My Obsidian note-taking workflow | Hacker News Reader

My Obsidian note-taking workflow

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101 pointsarticsputnik79 comments

I recently switched from a daily journal/to-do list to a weekly one.

I have been surprised just how much it has helped me to keep things moving that otherwise might have been neglected.

My platform of choice is Emacs, org-mode, and org-journal, but I imagine the workflow is similar to Obsidian.

Each day is a top level heading, its to-do and journal items are 2nd level headings. Journal entries are timestamped, to-do items have a state of TODO/PROG/DONE and a timestamped log is kept logging state transitions.

Unfinished to-do items move to the new day automatically when it is created. Completed items are left in previous days, and displayed in a fainter coloured text.

One thing that seems to help me is that the to-do items are interspersed between journal entries. This feels like it gives me more context around what happened on a given day, or around a specific task.

The weekly journal also serves as a store for those useful snippets I find, like "command to access an AWS EC2 via session manager with automatic bash execution".

Would you be willing to share your config for this setup?

Absolutely!

This gist is a barebones init.el that just loads org-mode and org-journal via straight.el: https://gist.github.com/aclarknexient/87518aee8a0fbc9c905072...

For those with existing Emacs init setups, lines 31 through 45 have the relevant settings.

Thanks a lot!

Obsidian has been very successful gaining "vocal" users who recommend and share their use of the software at "every opportunity. I'm not sure how they did it, but it must be incredibly valuable

I use Obsidian without necessarily being a vocal advocate of it but if asked I would certainly recommend it.

It’s a nice piece of software not because it’s exceptional in a very noticeable fashion but because it gets out of your way. It’s a markdown note taking app using text files in a folder of your choosing, supporting internal links, tags, and flexible metadata when you need them, with a fairly light UI, good plugins support and ecosystem, and which works on mobile and desktop.

Did it fundamentally change the way I work? Of course no, it’s a note taking app. But it does what I need so I’m happy.

Exactly.

I used to wonder why Obsidian had all that hype if it just seemed like yet another note-taking app. I was happy with Joplin and when I asked, no one could point to something concrete that I would need and that was possible in Obsidian and not in Joplin.

But at some point I tried it out of curiosity, and I became hooked.

Does it do anything I wouldn't be able to do in Joplin? For my usage, no (disclaimer: I don't use fancy plugins. I don't even ever look at the graph view, or make any diagrams or things like that). But it's just very good software, neatly executed. Boots up faster than 90% of programs I use, the UI has zero noticeable lag, it's simple and intuitive and has everything I need. I also like the fact that it stores Markdown in plain files without a database (contrary to e.g. Joplin) and that even though I use very few and basic plugins, if I have some complex need in the future, there will surely be one that covers it.

In an era where almost all software feels too bloated, it's a breath of fresh air. Honestly, just not having visible UI lag is something that can easily make me switch from one product to another on its own. It's so rare nowadays in any software more complex than Notepad or Calculator. Add the rest of things I mentioned, and it's a no-brainer.

For me I'm not particularly vocal, but I like Obsidian because the files are just regular markdown files in the filesystem, so can just edit them using vim, port them out etc. I like it way more than other notetaking systems for that reason.

And the authors embrace that idea so it's very happy if you make edits to the underlying files - it doesn't conflict or anything it smoothly reloads to reflect the new state and always feels snappy and easy to use.

I use notion at work and it's ok but for one it's dog slow and secondly they've put too much fancypants autocomplete stuff into it meaning it's actually quite annoying when you're just trying to type a note and it's popping up dropdowns and stuff all the time.

ymmv of course, different people like different things.

I would say notion has leaned more into the collaboration thing whereas obsidian has really tried to make a great note taking tool for individual use.

I’ll share why as a happy user:

- it’s clean

- it’s flexible and customizable

- it’s performant

- it has a robust ecosystem of useful open plugins

- it has a useful mental model

- you’re not tied to the vendor, it’s just markdown

In short, it’s just well made useful software. Nerds like that.

Luckily Open Source Projects such as Linux, Vim, or Emacs don't suffer from similar issues.

Most of their evangelists came from cloud-only tools like Roam Research and Notion that could be sluggish at times. Obsidian being free, fast flat file-based and local-first solved a bunch of problems at once.

The winner in the “software with passionate users” has to be emacs.

Not only am I vocal about using Obsidian but I also use Arch btw. I'm not vegan tho, but I'm working on it.

> “I'm not sure how they did it”

Perhaps by creating a great app?

Yes, perhaps, but I think the timing (the hype around Roam Research), their profile (local, privacy, no lock-in) and getting a specific user group early were important factors as well

I think it is just that Obsidian has a nerd vibe. Like Obsidian is to Notion what Neovim is to VSCode. It isn’t immediately obvious why it is better, but one of them is more l33t hax0r.

I used Obsidian for 2 years. But I ditched it because it was local only. And it’s sync capabilities (without storage) cost more than an entire office site + cloud storage subscription package. Ridiculou that they expect 8 Euro per month just to sync (not even store) my data.

I now use UpNote. Which has cloud sync, works cross platform and has a one time purchase option that is less than 50 bucks

You can sync Obsidian with whatever solution you want to. It’s just flat text files on your filesystem. I store my notes in OneCloud and it syncs fine. Heck, there is even a free plugin to sync your notes using Git.

The subscription is a convenience but in no way required.

Yeah, hearing the complaints about Sync is just confusing. I didn't have the money to pay for yet another subscription but i wanted to have the same notes on my phone as my computer, and have some backup somewhere. I just googled it and within 30 minutes i have a completely free git syncing plugin working on my laptop and phone installations with a private repository that backs up and holds the complete history.

It was very easy and immediately discoverable. Some day when my savings account starts going up again I'll pay for sync but it was trivial to get "Obsidian Git" plugin working in the meantime

But is there a way to do that with my iPhone and windows pc that doesn’t take <1-2 hours ?

You can use git to backup Obsidian for free, it works on every device, even iOS.

And that's where Obsidian is "obviously better" than notion, it has plugins that anyone can develop.

Another reason why it's better, which is also why it can be so easily backed-up to git, is that it uses simple markdown files with 1 file = 1 note. If Obsidian stops working one day for.. reasons? You still have all your notes and can use any markdown editor to use them.

> It isn’t immediately obvious why it is better

It's pretty obvious. It's an open format with local files and has plugins. It sucks all over the place, but it has a solid enough foundation for people to tinker it to death. Something they can't really do with most other tools in that space.

I think you'd want notes to last a long time, I personally am skeptical to Notion for this reason.

But I also found obsidian to be a bit brittle (especially if you don't pay for sync).

I've just reverted back to a note book for my journal and then files in ~/notes that I grep.

I hear what you're saying - though I've had good luck (i.e. haven't had to give it a thought in two years) with Syncthing pumping my vaults (and all business files for that matter) to phone, laptop, and backup nas.

I find these types of articles (and perhaps especially in the obsidian/2nd brain space) a bit funny.

It reads almost like they are trying to convince themselves how great their "new" workflow is. Which ofc they will completely change again in a few weeks.

It's akin to the guy focusing on the perfect VIM keybindings for super fast output, who then never really ends up writing much actual code.

I tried multiple times to use or create such workflow but it never sticks. I realized the only thing I need is to write things down and link notes when possible. No structure, no tags, no processes. It works well. The only missing thing for me is good local llm integration to ask questions agains notes.

Not an exact analogy but it reminds me of getting new notebooks and pens for Christmas, and writing "This is my new pen" in the book because I couldn't think of anything else. Inevitably the book stayed blank apart from that one sentence.

I love Obsidian. As I have 15-20k notes, Sync with iCloud is a pain. So I started using Obsidian sync. I pay gladly. Also for supporting the team. Yet even with that solution Obsidian takes up to 7 seconds to open on my iPhone. That’s way to slow. So when I try to lookup something or jot down something the startup time reduces my creative juices.

So I subscribed to Drafts to quickly create notes in Obsidian. As I switched to Obsidian sync, the file created by Drafts app in iCloud won’t be visible in Obsidian immediately as it needs to sync to the server and back.

After all these hiccups I started using Notion again. Yes, I have all my notes from past 20+ years in Obsidian, but I do my project work and quick journaling in Notion now. It immediately opens. I can also use databases. And I am in the process of creating a Python script that auto exports my Notion notes to my Obsidian vault.

Notion is really excellent for managing projects, and quickly looking up infos on the go. Perfect companion.

Edit: Corrected startup time of Obsidian with native sync.

I hear the latest iOS version might solve this, with the ability to keep folders downloaded. We'll have to see.

I set up a solution with iOS and a-shell and otherwise maintain my notes in Git with automation. This seems to get around the limitations that are encountered with large amounts of files. Since it’s just Git commands under the hood all the optimizations of syncing large amounts of files are included.

There are various guides on how to do this online. As a bonus: this method is completely free and uses no proprietary technologies

Since you mentioned iCloud and settled on Notion why not just use Apple Notes? I've tried all these other solutions, and always end up back on Notes.

Notion has an API. I create database entries with a Python script, export notes with another. I had a hard time exporting a couple of hundred Apple Notes entries some time ago.

Love to see Shida & Erica achieve such a runaway success. I remember alpha testing it during covid and thinking this is really clever and visionary. Their previous product Dynalist didn't take off, but I still use it, along with a devoted niche of folks. They still maintain it, despite Obsidian being the money maker. Dynalist is a workflowy-style infinite nested list that loads entirely into RAM, so all your whole list can filter and move around with zero perceivable latency (if your computer can handle the size). Its really good for storywriting or to do lists or other highly manipulated text. It's up to you to nest the hierarchal structure of it all. Obsidian is more notion/wikipedia style so it's good for tons of notes you don't look at often, but want linked together in a big non-heirachal graph. It doesn't vibe with me personally, feels like hoarding to have that many inevitably-neglected notes, but I get why folks like it.

I never understood why they haven't added the awesome from Workflowy^WDynalist to (the presumably much more financially lucrative) Obsidian.

I liked Workflowy^WDynalist, but (just like Notion and the lesser Notionesques) I didn't like my data being in some weird ass place I couldn't control. For some data it's OK, but...

The open-standards awesome of Obsidian is a huge benefit. But sync, while it works great once set up, costs like 5-10 minutes per machine. Which, compared to just being "on the web" is a huge cost. Potentially hours.

They obviously have the tech to make "on the web" an optional property of your Obsidian vaults... the only thing I can think is that they just don't have the manpower to do it with their lean team.

Which I can respect, but at the same time, as a (paying) user I am unsatisfied, and it seems like a glaring weakness to leave out there. A competitor with half the features, but with that one, seems like the biggest threat to Obsidian to me (even though I don't know of one yet).

EDIT: Oops, yes, I meant Dynalist (updated). I used Workflowy, too, and found them both good but both had that same flaw I couldn't accept for my important data.

I still use Workflowy. Never wanted anything else. I know a lot of people keep migrating tools. I wonder how much increase in productivity they actually get.

Migrating writing to a new organization is a great way to think about what you've written. It's field and personality specific whether that kind of reviewing and reshaping is helpful.

Yeah Workflowy is still popular. Dynalist was created because Jesse Patel was taking years to add any basic feature to Workflowy at the time. They didn't even have hyperlinks (you had to paste links in the note field as URLs) Dynalist added hyperlinks and API access and CSS themes and all sorts of features. Workflowy has slowly been catching up, but isn't quite there. Still no API, so my scripts can't send notes straight to nodes via mac spotlight for example. And lots of little nuances that have grown on me. But Workflowy has added some unique features like mirror nodes that Dynalist never had. I like both. If I wasn't used to years of Dynalist at this point, I'd definitely be on Workflowy.

I find all these systems, things like notion, obsidian etc intreasting but ultimately just hugely overwhelming when I come to use them, like I'm storing a lot of thoughts and ideas, but when I read through them, they sound nice to read, but pretty useless in real life as my brain just short circuits very quickly reading through it all.

I also had this problem and one thing I found useful was to create a distinction between reflecting on something and referencing it. Writing things down helps me think, but it doesn't mean a note will be worth reading. What I began doing is creating a short summary for every note. That way, I only ever reference the summary. Reflections are for thinking, summaries are for referencing.

I understand the appeal of a product like Obsidian. but... I want something robust, performant, trusted, open-source, and as close to my tasks/priorities as possible.

So I use something cross-platform, open-source, tested internationally every day for bugs and security, battle-hardened in production around the world, and used by leaders in the software industry.

I use git.

Obsidian is essentially just a nice, feature rich Markdown editor.

You can sync your Markdown files between machines using their sync feature, or you could use Git.

Good luck syncing notes on mobile with Git

…on iOS you can use the “Working Copy” app to sync Obsidian with Git:

https://meganesulli.com/blog/sync-obsidian-vault-iphone-ipad...

I sync Obsidian notes with Git on my Android phone and I don't see any problem. You can do it the tedious way using Termux[1] or easy way through obsidian-git[2].

[1]: https://github.com/termux/termux-app

[2]: https://github.com/Vinzent03/obsidian-git

there is also the open source MGit available in FDroid. it can work with arbitrary directories, so it is compatible with termux.

I use Obsidian as a journal but I have year-long notes. Each day is a H2 heading and each task/note is an H3 heading, with structured tags for each task/note in the same line. This way I can quickly scroll through my recent notes. Splitting them into years (7 of them already) keeps the size somewhat contained - I would happily have 1 large file if Obsidian and all the plugins I use was more efficient about scrolling through it.

To quickly navigate them I have the plugin Quiet Outline open on the right tab. To focus me I also have a single very short file called Current Priority Work open in a top left tab in Reading View with links to the currently important H3 headings.

New tasks automatically get a "#todo" tag. Currently worked-on tasks get a "#doing" tag. I also use priorities ("#priority/low") and search as such `line:(#priority/high #todo)`.

I also use more tags such as "#client/XYZ", "#systems/ABC". They help a lot to find related notes on various topics.

I used to have a separate file called "doing" that used DataviewJS to create links of all the "#doing"-tagged H3 lines but "Current Priority Work" is better for me.

The problem with digital note-taking apps like Obsidian is that after a while, your knowledge turns into PISS - Personal Information Storage System.

While storing your notes in digital format might be appealing, it doesn't get neuro-imprinted into your brain as if you write your notes by hand or into A6 physical cards.

Paradoxically, digital note-taking makes reviewing notes and memory recall even more complex. The fancy digital search doesn't help. The fact that each file can take an unlimited number of characters means you've got to consciously limit yourself and not turn your notes into a Second Wikipedia.

I'm using A6 cards to hand-write my notes and store them in my shoe box, Zettelkasten.

I still use Obsidian for meeting notes and other notes, but I keep my Zettelkasten on paper, like you. A6 slips in a box. It's harder to maintain, but that makes me more conscious of what I'm doing.

I don’t have preference to pay for a note-taking app, since there are way too many. Icloud sync did bad job as its sync solution, you never want to wait for 10mins for sync every time. Remotely save doesn’t work when you got long file names, i still got empty folders from my last tries per this plugin linking to onedrvie, google drive and webdav.

If i have to pay ob sync to get a complete solution, then ob may not be an option, ob is great, but it still causing cognitive overwhelming after years and thousands of files.

I love “day one” for note taking. And ob maybe just for PKM.

Few notes:

- the author essentially discovered a limited version of org-capture templates, being limited by the platform itself;

- what happen when, not if, Obsidian development stop?

The above are not critics but suggestions by someone who have tried many notes solutions having felt the power of taking notes, and have finally choosing Emacs because notes tend to be personal, so not really useful to share, and tend to last for a human lifetime, so they must be with a platform that likely exists even 50+ years in the future. Having notes as mere text do help but it's not enough because while you can still read your notes without the tool you normally use you are way too limited to properly operate and there is no guarantee other tools using the same markup can simply read the same note base issueless. A simple example: Zim and Dokuwiki share the same markup, as a base, but if you use some plugins many part of your notes will not work. Typically some very central parts like TODOs management. Finally there is the integration issue: Emacs is an ecosystem so I can integrate anything in my notes, a mail-search query like an "inbox note" with a link to my unread mails, some tasks to be done today, some other "code-to-be-executed-on-click links" etc. It's all easy due to a shared platform made to end-user programming. Modern software do not have anything like that. Try Zotero to integrate references in notes. No matter the tool you use to take notes outside Zotero, the integration will be damn limited. In org-mode I lost the Zotero plugin for quick import but anything is integrated, I can do anything and I have a third party integration and app "availability in 50+ years risk" less.

It's not about Emacs but about a classic Desktop paradigm, the OS as a single application, user programmable, full exposed and changeable easily at runtime vs a set of individual component semi-isolated, with very limited IPCs in the middle. The former it's hard to craft and might be fragile but is extremely powerful, the letter have to many destructive events and it's terribly limited to use.

Relevant:

https://writings.stephenwolfram.com/2019/02/seeking-the-prod...

https://publish.obsidian.md/history-notes/01+Notetaking+for+...

https://every.to/superorganizers/how-to-make-yourself-into-a...

After years of tool usage I came to the conclusion that the one note taking app does and won’t exist.

Requirements are different and change over time.

Obsidian is overkill for me. I have a lot of respect for it nevertheless.

Word with a space to organize documents like in the PowerPoint rearrangement pane, hashes and a graph view would be sufficient for me at the moment.

Obsidian seems to be too much markdown for me, it does feel more like a code editor to me than a writing tool.

My only nitpick with Obsidian (on desktop) which is actually a bug in Electron: the color picker gives "NAN" for red. Mainly an issue when creating large Canvas' and trying to select colors based on other media placed on the canvas/cards. Other than that, very solid and appreciate the fact that we can enable dev tools at any time to debug/hack plugins.

So do you mainly use this on your laptop?

I was curious if you incorporate the mobile version too, I try to with git based syncing between the two.

Is git-based syncing something that's built into Obsidian? I'd imagine it's awkward setting up git management on a smartphone outside of Obsidian?

There is a git sync community plugin and it works well on phones.

Is it the plugin « Obsidian Git »?

https://github.com/Vinzent03/obsidian-git

Yup! Thats the one - works great.

I use Working Copy on my iphone to push / pull from my git repo

Same on laptop

Obsidian vault is just the directory where the git repo is

I have a feeling that even the inventor of obsidian, who preferred and demonstrated simplicity with his system, will be surprised in these kinds of articles. yeah; it is up to the author to use as they wish as long as it serves them.

Reminder to everyone that Roam Research is still in business, still great, getting updates, and most importantly worth the subscription cost. While I don't use it anymore, it has served me extremely well.

I am once again asking if there is a way to freely and easily integrate my desktop and mobile note-taking with obsidian.

Currently doing onenote on my Pc and apple notes on my phone. It’s not ideal.

Pay for the sync feature, it works seamlessly.

What's your note naming convention? I still haven't settled on one for my own zk system

Not op, but what got me to name (fleeting) notes quickly is to name one main category/author, one subcategory (both limited to a single word) and just the date (year only for citations). Inspired by bibtex keys:

  Dist(24.07.29)Gaussian.md
  Dist(24.07.30)Poisson.md

  Transform(23_06_23)BoxMul.md
  Transform(23_06_24)Ranked.md

  Wilkinson(2012)Grammar.md
  Firth(1957)Words.md

Depending on your sorting preference, put the date first, second or last (I prefer sorting by main category, then date of entry, then subcategory). I use decimals instead of underscores but to each their own.

Sadly plugins don't seem to work on the mobile app.

Anecdotal, but every single plugin I've ever used works perfectly on android

Most plugins do afaik. I am using plenty!

I started experimenting yesterday and I was delighted that the templater strings I set up at my computer were functioning on my phone. I’m excited about it because the lack of good system wide text expansion on the phone has been frustrating for me, and it looks like using obsidian will be a way to define pretty complex templates and be able to create and edit notes on my phone using them.

Is it only me feel the Obsidian overcomplicated for the notes? I just prefer flat Notes directory and create .md files, which i can sync everywhere i want.

To be honest Obsidian is so good, but i like simple solutions.

> flat Notes directory and create .md files

This is exactly what Obsidian provides out of the box. All the other stuff like backlinks, tags, Mermaid diagrams, canvas whiteboards and knowledge graph etc are completely optional.

I use Obsidian as a CMS for my website for example. The filetree shows me a list of Markdown files, I add YAML as needed for things like title, date, etc, and that's it.

More important is the note reading flow. You write millions of words and for what?

I'm not convinced that note taking in this much detail is worth it. I have coworkers that do it and they can't recall information any better than the people who take no notes

I think some notes are better than others, especially in a job with many context switches. If you need it to get into context: worth writing down. If you are writing just to get "completeness" it's basically pointless. Your brain is pretty good at remembering stuff

Your brain is good at remembering stuff the same way your legs are good at lifting stuff -- a well designed system that can't in any way compare to a purpose-built machine. My brain can barely remember that I have even taken notes about many topics, much less the topics themselves.

People learn to take notes in school as a way to summarize things so they can reread to memorize them. This is largely useless over time periods greater than a semester, because of the limits of memory and the time burden of rereading. Notes that give you an accumulating knowledge advantage over a lifetime have to be taken with a mindset of "when I need this information, how am I going to find out I knew it?" Keywords taking you to an outline view that reminds you of related topics, or Obsidian's linking system.

> Your brain is pretty good at remembering stuff

Provided you are under 35 years old, have no cognitive issues, and have a maximum of 1 or 2 domains of knowledge to manage. Not everyone's brain works the same way.

The way I see it, one of the reasons is to "keep your cache empty", so to speak.

You find something potentially interesting and you don't leave a tab open for later, you don't try to remember it in case you'll need to recall it a week later, you have a reliable procedure dumping this information into cold storage, removing the mental burden from yourself. Retrieval of information from that storage and the efficiency of doing that is a separate question.

You don't write notes for memory recall, if you wanted recall you use something like Anki. You don't want your brain remembering everything so you write it down so you know where you can get it later if needed. I don't remember all there is to know about React because documentation is there when I need it. And your brain is really good at misremembering and fabricating information so taking notes at work makes sure your timeline of events is correct.

I agree. There are two topics for note taking where I found the process really worth it. They are research and important personal topics. The latter mostly consists of health information, bills, a budget and a list of books I read and want to read.

To search through and get the information when you need later, or to start with rough headings and start filling it in over the project. Works well imo.

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