Zettelkasten Forum


Question re outining

Hi everyone,
I used to use the ZKN3 program for running a zettelkasten, but switched to the Archive after migrating to a new computer caused all kinds of havoc. I'm loving the simplicity and bomb-proofness of this compared to a lot of other stuff I've tried.

I do find one shortcoming though and wonder how y'all might have dealt with it. I use these notes for writing, and one great thing about the ZKN3 program was the ability to generate an outline, where you could move notes around. This was, as I understand it, a core functionality of the old school notecard system, but I don't see a good way to do that here other than writing out an outline and linking the zettels. It works, but is a little clunky -- I would of course prefer something drag-and-drop, which I imagine would mean physically copying notes over to some other program like RemNote every time I want to write something. A buddy suggested printing hard copies and reorganizing that way, which might not be a bad idea.

Just curious what tricks others are using to gather up notes into an outline. Please share any successes you've had. Best wishes.

Comments

  • I'm also interested in the solutions that others have found for a more flexible outlining. For now, when setting out to write something based on ideas in the Archive, I create a new Zettel and dump all the links (Zettel links) that seem pertinent to the topic at hand, then order them in a potentially logical sequence. From there, though, I need to paste the actual content of the Zettels so that I can create text with it and around it. That becomes rather clunky within a Zettel. I then want to migrate to Scrivener to grapple with the text chunks and create article subsections. I have a sense that this process can be optimized. Suggestions are most welcome.
    For reference, I have to produce research articles, which are typically 6000-9000 words long.

  • @Dragonfly I follow a similar process to the one you are describing, except that I forgo the middle step, that is, I just find applicable zettels, then drag and drop them into Scrivener. I do the rest of my organizing and writing in Scrivener.

  • You could do what I do. My ZK is written in HTML, so I open my zettels in a browser. When I want to do that "moving notes around" thing I use the web browser's facilities of many windows and tabs and move those around.

    If your notes are in MD, well, a browser can read and display those…

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