From: Daniel Clemente <n142857@gmail.com>
To: John Hendy <jw.hendy@gmail.com>
Cc: emacs-orgmode <emacs-orgmode@gnu.org>,
Marcin Borkowski <mbork@wmi.amu.edu.pl>
Subject: Re: org-mode for knowledge management
Date: Sun, 12 Oct 2014 14:48:38 +0700 [thread overview]
Message-ID: <87k345hgo9.wl-n142857@gmail.com> (raw)
In-Reply-To: <CA+M2ft_ZKiiT5jw_=kSjinQx4cA7r6RgHC-p3cPonrGk2CwAqg@mail.gmail.com>
> […]
> uniformity, extruder/die temperature, cooling time, holding pressure,
> etc. I think this is awesome general knowledge. But I'm documenting
> our learning in an experimental report for export and upload to my
> company's internal technical report repo.
I find it very different to write notes for yourself and to write for an audience. In a report you need to follow a structure, you need to choose a particular natural language, you need to explain things that might be obvious for you, you cannot change topic, … Whereas in notes, you're free. Therefore I think it makes sense to have two different places for both.
> What I'm often torn about is re-writing the
> learning/understanding/summary in a more general way since how it
> usually arises is laden with specific details for *this*
> product/project, whereas the information I want to retain is about how
> I see the new understanding more generally.
… However, I don't consider that rewriting (specific→general) you mention as a necessary task or a burden (I don't do it), because in your notes (generic knowledge) you can simply refer to the specific one (e.g.: „see what I did in this case ([[link_to_the_report]])“.). A header with 1 or 2 or N links to specific reports is a good start before continue focusing on other generic-knowledge topics.
So you decide where you will work the most (either in the specific reports or in the generic knowledge) and then the other can refer to it.
I do it like that. E.g. I'm not writing in my generic notes a „code style guide“ because I did it already in project X, so I add knowledge in projectX.org and just link to it. If some particular knowledge grows too big for that projectX_code_style, I develop it in my generic notes (another file, project-unrelated).
> > Of course copy+paste is a nightmare to maintain (see: DRY). I am still forced to do it with some org tables which do complex calculations. I think org offers dynamic tables to apply the same process to different data sources, but it gets complex. I think there's no such thing as „templates“ where you change the base one and all uses of it (in all files) are automatically updated.
> >
> > About links: in org-mode they all look the same, but semantically there are many types, like:
> > - *is-a*: „this is a concrete implementation of [[that generic knowledge]]“
> > - *related*: „related to this is: [[that]]“
> > - *same-as*: „this and [[that]] are exactly the same topic, so write only under that header, not here“ ← this is poor man's transclusion, or more like „symbolic links“ in ext4. With it, a header seems to be present in many places at the same time; in reality the content is only in one place and the rest are links. The good thing is, it doesn't really matter /where/ exactly is that tree, because you'll find it anyway by following maximum 1 link. X can link to Y, or Y can link the X; what's important is that reading both X or Y you'll find exactly the same thing (not copy+pasted contents).
> >
> > So, it's all about finding a manual algorithm to organize things
>
> This is generally what I've tried to do, though I find this is
> cumbersome as I often use subtrees for more report-style/narrative
> analyses of data and experiments. Thus I don't find it as simple as
> your example to Brady with the PDF/HTML info, which is more basic. As
> I write this, I'm thinking I could probably still do this...
>
> For an example, let's say I'm making plastic widgets and we've been
> running a series of injection mold trials with a manufacturer. Some
> really novel understanding comes about with respect to part
> uniformity, extruder/die temperature, cooling time, holding pressure,
> etc. I think this is awesome general knowledge. But I'm documenting
> our learning in an experimental report for export and upload to my
> company's internal technical report repo.
>
> My initial thought was that links this way would get in the way... but
> I suppose now I could be writing along and create a link to the
> nearest headline in the report, then go to some other tree and insert
> a link to that headline with some note about the gist of the
> understanding or keywords for the future me trying to re-find that
> tidbit.
>
Note that:
- I don't suggest you abuse links and link every header. You can link to interesting topics. Like in Wikipedia: you /could/ link every word, but it makes sense to link only interesting information (only: in WP they link too much because they don't know what exactly will be interesting to the reader; but in your notes, you know already which links will you need in the future).
- In my example, the link meant „this is the same as that“, and I think this is always a basic concept, even in complex scenarios. In your case, your link may mean something different (like: „this heading is a specific wording of that knowledge“)
- That header with empty contents that says „for this, don't look here but look there: [[there]]“ is only one line and doesn't get in the way. And you use it only when you need it (e.g. when you ended in the wrong place after a text search and want to link to the good one for the next time).
next prev parent reply other threads:[~2014-10-12 7:49 UTC|newest]
Thread overview: 25+ messages / expand[flat|nested] mbox.gz Atom feed top
2014-10-09 22:17 org-mode for knowledge management Louis
2014-10-09 23:54 ` Marcin Borkowski
2014-10-10 15:46 ` Daniel Clemente
2014-10-10 21:40 ` mbork
2014-10-10 21:48 ` John Hendy
2014-10-11 2:53 ` Eric Abrahamsen
2014-10-12 4:54 ` John Hendy
2014-10-13 2:42 ` Eric Abrahamsen
2014-10-13 3:15 ` Daniel Clemente
2014-10-13 5:17 ` Samuel Wales
2014-10-14 3:47 ` Daniel Clemente
2014-10-14 1:14 ` Eric Abrahamsen
2014-10-11 11:36 ` Daniel Clemente
2014-10-11 19:45 ` Brady Trainor
2014-10-12 4:29 ` Daniel Clemente
2014-10-12 5:03 ` John Hendy
2014-10-12 7:48 ` Daniel Clemente [this message]
2014-10-14 2:14 ` John Hendy
2014-10-10 0:18 ` Thomas S. Dye
2014-10-10 2:32 ` Louis
2014-10-10 2:34 ` Louis
2014-10-13 19:29 ` Louis
2014-10-13 19:36 ` Thomas S. Dye
2014-10-13 23:10 ` Louis
2014-10-13 13:11 ` Brett Viren
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