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Practical Note-Taking: Tools and a Simple Obsidian Workflow

/ 2 min read

Note-taking should make your life easier, not create another project. Below is a compact workflow that works for most people, plus quick tool recommendations so you can pick what fits your needs.

Core workflow (the one I use)

  • Capture: Put anything useful into an inbox immediately (voice, quick note, clipped text).
  • Process: Weekly, convert inbox items into project notes, reference notes, or discard them.
  • Connect: Link notes to projects and to other notes — connections are where value appears.
  • Review: Quick weekly review to keep tasks moving and surface stale notes.

A minimal Obsidian setup that actually gets work done

  • Folder layout: inbox/, projects/, reference/, daily/
  • Templates: meeting.md, project.md (sections: goals, next actions, links)
  • Daily notes: use for small captures and to link to project pages
  • Plugins (keep it light): Templates, Search/Tag pane, Backlinks/Graph
  • Practical habits: create links while processing, prefer headings and checkboxes, avoid overcustomizing early

When to pick different tools

  • Students: Notion for structured courses; Obsidian if you prefer local markdown and backlinks.
  • Developers: Obsidian or a git-backed markdown repo for versioning and grepability.
  • Researchers: Zotero + markdown notes (or Obsidian with citation plugins) to connect sources to notes.
  • Managers/teams: Notion or Google Docs for collaboration and shared templates.
  • Creatives/designers: Milanote or visual boards for layouts that aren’t just text.
  • Privacy-focused: Joplin, Standard Notes, or a local Obsidian vault with encryption.

Choosing criteria (quick checklist)

  • Do you need collaboration? Choose cloud-first (Notion, Google Docs).
  • Do you want exportability and long-term ownership? Prefer markdown-first tools.
  • Do you rely on linking ideas over time? Pick backlinking tools (Obsidian).
  • Need offline + privacy? Pick local-first with optional encryption.

Keep it simple: start with the tool that solves 80% of your problems, adopt one or two helpful plugins or templates, and iterate only when the system actually slows you down.