/lit/ - Literature

>>18328639
Anyways, how's your progress, guys?
I noticed how Obsidian not only enlarges the nodes the more they are interlinked with others, but also moves them to their "centre of gravity" so to speak.
So my book note take from the Malaise of Modernity, after interlinking with some Schmitt, Bakunin and generating ideas of its own, has migrated from its parent-note closer to the centre of the graph.
Even if I drag bits of the graph to other places, it will still be somewhere in the centre of my ongoing work and interests. A most curious finding.
Also I use some color-coding to track some progress (the tags read #Book, #Project, #Idea), though I really toned down to at most 3 options on the same time, as everything else turn a graph into a Christmas tree.

i've used Joplin for the last 2 years but its graph and backlink plugins are pretty clunky. I checked that it exports to Obsidian flawlessly but there's still no mobile app so i'll wait for now

bump

>>18328930
The android and mac versions of Obsidian.md are in closed beta. They also plan to include synchronization, so your mobile vault will be the same you have on your PC.
Still, I see no need for that. If I am away, it is easier to write down the note in the paper notebook and type it into the ZK later. Two advantages - I can't just copy-paste a wall of text, and have to actually reword and compress the idea; second - reading it several hours later I might decide it's not worth the space and just skip it as irrelevant, so less clutter.

>>18328639
Who wants to turn this into a weekly thread instead? I don't think much is happening in them anymore.

>>18330879
Yes, make one on Wednesdays.

This isn't going to make you smarter

>>18331958
Define smart

>>18331958

It's just organizing ideas lmao.

>>18330879
Good idea, to be honest these techniques take time to see results. A day isn't much, but a week is enough to tell whether or not something is working. Been trying out mind maps for example and that feels terrible. I believe it'll work out though.

ALRIGHT LADS I AM BEGINNING MY SELF EDUCATION WITH PHILOSOPHY AND ECONOMICS AND I'LL BE LEARNING GERMAN ON THE SIDE
WHY SHOULDN'T I JUST USE THE ONE NOTE APP ON WIN10?
ALL OF THIS SEEMS AWFULLY COMPLICATED

>>18332518
What do you think your brain does?

>>18333075
I've been thinking about this. Does the brain have a way to gauge importance of information over another? I wonder if this is what leads to failure to recall over time. I presume the brain doesn't and that's why you can forget about something seemingly important.

>>18330879
the thread stays up for a week anyway

>>18333072
use pen and paper

>>18333072
you should use Linux

>>18331958
Extensive note-taking and linking doesn't make science easier. It makes science possible. I'm getting my essay topics and material regularly enough, so I am satisfied; perhaps in several months worth of time I'll maybe become a publishing philosopher.

>>18333374
Recalling information means you link it to something important happening somewhen. The more you remember, the easier it is to recall.
Now, the more a node is linked, the larger it gets (in Obsidian at least), and it drifts closer to the topics it is linked on the graph. Plus all the links on the note's text allow you to just follow trains of thought to recall them all, and possibly produce new knowledge.

>>18333072
You poor misguided soul.
Stop using caps.
One note is ugly, slow, lacks linking capabilities, and perpetuates Microsoft’s stranglehold.
It’s not complicated. Take notes. Make sure your notes are full enough that if you read them in a year you know what you were trying to say. Don’t skimp.
Link notes together when related or you have an interesting thought.
Stop equating economics and philosophy as fields of equal value.
Go outside.

Just dl'd obsidian today. Any tips/tricks/recs/plugins/etc?

>>18335088
I want to learn economics the fuck is it to you faggot

I just create tree-structured archives in Zotero for specific research questions I need to answer. I don't bother with any of this "second brain"/"linking" stuff.

>>18333072
It isn't.
1.)Read
2.)Note whatever of interest that you find.
3.)Add into the ZK.
4.)Link where you see, you guessed it, a LINK between two ideas.
...
5.)Cool graph.
6.)Re-read later for retention or amusement.

test

>>18331958
It's not about becoming smarter, but rather about becoming less dumb, in the sense that you offload memorization work to the computer and so you can focus on information processing aka understanding.

>>18333072
Word>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>Notepad>>>>>>>>>>>Onenote

>>18336253
do you really use word? genuinely asking because imo it is the most bullshit bloated reading app i've used

>>18337538
writing app*

>>18337538
>>18337548
I use word because other lawyers use word and all the books one how to format my legal documents are explained in word (or even worse, word perfect). I take notes in obsidian. I share documents with google docs/drive. Most of the work gets exported to PDF.

>>18337548
Personally I love using word because last year they added new filters to the spell check function. It now tells me when I am using uninclusive language (such as men, him, instead of people, her) and when my use of language is too complicated for the average person. They still haven't fixed the redo bug, but the spell check functions are great and make me feel valid.

>>18337587
>men, him
This is the inclusive language you are looking for, it's the generic form that includes everyone. If you follow Microsoft's directives for language you will ruin your English.

>>18337587
This bait is too obvious anon, you need to work harder at incorporating the ideology into the 4chan medium. We all know you are doing it ironically on a few different levels here, the point is to seem like you are actually someone who would say that and accidentally ended up here.

>>18337538
I have around four thousand pages (~1.5M words) in my main document and I don't feel much slowdown except when it autosaves, which can take like five or ten minutes on a good day. I believe this problem could be solved if I got an SSD. No money yet.
The true limitation I've started to feel is that of organization. Since it's a mostly linear format, some things can't be done cleanly, which is what brings me to this thread.

>>18337856
>1.5 million words in one word document
Wtf anon

>>18330879
So what day?

I download obsidian
Have I to create a general knowledge vault for this purpose?

>>18338566
How about Friday?

>>18338708
yes you dope.

>>18333072
I think it's useful to know what part of the picture your attention is shining light on. You're not discovering anything new, so you may aswell be able to know where you are within the hierarchy of thought, and if you get lost down some rabbit hole, you can find your way back to what's important.

>>18337548
its not a fucking app retard it's a word processor

>>18340830
Based

>>18338566
Wednesdays

>>18337856
Why this over plaintext with Markdown formatting? pandoc could convert it for you. I can't imagine plaintext would bog down like that upon save.

Not arguing, just curious.

have any anons who keep a zettelkasten (either IRL or digital) ever tried to keep one for things that aren't strictly scientific, like poetry or music or art? reading soenke ahrens' book now and i couldn't help but find myself wondering about the possibilities for something like cinema (one could draw connections between visual referrents etc, an individual shot being the basic unit of note)

>>18344239

you can do a ZK for whatever you want, including cinema or art or else

eg. some anon in previous thread exposed their notes (in Obsidian) for litterature

>>18344239

I’m an art history student on fourth semester and I’m currently doing something similar to what you mention in Obsidian but mainly with artists, movements, techniques, and so on. It’s coming out quite interesting because all of the obviousness links and similarities the art history has but observing the links in the visual manner Obsidian incorporates, it’s been tremendously helpful for remembering specific works of art. Linking notes has become really fun because all of the discoveries and the need to to dig into more and more influences and references, also my investigation sense has improved and I’m enjoying more my career even tho it’s still online.

>>18344195
There's actually a bunch of tables, pictures, and drawings too, is Markdown something like HTML? I read a bit about the possibilities of website-like organization some time ago but never got around it.
One of the main reasons I chose Word in the beginning was because of the formulae section, building them is very easy. I know there's something called LatEx but apparently it has a steep learning curve so I wasn't sure it was worth it.
I also like that you can just write in whatever format and you don't have to go into a code editor or anything. Obviously a superior organization system might require some "under the hood" work, in which case I wouldn't mind.

A similar issue arises with what >>18344239 writes about. From my side (drawing), it would be really great to atomize my picture folders in a booru-like way, database-like even, so that everything would be part of a great "file" of analized information that could be sorted in many ways. This might take some coding but the result could be worth it.

I don't know much, honestly, so I'm trying to learn more so that I can find the best way of doing it.

>>18344239
It sounds like you're describing a commonplace book.

When I first got started 4-5 years ago, I was using a PHP forum software to organize my thoughts into forums, threads, replies, etc. Eventually I exported the database and used various means to get it into text format. For a couple of years I organized it as a small offline website -- kind of like a manual wiki where I had to create the individual HTML documents and links which is not fun at all. Then I moved everything into an actual wiki running on a local server. I got frustrated with that and exported it out again to text files. Now I'm using Obsidian and, even if I dump the software for something else at some point, everything is in plaintext markdown files and that's how it's staying for good. There's a lot of great open source tools for working with these files. And beautifully formatted text files were/are a tradition in computing.

I write about basically everything in there. All kinds of lists, rants, short stories, poetry, daily journal entries, recipes, quotes, etc.

>>18344946
>There's actually a bunch of tables, pictures, and drawings too
I almost mentioned that in my question. It certainly complicates things. It can still be done though...I think.

With an editor like Obsidian, it lets you type math equations and it will display with the typesetting you've come to expect.

You simply type something like $$e=mc^2$$ and it gets rendered like you'd see in a proof. It's really not that hard to learn.

With Markdown, you only _kind of_ have a code editor. Strictly speaking, yes, there's a code pane and a preview pane, at least any good editor will have that. But to write Markdown you just do things like I want *this* word to have emphasis and I want [[this to be a link to a resource]].

It's really not any different than how you might format things while shitposting. You know, like saying black """"people"""" and

>green text

and >>18344946 is your post.

>>18345232
>And beautifully formatted text files were/are a tradition in computing.

Me again. This is by no means the best example, but check out:

http://textfiles.com/100/arttext.fun

Plaintext is fun. It's cross-platform, tiny, fixed-width fonts make for some nice ASCII art like headers, banners, etc.

Linux has some pretty powerful tools like grep, cat, sed, awk, python, etc. for searching, formatting, combining, etc. And most of these tools are also available on Windows (cygwin) and Mac (most should come pre-installed I think).

The idea behind Markdown is to take formatting embedded in the text file like *italics* and **bold** and

- item 1
- item 2

and render it to HTML. It's a great way to work because you don't have to stop and click to make a word *italicized* you can just keep typing and never leave your kekyboard. And if you learn something like vim, you can do even more without ever touching a mouse.

>>18331980
It’s called a visual communication skill

I want to try this but I need to convince myself to master org-mode first before learning org-roam.

Can i access this on another computer easily? Do i need to transfer the file and download the app again?

>>18345991
Obsidian has a sync feature, if that's what you're asking.

It's just a folder with plaintext files that any text editor can read (e.g. Microsoft Notepad, Notepad++, vim, emacs, gedit, etc.). It can be zipped, encrypted, revision controlled, backed up in the cloud or on a USB stick...anything you could normally do with text files.

Programs like Obsidian parse the files looking for a special syntax which it uses to create logical links between the files (aka "notes"). But the notes themselves do not get modified, and it does not have to create a cache or anything to store its internal representation. You'll get an ".obsidian" folder that stores some configuration information about the program, but there's nothing in that folder that is specific to your knowledge base. Which is great for all kinds of reasons... for example, compatibility between versions. You don't have to worry about a cache getting corrupted or being out of date or taking up extra space or anything like that.

And it's insanely fast. I'm at 142,907 words, 229 notes, and it doesn't hiccup at all.

Consume useless procrastinating tech.

>>18345991
By the way, you can edit all your notes with a text editor. You *never* have to open Obsidian until you want to navigate it. Obsidian basically turns it into a website with clickable links and formatting (which I believe you can modify with some custom CSS), and so on. But there is no requirement to edit it inside of Obsidian. Like I said >>18346329 here, there is no cache or metadata that Obsidian applies to your "vault" (which is just a folder with text files and, if you'd like, subfolders). If at some point you want to abandon Obsidian, your text files are intact, ready to be edited, searched, read, etc. You don't have to worry about losing valuable metadata that only Obsidian can read/write.

>>18345232
does any of this software let you add image files too?

>>18345991
it's easy to use rsync to move files/directories to another computer

>>18328639
>>18328714
Whoa what software is this

software wont solve your problems

>>18346333
the tech is the primary focus but writing in .md files is pretty much as minimalist as it gets

>>18347927
Wrong, software actually does solve the problem of knowledge. It allows you to prioritize as well as remember.

>>18347869

Obsidian

>>18347927
Fuck you, my mind is clear for once.

>>18347927
>software won't solve your problems
>paper won't solve your problems
>memory palace won't solve your problems
>sticks won't solve your problems
>oogah boogah

>>18347299
https://help.obsidian.md/How+to/Embed+files

>>18347299
Images, audio, video (both local and streaming e.g. vimeo and YouTube), iframes (think how the """media""" embeds Twitter posts into articles), and I believe PDFs.

bump

maybe I just need to put more time into it, but I just tried taking notes on Obisidian while reading Freud and while I like the software itself the note-taking becomes stressful in the way I organize it. I'm unsure about how I should structure my notes and suddenly it becomes a burden to think about it. Perhaps it's better for me to just take notes with pen on paper without organizing the whole thing.

>>18349404
slippery

>>18351166
Maybe take notes with pen and paper first then refine those notes then upload to Obsidian in a new and digitalized format to last forever? Note-taking sure is a craft I don't fully understand. Sometimes you can say a lot with little, but sometimes you have to say a lot about little to even grasp it.

>>18351166
How to Take Smart Notes by Sonke Ahren advises to first take "fleeting notes", and later process them into permanent notes.
So when you read, you write down whatever you think is useful or interesting, however you want. You edit them separately after the reading, not during it.

Personally I don't really care and write them down immediately if at PC, since I can just rewrite or reorder them at will later, but having a pen-n-paper solution for fleeting notes is useful when on the move or if you have an editor anxiety.

...heh

you are like baby to me

>>18352639
lol I was about to post this what an absolute mad lad

>>18349712
neat thanks

>>18347927
I suppose you only learned to read and write to communicate this important message and forgot right after you did.

>15000+ self created cards
>170.000+ reviews in Anki

It's a struggle and I think about quitting. My notes are top notch (q&a w/ pics, not just simple clozes) but I just want to delete everything. Anyone here who feels the same pain? What do?

A cluttered mind forces synthesis of ideas and the subconscious process that does this is smarter than you using some silly software you tards.

>>18353058
Retard

>>18353041
I would only memorize what required memorization due to constant use or criticity. Everything else can just stay stored in text and image or whatever. Unless you're going to compete in memory, what's the point?

>>18353222
That's what I already do... I also constantly delete cards. Still, the collection continues to grow as I add even more. If I just could sell my soul like Faust, that would be the shit man.

>>18353281
What the fuck are you memorizing Anon

>>18353339
psychology

>>18353400
Oh god

>>18352639
This really makes me just want to ask the guy how useful this has been

>>18351166
I can't take notes as I'm reading either friendo, I start being weird about 'what if something else comes along that alters my understanding' or thinking about how the final structure would look when I don't have the complete picture, blah blah blah...
What works for me is taking it chapter by chapter - I read a chapter, lightly marking any passages I think are important or want to come back to and put any 'fleeting' thoughts in the margins. Once I'm done reading I go back and review what I marked and think about the chapter generally and begin translating things into my own words and writing them by hand. I may think about the keywords/topics/name I'd file my notes under but I don't try and design a structure yet. I'll repeat this for a few more chapters / until I want to stop reading. Move over to PC and start storing in the ZK (I use Obsidian too). This is where the work of 'structuring' and considering where this new info fits/relates to existing notes.
I have no doubt that some people will view this as inefficient but I: 1) really believe that writing by hand is better when first formulating thoughts (Ahrens cites a study about note taking in lectures but I've found it applies more broadly than that) 2) don't like reading in front of a screen as I find them to be invitations to distraction.
I got a bit blog-posty there but maybe you and other anons will find it useful.

>>18333072
Don't listen to them. I use OneNote and it's fine.

Paranoidfag here. If you want to use Obsidian, but don't want to send the developers any data you may use a small software called Folder Firewall Blocker. You can get it from majorgeeks.com. The folder you want to block is the one located here:
>user/appdata -> local -> obsidian

>>18354216
so even a fucking note taking app is spying? my god I hate this world

>>18354392
Its flattering if the developers want to look at my notes.

>>18354216
Thank you anon. Now I can safely plan how to get a gf without some greasy developer using my schemes to steal girls from me.

>>18353041
Do you have any resources on the topic of creating good flash cards?

>>18356340
common sense is a great starter, don't look into what this supermemo retard wrote on his bloated wiki

>https://www.reddit.com/r/Anki/comments/lzsp6m/the_cognitive_neuroscience_of_memory_and_why_some/

perhaps this is good advice idk tho

>>18356314
The two devs are anime avatar “girls” lmao.

>>18328714
>Anyways, how's your progress, guys?

I only just discovered what the heck Zettelkasten and PKM really is all about the 23rd of May. (I can remember this date thanks to Obsidian) and needless to say I've become quite obsessed with it.
I was already quite into taking notes and trying to remember certain ideas or keep track of specific things that were mainly personal whether it was info, reading lists, bookmarks or projects and other misc notes using Workflowy, but the hierarchical linear model wasn't doing it for me until I found Obsidian.

This is a game changer, the backlinks and interlations I can build between subjects Ill jump from and toward as well as having a central location for basically anything I want is beyond helpful, I can't thank /lit/ enough for introducing this to me, these threads are great. Pic related is my node network progress

>>18358257
Wow that's beautiful

>>18358263
thanks!

>>18352639
This guy made all this and he would be lost 10 seconds in any debate on foreign policy.

What the fuck is this?

Im trying to get into using Obsidian, but I can't get over the power of excel for making tables and doing calculations.

I have figured out how to link from Obsidian to an excel file and have it open it upon click, but now I would have to make a different excel file for each little table I would want to store, and it sounds very suboptimal.

I mean you can also make "links" in excel where you click on a word/button and it goes to a specific sheet/point in the workbook. So I can't find a way over this. If I could embed excel tables into Obsidian that would be great, but all I can do right now is post images of said table, so its not dynamic and loses the actual power of excel

>>18358257
So whats the major singular point in your PKM that others are heavily linked to?

>>18358257
I am also interested in what that absolute chonker is!
>>18358393
If you're after excel like behaviour then maybe have a look at the 'Advanced Tables' community plugin? Can't say I've had a reason to use it myself but it looks like it may meet your needs (the formula syntax is... interesting though)

>>18358257
Wow. That look very nice
How do I start?
I discover this threads this week. I downloaded Obsidian and try to do something in a vault, but I don't know I feel disorganized. So I'm reading the "How to take smart notes" first.
Is it the right way or should I just start writing things in obsidian and wait for them to connect to each other?

>>18358393
I'm not sure if this helps, but I use Obsidian and LibreOffice Calc for 99% of my needs. I'm not sure Obsidian will ever have the features -- with plugins or otherwise -- that will allow me to replace Calc. It'd have to be *really* slick for me to give up my spreadsheets.

For simple lists, I use Obsidian. It might be something like what I ate today.

But let's say I'm putting together a list of my favorite movies and I want to query the list for information such as my favorite genre, then I am pretty much forced to use a spreadsheet at that point. A column with the movie title, another column with the genre, and then some wizardry to count and report the most-watched genre. Or maybe I want to know my favorite decade in film. A third column can be added with dates. I can't imagine I'd ever want to do that in Obsidian.

>>18358782
>should I just start writing things in obsidian and wait for them to connect to each other
I'll vote yes, but wait and see if and what consensus forms.

>>18358782
Reading that book is a good start.

Overall learning to organise this yourself will teach you how to organise your mind even better. Basically just take notes for things and parts that you feel are important or the note itself link to another note/part. Bit by bit you will be creating a similar map as other poster.

/omdg/ - obsidian.md general

>>18358410
The Lord and Almighty

>>18328639
Hey, I've beein doing this the past 3 years. Nice thread.

>>18360277
share advice and or resources for newbies, please!

howzit anons. i've started syncing my ZK system between my two computers using github. one benefit of this is that i'll be able to, at some point in the future, reconstruct the development of my notes push-by-push and visualize the graph's growth over time.
>>18328714
picrel's doing well, I've just started reading thru a few papers I have on standby but haven't processed into ZK format. that'll probably add some content to the list.
I'm planning on going thru the entirety of the alt-hype reader and adding its contents into the ZK
>>18331958
it's more to help contain and form new ideas from older ones.
>>18333072
begome lin/cuck/s
>>18333075
what obsidian does, but worse
>>18335073
>Extensive note-taking and linking doesn't make science easier. It makes science possible
s/science/making videos, and that's how it's been for me. seeing the connections and having a record of my ideas tied into sources/people/books &c. makes recording videos facile.
>>18335193
vim mode
>>18336253
vim>>>>>>>
>>18337587
git gud anon, everyone sees thru (You)r ruse.
>>18337856
~1.5M words this is another one of the benefits, for >>18331958
obsidian lets you, pretty freely, write virtually infinite amounts of notes. reformatting isn't a big issue, linking does the formatting for you. touching up on notes does help, but isn't necessary, and your system won't get bogged down if you don't do it.
>>18344195
>plaintext with Markdown formatting
obsidian is this. and it can automatically export to PDF like pandoc can (although i find i prefer obsidian's formatting for stuff like block quotes)
>>18344239
yeah, i do this primarily for philosophy but peripherally have theology, movies, the bible, some fiction, and uni notes in here. it's very useful for the only good kind of trans: transdisciplinary.
>>18344946
markdown and HTML are both markup languages, but one's much much more simple. however, you can embed HTML into your markdown (including in obsidian's version of it)
>>18345467
>tiny
another benefit of markdown is this. anon at >>18337856 with 1.5m words will probably only be using at most five MBs of storage.
>>18346333
literally nothing could be more minimal and to-the-point than obsidian. even org-mode is heavier.

>>18347299
yeah man u can embed anything with obsidian's markdown
>>18347927
they said this abt GTD and Anki, and they were wrong.
>>18351540
coincidentally, kindle's highlight and notetaking system works perfectly for this.
it's much slower to type on than a phone/physical keyboard, so it has all the benefits of handwriting (having to type more slowly makes you think more deeply; this is why handwriting notes is superior to typing them, generally)
it's very smooth & quick to do
it's very easy to survey what you've noted down in context
great stuff.
>>18352639
these notes look too fleeting, IMO. but idk what they look like on the inside, so no way to know.
beautiful, though.
also,
>Untitled 1
>>18353041
don't memorize everything. anki is a last resort, for what doesn't fit in your ZK.
>>18353058
lol this software just makes it more transparent obvious & accessible. also, makes knowledge work more obviously material
>>18358326
are you kidding? i've had my ZK onhand in a debate before, it makes literally any relevant topic smooth as butter to talk about. maybe i'm just really good at taking notes, but this mode of organization is perfect for debates IMO.
>>18358410
>So whats the major singular point in your PKM that others are heavily linked to?
Jesus Christ, and the bible.
>>18358782
just write naturally. things will fluidly connect very quickly. but i recommend you don't use the built-in zettelkasten plugin. instead, just write down ideas you have, who/where they come from, how they relate to other ideas, &c.

>>18358581
>I am also interested in what that absolute chonker is!
it looks like he has the tag filter on

>>18353041
use anki for thing you wanna really remember

Works well for vocab when learning a new language or formulas in scientific field (navier stokes by heart, really?)

>>18352639
Damn whose vault is this?

>>18360579
>obsidian is this. and it can automatically export to PDF like pandoc can (although i find i prefer obsidian's formatting for stuff like block quotes)
His document is currently in Word format therefore pandoc.

>>18360595
>but i recommend you don't use the built-in zettelkasten plugin
What does that do?

>>18360595
>are you kidding? i've had my ZK onhand in a debate before, it makes literally any relevant topic smooth as butter to talk about. maybe i'm just really good at taking notes, but this mode of organization is perfect for debates IMO.
No I meant Kantbot wastes his time studying dumb useless shit

>>18360970
it makes the default file title a timestamp (e.g. 202105312150) so you can make arbitrarily many notes with throwaway titles like the original Zettelkasten system, as opposed to thematically titling each note the way a personal wiki would work.

>>18352639
frig off kantbot & everyone knows your wife is a tranny

>>18352639
This is like a crime investigator's board except 10x more pins and strings. Jesus. Technology might just really be the future after all.

Hi friends,
I think this is all interesting and would like to start using Obsidian but I'm a physics student and would like to use LaTeX for mathematical equations.
While Obsidian does support LaTeX, the only way for me to see it is to export as a PDF.
Is there a way to view the formatted text live or some other software more suited for me?
Thanks anons.

>>18362489
Preview pane, anon.

Explain in *detail* how I can use all this nerd software to improve my cooking skills

>>18362619
Amazing, I'm a retard. Thank you, anon.

>>18362656
I'm not sure it will directly improve your cooking skills (i.e. motor skills), but it can improve/increase your knowledge of food and cooking which will help your observational skills thereby improving your cooking skills, maybe?

Take a simple béchamel sauce, for example. While taking notes you might notice that this is the basis for sausage gravy and biscuits (if you're European, might want to look this up).

Instead of trying to remember a sausage gravy recipe, you simply need to remember that a béchamel sauce is made from equal parts butter and flour, cook out the flour taste, and then add cold milk. If you add crumbled, browned breakfast sausage, then it becomes sausage gravy.

It allows you to collapse the entire recipe down to two ingredients (or maybe 'components' is a better word): béchamel sauce and breakfast sausage. That's a handy way to begin remembering a lot of recipes. A connection you may have otherwise never made.

If you're trying to learn molecular gastronomy (Harold McGee's book is the bible of said topic although some others have come along since), then it can help you wade through the (often technical) topics.

For example, you could employ the Feynman Technique. Basically you make notes about what you're trying to learn, and then you make notes about the notes.

Say you're trying to learn about freezer burn and how to prevent it. While reading, the book informs you that freezer burn is the result of a process known as sublimation. You could stop there, and that would be fine. It would probably help you pass a test or nail an interview. But maybe you make a new note about sublimation and start writing about how it's evaporation at sub-zero temperatures. You probably know what 'evaporation' mean so you might end there. Maybe you desire even more understanding. It's all up to you.

Think of it as "zooming in" to a topic until you can explain it to a five year old. "Freezer burn is when cold air draws moisture from food leaving empty pockets in its space. To prevent this, we need to create an insulating layer between the air and the food." Something like that. The kid doesn't need to know more than that. It's a decent, functional understanding of what's going on. It's something to at least act on ("I need to wrap this food tighter"). Maybe after a few months you even forget what some of the words mean, but your notes are there to go back to at any time.

I hope that helps.

>>18358410
>>18358581
Unfortunately its not a link to the Bible or God, although I started that article today and by the time I've finished reading St. Augustine's Confessions I can flesh it out a bit.

But I keep central points or landing pages to help navigate without relying on the sidebar as often.

So I use Maps of Content on topics surrounding a central theme, and categorise all notes by Dewey Decimal Code numbers; so all notes under religion are coded 200, and the Bible specifically under 220.

>>18360605
Nope, just existing files turned off and group colors turned on and orphans on.

>>18358782
That book is a good place to start, as well as just any youtube video that covers Obsidian/Zettelkasten really that what got me started, and once I established a way to organise and connect that works for me (MOC, DDC, using [[]] tagging) I can just start creating new notes and create links where possible, even if I don't have a note referring to it yet when I link it I am pretty sure at some point it will link.

Sure enough when I generate a new note it does; and you'll be surprised over time how much things can connect together even when it doesn't seem like it initially would.

>>18363959
Can you give an example of some profound insight you've had as a result of using Obsidian? As it is, I'm skeptical that any of this actually aids in knowledge acquisition.

>>18364021
More than anything the practice of using it helps me develop stronger organizational skills by finding ways to synthesize ideas into more fleshed out concepts which can then become full-scale projects, the idea of the centrality of it all allows me to make connections by remembering I have it stored on Obsidian and just by looking back on old notes the time I took previously to make backlinks now pays off as I can go through the network and easily recall information rather than just noting it and it likely is never seen again.

Through this exploration of ideas using Andy Matuschek's method of Evergreen notes you can lay out multiple relative notes along side by side and find a throughline to sythesize a new idea.

Even on pure research of anything I'm interested in I go on far more rabbitholes than ever with Obsidian by relative searching and whilst I'd achieve this every so often just browsing the web, it never amounts to anything or gets noted. Zettelkasten as a concept ties it all together.

>>18364053
Can you post an example of some new idea/insight you've synthesized as a result of doing this? To be frank, I don't believe a word you're saying because you keep repeating the same claims over and over again (not just you but every single poster in these threads) without actually providing any concrete evidence, i.e the basis of charlatanism.

>>18364504
how obtuse are you?
anyone who engages regularly in scholarly work or knowledge acquisition needs to organize their thoughts. it is nigh impossible to remember everything by simply reading it once and not writing it down.
it's literally just an organizational method, there are plenty of others.

>>18363346
very nice

I accidentally zoomed in on obsidian using ctrl and + and idk how to zoom out. Ctrl + scrolling only zooms out of the text but not the whole program. There seem to be no shortkeys for this and google doesn't help. what do I do?

>>18364504
How do you propose anyone would even provide 'concrete evidence' that X idea was formulated 'because of PKMG method Y', that's not how knowledge based work... works.
The author of 'How to Take Smart Notes' states that the book came about as a result of his usage of the ZK method. Is that good enough evidence? Or how about Luhmanns (the ZK originator) himself - he claimed his prodigious output was almost solely because of his usage of a zettelkasten.
It's baffling that you'd equate it to charlatanism, anons in this thread aren't trying to convince people that "THIS IS THE WAY EVERYONE SHOULD FOLLOW", nor is there really a particular product being peddled (a lot of people gravitate to Obsidian because it is 1) free, 2) good). ZK and PKMG more broadly are just tools that people come to when they are dissatisfied with the classically taught methods of studying and writing. We discuss them because we have found them personally useful.
If you don't think it's good for you then... fine? Nobody cares if you do or do not use it. You seem to just be shitting up the thread to be a contrarian. If you need 'convincing' before you try something that is free + entirely personal then the problem lies with you.

>>18364879
time to buy a 4k monitor

>>18364879
as you can see in this ss I can zoom out of the text but that huge sidebar is so bothersome. This is really stressing me out pls help

>>18364744
>>18364894
All I'm asking for is one new idea/insight that you've had after using this method. I know all about Luhmann's claims and the claims of the author of the book but I can't interact with either of them directly. I can't even check Luhmann's body of work because all of it is in german.

You (and others) are claiming that via this method one can:
>synthesize ideas into more fleshed out concepts which can then become full-scale projects,
>find a throughline to sythesize a new idea

So give me an example--from your own experience--where you've accomplished this. No need to take things so hostilely. I'm not trying to be a contrarian. I've used ZK myself for a while in my own field of research and did not experience any of the benefits you are claiming; I only ended up with an illusion of competence. I'm trying to figure out if it was an issue with the way I was doing things or if, in fact, the method itself is flawed (or else incompatible) and you all are falling into the same trap of illusory competence.

Also the book "How to Take Smart Notes" is... mediocre to say the least and probably shouldn't be used as an advertisement for the method.

>>18364879
>>18364982
nvm I fixed it

For some reason my anxiety has spiked, I guess due to work (or rather the lack of it), and I haven't been putting time into my vault. Also the only reading I've been doing is fiction, so it feels pointless to take notes on it. Like, what the fuck would I even write about great expectations. I have a new book coming in the mail today, maybe I'll take some notes of it.

>>18365092
Just write a simple review/analysis and see if you agree in a few months. If you've read something you've written many years ago (like a blog), then you probably have experienced the cringe at your earlier, more naive, less experienced self. That in itself is very rewarding, in my opinion, if for nothing else than it's proof that we grow and improve throughout our lives. Not a bad reminder when you're learning something difficult and you think "I'll never understand this". Your notes are proof (or can be proof) that you overcome things. If you never overcome things, yeah, put Obsidian down and sort yourself out. But I know that doesn't describe you, dear anon.

>>18328639
>Personal Knowledge Management
Socrates disapproves. By offloading "knowlege" onto an external medium it ceases to be knowlege. Rather than "freeing up the brain" it makes it lazy, like a man whose muscles grows weak because he hires workers to do all the toil for him.

>>18365316
>sure glad I never bought a squat rack, carrying around this weight on my back at all times has been great for my posture and totally hasnt exhausted or fatigued me in any way! Setting weights down is for losers!

>>18365316
>I dont know how brain work and I prove it to you
Fuck socrates

>>18365316
cringe

>>18365002
Aight, apologies if I came across as overly hostile.
> claims
I've never claimed either of those things (although I acknowledge the other anon did) - I just found it confusing that you seemed to imply that the method cannot work when there's clear historical examples of people saying it worked for them. With the context of your explanation I think I get where you're coming from.

I do wonder if there's some confusion about what you and other anon mean by 'new ideas' -- I might call 'seeing an abstract connection between two books a 'new idea' (e.g. I thought Nietzche's comments about human evolution/history not resulting in more/better 'great men' was an interesting observation/description of regression to the mean, given it seemed improbable N would have read Galton) because it was a novel thought to me, that I created from my own understanding (I'm sure it's a comparison already made elsewhere, I've not checked).

If you're after 'objectively novel', or even 'used interesting connections for a creative purpose' then I've indeed got nothing for you. I work as a software engineer and came into this solely as a way to better store and understand the stuff I read in my free time and to help me figure out what I find interesting / have gaps of knowledge in. Is that similar to what you're calling illusory competence?

And re: smart notes - The quality of a derived work isn't really a useful metric when the bar was 'did they use X to create a thing Y' but I agree with you! It's not great, but it gave me the kick to start writing notes in my own words so it did its job for me.

>>18365316
That was Plato, not Socrates.
Second, argument from authority is not an argument, but merely an allegiance pledge.
Third, they did it in the memory palace because papiri had to be imported, and rot.

>>18365002
I found interlinks between Charles Taylor and Helmuth Plessner while checking my Philosophical Anthropology notes, and wrote an essay about that. Works for me.

>>18365591
holy based

>>18365591
>Second, argument from authority is not an argument, but merely an allegiance pledge.

Few understand; incredibly based.

>>18365464
Thank you for the sincere answer. The kind of thing you're describing is not what I would consider illusory competence but it is close, in as much as there's no accountability as to whether you're actually learning anything or not (i.e you're not testing yourself in any way). Obviously you're doing it for hobby activities so it doesn't matter that much but when I was using to learn topics related to my research I found that the note-taking took up a lot of time and it felt like I was learning while I was doing it but there was little actual benefit (compared to say, using spaced repetition software). I don't discount there might have been flaws in the way I was taking notes but from what you've written, my suspicions are confirmed that this method isn't compatible to my goals and it isn't worth abandoning the methods I've developed till now to try ZK again.

I created a telegram group if anyone is interested in joining a group to discuss this
https://t.me/joinchat/LZmgo86wgghkNDMx

>>18365002
I mean I had the insight that Jason Jorjani's concept of a specter ties in perfectly with the EO apophatic concept of God's ousia.

>>18364903
>>18364879
>>18364982
>>18365064
lol'd
>>18365316
your soul is for having ideas, not for holding them.
>>18365329
+1

>>18361385
I use unique id + title for my note titles. Unique id is how I reference a note because it is immutable. The title on the other hand is open to being refactored. Title of notes (concepts, ideas) are difficult to get right the first time or change over time with new understanding. Obsidian, Bear update the links of all notes that reference the note if you change the title, but this locks you into software.

Between notes, using a unique id for reference followed by a description of why the link exists creates more knowledge IMO. Some people prefer note titles without an id "this relates to [[My cool concept]]", however I feel this is too rigit. Some (myself included) prefer "[[202123312]] here I describe how my cool concept relates to this particular note".

>>18366594
HMMM

>>18365064
Ctrl - usually does the opposite of Ctrl +

>>18366940
very nice concept

>>18368451
i stole it from GTD but he says "brain"

Thinking of a memory superstructure is bullshit psued shit. What is the optimal way of taking connected notes (preferably with a keyboard shortcut) on windows 10? I understand obsidian just organizes markdown files, but is learning markdown the simplest way to practically take notes quickly, while keeping them extremely organized? or is there a more optimal way?

>>18368655
Windows key
Type notepad
Hit enter
Get going
Memory superstructures are real and you'll understand once you realize you're already in one.

>>18368655
>learning markdown
there's hardly anything to learn
takes like 15 minutes to skim over the syntax and then you just reference what you need

>>18369532
Formatting is pretty important

>>18368655
markdown is as good as it gets because it's easily switched to other file types and systems. a lot of people write their websites in .md and have a script to turn it into html for publishing.

>>18371309
ok?

bump

tl;dr what's the best program for linux?

>>18368655
>>18369532
OK, so if anyone is interested in the optimal solution for quickly writing notes and adding them to a Zettelkasten of their choice on Windows 10, I've deduced that you can easily do so with AutoHotKey and this script:
https://pastebin.com/2bm1UzcK
Credit to mrjackphil on Github for original code, which I have improved to get rid of his original #qnote tag, replaced with an always-on time tag, and if you don't write a filename then the first 20 characters will become it while ignoring any Windows Reserved Characters.

I also found that using plain Unicode 8 encoding included something called a Byte Order Mark, which in Obsidian shows up as an annoying little character write at the beginning of the document. So it has to be Unicode 8 RAW, which excludes the BOM.

You can just drop the script into whichever directory you have your notes in, and use Task Scheduler on windows to start it at login.

caillim airgead nuair a rithim le mo mhac

>>18374451
sa-mi sugi pula

>>18368789
>Memory superstructures are real and you'll understand once you realize you're already in one.

What a dumb thread.

>>18375688
only as dumb as what you bring into it, fucker

I want to start using Obsidian to map out my mind and draw links between texts I read and lectures I watch. But I want it to be more categorised/hierarchical than Zettlekasten, what should I do? I feel if I make it too hierarchical I will end up with not being able to link things whatsoever.

For example, if I'm reading religious texts, should I have a folder for each religion? For each religious concept? How deep should I go? Or is pure top level zettelkasten superior in this way too?

>>18378680
Let it grow organically. If you run into an issue with the organization, then change it. I would file this issue under "choice paralysis". You're overthinking how to get started when you should just get started. I'm not attacking you or anything -- I've been there before. I am a game developer who has "wasted" time trying to make my own custom game engines and tools. I say "wasted" because you *do* learn from those experiences, but it's also a huge drain on productivity. If you're making, for example, a room escape game, it's nice to have abstractions that perfectly fit that type of game, but the reality is the time spent could have been saved using something off-the-shelf. Just have fun, anon.

>>18378742
Thank you, yes I suffer from it all the time

>>18378680
Obsidian lets you have a hierarchical file structure on top of that, which is nice.
What I do is I just create the new files and place them in the folder without any organization and once it starts to get a bit unwieldy, I make a general folder or two like 'Humanities' and 'Sciences' which I place them in. Once that isn't enough, I go one level down and so on. As long as it's somewhat organic, I don't think you'll have any problems. If you try to create an organizational structure without having a good number of notes already written, that's when the problems come about.

Can anyone speak to how well or badly calibre can mass convert pdfs to epub?