ID Zettel only title, not number

Nikolay

I started practice the method of Zettelkasten! Very cool! I have a question: can I use the title of each note instead of ID numbers? All my notes will have different names and will be unique.

I understand the basic idea: not to accumulate an archive, but to connect thoughts. But ID like numbers are very distracting my attention.

ctietze

Allow me to quote myself from a blog post

[A]ll your links will depend on the full title of the note. Titles may change over time as you extend, break up, or combine notes. Note ID’s don’t change. So you will have to use IDs as page titles to get the same combo of flexibility (contents may change) and rigidity (link targets are stable). Readability will not be harmed much [...]

There's also a related discussion in the old Disqus comments of a post around that time but I cannot recall which.

Sascha

I double-down on that. Titles will change and should change in the long-term. It is all about longevity of the archive.

Nikolay

Thank. But if I use 1Writer I can name the note like “ID-number.md”, and then insert references to it in the form [[ID-number.md]]. If I add the title of a note like “ID-number Title.md]], so as not to lose readability, then the file name will still contain the Title, and if I want to change it later, I’ll break the links. Maybe I'm missing something? Maybe iOS solutions are not very suitable for Zettelkasten?

mediapathic

@Nikolay said:
But if I use 1Writer I can name the note like “ID-number.md”, and then insert references to it in the form [[ID-number.md]]. If I add the title of a note like “ID-number Title.md]], so as not to lose readability, then the file name will still contain the Title, and if I want to change it later, I’ll break the links.

Untrue, as far as I understand what you're saying. I just pulled up 1Writer and clicked on [[201905081314]] and it took me to 201905081314 Name of File.md.

zappino4

Please excuse me if this question is too basic. I do not use The Archive because I am a Windows user, so I use Obsidian. In Obsidian you can reference the notes by their title. And if the title should change for any reason, Obsidian updates all the links automatically.

In that case, what would be the inconvenience of referencing the notes by their title and not by their numeric id?

Sascha

Choose the inconvencience to keep your options alive.