on-call issue record the steps you took to fix it. At Datadog we just used GitHub issues in a dedicated runbook repo, but almost anything could work. The point is to reduce friction as much as possible and eliminate decision points. You can always clean it up later but if the barrier for entry is too high developers won't bother doing it.
Remember this is a developer at their worst - it's 3am, they're fixing something they might know little to nothing about, and they're working as fast as possible under pressure. Any additional procedure needs to be as lightweight as possible.
But if you get it right, man does it make on-call and onboarding easier.
Recently I switched to a physical journal that I carry everywhere. I find a zen like joy in physically writing my thoughts and the portability can't be beat. I do miss the search though. Wish there was a way to combine these two systems without creating more work for me.
Ultimately the best system is whichever one you find it easiest to keep up to date. It's almost like negotiating with my lazy side. "Ok lazy brain, if you're too lazy to keep a list in google docs, let's see if you can get excited about this journal. Look it's got a picture if space on the cover!"
https://www.leuchtturm1917.us/notebook-medium-a5-hardcover-2...
Paper real estate is also not nearly as limited.
I also use a bug tracker and sometimes a text file, but always have the minutiae on a piece of paper.
It really does work nicely without getting in your way.
I tend not to include specific time logged entries tho. I just free form drop things in. That's why I like having it split up per month, it's so I can look back and get a high level picture of "oh, that's what I was working on 6 months ago" or in this case almost 20 years ago.