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Cyborganize launched - the ultimate outliner productivity system
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Posted by JBfrom
Aug 22, 2011 at 08:51 PM
I should’ve said Tier 1.5 content, not 2.5
Posted by Foolness
Aug 23, 2011 at 12:15 AM
Thanks for the quick reply. I think this was the only one you didn’t understand so let me clarify:
“?It basically seems like the idea is to create one panel where these are all notes and on the other side these is your blog editor with the exception that instead of immediately or randomly creating a post from several references? there?s the additional barrier that you just combine the brain dumps of tags with the notes and then reorganize them into categories and voila! You have now produced a webpage.”
I was trying to rephrase your right brain and left brain workflow graphic into a synchronized side by side sequence.
From the way your graphic showed, the two tasks had to be done the same time and in cooperative levels.
This is where it seemed to simulate someone having their notes and typing things into their text/blogs while they have their notes in front of them, on a list of files in another side like a panel of notes or a dual pane outliner.
One thing I do not quite follow is where the increase of speed happens. I can sort of understand where you might see simpler outliners as unfocused but surely the speed boost from using Brainstorm’s hotkeys would be offset by this:
Quick: Now here?s an example of Cyborganize in action: I dumped your message into a scratch Emacs file,
Medium: composed my reply to your quoted paragraphs, posted it on outlinersoftware.com, and will now switch to another scratch file and continue what I was doing before.
Slow/Requires web access/requires wordpress to update the finished post: Later when I batch clean my scratch files, I will upload this to my T3 blog and categorize it ?Cyborganize.?
Slow in Wordpress depending on speed of internet or whether it’s the hosted or free version: I?ll also create an actionable ?take into account foolness?s questions on next cyborganize writing round - see T3?.
Thinking required/Requires searching for specific content: Much later I?ll come back to all this, and the info will be there waiting for me, whether I come across it by searching through my Cyborganize Longform Loop for content ideas, or as I?m sorting through my actionables tree for next Cyborganize actions.
Duplicate action: It will also be copied into my ?notes.org? Emacs chronological tape,
Inconsistent future action that may or may not happen: and it may even at some point get sorted into my notes.brn file, if I ever catch up on that. Most likely though, it will get re-digested during a future Cyborganize writing session with the aid of BrainStorm, and converted into document editing actionables.
As with any to-do list productivity system that tries to waterfall the tasks, Cyborganize seems to encounter many friction as it cascades down. I hope you don’t take this as an insult. I’m generally curious but the process seem to disappear the more you go down the workflow and as a result it seems like you end up having to re-edit and re-write the contents kind of like a book or a constantly updated blog or for the sake of simplicity even e-mail replying which follows the same Inbox Zero-like mentality where you set it aside, collect the things you need to say, reply and then let the e-mail program archive it. In the near future if you remember something about the item, you search for it. Only the setting aside of the “scratch file” and the search capability of the program seems to be frictionless. Everything else like categories seem to be just that: about making categories for everything with little help from the other steps in the workflow and transforms every task list into a make a category for this task or insert this task into a category you like and it will automagically boost your productivity for now being in a category that you can also put in other categories.
Posted by JBfrom
Aug 23, 2011 at 12:50 PM
“I was trying to rephrase your right brain and left brain workflow graphic into a synchronized side by side sequence. From the way your graphic showed, the two tasks had to be done the same time and in cooperative levels. This is where it seemed to simulate someone having their notes and typing things into their text/blogs while they have their notes in front of them, on a list of files in another side like a panel of notes or a dual pane outliner.”
No, nothing is simultaneous in the graphic. I never have two different program windows open side-by-side. I do use alt-tab a lot. It seems I need to create a demo workflow video.
“One thing I do not quite follow is where the increase of speed happens. I can sort of understand where you might see simpler outliners as unfocused but surely the speed boost from using Brainstorm?s hotkeys would be offset by this:
Quick: Now here?s an example of Cyborganize in action: I dumped your message into a scratch Emacs file,
Medium: composed my reply to your quoted paragraphs, posted it on outlinersoftware.com, and will now switch to another scratch file and continue what I was doing before.”
Why is this medium? I wanted to reply. I didn’t have to, I could’ve deferred it.
“Slow/Requires web access/requires wordpress to update the finished post: Later when I batch clean my scratch files, I will upload this to my T3 blog and categorize it ?Cyborganize.?”
No, my T3 blog is locally hosted and there is zero load time.
“Slow in Wordpress depending on speed of internet or whether it?s the hosted or free version: I?ll also create an actionable ?take into account foolness?s questions on next cyborganize writing round - see T3?.”
No, actionables are managed in the Emacs chron tape and then the actionables.brn file, not in Wordpress. That WOULD be slow.
“Thinking required/Requires searching for specific content: Much later I?ll come back to all this, and the info will be there waiting for me, whether I come across it by searching through my Cyborganize Longform Loop for content ideas, or as I?m sorting through my actionables tree for next Cyborganize actions.”
Yes, you have to sort your actionables into related projects. Every GTD app imposes similar burdens, except with BrainStorm its deferrable until the moment of need. Yes, you have to search your T3 & T2 blogs to find old thoughts on a topic, but with proper headlining and categories this takes moments. If you want better search Wordpress supports lots of plugins. It’s really quite quick. And you can always search within Emacs instead, which is even quicker.
“Duplicate action: It will also be copied into my ?notes.org? Emacs chronological tape,”
Takes a second or two if you’re a touch-typist:
Copy the scratch buffer: M-
M-w
Switch to notes.org: Ctrl-x b notes.org (use TAB for auto-complete)
Paste the text: Ctrl-y
Switch back: Ctrl-x b scratch.org
Remove non-actionables: Use Ctrl-k to kill lines, Ctrl-w to kill selected text
Copy Actionables to actionables.org: Repeat above copying steps
Clear the buffer: M-
Ctrl-w
Save and kill the buffer: Ctrl-x s Ctrl-x k
“Inconsistent future action that may or may not happen: and it may even at some point get sorted into my notes.brn file, if I ever catch up on that. Most likely though, it will get re-digested during a future Cyborganize writing session with the aid of BrainStorm, and converted into document editing actionables.”
Otherwise known as flexibility and choice. Inconsistency only matters in initial storage. After the info is safe, you can work on it however you like.
“As with any to-do list productivity system that tries to waterfall the tasks, Cyborganize seems to encounter many friction as it cascades down.”
You haven’t shown a friction point yet. Certainly they exist… it’s not a mind-machine interface. But you’ll need to try it to know the difference between “that sounds complicated” and “I actually experienced mental resistance at this point.”
“I hope you don?t take this as an insult. I?m generally curious but the process seem to disappear the more you go down the workflow and as a result it seems like you end up having to re-edit and re-write the contents kind of like a book or a constantly updated blog or for the sake of simplicity even e-mail replying which follows the same Inbox Zero-like mentality where you set it aside, collect the things you need to say, reply and then let the e-mail program archive it. In the near future if you remember something about the item, you search for it.”
You need do no more editing and rewriting with Cyborganize than you would normally. Cyborganize just CAPTURES and FOCUSES that continuous output.
In practice Cyborganize encourages you to write a lot more, and be more productive in general, because it removes the barriers and anxieties that normally accompany high output. This is not a disadvantage.
“Only the setting aside of the ?scratch file? and the search capability of the program seems to be frictionless. Everything else like categories seem to be just that: about making categories for everything with little help from the other steps in the workflow and transforms every task list into a make a category for this task or insert this task into a category you like and it will automagically boost your productivity for now being in a category that you can also put in other categories.”
Tasks are not given categories. That wouldn’t work. Categories are for the Longform Loop ONLY. They apply only to your blog posts in Wordpress. You focus on them way too much. They’re just a handy way of narrowing a search; that’s it. Almost every blogger organizes his posts into categories; it’s not that hard.
Posted by JBfrom
Aug 23, 2011 at 12:57 PM
Behold the power of Emacs… invoking its arcane language causes the very fabric of the internet to rip
Posted by Foolness
Aug 23, 2011 at 03:01 PM
“Why is this medium? I wanted to reply. I didn?t have to, I could?ve deferred it.”
Oh, generally when I discuss productivity systems, I try to take away the power user from it and approach it from the perspective of “any user posting a reply using Cyborganize” and in the case with posting replies and things alike, it’s just never frictionless in any system. There’s always the risk that someone replying might get offended and then you have to react to that or other things that can all be lumped as time sinks. If I’m not mistaken, Ferris refers to this situation as the knowing the difference between efficiency and effectiveness and many times it can be hard to figure out where a system starts or stop influencing these factors.
“No, actionables are managed in the Emacs chron tape and then the actionables.brn file, not in Wordpress. That WOULD be slow.”
I’m a bit confused here though. If actionables are managed in Emacs then where does someone start to use the T1,T2,T3 transition of blogs. Or by actionables, do you mean small actions? It can be confusing because pure GTD stresses everything to be actionable where as the more GTD becomes summarized, actionable can mean the dictionary definition which is not so related to next action except by the first entry. (but this can also depend on interpretation)
“Yes, you have to sort your actionables into related projects. Every GTD app imposes similar burdens, except with BrainStorm its deferrable until the moment of need. Yes, you have to search your T3 & T2 blogs to find old thoughts on a topic, but with proper headlining and categories this takes moments. If you want better search Wordpress supports lots of plugins. It?s really quite quick. And you can always search within Emacs instead, which is even quicker.”
Again you lost me since GTD stakes the same claim. Mind you it may be because many GTD apps (at least by my consideration) are not true GTD apps but closer to to-do lists with modified categories so could you clarify “deferrable until the moment of need?”
I think another vague point that your site doesn’t seem to address is on how to do “proper headlining and categories”.
Even GTD with static “stated as needed” categories such as In-basket and Weekly Reviews get composed into extended books by David Allen.
Your system appears to say that the T1, T2 and T3 transition of blogging is what produces the proper headlining and categories but that still doesn’t make it clear how it can differentiate from simply using two different software. I’m using a variation of dual category transitioning myself (less so much T1 as my software is my brain dump) but you seem to say the T2 transition from a blog to a T3 transtiion to a wiki would have special effects beyond just producing slightly better categories from drafting but I find that hard to understand.
Not so much in the context of wikis or search based notes as I know some users prefer things like TiddlyWiki, Evernote, Ultra Recall although I could never narrow down the category for them; but more on how this generates a frictionless transition that produces great results in terms of both category generation that matches perfectly with search based tools to produce a far superior search based productivity system than softwares like Evernote or Ultra Recall especially as the line blurs between when the system is going to use Brainstorm, a chron tape system, a blog service and the actual sorting and doing of tasks.
“You haven?t shown a friction point yet. Certainly they exist? it?s not a mind-machine interface. But you?ll need to try it to know the difference between ?that sounds complicated? and ?I actually experienced mental resistance at this point.?
I guess that’s the heart of the question. My reply could be summed up as a repeat question of what is Cyborganize except I tried to read the topic and the video which helped me expand my question but it seems to get more and more confusing.
When I originally read this topic, I had never taken into account touch-typing and Emacs usage as even something like org mode can be already productivity draining to many general users because of the need to learn or at least be productive from a simple outliner. I had assumed that most of the brunt of the complexity would stem from understanding how BrainStorm works alone.
Here however it seems the friction point lies not just in the tasks but in skills like touch typing speed, multiple complex program hotkey memorization (Brainstorm to Emacs) and even things like a locally hosted blog seems to be a requirement yet the initial theory of the page doesn’t appear to hint any of these.
“You need do no more editing and rewriting with Cyborganize than you would normally. Cyborganize just CAPTURES and FOCUSES that continuous output.
In practice Cyborganize encourages you to write a lot more, and be more productive in general, because it removes the barriers and anxieties that normally accompany high output. This is not a disadvantage.”
Could you define high output here? Often times I find high output requires a mastery of the subject matter itself.
Like if I want to use Cyborganize to learn how to touch type or learn Emacs, I have to specifically know the commands. (as you listed).
Then things like Supermemo might enter here depending on whether a user knows or can figure out Supermemo.
“Tasks are not given categories. That wouldn?t work. Categories are for the Longform Loop ONLY. They apply only to your blog posts in Wordpress. You focus on them way too much. They?re just a handy way of narrowing a search; that?s it. Almost every blogger organizes his posts into categories; it?s not that hard.”
Yes, that’s true. I guess I was looking at it from the perspective of any general user. No offense but not every power productivity user is a master of blogs and searches.
Although you lost me at the longform loop. Wouldn’t the longform loop also encompass tasks? or are you using a specific definition of tasks here like actionables earlier on where tasks have a certain length or have undergone a specific amount of incubation?
I also want to add a separate question. Do you believe that a (searchable) outline is the end be all of a frictionless productivity system? Not to make the question sound rhetorical but I often find that many software developers seem to unconsciously treat productivity that way. It can be an advanced outline like a bunch of outlines in a wiki or a blog or a super database like Ultra Recall and even GTD apps seem to go that way but often for to-do lists only.
I guess I’m asking this last question because I find there are many productivity users that not only work poorly with outlines but the finish organized “task list” is never their productivity road block and you do reference lots of guys who have said in their small ways different things that are unrelated to an organized database but at the same time Cyborganize’s finished product seems to be a case where if you want to do something now, you search for it, you see it and then through seeing that task itself - you execute it or defer it and execute something else.