Personal knowledge management tools and methodologies
📅 Oct 24, 2021
⌛ 2 minutes
I am looking into organizing my notes in a better way, here is a collection of the tools and related methodologies I have come across so far.
Hierarchical knowledge silos
Strengths
- Easy to get started; user-friendly, intuitive UX
- Built-in synchronization
- Freemium
Weaknesses
- Hard to get data out (proprietary XML etc.)
- Do not impose/enforce structured note taking
Examples
- Microsoft OneNote (for Windows 10+, for Office 365/2019+)
- Proprietary software and storage format
- Limited API available (Office version only)
- Primary copy stored in the cloud (OneDrive or SharePoint)
- Collaborate on “Notebook” level
- Evernote
- Proprietary software and storage format
- Atlassian Confluence
- Proprietary software and storage format
- Collaborate on “Space” or “Page” (item) level
- Microsoft SharePoint
- Proprietary software and storage format
- Collaborate on “Space” or “Page” (item) level
- Google Keep
- Proprietary software and storage format
- Stored in the cloud (only)
Graph-based knowledge silos
Examples
Local-first, graph-based knowledge management apps
Usual features
- Notes often stored locally in a non-XML text format (Markdown etc.)
- Graph-based navigation (links, tags)
- Block references
Examples
- Dendron
- Open-source (AGPL 3.0)
- Based on VS Code
- Selective publication
- Static pages, probably hydrated as Next.js app?
- Not SEO-friendly URLs (UUIDs)
- Opinionated: Hierarchy-first (canonical addresses with optional schemas), graph-based second
- No built-in synchronization (could use Git (GitHub, Gitlab, Atlassian Bitbucket etc.), Syncthing, Dropbox, etc.)
- Roam Research
- Proprietary, subscription-based
- Foam
- Based on VS Code
- Athens Research
- Open-source (Eclipse Public License 1.0) (open-core?)
- Stores notes in a datascript database
- Freemium
- Obsidian
- Org-roam
- Open-source (GPL 3.0)
- Based on Emacs
Methodologies
- Zettelkasten
- PARA
- Linking Your Thinking (LYT) (workshop, kit, YouTube)
- Hierarchy-first
- Building a Second Brain (workshop)