

Ask YC: How do you organize and manage your daily contents? - quan

Like many HN members I love generating ideas, and I write them down whenever one pops up, wherever I can.  Most of the time I just save them as txt files. Sometimes, I save them to Google docs or email it to myself. In addition to my own content generation, I also save useful links to code reference and insightful articles by emailing to myself or using delicious.<p>As the result, my inbox is filled with my own notes and reminder of things to do, my google docs documents keep piling up (about 300 right now), my desktop is cluttered with text files since I want to keep my recent ideas visible so that I can see them (when there're alot of them I just drag and drop the non-interesting ones into a folder). Worse, these contents are scattered across different places: in my local drive, on google docs, my inbox, delicious account.<p>It is becoming increasingly impossible for me to both intuitively save my contents and make them easily accessible. I'm trying to come up with some kind of process to save and access my notes/ideas/references and just wonder how HN members deal with this problem?
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spydez
I subscribe to the one text file way of thinking. Well, mostly one text file.
Some giant parts (phone/address book, usernames/password hints) got sharded
off into their own text file.

Reasons for a simple text file: Text works well with unix CLI tools (grep,
etc). Text can be read and editted on every computer out there. I own my data
- ain't stuck in someone else's server or hidden in a big binary blob. The
format is flexible, so it works with everything I throw at it.

Everything else is in the one text file. Ideas, books I wanna read, reminders,
todo lists... everything.

It's sort of a mess, but I can usually search straight to what I need. If I
can't find it straight away, I sprinkle in keywords when I get there...

Before I was doing things this way, I using emails and IMs and post it notes
and a notebook and... I could never find anything.

~~~
bprater
I do similar. To search for things, I tag all my entries, so it looks like
like this:

@todo @linux @work

\- Don't forget to process the client's log files today!

The file has grown huge, but I can still find what I need quickly.

BONUS: You can use quicksilver to add text to files, so from idea to entry, it
only takes a second or two. No app booting, web page surfing, etc.

------
redorb
I use a paper notebook, turned completely backwards, I work from back to front
- Put dates on every entry... Thus when it is full I can read it like a book,
I also Post-it tab every important entry.. I prefer the 70pg .70 cent
notebooks with a spiral bound, also picked up a $1 portfolio at wal-mart, my
boss taught me this one; he has used it for 5-10 years with great success. He
can look back to when we build this building (7 years ago) and tell you the
exact paint on the walls and the carpet he used and dimensions or each room...

write the range of dates on the front of each notebook then stack them in
order...

------
terpua
<http://evernote.com> \- exactly what you are looking for. I have 20 invites
if anyone wants to give it a spin.

EDIT: Please email terencepua gmail

I hate clutter :)

~~~
terpua
I'm out of invites :(

~~~
snewe
I have 20. Give me some emails.

~~~
yangyang42
hi, i'd like one please: my gmail-> hsuyangchang

thanks in advance!

------
natch
Each idea becomes a project, even if it is a potential project.

Projects are under a year (2008) directory under a 'work' directory (where
work refers to something I'm working on, as in in-progress, not work as in
job). But job stuff can go under work/{year}/projname too.

So then I have:

~/work/2006/proj1 ~/work/2006/proj2 ~/work/2006/projn ~/work/2007/proj1
~/work/2007/projn ~/work/2008/proj1 ~/work/2008/projn

etc.

Then when something is really finished and polished, I move it to a
~/proj/projname directory. That happens only rarely. I've been reconsidering
this and might start keeping everything in its original place under
~/work/{year}/projname

The other systems I've tried suffer from not being scalable as the years go
by.

Periodically I back up each year (zipped and gpged) to Amazon S3 with a
script.

Sometimes a project will span years, of course. When that happens I decide on
a case-by-case basis whether to do a symbolic link back to one original
project directory, or whether to start fresh at some point with a clean set of
files for that project, leaving the cruft behind but still intact in a
previous year.

Inside each project I can still use version control for the project.

Some projects are just repositories for ideas. Projects can be my own, or they
can be me playing with third party tools I've downloaded. Even just a new open
source package I'm installing might get its own project, with all files, if
it's tricky and I want to make my own installation notes for future reference.

All project directories have a notes.txt file (or can have, at least). I have
a 'tagthis' script that takes text tags as argument and adds the new tags to
header lines in notes.txt in the current directory. Then later I can grep for
these tags.

Works pretty well so far. It gives me the freedom to call anything, even an
idea I don't have time to work on right now, a project and make a starting
place for it. So-called projects in this scheme are very, very informal, so
it's a very light weight system that doesn't get in my way, yet it keeps
everything organized forever.

------
davidmathers
If you use a Mac you might find one or more of these softwares helpful for
storing certain types of things:

Things to do (Things): <http://www.culturedcode.com/things/>

Things to memorize (Mental Case): <http://www.maccoremac.com/>

Wiki style notes (VoodooPad): <http://flyingmeat.com/voodoopad/>

Tag style notes (Notae): <http://www.codepoetry.net/products/notae>

Journal/Blog style notes (Journler): <http://journler.com/>

Search style notes (Notational Velocity): <http://notational.net/>

Visual style notes (Curio): <http://www.zengobi.com/products/curio/>

Notebook style notes (NoteBook): <http://www.circusponies.com/>

Analyze your notes (Tinderbox): <http://www.eastgate.com/Tinderbox/>

Personally, I'm going to try Evernote soon. It has synchronized web access,
unlike any of the above. <http://evernote.com/>

You can also use Jott to create auto-transcribed voice notes from your phone:
<http://jott.com/>

------
fugue88
I use Org Mode for emacs. Each project idea gets its own org file in an all-
project-ideas directory. Each file is added to an Org Mode meta-file that
specifies the location of the org files.

I go through my ideas directory about once a week to keep things fresh.

Org Mode has built-in outlining support, date tags that bring items onto your
calendar in several ways, and a ton of other features.

I tried it out for GTD a few months ago and got very quickly hooked. Until
then I had been planning on writing my own web-based system.

~~~
fugue88
P.S. The entire thing's version controlled so I can view and edit from any of
my systems. I also collect ideas on paper, and later enter them into this
system.

------
LogicHoleFlaw
I use a small spiral-bound notebook. I've thought about moving to a software
version but I find the physical act of writing to be crucial to the process.

For a software to work for me, it would need certain features. I want wiki-
like cross-referencing but don't want html output. Just text. I want to be
able to edit in vim. Some basic formatting would be nice, and I want links to
web sites to open in my browser. I want to be able to scan changes by date, to
search through content, and to be able to view multiple entries at a single
time. To-do lists are nice but I don't need a scheduler; I just need a place
to keep track of current concerns. I want to integrate with my email, browser
history, and IM logs.

Now that I list out the sorts of features I'd like to see, it looks like what
I want is not just a single program.. it's a different way of interacting with
my computer.

------
blogimus
I'm currently using google notebook. It's much faster than google docs. Stuff
that I don't want to keep up there, I put on my encrypted usb flash drive or
my palm tx.

From reading the other posts, it looks like I'm not the only one who is
working on something that _I_ want as a better solution.

------
arthurk
I write them down in my Moleskine (which i take everywhere). At the end of the
week I review the ideas and normally start prototyping the following week.

------
kmt
emacs with planner + muse + gnus + remember + calendar + bbdb, etc.

You get the idea: I live in emacs.

~~~
indy
For anyone living in emacs I highly recommend org-mode (part of the standard
emacs distribution since v22)

------
tpimental
I've been slowly coding something to do this. I'm a heavy note taker, but
often find myself searching for notes in multiple places. I've been trying to
build a task tracker/note organizer, but have yet to find the right combo. The
tool has already been rebuilt twice with a third already on paper, so it may
look like a mess... but its my simple attempt at solving this problem.

<http://tasks.tompimental.com>

~~~
quan
Great, hope you'll find the right combo and all of us will be benefited as
well. One thing I can suggest is an 'import my existing documents' feature.

------
dhs
I use <http://www.assembla.com/>. I've got a workspace for each project and
ongoing process (e.g. "Taxes"), each with a wiki to collect notes and links,
the ability to write tickets, assign tickets to milestones, send messages to
the process, &c. SVN, too, for projects that need that (I don't use version
control on my tax files, but I could now :-). So far, this has been a splendid
arrangement.

------
lbrandy
Write your own. Let me use it :)

(that's my way of saying that I have no idea, but I voted you up so someone
can help us)

------
bigtoga
For ideas I use OneNote (<http://office.microsoft.com/en-
us/onenote/default.aspx>). I'm a Windows user and it is part of the Office
suite. OneNote is great for bringing order and search to disorganized ideas.

~~~
michael_dorfman
Hear, hear. OneNote is by far my favorite Microsoft application.

~~~
markbao
Am I the only one bummed that there isn't a Mac version of OneNote?

------
keefe
I use a secured installation of tikiwiki off of my normal site for security
reasons. I move computers too much to save everything on one machine, and it's
more secure as I have backup jobs setup for replication.

------
Alex3917
If my ideas are unrelated to projects I'm currently working on, then I save
them as .txt documents in one of two folders: "ideas" or "writing." Writing is
just a folder of things I want to blog about in the future, whereas ideas are
more business idea type stuff. If the idea is related to a current project
then it goes in my mindmap for that project. All of my mindmapping is done
using FreeMind, and I have a mindmap for every major project: businesses,
extended essays/books, classes, etc.

------
henning
Backpack (backpackit.com).

~~~
snewe
Google Sites is a near-replacement for Backpack once you integrate a to-do
list app from say Remember the Milk. The "Announcement" page type = Page in
Backpack. If you need more formatting for a page, you use a "Web Page" style.
Sites is just a little slower (less Ajax) and less pretty. As a 2-year paying
Backpack customer, I think I can make a complete switch.

~~~
redorb
How do you integrate with 'remember the milk' ?

~~~
snewe
Go to any page that you created, and select "Insert" --> "More..." Then search
for 'Remember the Milk' Hit insert and if you are already logged in it will
show your list of tasks. Pretty rad.

------
JesseAldridge
Here's an entry in my to-do list:

 _"Make a database of questions I've asked and other info. And make it easy to
find the answers again. Look at: YCombinator, StumbleUpon, Google, Tomboy,
thinklinkr, CreateDebate, Delicious, Experts Exchange, DabbleBoard,
Wikipedia"_

Piece of cake, right? :)

------
figured
I use Google docs.

A separate doc for each idea and a master doc with each idea being a quick one
line summary. It sounds like a lot of work about it allows you to quickly scan
your ideas, looking for patterns or possible solutions to problems. And it
really doesn't take that much maintenance

~~~
SA
Google Docs to me are just too slow and a bit less featuristic.

------
neovive
Simple Solution: Use one Google Spreadsheet with columns for date, rank,
category, industry and any other useful meta information related to your
ideas. You can then sort and filter by the various columns. Spreadsheets are
an excellent and proven way to organize information.

------
dimitry
Yup, same problem here. I'm writing my own as well. It's very simple (twitter-
like) and the site will email me with recent notes, etc. (not sure how often,
but I don't want to forget things, soo)

Making notes/tasks shareable is a feature too to get feedback on ideas.

------
greyman
I use windows freeware application called Keynote
(<http://www.tranglos.com/free/keynote.html>). It is basically a tabbed
notepad, where each tab is either a rich text file, or a tree with nodes.

------
davidw
I use "Stuff To Do" ( <http://stufftodo.dedasys.com> ) for that as well. I put
the random ideas at the bottom of the list, and weed out lame ones every once
in a while.

------
kamme
I use google notebook (notebook.google.com). It has a nice firefox plugin that
lets you manage your notes and you can create different categories (for
exmple, I have webdevelopment, personal, stuff).

------
ComputerGuru
PostIt notes. They're hard to manage but they give me so much creative
freedom!!

<http://neosmart.net/blog/2007/postit-notes/>

------
maxklein
I lost 2 years worth of ideas and notes when my PC crashed. Since then, I do
it all using todoist. Pretty nice - just add a Project and add each idea as a
todo item.

------
capablanca
I basicly use an emacs mode to organize them, keep them version controlled,
tagged, only to never find the information i need when i need.

~~~
spydez
Don't tease me man...

What emacs mode do you use?

------
SA
Nothing beats Microsoft Office OneNote. I use it for all my notepad things and
it really makes organizing things a bit easier.

------
adammichaelc
I have a notepad that I keep in my wallet. Every time I get an idea it goes in
the notepad. It works great!

------
yaj
google notebook for quotes, ideas I see in the web.

rememberthemilk - for my action items, also includes my "read notebook" tasks

basecamp - for my project action items

By the way, I also have invites on evernote. send me an email yajmail at gmail

~~~
bporterfield
I seethat you have invites to evernote and yet it's not on your list of apps
you use - why not?

------
tigerthink
xPad is free and awesome for Mac OS X.

<http://getxpad.com/>

------
aggieben
tiddlywiki

------
newt0311
Good directory structure + version control + a list keeping program that I
wrote. The list keeping program just keeps lists along with entries in said
lists. Lists and entries can then be retrieved based on regular expression
sequences, timestamps etc... The actual data is kept on a remote postgres
server so I can access it from anywhere.

