
Ask HN: What's your journaling setup? - olegious
For those of you that consistently journal, what&#x27;s your set up?  Do you use paper? Do you use an app? Do you answer specific questions?<p>Thanks.
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krrishd
I use an app that I made myself
([http://write.itskrish.co](http://write.itskrish.co)), its defining features
being:

1\. you choose a fixed duration of time within which to journal (i choose 15
minutes even though it is initially tough to spend all of)

2\. if you stop typing for more than a few seconds within the duration, you
lose your writing

These constraints basically force me to dump anything and everything on my
mind for the sake of continuous typing, and I've been successfully doing it at
least 1-2 times a week for more than a year.

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zachlatta
I've given up on using any sort of branded app for notetaking. At best it's
open source and the maintainers will lose interest in a few years.

When you write things down, you're investing in your future. It's silly to use
software that isn't making that same investment.

After trying Evernote, wikis, org-mode, and essentially everything else I
could find, I gave up and tried building my own system for notes. Plain
timestamped markdown files linked together. Edited with vim and a few bash
scripts, rendered with a custom deployment of Gollum. All in a git repo.
It's... wonderful. Surprisingly easy. Fast. If there's a feature I wish it
had, I can write a quick bash script to implement it. If Gollum stops being
maintained, I can use whatever the next best markdown renderer is. Markdown
isn't going away anytime soon.

It's liberating to be in control. I find myself more eager to write things
down. I'm surprised more people don't do the same.

Here's what my system looks like on mobile
[https://imgur.com/a/nGplj](https://imgur.com/a/nGplj). I usually SSH into the
tmux session from a computer.

When it comes to the act of journaling itself, I’ve found that sometimes I
feel like typing, sometimes I feel like speaking, and sometimes I feel like
writing on paper. The most important thing is that the barrier to Just Writing
is as low as possible.

With this setup, I just need to run `new_journal` and I’m dropped into a new
Markdown file where I can just write. If I feel like speaking or writing on
paper, I have workflows ([https://workflow.is](https://workflow.is)) on my
phone for creating journal entries from voice memos or photos with one tap.

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dejv
All of my journals are paper and I do have few of them. One is strictly work
related, another one is for travel, next is more like work ideas/things to do.
They are all dated and it is just simple stream of what is going on in my head
and what I think is going to be interesting to read in future (as I do read my
old journals from time to time)

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Ginguin
Outside of keeping a Field Notes notebook on me at all times for jotting down
ideas (or keeping score when playing a board game or cards), I have basically
just copied and tweaked the entire system from [http://plaintext-
productivity.net/](http://plaintext-productivity.net/) to work for me.

For the journal, I create a new text file every month and use Markdown to type
up what is happening. Every day, I insert the date and list what I hope to
accomplish for the day. I will occasionally add what I have completed for the
day, notes on random stuff, etc.

It's quick, searchable, and accessible from anywhere (backed up to both
OneDrive and Dropbox and editable from home/work/phone, etc.).

------
zapperdapper
Combination. I use a Paipur notebook for physical notes. Slightly larger form
factor than a typical Moleskine but very good paper quality still.

I used Ulysses app for years for journaling and note taking etc, and I loved
it, I but don't like the fact they've switched a subscription model so I now
use Emacs in combo with GitHub.

Something that I tried years back and it worked quite nicely was sending
myself emails - it sounds sad but you get auto-archiving dates and all the
benefits of the email app/web app (search, labels etc.). Tempted to go back to
doing that frankly, but got into the habit of using Emacs now.

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afarrell
I have 1 paper journal which I keep behind my bed with a reading light. This
is for me to be able to write down the thoughts that come to me as I go to
sleep.

I have one digital journal that I use to record my accomplishments and
feedback at work. This is just a Dropbox Paper doc.

I have one digital scratchpad that I use while I work to write down Question-
Approach-Answer as I’m working through things. This helps keep me focused and
helps me break down problems.

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wingerlang
While I kind of stopped using it, DayOne is quite nice on macOS. It let's you
setup an automated popup that shows from the menubar. This makes writing quite
frictionless.

It also asks you random questions about anything really, like whats you
childhood memory of X and Y.

It also has a calendar view which is nice.

~~~
olegious
The problem with Day One is it is now a subscription model and the old version
no longer syncs across all your devices.

------
ryanthedev
[https://boostnote.io](https://boostnote.io)

And a notebook

