Knowledge Workers Drowning in Notes
344 posts across 53 communities in the last 30 days; 30% from r/ObsidianMD.
“Now that gives me a much better picture. Going through somebody’s messy process notes and finding the rule that causes all the trouble sounds like work I’d enjoy. Probably more than building the scheduling system afterward. How did they find you? Had you worked with them before…”
“Yeah 😭 . At that point I recommend to OP to explore something like Quarto. I have mentioned it before here, I forgot in what context. Quarto is for researcher and long form writing purposes. Can't expect Obsidian to be an everything tool. And the markdown format of Obsidian…”
“they were better because they came from other domains. I have over 1,000 notes. I forgot I wrote most of them, and I don’t have time to browse through them all. that’s the problem with search, tags, and links. they only work for what you remember exists. and old notes gain…”
Individuals are overwhelmed by the sheer volume of information they capture and the difficulty in retrieving it later. Existing tools often focus on organization but fail to address the core problem of quickly capturing and easily finding small, fleeting pieces of information, leading to wasted time and unutilized insights.
SOURCES (60)
“How about for people with hundreds of gigabytes of videos and images and they want to add index cards and a index cabinet to catalog them in their own private library? I'll share that because it's exactly what it could be used for. But ok.…”
“It's not a bad approach but I don't want to bulk edit a all notes for their properties... No offense [re: How do you write your Properties? Is there a proper way]”
“the rule that helped me most: edit the note that already exists, never write a new one next to it. most of my stale info came from two notes saying different things and both looking current. for the current context page, I stopped keeping it by hand. each project or plan note gets a status property (active, paused, done) and the page is just a base filtered to status: active. it can't grow past what's actually active, and closing something is one property change instead of another edit t”
“Oof. If you are going into a profession after uni, or graduate school first, you're going to want all those notes! I'd kill to have mine back. I'd suggest putting some effort into making them retrievable. You won't ever be "done" with some of those topics! (Maybe you're already doing this but I'm not sure, and throwing out my old notebooks and donating old texts was such a dumb move that every chance I get I tell my students to treat theirs like a Wiki for Life”
“Love the simplicity and the fact that it doesn't create separate files. One thing that would make it a permanent fixture in my workflow is a sharper visual distinction between structural headers and body text/paragraphs, so the map stays clean during deep writing sessions. Great work so far! [re: I made mdmap: edit your Obsidian notes as mind maps]”
“Now that gives me a much better picture. Going through somebody’s messy process notes and finding the rule that causes all the trouble sounds like work I’d enjoy. Probably more than building the scheduling system afterward. How did they find you? Had you worked with them before, or was this your first project together? I’m curious what gave them the confidence to pay you to investigate before they committed to the build. [re: Give me a problem nobody knows how to solve and you’ve probably ruined”
“Edit to add: I have found this significantly aids me in keeping track of everything that's going on. All of the world's lore, every small detail... it's not perfect, but it's far and away better than just relying on my own brain and a giant overstuffed notebook. It frequently responds with things like 'yes, but you ruled on <date> otherwise:...' or 'this idea is gold and pairs well with this module in DEVONThink here: <DT-link>'. [re: My Obsidian vault”
“Where is the productivity part? You just feed inbox with shit, then summarize it to get shit extract. It's good for reflection, but not for progress nor quality. After a month or two you will just collect all your biases - what you noticed, what you felt compelled to record, what you believed, what you wanted. And since when consistency in your recorded thoughts is proof that they are valuable? You just removed a little bit of friction... And that's all... [re: Rambling into obsidian dai”
“Can also just use a shared notion doc for this instead of building a new app. Could just build a nice notion template with ai [re: Web app to see your close friends curations]”
“I ran into the same wall. Sync wasn't the thing people paid for, search was. I couldn't find my own notes from last year in the app I was already using, that's the pain I'd build around. [re: What I learned from my first Beta launch: When "Rationality" isn't enough.(I will not promote)]”
“Yeah 😭 . At that point I recommend to OP to explore something like Quarto. I have mentioned it before here, I forgot in what context. Quarto is for researcher and long form writing purposes. Can't expect Obsidian to be an everything tool. And the markdown format of Obsidian will transfer easily to Quarto in something like VScode anyway. [re: I have STRONG OPINIONS about footnotes in markdown]”
“doing this work for 25+ yrs and 100% think meeting notes are one of the least valuable things created by mankind. no one reads them. action items off the back of a meeting are somewhat useful but the whole process of hanging the pm/organizer with the responsibility of making sure people know what they just committed to do is the reason things take so long to get done and teams run in circles for weeks. its epic how much time and money is wasted on a simple communication activity. [re: ai meeting”
I primarily use Frontmatter/Properties and a few folders. Then I create overviews with Dataview and some are linked to "Top notes". The latter reallys has not worked for me, though. [re: should…
“I reopen only the ones that contain tags. The rest are only occasionally parsed by Claude. [re: Out of all the notes in your vault, how many have you opened a second time?]”
“You could try to use AI for it but ALWAYS review EVERYTHING and then accept the proposed categories and which objects are part of which category/categories [re: How to organize notes by different characteristics ?]”
“More or less, notes depend on excalidraw and stuff to be coherent but I honestly don't care, what I want is usefulness [re: Let's talk about the "File over App" Philosophy]”
“Nothing kills momentum like digging through a graveyard of old thoughts, only to realize the insight you needed was sitting there all along. [re: It took me 2 hours to find 10 old notes that were relevant to what I was writing. It took a tool 20 seconds to find 10 better ones.]”
“they were better because they came from other domains. I have over 1,000 notes. I forgot I wrote most of them, and I don’t have time to browse through them all. that’s the problem with search, tags, and links. they only work for what you remember exists. and old notes gain meaning when you learn something new, which is exactly the moment they should come back. not being able to remember the right thing at the right moment bugged me enough that a few friends and I started building something for o”
“Just saw your reply, and the current “Saved this visit” label — that makes the distinction from stored notes much clearer. I rechecked Augur 760819e3 with the released App Crash Lab 0.11.0: a synthetic feedback note kept its body, broke category and answered outcome after reload; the exported Playwright test passed 1/1 too. This is my AI-assisted compatibility run, not a production-backend test. I shortened the setup so you can start from a disposable local copy instead of checking out the old r”
“I do reference and daily-journal vaults.. Home - reference for recipies, game notes, project ideas and have-done journal notes; consult them all the time Work - daily notes and topical reference; daily often get opened a few times until they age out, and the reference stuff gets used all the time. So yeah, my vault is very much the centre of things .. notes go in, look up notes a lot [re: Out of all the notes in your vault, how many have you opened a second time?]”
“For me it’s more of a I’d rather know where it is if I need it. The bulk of my notes are study notes and I rarely go back to study notes after the test or class is done unless if a class is building on something from before. For other notes like my watch list, yeah I do go back to them. [re: Out of all the notes in your vault, how many have you opened a second time?]”
“I have setup some skills to refines teams transcripts into actionable meeting notes (after I thoroughly read through them). I usually include my own hand written notes and it does a fair job when both are provided. My other use case: turning my document outlines into documents. Im old enough that I was taught to outline any document I want to wrote before wasting time writing it. It makes revision and editorial work way easier. But I never loved the step of turning it into a more fleshed out doc”
“The pain point you're describing is real, everyone has a notes app graveyard of half baked ideas they'll never look at again my problem with a dedicated tool is it adds another step to a process I already avoid. I jot stuff in a plain text file and then never open it because the friction of sitting down to "develop" an idea feels like work before you even know if it's worth the effort. what got me was your point about browsing opportunities, that's the hook most of thes”
“I prefer to privilege consolidating all the materials for a projects, rather than the files from an app. Hey, all considered isn't this files before apps ? [re: Finding the vaults]”
“Hey r/PKMS , Like many here, I've spent years jumping between Obsidian, Notion, and Logseq. While desktop PKM has gotten great, mobile capture has always felt broken to me: Cloud lock-in: Most mobile AI note apps force your entire personal diary into their proprietary servers with monthly subscriptions. Capture friction: By the time an app opens, loads plugins, or syncs cloud workspaces, the thought is gone. Island problem: Your notes exist in a walled garden disconnected from where your act”
“At work I use Daily Notes as a scratch pad. I've been good about using Daily Notes to keep track of external links I've gone to for years. Major slack threads that I need to keep track of get dropped in there with a little note. If I'm solving an issue and there is some important code I ran or an important error but it doesn't have its own ticket or documentation somewhere else I put it there. In the beginning I watched a lot of people's videos about different systems. Zettel”
“So how do you like make new notes? Do you use an llm or just manually type all the world info? [re: Out of all the notes in your vault, how many have you opened a second time?]”
“Ok but you need go through the effort to throw all the info into your ai first right? Like it can’t automatically pick up everything you read i.e. and build a note system for you? [re: Out of all the notes in your vault, how many have you opened a second time?]”
“I'm Neil, the solo builder working on MyMemory. I'd love feedback from people who save articles, notes or reference files and struggle to find them later. It collects links, notes, files, voice and video, with search by meaning and questions across your saved material. Answers include sources. A small test I'd find useful: save a few things you already know well, search using what you remember rather than their exact titles, then ask a question that needs more than one of them. Does”
“I have this problem too, especially with non fiction books. I’m taking notes with a voice recorder right now, but being able to see those notes next to where specifically I had the thoughts would be really helpful [re: Somebody make an app that saves my thoughts while I’m reading]”
“Hey guys, I’m getting through my first semester in a History MA program and have been facing some issues to do with note taking. I don’t really take notes during class, but the issue is more so when I’m doing the dense readings (2-3 books/week). I feel like I either take way too long annotating and taking notes or just forego it completely. Any tips? Also, if anyone has any recommendations for online planner tools, I just got an iPad and have tried out good notes/notion but am open to suggestion”
“I did a rough count of mine and it was embarrassing: around 1,400 notes, and I’d guess under 100 ever got a second visit. The graph view looks great but also does nothing for me.... For people who’ve kept a vault for many years: what’s your ratio? And was there a point where your notes started paying off, or did you change how you take them? Also how would you use the graph to avoid this/in general? submitted by /u/Infinite-Job-5616 [link] [comments]”
“I appreciate your time and explanation of your processes. I'll continue to think on it. Certainly for small personal tools I do find LLMs much more exciting. [re: Are you behind if you don't use AI?]”
“This is just a 21st century version of romanticizing your life, so yes, let me make my saved copy-pastas into glorious tomes in a library. My memes will be legendary! [re: I'm walking through my Obsidian vault right now in the form of a magical library. Every file's a book. Cool idea?]”
“>Or jotting down any kind of quick idea I have when I am on the road (frequently).Seems way too inconvenient compared to opening a notes app on a phone. I always have a phone with me, but there's no way I'd ever bring paper with me when leaving home.>Or sketching an idea for a screen print or art design.Fundamentally niche, but if ever wanted to draw anything, I'd get a tablet.>Or making notes about what groceries to pick up the next time the wife and I head to the grocery store.I use the cart o”
“When you're working on a long article, how do you organize your research notes? I sometimes find that collecting information is easy, but figuring out how the ideas connect is much harder. Do you use an outline, a notes app, a mind map, or something else? I'm curious how other writers handle this. submitted by /u/AelChavez [link] [comments]”
“I like the idea of removing the pressure to organize everything while you're capturing it. That's usually the part that makes me stop taking notes altogether lol. Do you ever go back to the original messy notes, or do the daily/weekly summaries end up being enough? [re: Rambling into obsidian daily note is the best habit I've built these 2 months]”
“If you wanna check the benchmarks, here is the github page: github.com/kusule1351-hue/thought-desk submitted by /u/stressed_Cucumber [link] [comments]”
“Respect for doing this at 38 next to a full-time job. Two things keep a study tracker from turning into the project. First, one view that only shows the next two days, so opening it never invites redesigning it. Second, a 10-minute weekly review: check the exam date, pick the three modules that matter this week, ignore the rest. Your current setup with modules, lab hours and exam dates is already most of what you need. [re: Anyone using Notion to track adult learning or certification goals?]”
“Plain Markdown per page is the right call. Nobody's notes end up hostage to the app. How are you handling databases, one file per row or one file per database? [re: Presenting Morrow, an open source, privacy focused, and always free alternative!]”
“as someone who's been scribbling rep counts on sticky notes and losing them in my gym bag this is exactly what I need downloaded it, the plan builder is slick but it'd be great to have a rest timer between sets built in otherwise super clean [re: Made a double progression app, would love feedback]”
“Thank you!! It’s nice to have a phrase/title for this. I like organizing/writing down things (I think that’s part of why the task was given to me haha) so we’ll see where this goes :-) [re: Many sites with same components]”
“Thanks for your work on this project. My situation I have over a thousand documents divided into 3 directories: docs, wiki, and product. I find the experience somewhat inconvenient. Problem I cannot return to the main interface while a folder is open — there is no back button. The core issue is that I cannot switch directories or add directories. Currently, I can only open another TrailMark instance. I cannot solve the problem using just one app instance. I'm not sure whether this is intentional”
Yeah, I created it now. [re: Capture to Daily notes from MacBook Shortcut]
“"Rabbit hole" is the right word. I added a "More Tools" section to every calculator linking to 5-8 related ones and session duration tripled. The trick nobody talks about: the links have to be genuinely related, not "you might also like." If someone's using an LTV:CAC calculator, link to CAC payback and churn rate, not to your homepage. Google can tell the difference and so can users. [re: I stopped writing blog posts and built 30+ free calculators instead. Here”
“looks clean, i like that it doesn't touch your notes with extra properties. that's the part that always puts me off other task plugins too. might give this a spin when i get a chance [re: Taskloop Task and Project Manager]”
“Breakup the notes into key areas, I use it for storing my pentesting notes [re: Anyone using Notion to track adult learning or certification goals?]”
“I still wonder how many actually are taking notes and even reviewing than. Clipping and copying pasting sources is fine, but it seems so many build a PKB for the sake of it then actually use the information at some point in the future or try and find things that pop in their head; and then there’s if discoveries are made, assuming the linking is done intentionally and well… [re: Hello question about the graphs views]”
“I don't need to buy a fancy template anymore for my reMarkable. ChatGPT proves to be very good at gathering all my todo's, follow up items and everything important and gather them in a daily work sheet. This was done in one prompt and at the end ChatGPT sent it on my reMarkable tablet. My name is Bogdan, and this was possible with a service that I created called Folio. I've been using ChatGPT + reMarkable (and other AI agents) in a few productive ways so far: ChatGPT, research the ne”
“I think if you used git by committing every day then it’s possible to go through the daily written words. Though the count is maybe not the real count. What I mean by that is, if you typed 100 words on a day and deleted 20 words, the daily word count may be 80. I’m not sure why these plugins don’t work well with Obsidian sync. My guess is the plugins create a datafile thats not markdown. Do your settings allow syncing other files? Or syncing plugins? [re: retroactively track word count?]”
“Consider adding bookmark sorting, especially alphabetical, but potentially including: Alphabetical Creation Date Last open date Acdending/Descending for each The sorting UI element could be tucked into the 3 dot button into the top right.”
“I can see that. Writing things down can feel unnecessary until the same questions keep coming up. I think it works best when the documentation is treated as a shared reference for everyone, rather than a way to check up on people. It makes consistency easier without having to ask the same questions repeatedly. [re: What's one business process you wish you'd simplified earlier?]”
“month navigation is a nice touch; habit trackers get overwhelming fast when every day lives in one giant view, so keeping the history browsable makes a real difference. [re: I made an interactive Notion habit tracker that lets you navigate through months]”
“For the people side of things, having the information attached to my contacts has been useful. I use Dextr, an address-book app I found last year with on-device AI for contact organization, plus notes and reminders. Things like where we met, what we talked about and something I wanted to follow up on all go there. It only covers that part of your setup, but it saves me having to figure out where those details belong every time 😅 [re: Anyone recommend a set of tools/plugins to AI-automate most o”
“thanks. will send my petworking notes here in a day or two [re: Need help finalizing pet app features need more opinions!]”
“I use paper notes, to keep my mind sharp. I use Notion, to let AI to scan & read my paper notes and make it into searchable databases. [re: For people who use digital and paper system together, what do you use notion for and what do you use pen and paper for?]”
“Most PKM setups I see are excellent at capture and retrieval. Highlights flow in automatically, everything’s tagged and linked, and search finds anything in seconds. What I’m less sure about is the next step. When a real situation calls for an idea you’ve saved — a decision at work, a tricky conversation — does it come to mind on its own? Or does it only surface if you think to go looking? Questions for people with mature systems: Has your system changed how you act, or mostly how you store and”