Hi Graham, Graham Smith <[email protected]> writes:
> I would be interested in any insights into how people use orgmode for > information management eg. gathering information for scientific paper. Org-mode is very well suited to this purpose. I like to think of org-mode as an outliner with the functionality of a database. Each outline heading/subheading is a node to which all sorts of metadata can be attached. Thus, notes can be as free-form or as structured as the project requires. The structure can emerge as the project progresses. When beginning a research project, I dump a lot of material into a new org file, making heavy use of org-remember and org-protocol. I tag items as they come in, so I know that I'll be able to find them easily later. I also create links to relevant files (pdfs, images, etc.). And any time I need to follow up on something, I create a todo. Indeed, todo state changes are immensely helpful for keeping track of what I've done so far. My citations are located in a bibtex database; org-mode is able to create links to individual items via org-store-link or org-remember. I make sure to add a link to every outline heading, whether it be to a website, a bibtex item, a file, or to some other node in the outline (via <<internal-links>> or ID properties). The beauty of org-mode is that I can organize my outline only when the need arises. Thanks to tags, searches, and sparse trees, I can easily find individual notes. And thanks to hyperlinks I can travel quickly to the source of the information. Anytime I need a more structured database, I create one within the outline by using properties and column views. Let's say I need to keep track of sources I've looked at an archive. I can easily create a mini-database for the archive. --8<---------------cut here---------------start------------->8--- * Some Archive :PROPERTIES: :COLUMNS: %25ITEM %10TIMESTAMP_IA %17collection %6doc-number %18author %25title %10origdate %TAGS :END: ** An old letter :industrialization:letters: :PROPERTIES: :collection: Personal Letters :doc-number: 768b :author: Michael Smithson :origdate: 1868 :title: Letter to brother :END: Some notes about the letter here... [2009-06-23 Tue 09:37] --8<---------------cut here---------------end--------------->8--- So an individual org outline can contain numerous custom databases! The possibilities are endless. And, of course, at any point I can export any part of the outline to pdf, html, ascii, etc. Hope this helps. - Matt _______________________________________________ Emacs-orgmode mailing list Remember: use `Reply All' to send replies to the list. [email protected] http://lists.gnu.org/mailman/listinfo/emacs-orgmode
