
Ask HN: How are you taking notes - arrmn
Right now there is an article article on the frontpage about note taking, Study: Students who take notes by hand outperform students who type [1].<p>So I wanted to see how are you taking your notes, not just related to college classes but generally when learning new things?<p>Currently I&#x27;m using a different notebook for each subject.I write down notes randomly (whatever I think is important), for math I&#x27;m leaving out the formulas if it&#x27;s on the slides. At the end of the lecture I write down the key points at the top right corner of the first page.<p>I came across Cornell Notes but I&#x27;m not using it. I didn&#x27;t find the optimal system for me right now, so it would be helpful to hear from other people.<p>Thanks<p>1: https:&#x2F;&#x2F;news.ycombinator.com&#x2F;item?id=11459710
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wallflower
There is no optimal system.

What works for you is what works for you. And what works for you well in one
subject might not be as optimal for you in another subject. We all love the
idea of one-size fits all (in fact, this is marketed to all of us all the
time).

In fact, I am going to go off on a tangent here and expand to not just taking
notes - but how you learn new things.

I am assuming that you are optimizing for short-term usage and recall. For
rote memorization, if you have not already encountered it, try Anki
([http://ankisrs.net/](http://ankisrs.net/)). To simulate a test (for those
tests requiring essay answers), get a group of study friends together and just
do what Toastmasters does - ask them a question related to the subject and
have them speak for 1-2 minutes off the cuff about it. This closely
approximates a short (or longer) essay question. For subjects like physics,
optimize your method of problem solving. For example, don't solve problems
line by line in the textbook. But on a whiteboard or a blank sheet of paper,
ideally with friends, solve that problem at a high level. What is the process
that you will need to do to solve it? Where can you get lost? (VERY IMPORTANT)

As for longer-term recall and usage, it is all about day by day actions, not
binging. Just an hour or two a day consistently. Active not passive. I'm
currently studying a new language (Spanish). I used to have a giant Google doc
where I just copied and pasted in in translations of single words. Later, it
evolved to include example sentences. Finally, it became blocks of writing
from native speakers.

It didn't do anything for studying. What works is actively trying to use the
words/phrases. I can only handle maybe 5 or 10 a day. And by actively using
them all day (even if just in my head, sometimes with headphones in public -
no one knows you aren't talking to someone but yourself) they become gradually
more medium-term and eventually permanent.

~~~
arrmn
Thanks for your comment.

I'm not trying to optimize for short term usage, in the beginning it is short
term obviously, but I would like to be able to use the notes to repeat the
topics and move them to my long term memory. That's my problem my notes aren't
that clear to use them as a reference.

And for Anki/Flashcards I didn't find a good way to use them for CS topics,
and more importantly for math.

~~~
wallflower
You're welcome. Have you considered visual note taking?
[http://www.amazon.com/The-Back-Napkin-Problems-
Pictures/dp/1...](http://www.amazon.com/The-Back-Napkin-Problems-
Pictures/dp/1591841992)

It's not dissimilar to mind maps, and it exercises your brain more because
_you_ are making the connections more than the software.

Don't worry about drawing skills, those info visualizations from TedX talks
are usually from professionals. Like these -
[http://blog.ted.com/tag/sketchnotes/](http://blog.ted.com/tag/sketchnotes/)

Your notes won't ever be clear enough to use as a direct reference unless you
write a literal book. Perhaps just use it as a prompt for what challenged you
(at the time of writing the note). Also, look at memory palaces. I don't like
the technique myself but it has uses for more complicated memorizations that
defy rote memorization (e.g. irregular conjugations of verbs that diverge from
the standard patterns).

In case you missed it, there was a recent HN post about using Anki for CS
topics (not Math). The basic concept is that the Anki cards can be used to
pose questions on topics or subtopics that may be on the verge of slipping
from working memory. It is different from a vocabulary card where you know the
answer right away. The Anki card solely exists as a random-access method to
challenge your ability to solve a particular problem of a topic or subtopic.

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11408447](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11408447)

------
ultrablue
I like mindmapping because it helps me to remember relationships between
ideas. But I don't always use it.

I use a red pen to mark things: A star for action items. More stars = more
urgent. A ! for points of interest, important facts. A ? for questions.

As I go over my notes, I cross out the stars, !s and ?s as I address them.
That way I'm not confused later.

I do the marking regardless of whether I mindmap. One thing about mindmaps is
that they take up a lot of paper real estate, and 8.5x11 quickly gets used up.
So it depends on the nature of session.

~~~
arrmn
Mindmaps never worked for me, like you said they take up a lot of space and I
quickly lose the overview. Maybe I should work on it.

I'm also using ? if something is unclear during my lectures.

------
lcall
I have tried and thought about many things until finally writing my own tool
that is extremely fast, powerful, and flexible. Currently it could be seen as
org-mode replacement that addresses some of the key challenges (hard to learn,
awkward) while keeping some key benefits (efficient from keyboard, extremely
flexible), and adding huge flexibility in what can be done:
[http://onemodel.org](http://onemodel.org) (AGPL).

It is a personal organizer, is something like really fast mind maps but
(currently) keyboard-driven and handles very large amounts of interlinked
data, different topics at once or mixed etc: the beginning of a platform to
change how individuals (or mankind) manage knowledge overall. Future features
involve much more than note-taking, but exploiting the internals for
collaboration, anki-like repetition, to-do reminders, and more.

For current org-mode or evernote users: The app has export (& import) features
to convert anything to (or from) an indented plain-text outline. The FAQs have
links to a discussion of a more detailed comparison with org-mode that seemed
somewhat well-received at the time (link is on this page which discusses
evernote:
[http://onemodel.org/1/e-9223372036854614741.html](http://onemodel.org/1/e-9223372036854614741.html)
).

Feedback would be much appreciated. If one has any interest at all, I suggest
signing up for the (~monthly?) announcements list, and participating in
discussions on the general list, for suggestions & input on things going
forward.

(Ps: in the next week or less I hope to have a demo version available to play
with easily, without having to install anything first but the .jar.)

------
fosco
emacs org-mode.

I've seen a few of these ask HN's and have payed very close attention.

I like workflowy [0] but dislike that is is cloud based. I wanted to host
whatever I use.

after giving org-mode [1] a a few hours of tinkering, I am now completely in
love. I host it from an ssh server and manage it from a terminal and can
honestly say ythe few hours of tinkering were completely worth it. try it out.
I typically use lists/todo's and tables.

[0] [https://workflowy.com/](https://workflowy.com/) [1]
[http://orgmode.org/manual/](http://orgmode.org/manual/)

------
MalcolmDiggs
In college I tended to annotate some existing document/book rather than
writing notes from scratch. That tended to save time and energy, and meant I
had to write a lot less than if I was starting from a blank sheet (since the
textbook provided all the context for my annotation).

The goal would be to make my textbooks/articles the single source of study-
material when midterms/finals came around. Rather than sift through stacks of
notes, I'd just have to re-read the textbook including my annotations, and I'd
usually be fine.

------
tedmiston
I'm an obsessive notetaker. It helps me improve comprehension and memory.

Having tried a lot of tools including paper notebooks, mapping, personal wikis
(ex. TiddlyWiki), tagged note-taking apps (ex. Evernote, Day One journal),
blogging platforms, ... I've come to the conclusion that nothing does
everything that I want as well as good old markdown.

My solution is a simple but flexible git repo [0]. So far I've logged notes on
50+ items over about a year, including books, courses, videos, magazines,
podcasts, etc.

Some of the best examples are Show Your Work! [1] and Cities and Ambition [2].

P.S. One recent development is GitBook
([https://www.gitbook.com/](https://www.gitbook.com/)). It's a little more
than I need personally, but incredibly cool software nonetheless.

[0]: [https://github.com/tedmiston/notes](https://github.com/tedmiston/notes)

[1]:
[https://github.com/tedmiston/notes/blob/master/books/Show%20...](https://github.com/tedmiston/notes/blob/master/books/Show%20Your%20Work!.md)

[2]:
[https://github.com/tedmiston/notes/blob/master/essays/Cities...](https://github.com/tedmiston/notes/blob/master/essays/Cities%20and%20Ambition.md)

~~~
arrmn
I see a lot of todos for your books, did you already read these books and just
didn't write down the notes or are you planing on reading these books and
writing the notes "live"?

~~~
tedmiston
Mostly the latter. If I read one chapter of a book I'll leave a TODO in every
other chapter to show that the whole book isn't complete, though most of the
time I'll never read the entire book anyway...

That approach worked better in the early days. Now it's a bit demoralizing to
have hundreds of TODOs. I'm open to better ideas for handling that case.

------
sgillen
I have one notebook for all my subjects. This only works because I never
really look back at my notes (I refer to online lecture notes, the textbook
etc. for that). I only write notes down because it helps me remember. my style
is similar to OP's I just sort of randomly write down whatever I think is
important, I'll use lot's of arrows and pictures.

I started doing this sometime in like middle school and have stuck with it,
it's perfect for me but ymmv.

~~~
arrmn
I used also just one notebook and wrote everything down randomly with a lot of
arrows and numbers/symbols referencing each other, but it was impossible to
use the notes for learning. So I switched to multiple notebooks, it helped
somewhat.

Our way of notetaking is just write-only.

But I'm trying to improve it.

------
BoysenberryPi
There was a lecture by Marty Lobdell[1] where he talks about a note taking
system that separates facts and concepts that I really like. Concepts are easy
to get a handle on because it doesn't take much effort to think of a real word
example to relate it to. Facts on the other hand are very difficult because
they aren't easily related to knowledge you already have so for facts you use
a mnemonic device.

[1] [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IlU-
zDU6aQ0](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IlU-zDU6aQ0)

------
a-saleh
I don't take notes anymore, because I no longer have any need to. In rare
occasion I do, usually on longer meetings with colleagues, we have an
etherpad/google doc and edit collaboratively.

And even in college I usually didn't take notes at all. I learned by borrowing
notes from several people, and then meticulously created a cheat-sheet.

------
rofrol
Markdown stored in git with script auto-pushing changes/new files to github.
Just:

$ git clone
[https://github.com/rofrol/m1ndmap](https://github.com/rofrol/m1ndmap)

$ cd m1ndmap

$ npm i

$ npm run watch

------
edoceo
Post-Its for rawidea phrases.

Scrap paper, big post its for longer ideas, phone calls, notes while reading.

Both of those create physical baggage for me forcing the next function: drop,
file, delegate, share, etc.

------
wprapido
evernote + moleskine notepad. draw.io for charts / drawings / mindmaps

