
Index cards are pretty cool (2009) - Tomte
https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2009/may/09/health-and-wellbeing
======
jmcphers
For several years, I used index cards extensively to track my to-do list and
capture notes on the go, inspired by Merlin Mann's "Hipster PDA"[0].

The flaw in my system turned out to be that there was just no convenient way
to carry the cards around in my jeans pocket. They always wound up getting
bent or wrinkled, and I couldn't find a way to keep the cards together that
was both pocket-friendly (a binder clip isn't; it pokes and scratches) and
quick-releasing (undoing e.g. a rubber band is just too much work for a quick
note).

If anyone's still using a hipster PDA I'd be curious to hear what your
physical system looks like and how you carry it with you.

[0] [http://www.43folders.com/2004/09/03/introducing-the-
hipster-...](http://www.43folders.com/2004/09/03/introducing-the-hipster-pda)

~~~
kyoob
I put a Levenger Pocket Briefcase[0] on my Christmas wish list many years ago,
and I still carry it around today. As a bonus I always get to show off how big
my wallet is compared to everyone else's wallets.

[0][http://www.levenger.com/FOLIOS-579/POCKET-
BRIEFCASES-304/Bom...](http://www.levenger.com/FOLIOS-579/POCKET-
BRIEFCASES-304/Bomber-Jacket-Pocket-Briefcase-14130.aspx)

------
jacquesm
I used to consume stacks of them. Schematics, notes, CD catalogue, address
book. It was by far the easiest format to keep structured data in paper form.
I still miss them, but searching files is much quicker and database tables
have a power all their own.

------
jseliger
It's also possible to buy better index cards from the Internet these days, at
sites like Jet Pens:
[https://www.jetpens.com/search?q=Index+cards&v=2](https://www.jetpens.com/search?q=Index+cards&v=2)
or the Goulet Pen Company:
[https://www.gouletpens.com/e13271/p/E13271](https://www.gouletpens.com/e13271/p/E13271)
. Oddly, perhaps, the Internet has enabled the proliferation of great papers
and pens.

------
nabla9
Niklas Luhmann's indexing method was really advanced and simple. There was
article in HN, but I have lost it.

~~~
Jtsummers
[https://www.ft.com/content/0de32666-b9fd-11dd-8c07-0000779fd...](https://www.ft.com/content/0de32666-b9fd-11dd-8c07-0000779fd18c)
from
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13852785](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13852785),
perhaps, but I can't get past the ft.com paywall.

[http://takingnotenow.blogspot.com/2007/12/luhmanns-
zettelkas...](http://takingnotenow.blogspot.com/2007/12/luhmanns-
zettelkasten.html) from
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13851727](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13851727)
is accessible and describes the gist of the system.

The summary is an arbitrarily deep tree/list of nodes. The notation for index
card headings is similar to the way we typically do outlines (1, 1/1, 1/1a,
corresponding to the typical 1, 1.1, 1.1.a, etc.). Searching was easy as you
could find cards grouped by the first index, then the second, then the third
(so 1/1a is next to 1/1b, and anything that might sit between them is a
_child_ of 1/1a). So for a physical system, despite its size, it remained
manageable. References to cards located in other branches allowed for an
effective-cross referencing system, and could be paired with things like index
(no pun intended) or topic cards which might list a bunch of related indices.

I suspect the physical limitations may have made it more manageable than an
equivalent set of mind map nodes or a wiki, and the simple indexing (and
consistent, never changing, once a number was assigned it was assigned) means
everything is "static" once in place, but can have an arbitrary number of
children to expand on it. This means no rewriting cross-references and/or
indexes.

With a wiki you might be tempted to retitle (or find the perfect title) for a
page, with this it's simply done. If you think of a better descriptor you can
put it on a new card and include the index as the reference.

~~~
jacquesm
I built a website around this a while ago just to play around with, complete
with index card looks.

~~~
mafribe
Egged on by Luhmann, whom I read obsessively in my youth, I started a Luhmann-
like hyper-text. Been doing it for a long time now. There are several
implementations based on Luhmann's Zettelkasten, e.g. [1, 2, 3], but I've not
used those myself, so can't comment on their usefulness. My own system is just
HTML, grep and a few handwritten scripts. It's extremely lightweight.

It's been spectacularly useful for me. In my experience such a system becomes
more useful with time, and with effort put in for curating. I spend maybe 2-3
hours every day with my private 'index cards'.

I guess most prolific writers in human history have been following a "write
down every idea and refine it later" type system. But it must be so much
easier now, with smartphones, computers, internet etc.

[1]
[http://zettelkasten.danielluedecke.de/en/](http://zettelkasten.danielluedecke.de/en/)

[2] [http://www.verzetteln.de/synapsen/](http://www.verzetteln.de/synapsen/)

[3] [http://zettelkasten.de/tools/](http://zettelkasten.de/tools/)

~~~
ycombinete
I'm interested in _your_ system. Do you explain it fully anywhere? To the
extent that it's something that I could try?

~~~
mafribe
Thank you for your interest. I'm afraid I have nothing in public.

The technology is near trivial, mostly scripts to generate HTML5/CSS on
demand, and grep for searching. The magic comes from how I use it. Short
summary.

\- Write down every idea, and every insight. Write down half-baked ideas. You
can later refine it.

\- Don't censor yourself. (That's why I don't write a public blog.)

\- When writing about some subject X, think carefully about how to link X to
other pages. When making a link to another entry, read/browse the entry and
let what you read give you inspiration about looking at X from another angle.
This can be rather inspirational.

\- Curate carefully, I spend maybe 3-4 hours every day on your ZK. Have a
long-term view: this is to be used your whole life. To longer you do it, the
more useful it will become.

\- Be clear what you want from this system.

\- The whole system wasn't useful for the first couple years. Why? Because I
could still remember what I had written. That changed after about a decade.

~~~
ycombinete
That's very interesting. Do you use it for ideas exclusively, or "personal
logging"/journaling too?. I've found a program called Connected Text[0], which
bills itself as a "personal wiki", and. I'm also looking at refining my use of
OneNote Desktop which I've been using for years, and it has a [[link]]
feature.

[0] [http://www.connectedtext.com/](http://www.connectedtext.com/)

------
dergachev
If you like organizing your thoughts in index cards, consider checking out
Gignko App (created by friend to write his physics PhD):
[https://gingkoapp.com/](https://gingkoapp.com/)

------
tunesmith
Hmm... you could paint a wall with magnetic whiteboard paint, and then get one
of those packs of 100 magnetic whiteboard cards - write on the wall if you
want, and then write on the cards too - erase the cards if you want, or just
lift them off and move them around... I might do that.

------
itstriz
For whatever reason, whenever I need to work out a problem on paper quickly, I
find myself reaching for a post-it note or index card instead of my notebook.
I'm not sure why I prefer the smaller format for scratch work.

~~~
gumby
I suspect there's an important psychological factor in the idea that the post
its or cards are disposable while the paper in the notebook is bound in.

I had to work to learn to use my lab notebook for this kind of thing. In
school I only recorded lab setup and results. Once I got a "real job" I
realized (well it was sternly told to me) that even random calculations and
stupid incomplete ideas could be very important to my employer at some point
in the future if something related later came out. This included crossing
things out in a way that was still legible.

When we'd sign each other's notebook pages nobody ever commented on the half-
assed stuff in my notebook and I saw it in others' too.

~~~
sndean
> Once I got a "real job" I realized (well it was sternly told to me) that
> even random calculations and stupid incomplete ideas could be very important
> to my employer at some point in the future if something related later came
> out.

I got this lecture too, but (unfortunately?) all that really changed was that
my post-it notes were stapled into my notebook.

~~~
jplayer01
I had to laugh, but technically, aren't you getting the best of both worlds?

~~~
gumby
I think you are as well but it does mean the person signing has to include a
signature that spans both the post-it and the book's paper to show that the
post-it wasn't put in later. Also it raises questions as to what is not
getting recorded (which is absurd since of course you could simply use a
notepad and hand copy in what you want, but this is human nature and
suspicion, we're talking about).

I understand the US Secret Service has analyzed lab notebooks in some major
disputes.

(To the best of my knowledge nobody has ever looked at my notebooks after I
was done with them).

