Ask Slashdot: Professional Journaling/Notes Software? 170
netdicted writes "At the very outset of my career the importance of keeping a daily journal of activities and notes was clearly evident. Over the years I've always had a college ruled composition notebook nearby to jot down important ideas, instructions, tasks, etc. Putting away the rock and chisel was not optional when the volumes grew beyond my mental capacity to successfully index the contents. Over the years I've tried countless apps to keep a digital journal and failed miserably.
In my mind the ideal app or solution is a single file or cloud app where I can organize personal notes on projects, configurations, insights, ideas, etc., as well as noting major activities or occurrences of the day. My original journals saved me on a number of occasions. Unfortunately my tenacity for keeping one has suffered from a fruitless search for a suitable solution. Currently I'm experimenting with Evernote and Tiddlywiki. They approach the problem from two different angles. What do you use?"
In my mind the ideal app or solution is a single file or cloud app where I can organize personal notes on projects, configurations, insights, ideas, etc., as well as noting major activities or occurrences of the day. My original journals saved me on a number of occasions. Unfortunately my tenacity for keeping one has suffered from a fruitless search for a suitable solution. Currently I'm experimenting with Evernote and Tiddlywiki. They approach the problem from two different angles. What do you use?"
The Luddite Answer (Score:4, Insightful)
Dear Slashdot, I'm afraid that years from now, my nuggets of wisdom will be lost, and I will not be able to find the appropriate pithy thought to properly respond to a Slashdot Troll... What ever shal I do?
Dear "Netdicted", first of all, your screen name for some reason reminded me of getting my cat neutered. Second, unplug. There is more to life than a 24/7 high speed connection. Third, consider your follow-on. Your children and grand children will not be able to read your e-diary, and writing things on paper long-hand will help you stave off Alzimers. In other words, keep writing in your Moll Skin, it's really the hippest and most practical way to go, and will leave something for your kids and grand kids to enjoy long after you are gon. Seriously.
Snark aside, work out a system of indexes - electronically in necessary, but please continue using that old "buggy whip", a pen and paper.
Excuse me now, I have to mow my lawn.
paper...pencil (Score:5, Insightful)
I've been working on a research project in Chemical Engineering for the past 5 years as a consultant. I struggled, like you, to find a technical solution for a professional journal. I had to settle for fifty cent spiral bound notebook and pencil (I found a neat plastic case to keep them in). No other solution could provide me a way to easily keep a written ledger of text and numbers, draw diagrams, schematics, and allow me to easily edit mistakes. When the notebooks were full, they went into a three-ring binder. Searching through the pages of the binders is fairly easy, especially since *I'm* the one that wrote the notes.
Don't over-think the problem.
Re:paper...pencil (Score:2, Insightful)
Big advantage paper has is you can spread it out.
I don't think I've ever been in the design of anything non-trivial where we didn't eventually end up with 3 or 4 people in a room with a big table just covered in paper with hand written notes/diagrams/whatever.
Re:The Luddite Answer (Score:3, Insightful)
I love the irony of such shallow thinking to no end.