Re: [Orgmode] My reference data management approach with org and emacs
On Wed, Apr 14, 2010 at 10:29 PM, Jan Böcker jan.boec...@jboecker.dewrote: I have published a more detailed description of my setup, including the source code, here: http://www.jboecker.de/2010/04/14/general-reference-filing-with-org-mode.html Wow, this is a very nice setup, and a good way to see how org-attachments can be used in practice. Maybe a link to worg/tutorials would be ok? bye! alex ___ Emacs-orgmode mailing list Please use `Reply All' to send replies to the list. Emacs-orgmode@gnu.org http://lists.gnu.org/mailman/listinfo/emacs-orgmode
Re: [Orgmode] My reference data management approach with org and emacs
On Apr 15, 2010, at 12:09 PM, Alexander Poslavsky wrote: On Wed, Apr 14, 2010 at 10:29 PM, Jan Böcker jan.boec...@jboecker.de wrote: I have published a more detailed description of my setup, including the source code, here: http://www.jboecker.de/2010/04/14/general-reference-filing-with-org-mode.html Wow, this is a very nice setup, and a good way to see how org- attachments can be used in practice. Maybe a link to worg/tutorials would be ok? Definitely. Can please someone make that link? - Carsten bye! alex ___ Emacs-orgmode mailing list Please use `Reply All' to send replies to the list. Emacs-orgmode@gnu.org http://lists.gnu.org/mailman/listinfo/emacs-orgmode - Carsten ___ Emacs-orgmode mailing list Please use `Reply All' to send replies to the list. Emacs-orgmode@gnu.org http://lists.gnu.org/mailman/listinfo/emacs-orgmode
Re: [Orgmode] My reference data management approach with org and emacs
I have published a more detailed description of my setup, including the source code, here: http://www.jboecker.de/2010/04/14/general-reference-filing-with-org-mode.html Thanks to Claus and Marcelo for the (off-list) nudge to do this. (It's getting late, so I finally stopped fiddling with the layout and changing phrases.) - Jan ___ Emacs-orgmode mailing list Please use `Reply All' to send replies to the list. Emacs-orgmode@gnu.org http://lists.gnu.org/mailman/listinfo/emacs-orgmode
Re: [Orgmode] My reference data management approach with org and emacs
[sorry for the dupe, forgot to cc the list on first shot] Jan, thanks for sharing your setup, which got me intrigued. Is there a place where a interested person can take a look at your (org-) configuration-files, esp. the two template-sources you mentioned? Thanks, Claus On Sat, Apr 10, 2010 at 1:31 AM, Jan Böcker jan.boec...@jboecker.de wrote: [The following text has gotten quite long. Sit comfortably and get a cup of your preferred drink if you want to proceed.] That is an interesting setup you describe there. I had considered something similar myself, but found it a hassle to come up with a file name for every new piece of information (although unix does allow everything except / in a file name, I want my file names to be lower case, short and without spaces where feasible). To paraphrase what you said, putting things into files just makes you loose time thinking about file names (which I also consider structure). In the end, I settled upon one big org file (reference.org). Each piece of reference information is in its own top-level node. When I want to find something there, I use isearch and/or search for a specific tag (in virtually every case, a simple isearch for one or two words is sufficient). This is way faster than navigating the file system! I also share your dislike of categories (which a strictly hierarchical file system would force me to use). I have two remember templates to add an entry to reference.org. The first template asks me for tags (%^g) and a title for the headline. After filing it (at the top of reference.org) with C-c C-c, Org jumps to the location it was just filed (% in the template), in case I want to use C-c C-c again to readjust the tags. I use this first template to keep data that can be expressed in plain text (including all the powerful tools Org gives me to work with plain text, such as outlines, links and tables). The second template is a little more complex; it calls a custom elisp function to do all the work. When I call this second template, I am asked for the following: - a title for the headline - a date (I mostly use this template to file scanned letters, invoices and the like, so it helps to be able to change the date from the default of today.) - a folder name (defaulting to -MM-DD.S, i.e. the previously specified date followed by a sequence number to make the folder name unique). Normally, I do not customize the folder name, because I only need to find the reference data via Org and do not need to navigate to it using e.g. the open dialog of any other program (and I do not want to change it in the future, which might make a folder name containing a date obsolete). - where the original went (defaults to Trash). This is stored as an attribute in the outline node. A new subfolder with the specified folder name is created in ~/org/data/ and set up as this node's attachment directory. The ID of the node is set to data-folder name, so I can link conveniently to this entry from project notes. The custom elisp function also installs a hook that automatically calls org-attach-attach-mv if I try to file the template without having added any attachment, so I do not forget this. I use this second template when I have to attach a file to the entry, because it cannot be represented in Org. This mostly applies to scanned paper of any sort (letters, invoices, etc). I have a shell script which I use to scan directly to PDF files (I do not use OCR, the PDF just serves as a container for possibly multiple scanned pages, so that browsing and printing the whole document is convenient). If it was an important document where I might need the original in the future, I specify Filed when asked where the original went, write the folder name/ID number in the top right corner of the document with a pencil (in case of very important documents or certificates I use a post-it note), and file it on top of a normal paper file folder. When keeping the original, I do not change the folder name from its default. Should I have to dig out the original for any reason, I can manually execute a binary search on my chronologically sorted file folder(s). I have been using this system for a few weeks now, and it has worked great so far. Its main design goal was not simplicity of implementation, but simplicity of use: it has to be so simple (and require as few decisions as possible) to file something that I actually do it instead of postponing it. The system actually evolved along with the aforementioned shell script for scanning while I was scanning and filing about 20 exercise sheets (about four to twelve pages each) from the last semester to access them conveniently when preparing for the exams. I also noticed a while ago that very long org files become less intimidating once you learn to love C-x n s (org-narrow-to-subtree), which helped with my decision for one big file over many small ones. One
[Orgmode] My reference data management approach with org and emacs
Amazing stuff, Jan. From what I could understand, it aims on being a no-brainer reference system, and indeed, my aim is capturing quickly *but* with enough information and structure to be able to find it later. What I find happening to me time after time, is that even though I do have a quick way to capture, I end up not using the information later, because it is hard to find. The reason? I have two reference baskets: * The wiki files (under wiki/) -- I press S-w and can type the name of a file and start typing. * My GTDReference.org file. C-c C-r r, title and boby, C-c C-c to capture. (And the GTD Inbox, but that's not reference, only data that I want to process later). The problem, I think, is that I end up with a bunch of files under wiki/ and a bunch of notes in GTDReference.org. A rgrep search is often enough to find what I want, but it is definetly not as clean, straightfoward and simple as your system's implementation. In an effort to make the wiki stuff more organic, I have setup howm-mode to work with org, and while it works great to link files, it just added more complexity. I think I will just get rid of it. Could you share the custom elisp function and the scan shell script? Also, how does all of this fit on your overall PIM architecture? There's more to it? If so, then I'm ready to get another cup of coffee :) Thank you very much for sharing all these gems. Marcelo. On Fri, Apr 9, 2010 at 6:31 PM, Jan Böcker jan.boec...@jboecker.de wrote: [The following text has gotten quite long. Sit comfortably and get a cup of your preferred drink if you want to proceed.] That is an interesting setup you describe there. I had considered something similar myself, but found it a hassle to come up with a file name for every new piece of information (although unix does allow everything except / in a file name, I want my file names to be lower case, short and without spaces where feasible). To paraphrase what you said, putting things into files just makes you loose time thinking about file names (which I also consider structure). In the end, I settled upon one big org file (reference.org). Each piece of reference information is in its own top-level node. When I want to find something there, I use isearch and/or search for a specific tag (in virtually every case, a simple isearch for one or two words is sufficient). This is way faster than navigating the file system! I also share your dislike of categories (which a strictly hierarchical file system would force me to use). I have two remember templates to add an entry to reference.org. The first template asks me for tags (%^g) and a title for the headline. After filing it (at the top of reference.org) with C-c C-c, Org jumps to the location it was just filed (% in the template), in case I want to use C-c C-c again to readjust the tags. I use this first template to keep data that can be expressed in plain text (including all the powerful tools Org gives me to work with plain text, such as outlines, links and tables). The second template is a little more complex; it calls a custom elisp function to do all the work. When I call this second template, I am asked for the following: - a title for the headline - a date (I mostly use this template to file scanned letters, invoices and the like, so it helps to be able to change the date from the default of today.) - a folder name (defaulting to -MM-DD.S, i.e. the previously specified date followed by a sequence number to make the folder name unique). Normally, I do not customize the folder name, because I only need to find the reference data via Org and do not need to navigate to it using e.g. the open dialog of any other program (and I do not want to change it in the future, which might make a folder name containing a date obsolete). - where the original went (defaults to Trash). This is stored as an attribute in the outline node. A new subfolder with the specified folder name is created in ~/org/data/ and set up as this node's attachment directory. The ID of the node is set to data-folder name, so I can link conveniently to this entry from project notes. The custom elisp function also installs a hook that automatically calls org-attach-attach-mv if I try to file the template without having added any attachment, so I do not forget this. I use this second template when I have to attach a file to the entry, because it cannot be represented in Org. This mostly applies to scanned paper of any sort (letters, invoices, etc). I have a shell script which I use to scan directly to PDF files (I do not use OCR, the PDF just serves as a container for possibly multiple scanned pages, so that browsing and printing the whole document is convenient). If it was an important document where I might need the original in the future, I specify Filed when asked where the original went, write the folder name/ID number in the top right corner of the document
Re: [Orgmode] My reference data management approach with org and emacs
[The following text has gotten quite long. Sit comfortably and get a cup of your preferred drink if you want to proceed.] That is an interesting setup you describe there. I had considered something similar myself, but found it a hassle to come up with a file name for every new piece of information (although unix does allow everything except / in a file name, I want my file names to be lower case, short and without spaces where feasible). To paraphrase what you said, putting things into files just makes you loose time thinking about file names (which I also consider structure). In the end, I settled upon one big org file (reference.org). Each piece of reference information is in its own top-level node. When I want to find something there, I use isearch and/or search for a specific tag (in virtually every case, a simple isearch for one or two words is sufficient). This is way faster than navigating the file system! I also share your dislike of categories (which a strictly hierarchical file system would force me to use). I have two remember templates to add an entry to reference.org. The first template asks me for tags (%^g) and a title for the headline. After filing it (at the top of reference.org) with C-c C-c, Org jumps to the location it was just filed (% in the template), in case I want to use C-c C-c again to readjust the tags. I use this first template to keep data that can be expressed in plain text (including all the powerful tools Org gives me to work with plain text, such as outlines, links and tables). The second template is a little more complex; it calls a custom elisp function to do all the work. When I call this second template, I am asked for the following: - a title for the headline - a date (I mostly use this template to file scanned letters, invoices and the like, so it helps to be able to change the date from the default of today.) - a folder name (defaulting to -MM-DD.S, i.e. the previously specified date followed by a sequence number to make the folder name unique). Normally, I do not customize the folder name, because I only need to find the reference data via Org and do not need to navigate to it using e.g. the open dialog of any other program (and I do not want to change it in the future, which might make a folder name containing a date obsolete). - where the original went (defaults to Trash). This is stored as an attribute in the outline node. A new subfolder with the specified folder name is created in ~/org/data/ and set up as this node's attachment directory. The ID of the node is set to data-folder name, so I can link conveniently to this entry from project notes. The custom elisp function also installs a hook that automatically calls org-attach-attach-mv if I try to file the template without having added any attachment, so I do not forget this. I use this second template when I have to attach a file to the entry, because it cannot be represented in Org. This mostly applies to scanned paper of any sort (letters, invoices, etc). I have a shell script which I use to scan directly to PDF files (I do not use OCR, the PDF just serves as a container for possibly multiple scanned pages, so that browsing and printing the whole document is convenient). If it was an important document where I might need the original in the future, I specify Filed when asked where the original went, write the folder name/ID number in the top right corner of the document with a pencil (in case of very important documents or certificates I use a post-it note), and file it on top of a normal paper file folder. When keeping the original, I do not change the folder name from its default. Should I have to dig out the original for any reason, I can manually execute a binary search on my chronologically sorted file folder(s). I have been using this system for a few weeks now, and it has worked great so far. Its main design goal was not simplicity of implementation, but simplicity of use: it has to be so simple (and require as few decisions as possible) to file something that I actually do it instead of postponing it. The system actually evolved along with the aforementioned shell script for scanning while I was scanning and filing about 20 exercise sheets (about four to twelve pages each) from the last semester to access them conveniently when preparing for the exams. I also noticed a while ago that very long org files become less intimidating once you learn to love C-x n s (org-narrow-to-subtree), which helped with my decision for one big file over many small ones. One big file also avoids cluttering the buffer list. - Jan, who really should start a blog to do more detailed write-ups of this and similar things, because they are so much fun to write. ___ Emacs-orgmode mailing list Please use `Reply All' to send replies to the list. Emacs-orgmode@gnu.org http://lists.gnu.org/mailman/listinfo/emacs-orgmode
[Orgmode] My reference data management approach with org and emacs
Hello list, I would like to share how I'm keeping my reference data. This includes articles I write, blog post drafts, braintorms and anything else that we could fit in the reference category (gtd-wide). I don't like categories too much. Actually, I find them too strict and limited. Putting things into folders just makes you loose ]time thinking about structure. I'm adept of tags, though. I love them. So, my basic idea was to have a folder (which I right now call wiki/) with a compendium of all my reference data. Whenever I need to create a new entry, I press s-r and it triggers dired with this directory as context. So, I can just type something .org and press enter to create it. Then, at the bottom, I create a * tags item. I tag it with relevant tags and save. *I don't add it to the agenda list* -- I have a custom rgrep function to seach over wiki/, which is binded to s-o. When I want to find something from my reference data, I just press s-o and type a string, and rgrep does the rest. It's pretty simple, and, as you could note, doesn't use much of org's functionalities. Using agenda would be overkill, as I have dozens of files in the directory, and it would be probably overkill for org-agenda. Anyways, just thought I'd share. It works great, is very organic, flexible and simple. The goal was to have a simple storage system which was easy to search and that wouldn't get on my way, but be easy to access/use when I needed it. As a knowledge worker, I find that it works quite well to quickly brainstorm, draft blog posts or anything else that I want to keep as reference. How do you manage reference information? It'd be nice to know :) Cheers, Marcelo. ___ Emacs-orgmode mailing list Please use `Reply All' to send replies to the list. Emacs-orgmode@gnu.org http://lists.gnu.org/mailman/listinfo/emacs-orgmode
