691 karma · joined June 25, 2011
Not immediately obvious, but nice to know: the *.boards file format is simply a .zip file. It contains all resources/images and an HTML file with the contents of the board so that you can access your data even without the app (I'm strong on data accessibility after getting locked out of binary data formats once too many).
Notes can have tags and attributes so you could have attributes per note like: topic=rocketscience, semester=fall2020. Later you could say: "sort all my notes by semester and then group by topic" or if you change your mind, set up a second view for "all notes grouped by topic then by semester".
If you're interested, feel free to contact me through the site (kitestack.com/lnotes). I'd love to learn more about how you currently organize your notes.
Rather than using solely a time based ID like "202006110955", I'm adding the date to the file name. Links then show the file name instead of the id (e.g 2020-10-29 lessons learned.html → [[lessons learned]]).
Also working on ways to surface information from the Zettelkasten like a spreadsheet view and generated one-page summaries.
Quick demo here: https://youtu.be/hf2s8fZsojY
You can customize the intervals yourself per deck to adjust for the subject (e.g. vocabulary cards with only one word per card probably can have longer intervals than, let's say, an anatomy card with details about a muscle, bone or nerve).
I strive to keep the app as easy to use as possible.
Why I went for HTML is the ability to embed images (via data URI). This allows for a note to be a single, standalone file that can easily be shared or moved around without losing track of its images.
Even if you want to open a note in 20 years from now you can do so with a browser (assuming HTML will still be around then). You'll get a fully formatted document. For Markdown you can always use a text editor, but to get formatting and images to show, you'll need a Markdown compatible app.
UPDATE: I gave Zim a try and noticed another difference, file format aside: the app I'm working on will show all files in your folder structure, including PDFs, etc. It renders a preview with QuickLook and allows to open the document with its default app.
This comes in very handy when you want to mix & match notes and other documents. For example, let's say you have a hotel reservation as PDF, you could attach a note with driving directions all in the app.
My goal is to build an app to capture personal knowledge over a lifetime. Hence data longevity is key.
I’m looking forward to your thoughts, especially for my choice of using HTML instead of Markdown as file format. I debated this for a while.
HTML has the advantage that can be previewed in any browser with formatting and images intact. Markdown would require a compatible app (text editor aside, which won’t show images). Also, HTML documents can easily be shared as single file, even if they contain embedded images.
What do you think?
The app I'm working is more focused on capturing knowledge as structured notes. It sounds like a good full text search could already be of help in your case. That maybe combined with slowly categorizing your content with a system like Johhny.Decimal or something similar.
I'm curious about your folder hierarchy. What kind of files do you keep there to get to tens of gigabytes and what type of knowledge would you like to extract/what type of connections to form?
I'm currently at about 100 MB for roughly 1,400 individual notes (text and images).
The idea is that the app "understands" the structure of the content. A bit like a combination of a notebook, Xcode, a calendar, and Wolfram Alpha :)
Bi-directional links and timestamps are working already so implementing a "Zettelkasten" should be possible with the current version.
If you're interested, there's a signup for the beta here:
A suggestion: adding decimal separators to numbers in the "Cases through time" chart for better readability.
I'd even recommend to not worry so much about timing your workouts as this causes too much stress, just focus on the exercises themselves in the beginning to make sure you do them properly.
Is it a random number or another image or something else?
Let's say you wanted to re-render the exact same image given the same state of your pre-trained model, what information would you use here?
A home-cooked app can have hard coded values (oh yeah!), doesn't have to be pretty (although it's more fun), doesn't have to support all platforms (no, I won't add Apple Watch support!), it just has to work for me.
My latest project: a little iOS app that I can use at a bookstore to scan the book's barcode and then checks if that book is available at my local public library.
When I showed that to my SO she was amazed and said: "And you just made THAT?". Well, yes. My secret superpower is that I can make these little computers that we all keep in our pockets these days make anything I want them to.
A few other projects that I made for myself over the years:
- App that generates PDF invoices from my App Store financial reports (I simply paste in the plain text from the website)
- A break timer app (old one was 32bit-only, I didn't bother to download a new one)
- Text snippet app: it scans an email for the senders name and pre-populates possible answers. I turned this into a tiny CRM that keeps track of feature requests and whom I sent an update. This is actually in the App Store, but was a huge commercial failure, but I use this myself e v e r y day.
- Quick click: it's like a command line for my Mac. I type something I see on the screen (e.g. the title of a button), the app highlights possible matches, I press Return and the app sends a simulated mouse click. I can also use this as a window manager to resize the active app, because, why not?
For personal use:
- Portfolio simulator app that calculates every possible IRR for a given number of years (once I was done I discovered portfoliocharts.com, well...)
- Portfolio tracker app to track my retirement savings: this is like a tiny spreadsheet app only that it's fed by 3 csv files (orders.csv, transactions.csv, asses prices.csv). "editing" is done in VIM. The app generates various reports that I use to check if I'm on track with my savings.
- Simple stock checker app (fetches the prices of a, yes, hard-coded list of ticker symbols).
- App to categorize my spendings. Input is a csv file (I like plain text). I wanted to learn now Naive Bayes filtering works and have to say, seeing the app do its thing is as close to magic as I ever got.
- Time lapse screen recorder: creates a screenshot every x seconds. I used this once to record a video of how I'm developing an app.
- Custom implementation of Unshaky (with more stats and settings) to fix the double-space keypress issue of my new MacBook Air
- Alarm clock app that uses the accelerometer to wake me when I'm not in a deep sleep phase.
And a few more that I don't use anymore...
The simplicity and longevity is very appealing, but how do you handle images in your note taking? Any recommendations on tools and workflows in that regard?
This. A follow-up suggestion: try to truly understand the motivation and concerns behind the other person's arguments.
Useful tools are asking "Why?" multiple times to dig deeper. If the conversation seems to dead-end in a broad claim, ask "Can you give me a specific example of …? to continue your quest.
This is especially useful (and interesting!) when talking about politics.
Please keep in mind it is a version 1, so here is what is already working:
- Creating boards, lists, and list items
- Adding a link, cover image, notes to an item
- Share extension to add a web page to a board
Here is what is conceptually different compared to Trello (aside from the features that Boards doesn't have):
- Lists wrap. This lets you have multiple "rows" of lists, see the Journal or yearly planner templates for an example.
- You can have multiple kinds of entries (heading, list item, card, note), not only cards.
For example, there's a "heading" entry type that lets you create sections within a list, like the "Waiting for" section in the demo video.
- Basic Apple Mail integration. You can drag in a message from Apple Mail to attach it as a link to an existing item or to create a new item. I personally use this to keep track of feature requests. I have a request card and drag & drop mail messages onto it, which appends them to the notes field. Once I implement a feature, I know who to send an update to.
I don't want to (and can't) compete with any of the large online-based task board/Trello-like services. Instead I see this as an alternative when you need something "quick & easy" that you can fire up, note down some ideas, and you're done (TextEdit vs. Pages), no matter if you're online or not.
Not only is this a lot of fun, it will also train your reflexes. It's like having a hidden superpower. The next time you are about to drop something, you'll be amazed how quickly you'll be able to reach and catch (don't try this with sharp objects, obviously).
Lots of resources available on how to start. Here's one: https://youtu.be/x2_j6kMg1co
That's why I'm designing any new apps around a file format that can be accessed even without the app.
I have a "local-first" Kanban/Trello-style app, "Boards" (http://kitestack.com/boards/), that uses zipped HTML files (to support rich text with images). No collaboration and cross-device support just yet, but it works without a network and saves everything locally.
Everything is saved locally on your Mac. You have full control over your data. No servers involved.
I'm somewhat of a control-freak when it comes to app data. For personal projects and data, I want an app that works offline and I want to know where my data is kept (preferably on the device).
Ideally I can even access my data in 10 - 20 years down the road, when the app doesn't exist anymore.
That's why each board is saved as single file on your Mac. You can see these files in Finder and even open them with a browser (they are just zipped HTML files).