Reducing my PIM/Knowledge/Writing Tools

Posted by Chris Murtland
Apr 6, 2007 at 04:33 AM

Ike Washington wrote:
>Better to hunker down for the long haul: make sure it’s
>easy to export data out into html/plain text; use a heavy-duty local search app; think
>of apps as modules forming a larger knowledge system; be prepared to change aspects of
>this knowledge system pretty regularly.

Ike, I have been moving toward this way of thinking as well. However, it seems to take more discipline to eschew the all-in-one approach and build a system from multiple parts. There are decisions to be made about which data should go in which apps, and you lose some benefits of having everything in one place. On the flip side, trying to manage a monolithic database of everything ends up getting unwieldy.

I like Zoot’s approach of having multiple databases and being able to bring things in and out of focus by switching databases while still retaining global search. But then that’s where the cycle begins again: “hey, I can do everything in Zoot.” Then I start cycling through apps again, thinking I can do everything in each of them and then being drawn back to some features of each that the others don’t have.

I have even considered just running all of my favorite info managers at once… But that doesn’t seem very logical.

In any case, it would be nice to have a rational approach to all of this - something that makes sense but can also evolve over time. I’m also feeling a greater need to bring small things into focus without a lot of distraction, but still having easy access to all of the other details when needed. Perhaps software isn’t the problem at all; perhaps it is just a matter of work habits…

Chris